What Did the Critics Think of Nicole Sherzinger in 'Sunset Blvd?'

The official title to Billy Wilder's blistering take on Hollywood fame is "Sunset Boulevard," but in the film its title appears as a stenciled street marking on a curb abbreviated to "Sunset Blvd." And it is the abbreviated one that is being used in the new revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber's 1994 musical that came to Broadway last weekend after a much-heralded London run last year. The title change clues audiences in that this is not Glenn Close's "Sunset Boulevard" anymore; no big Hollywood sets, no hydraulic lifts are to be found on the stage of the St. James Theatre. Instead, under the direction of the innovative Jamie Lloyd, this is a stripped-down, video-intense, 21st century take on the show that returns it to the film's noir roots.

His version thrilled London, winning an Olivier award for Best Revival and its two leads – Nicole Scherzinger and Tom Francis Oliviers as well. The production, with former Pussycat Dolls lead singer Scherzinger as Norma and Francis as Joe Gillis, the down-in-his-luck screenwriter who finds himself integral in her making a comeback, opened on Sunday, October 20 on Broadway. The reviews are in, as is the original cast album, this week, and the critics ran from breathless praise to cool dismissal.

But the show has never been a critics' favorite. When it opened in 1994, New York Times critic David Richards started his review with "The mansion has landed," referring to the spectacular rendering of Norma's extravagant Hollywood digs that were literally recreated on the stage of the Minskoff Theatre. The mansion doesn't land in Lloyd's take – it never makes an appearance in the theater. This is not Glenn Close's "Sunset" – instead it is lean, modern, with a bold orchestrations and fierce performances, notably from Scherzinger, whose fans interrupted her performance with standing ovations, much to the chagrin of the critics who took note.

Also, on Friday the original cast album (recorded in a live performance) was streamed. For more on it, follow this link.

But were the critic's cool or cooly enthusiastic? Here is a selection:

The New York Times, Jesse Green

"Despite Norma Desmond, who famously declares in the film 'Sunset Boulevard' that it's not her but 'the pictures that got small,' the opposite is true on Broadway these days. In musicals especially, video and projections have grown ever more dominant. Perhaps it is not so much an irony as an inevitability, then, that at the St. James Theater, where a revival of the musical based on 'Sunset Boulevard' opened on Sunday, the pictures – live video streamed onto an LCD screen more than 23 feet tall – are so big they almost blot out the show below.

"But alas, only almost.

"For despite many fascinating interventions by the director Jamie Lloyd and his technical team, and the fact that it is based on one of the greatest of movies, the musical remains too silly for words. In that sense, and others, Norma would have loved it."

Naveen Kumar; the Washington Post

"Youth is relative, and the company of director Jamie Lloyd's electrifying revival of the musical composed by Andrew Lloyd Webber, transferring to Broadway from London's West End, drips with a cutting-edge L.A. cool that would make anyone feel they need to scramble to keep up. When Norma says 'it's the pictures that got small,' she could be referring to social media and the glut of competition to stand out...

"Lloyd, whose typical stripped-down style was last seen on Broadway in 'A Doll's House,' here plunges deep into noir. The setting is a psychic dungeon, with stark shadows and reflective haze marking the warp in Norma's self-perception. (The set and Jil Sander-chic costumes are by Soutra Gilmour; the arresting lighting is by Jack Knowles.) The focus is on bodies in space (the athletic and libidinous choreography is by Fabian Aloise) and the sheer bigness of the sound.

"This being Lloyd Webber, that bigness will send your hair flying to the back row. Orchestrations by the composer and David Cullen are bright and muscular, with swelling strings and brassy crescendos thrashing like a storm at sea. (Alan Williams is the music supervisor and director.) Sleek head mics are visible accessories, and sound designer Adam Fisher pulls off the technical feat of rattling but not splitting eardrums..."

Patrick Ryan, USA Today

"The revival, which opened Sunday at New York's St. James Theatre, is already shaping up to be a word-of-mouth hit stateside. And for good reason: Scherzinger is every bit as stunning and volcanic as you've heard, even if Jamie Lloyd's hollow production doesn't always match her earthshaking talent...

"Like the film, the show doesn't try to hide that things end badly. (Joe literally climbs out of a body bag in the gloomy opening moments.) But Norma's descent into harrowing, blood-soaked mania is a wonder to behold in Scherzinger's more-than-capable hands. Taking the reins from Glenn Close, who originated the role on Broadway, Scherzinger brings an almost alien quality to Norma, whose strange poise and aloofness masks much deeper, repressed trauma. She can be vampy and volatile, but also quietly devastating.

"The singer earned midshow standing ovations for both of Norma's signature ballads: 'With One Look' and 'As If We Never Said Goodbye,' both of which Scherzinger delivered with breathtaking power and bravura. But perhaps her finest moment was the more subdued 'New Ways to Dream,' as Norma is tearfully confronted by her younger self (Hannah Yun Chamberlain) in a tight close-up, which is filmed live and projected onto a giant backdrop. It's a striking juxtaposition, and Scherzinger hauntingly conveys Norma's fear, fragility and longing as she stares down the barrel of her life."

