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London Awards | Awards Around the World | London Reviews | Broadway Reviews
| "A
major Broadway event... One of the most memorable, moving and
original theatrical extravaganzas in years... It is told with a
theatricality that frequently takes the breath away... Time and
again Ms. Taymor seduces the audience into seeing what, in
reality, isn't there. That is theatre." |
| Vincent Canby, The New
York Times |
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| "A
primal paradise... breathtaking beauty and scenic ingenuity. You
will gasp again and again at the inventive visual majesty of the
show... Ms. Taymor has introduced a whole new vocabulary of images
to the Broadway blockbuster... There is simply nothing else like
it." |
| Ben Brantley, The New
York Times/WQXR Radio |
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| "Theatre
to roar for. From the very first minutes of 'The Lion King' you
feel yourself on a whole new ground-no-in a whole new world." |
| David Patrick Stearns,
USA Today |
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| "Awe-inspiring...
Broadway theater is alive again... It's a gorgeous, gasp-inducing
spectacle. The show appeals to our primal, childlike excitement in
the power of theater to make us see things afresh... One of the
year's top ten." |
| Richard
Zoglin, TIME |
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| "You
will be bombarded by some of the most beautiful and spectacular
sights theater can offer from before and behind, so eyes in the
back of the head will come in handy... This is the one such show
adults will feast on, too, mostly because of the wonders wrought
by Julie Taymor, who designed and directed this cornucopia of
dazzlements." |
| John Simon, New York |
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| "'The Lion King'
is a rare theatre experience... The musical is
intelligent spectacle, extravagance with a purpose - and a
heart... The wonderment never stops." |
| Michael
Kuchwara,
Associated Press |
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| "Wonderful.
Terrific. I hope every man, woman and child sees 'The Lion King'." |
| Jeffrey Lyons,
WNBC-TV |
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| "They're
saying that what The Beatles did for music, 'Lion King' will do
for Broadway." |
| Howard Stern , WXRK
Radio |
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| "One
child counted down the seconds until the 2 o'clock matinee began.
A little girl stared, as did her mother, at the walls and ceiling
of The New Amsterdam Theater, whose ornaments intertwined like a
jungle of architectural marzipan... But then the lights fell, and
within moments the aisles and stage had filled with the animals of
invention. Adults gasped, and every child in the audience began to
reread an old, familiar text - the one inscribed on work videos of
Disney's animated Lion King - now brought to life by Julie Taymor
on Broadway demonstrates something even more striking - the Walt
Disney Company's willingness, in this case, to reinvent a known
and fabulously profitable, product, not by dumping it down to live
action, but by allowing Ms. Taymor to test the limits of
representation and theatricality... What a miracle it would be if
the corporations those icons represent were to conclude, as Disney
in this one case has, that commercial prosperity licenses - even
obliges - cultural risk." |
| The New York Times
Editorial |
Top |
| "It's
like being in a dream awake." |
| John
Lahr, The New
Yorker |
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| "Disney
and Broadway have found a box-office bonanza that in every
likelihood will run for years... A stunning coup de theatre...
unquestionably the most pulse-quickening on Broadway...
impressionistic and utterly graceful... the stunning physical
production and terrific score is an ensemble that ranks with the
best currently on Broadway... 'The Lion King' is a show that will
introduce a new generation of children to the theater, and doesn't
sacrifice a drop of intelligence, integrity or sophistication to
do it." |
| Greg Evans, Variety |
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| "Spectacular.
Birds fly, elephants lumber, gazelles leap. Indeed, a veritable
jungle of costumed actors and life-size puppet creatures great and
small populate the state in the show's gorgeous opening sequence,
The Circle of Life, ...Superb stagecraft and dizzying, often
mystifying array of theatrical techniques... Watching The Lion
King is in many ways like watching a magical act, with the
audience constantly wondering what impossible trick Taymor has up
her sleeve next." |
| Tad Simmons, Variety
(Minneapolis Review) |
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| "Triumphant.
