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kaydazza

Urgent and Opinon needed - Please !

Hello People .... Im Doing Les Miserables at My College for a Production and i recently auditoned and worked really hard to get my dream role of Th�nardier !! the Innkeeper ... to my amasement i got it and just wondered .... do you class Th�nardier as a Lead in the production as it is vital for documentation for my project at school of progression level 3

IF you can give me your opinon of wither you think Th�nardier is a lead and what you think of the character i will be very grateful

Many thanks

Darren Kay !!
JIJane

I have asked someone who has played this part professionally in the West End and they have said no, it is not considered a lead.
Trevor reincarnate

Definately not a lead.
Aimee

Its a supporting role. Smile


A brilliant one and well done for getting it.
flying_pigs

Just out of curiosity, who would you say was a lead (Valjean and Javert? and who was supporting?

I always considered Valjean, Javert, Fantine, Th�nardiers, Marius, Enjolras, Cosette and Eponine as the leads to a certain extent? But then, I know nothing about this sort of thing!
Orestes Fasting

I've heard strange things about everyone except Valjean and Javert being technically considered featured ensemble, since Valjean and Javert are the only ones who have no ensemble roles at all... but I would consider them to be leads and Fantine, Eponine, Marius, Cosette, Enjolras, the Th�nardiers, Gavroche, and Young Cosette to be supporting roles.
herkind

I thought Fantine was considered a lead too since she didn't have a part in the ensemble until Patti Lupone got bored and asked for one. Razz I consider Valjean and Javert the only leads though.
Trevor reincarnate

I think it's a completely ensemble show.
Valjean and Javert just happen to be the biggest parts in that ensemble.
You can't have Les Mis without the ensemble of characters.
Fantine

I think I saw Valjean, Javert and Fantine billed as the leads once.
Moci

I believe that in the original Broadway production, at least, Valjean, Javert and Fantine were given principal contracts because they appear as their character the first time they are on stage. Everyone else is featured, because they appear in the ensemble, before assuming their main character. In 1996, Cameron Mackintosh said that, "In America, all but three of the company are considered chorus", whereas the London production, doesn't give out separate contracts to principals and chorus, because British Actors Equity doesn't require them to.

herkind wrote:
I thought Fantine was considered a lead too since she didn't have a part in the ensemble until Patti Lupone got bored and asked for one.


Thats not quite the way that Patti LuPone tells it:

Patti LuPone wrote:
Very early in the rehearsal of Les Miz, Trevor Nunn announced to the principles that when we were finished with our roles we would become members of the chorus. I thought to myself, "I don't think so!" As you know Fantine is off the stage and out the door 20 minutes into the musical. I was performing "The Cradle Will Rock" while I was rehearsing Les Miz and always found an excuse to get out of any chorus scenes Trevor or John may have put me in. I also had in my contract that I could go home to America for 5 days while they loaded the stage floor into The Barbican Theatre. When I returned, the cast was rehearsing in a different theatre. When I found them they were staging the barricade scene and before I could duck behind a seat in the orchestra, a cast member Sally Mates yelled, "Why, there's Patti!" Hence, Fantine is only in the barricade scene. I could have killed Sally Mates. I know she did it on purpose. Anyway, I went on as a smelter, a man. But, when the character Enjolras shouts out, "All women and children leave the barricade," that was my cue to leave the stage. I miraculously became a boy.


I think you might have got the story confused with Rebecca Storm, who refused initially to be in the ensemble and then changed her mind.

Rebecca Storm wrote:
I went up to the wardrobe department to try on my Fantine costume and was handed a 'boy on barricade' suit. I stuttered and stammered for a while but then plucked up enough courage to say ' I'm sorry, but I am one of the leading ladies, I'm not in the ensemble'. They told me Patti and Kathy Rowe McAllen had both been 'boy on barricade' and had enjoyed it. I wasn't convinced and insisted that my agent sort this out. I did not want to be a 'boy on barricade' and that was that!!! Trevor and Ken said that that was absolutely fine and not to worry. I started the show at the end of Feb and by the middle of March hadn't really met anyone in the cast. Fantine is very much on her own. In the dressing room and on stage. I had decorated the dressing room, put up curtains, set up a T.V. and they had kindly installed a phone for me so I thought I would be quite happy. However I was feeling so lonely, not really getting to know any of the cast, who all seemed to having so much fun on and off stage. I felt very isolated. After about three weeks I sheepishly went in to the office and asked 'Please can I be "boy on the barricade"?' Everyone laughed at me and sent me up to the wardrobe department. At first I felt a bit awkward because everyone knew what had happened, but pretty soon I got to know some of the best people ever, and a good few of them are still very close friends. It was a great lesson to learn. It was really quite strange going from Eva to Fantine, but eventually I adjusted and had a great time.
Fantine

Is it just me, or is that really diva-ish?
Quique

Hell ya, it's diva-ish. Patti is known to be the biggest diva-head ever, lol. But that's why I love her. Mr. Green
herkind

Oh. I always remember Patti cracking jokes about the length of time between Fantine's death and her entrance in the finale (wasn't the show about 4 hours long when it was at the Barbican?) and I'd heard the story that she'd asked for an ensemble part because she was bored sitting backstage.
Patti says Fantine is only in the barricade scenes but in the revival she was also in Look Down and Do You Hear the People Sing. Was it always like that or was that a recent change?
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