Vulture, Sarah Holdren

"... I dared myself to come into Lloyd's revival of Lloyd Webber's 1993 megamusical 'Sunset Blvd.' with a wide-open mind. And this production is indeed remarkable, at least on its charged-up, sweat-slicked surface. If you spend any time at all following the hypes and hysterias of theater and its accompanying Twitterverse, it will hardly surprise you to hear that this Sunset is more of a solar flare, sometimes quite literally blinding its audience. ..

"There's nothing floating or aloof, however, about Scherzinger's performance. With no armor to depend on (I kept wondering if she's cold in that little black sheath or if Knowles's lights and her own nerves generate enough heat), her Norma is gargantuan and almost feral. She charges head first at the famous lines ('I am big. It's the pictures that got small'), delivering them with a cavernous boom. She's not dignified – she's so big that she seems to be ripping her own seams. But she's also got a wily little sense of humor, a giggling, contemporary-coded bounce and wiggle that come out especially when the cameras are around. She whips her hair back and forth and flashes duck-lips for the onstage paparazzi, even throwing some splits and twerks into the mix. It's surprisingly funny, and also tinged with sadness: Here's a woman who may have lost the better part of her mind, but not the part that's entirely aware of how the kids are telegraphing sexiness these days, even as those kids have no idea who she is.

"The pop singer in Scherzinger can also do a thrilling range of things with her voice. There's nothing classical in the way she bites into the songs – she simply devours them, ricocheting between vulnerable tremblings and voracious howls. Lloyd mics the bejesus out of his shows (here with sound designer Adam Fisher), and the results are mixed: Yes, it's exciting for Scherzinger to be able to go internal, her breathy whispers beamed into our ears, but on the loud end, the organic power of her voice is eaten by the amplification. When she belts, it's thunderous, but there's also a mechanical buzz to the sound...

"... There's no doubt that Lloyd's Sunset dazzles in the beholding, though the farther you walk away from it, the more you may find yourself feeling like poor Joe Gillis – remembering the thrill but no longer able to feel it, somehow both stirred and empty. Hooray for Hollywood!"

New York Post; Johnny Oleksinski

"... .Sunset Boulevard,' which opened Sunday night at the St. James Theatre, is Broadway's most exhilarating show in years.

"So much energy, freshness and unrelenting intensity courses through the veins of director Jamie Lloyd's startling production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical from beginning to end, you'd swear it was brand new.

"And adrenaline pumps through our bloodstream anytime the extraordinary Nicole Scherzinger, making her wondrous Broadway debut, wails a note. ...

"The entire production leaves you breathless. We're transfixed from the moment the giant video screen – this staging's chandelier – descends from the rafters bearing the image of actor Tom Francis' dangerous eyes as struggling screenwriter Joe Gillis drives toward his doom...

"But the show belongs to the titanic Scherzinger, who makes an especially proud and feral Norma. Her confidence and burning desire to succeed makes her fall much greater than that of a dusty hermit.

"It occurred to me, while watching her fluid arms as she sang 'As If We Never Said Goodbye,' that the actress was channelling Michael Crawford's ghoulish, lovesick Phantom..."

New York Observer; David Cote

"The latest revival of 'Sunset Boulevard' – glossily stark and aggressively meta – puts several shades of lipstick on a pig. 'Shades' being black, white, and red. 'Pig' being a musical that may be one of Andrew Lloyd Webber's better efforts but remains a bloated, subtlety-free slab of pop melodrama. Director Jamie Lloyd and his chic design team immerse Webber's 1994 adaptation of the movie classic in a vertiginous zone of inky surfaces and white highlights, all swaddled in incessant billows of stage fog. Soutra Gilmour's modish costumes are likewise monochromatic, as is her sparse scenic design – essentially a cavernous camera obscura. When the threat of murder arises, lighting designer Jack Knowles floods the stage in a scarlet wash. By the end of the action (slight spoiler), fallen star Norma Desmond (Nicole Scherzinger) is a gothic vision: glowing olive-toned skin, black silk slip, and neck streaked in gore. The remarkable thing about this brutally regimented palette is how it helps distract from the music...

"In her Broadway debut, the leading lady grows on you. In contrast to audience members who stood and screamed every time Scherzinger blasted out one of Norma's obligatory, overheated ballads ('With One Look,' 'As If We Never Said Goodbye'), I went in with minimal expectations. Happily, Scherzinger commands her scenes – on stage and blown up to gargantuan proportions on the 27′ x 23′ LCD screen fed live video by actors strapped into camera units.

"Scherzinger may begin tentative and stiff, but soon she's vamping and pouting for the camera like a giddy teenager with her first TikTok account. When Norma talks astrology with Joe, she adopts a goofy Valley Girl vocal fry. Is Norma aware of her eccentric excesses, or is that Scherzinger and Lloyd commenting on it? The anachronistic, self-mocking gestures extend to the choreography. Fabian Aloise gives Scherzinger cheeky quotes from the Pussycat Dolls's synchronized strutting. Scrawled somewhere in my notes is 'Norma twerks?' If it weren't horribly outdated to say postmodern, that's how I would describe Scherzinger's delightful pastiche."