Gypsy: I wish they'd done more

My wife and I saw Gypsy last night. Audra, as expected, blows everything away and this will definitely be a performance for the history books.

But having just seen Sunset Blvd last week, my wife and I left wishing they had done something more with the rest of the show. Especially since all the pieces are right there to create an interesting commentary on race in the early 20th century. Not that we've progressed much more, but all the pieces were right there.

Maybe they felt it was too much or too obvious or too detracting from Audra's performance, but as the first black Gypsy actress they already started making some changes. The children in the beginning are all black, and then grow up to become white (gulp). They end up doing soft shoe instead of more traditional tap, and even that feels like backing away.

You even have the scene with Danny Burstein's character able to immediately book Rose's act even though she can't. Which can be about a lot of things, gender or familiarity or etc. But it's another instance where it feels like all the pieces are there to make this more layered.

Gypsy, as written, is a better show as Sunset Blvd IMO. But with that Sunset Blvd did with the script, that's a better show. The production here probably didn't feel like they needed to take any risks. They have Audra and that's all they need. I just wish they'd been bolder.

Audra will definitely win the Tony. And many others will be nominated here (Joy Woods as Louise also has a great shot at winning featured). It's hard to say you had to settle for the 5 ct diamond it could have been 6, but isn't the show about dreaming anyway?