Spectacular, brilliant... It should fill the beautifully restored
New Amsterdam Theater on 42nd street for many years... visually
stunning use of masks, puppetry, costumes and scenic effects." |
| Frank Scheck, Hollywood
Reporter |
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| "Let
it be said once that, 'The Lion King' is a great show, not just
for the parents and kids who will flock to it but for anyone drawn
to landmark event in American entertainment. The Disney
organization deserved credit for guts in this enterprise. It could
have played it safe. Instead it chose Julie Taymor. The result is
a fusion of commerce and art sure to delight all but the stuffiest
theater intellectuals, who will no doubt accuse Taymor of selling
out. But selling is not selling out... Taymor demonstrates that
she's a master showman as well as a stage magician of incandescent
imaginative power... In 'The Lion King' all the senses come
together in flashpoints that can explode... But it's Taymor's
visual magic that's unprecedented in Broadway musicals... Only a
cosmic calamity can prevent 'The Lion King' from being a historic
success... Disney has upped the ante on the resurging American
musical." |
| Jack Kroll, Newsweek |
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| "It's
Broadway's biggest hit in years... Oh, the artistry and innovation
at work here - the puppetry and the visual poetry, the memorably
breathtaking Circle of Life opening number, the great lanky
giraffes, the lovely music, and the magnificent vocal stylings of
featured actress nominee Tsidii Le Loka. A special award should go
to Disney for making prepubescent audiences fall in love with
theater..." |
| Jess Cagle,
Entertainment Weekly |
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| "'The Lion King'
is enormous, fantastic, riotous fun... It is
extraordinary to look at and to experience... What is most
extraordinary is what a wonderful, dazzling musical has been
created- a work that stands up to the original not as a copy but
as a brilliant development... What you will remember, cherish and
(if it's not still running) tell your grandchildren about this 'The Lion King'
is the total impression of the show: our renewed joy
of amazement in the theatre of miracles." |
| Clive Barnes, The New
York Post |
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| "'The Lion King'
is a perfect marriage of entertainment and art. The
experience of the show goes so far beyond its starting point that
the title gives you no idea of how beautiful, inventive and even
moving it really is... Gorgeous creativity... Great adventures in
the theatre, like this one, leave all your senses singing." |
| Fintan O'Toole, The New
York Daily News |
Top |
| "The
show and the playhouse are enchanting... The unprecedented
production is worth every penny... If this is Disney's idea of a
theme park, we are delighted to report that the theme is
quality... a jaw-droppingly magnificent spectacle." |
| Linda
Winer, New York
Newsday |
Top |
| "A
journey that no child and no grown-up will soon forget. It is like
nothing you have ever seen before. Stop reading and buy a ticket.
Move over 'Cats', 'The Lion King' is here to stay." |
| Jacques le Sourd, Westchester
Gannett Newspapers |
Top |
| "'The Lion King'
is a singular event. It is an evening of unusual
pleasures. It has been staged with the utmost sophistication." |
| Robert
Feldberg, The
Bergen Record (New Jersey) |
Top |
| "Right
at the start, the whole building explodes into joyous life...
Julie Taymor is our theatre's supreme wizard of spectacle." |
| Donald Lyons, The Wall
Street Journal |
Top |
| "The
lyrical lions, lumbering elephants, mangy hyenas, loping antelopes
and lush jungle scenes have to be seen to be believed." |
| Sydney Weinberg, Time
Out New York |
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| "It
is pure exhilarating theatre, unlike anything ever seen on
Broadway." |
| Miriam Horn, U.S. News
& World Report |
Top |
| "Julie
Taymor's adaptation is a stunning visual feast." |
| Laurie
Winer, The Los
Angeles Times |
Top |
| "'The Lion King' has riveted the New York theatre community." |
| Vanity
Fair |
Top |
| "'The Lion King'
is an absolute triumph of visual imagination. Julie
Taymor delivers visual coup after visual coup." |
| The Financial Times
(London) |
Top |
| "'The Lion King'
works superbly. The most remarkable thing about this
animal show, in fact, is its humanity." |
| Charles Spencer, The
Daily Telegraph (London) |
Top |
| "Brilliant
and irresistible... A thoroughly imagined stage show in its own
right." |
| Michael Coveney , The
Daily Mail (London) |
Top |
| "Indeed,
the whole experience left me with the strangest feeling. I was
proud to be a theatre critic." |
| Benedict Nightingale,
The Times (London) |
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| "It's
like nothing you've ever seen on a legitimate stage." |
| Clifford Ridley, The
Philadelphia Inquirer |
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| "The
most gratifying sound of all comes from the audience, the swelling
murmur of astonishment for a spectacle that is pure theatre
'The
Lion King' makes its claim as a work of exuberant theatrical
imagination." |
| Stephen Winn, The San
Francisco Chronicle |
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| "A
wondrous display of human ingenuity. Stunningly inventive...
brilliant. Long live the king." |
| Roma
Torre, New York |
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| "Expect
to be dazzled. Completely original and ingenious. There has never
been anything like it on Broadway before. A feast for the eyes and
ears. May it reign forever." |
| Pat Collin,
WWOR-TV |
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| "One
of the most enthralling happenings ever conjured for Broadway." |
| Misha Berson, Seattle
Times |
Top |
| "I
would pay to see the Broadway bound 'The Lion King' again, even if I
could only stay for the first five minutes. The opening number,
The Circle of Life, is among the most spine-tingling, goosebump-raising,
overwhelmingly beautiful curtain raisers in the history of
Broadway musical theater... It cannot be overpraised." |
| Chris Hewitt, Saint Paul Pioneer
Press (Minneapolis Review) |
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| "A
playful, imaginative celebration of theater... It's technically
complex and sophisticated, yet the end result is earthy and
simple, like the fable 'The Lion King' is." |
| Mike Steele, Star
Tribune (Minneapolis Review) |
Top |
| "A
dazzling progression of scenic invention... the scenic, costuming
and choreographic wonders give the story an extra splendor and an
added dimension that make it the most incredible combination of
children's show and avant-garde spectacle ever conceived for the
American Theater." |
| Richard Christiansen, Chicago
Tribune (Minneapolis Review) |
Top |
| "Stunningly
beautiful in design and execution." |
| Jeffrey Eric Jenkins,
Seattle Post-Intelligencer |
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