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‘The Lost Boys’ Broadway Review: Or, Why Frank-N-Furter Gets the Last Laugh

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It’s not great news for your new vampire musical when a half-century-old vampire musical comes off a lot wilder.

One of the delights of Frank-N-Furter in “The Rocky Horror Show” is how he brought vampires out of the closet. Even Bram Stoker’s “Dracula,” written in 1897, possesses a strong same-sex subtext with its title character’s attraction to Jonathan Harker. Those three female vampires residing in Dracula’s castle are nothing more than the count’s cover.

Frank-N-Furter abandons any pretext of being straight. He creates a husband, Rocky, not a bride, and Frank only seduces Janet to get to Brad.

Which brings us, finally, to “The Lost Boys,” the new vampire musical that opened Sunday at the Palace Theatre. Its timing is not great. Only a few days ago, a fun new revival of “The Rocky Horror Show” opened on Broadway. The new Undead musical actually features two lead vampires. If you haven’t seen the musical’s source material, the 1987 movie of the same title, this review will respect your ignorance and not give away the story’s big secret.

In the “Lost Boys” stage musical, we know David (Ali Louis Bourzgui) is a major screaming bloodsucker from the get-go because he looks just like Kiefer Sutherland from the movie, right down to the bleach-blond hair. Even though David leads a rock band with three other male vampires — they all sleep together in an abandoned man-cave factory — book writers David Hornsby and Chris Hoch give David a beard. We know Star (Maria Wirries) is a beard because David (the vampire, not the book writer) pushes her into having an affair with the hot new boy toy in town, Michael (LJ Benet). 

Michael has arrived in town with his mother, Lucy (Shoshana Bean), and young brother, Sam (Benjamin Pajak), after having been terrorized by an abusive husband-father (Ben Crawford). In the movie “Lost Boys,” the mother (Dianne Wiest) is recently divorced. One of the musical’s better ideas is to make this family of three on the run from the really bad dad, who shows up in Michael’s nightmares. The family’s fear and isolation fuels the musical’s best songs.

The Lost Boys
“The Lost Boys” (Matthew Murphy)

Michael sings “Belong to Someone” when he contemplates joining David’s gaggle of vampires. His mother sings “Wild” to her new boyfriend (Paul Alexander Nolan) when she reminisces about a life before her ex-husband. Benet and Bean are both in great singing voice, and, fortunately, both songs are keepers, written by The Rescues, an L.A. rock band that has written music for a few TV series, including “Grey’s Anatomy.” 

The Rescues (Kyler England, Adrianne “AG” Gonzalez and Gabriel Mann) make an auspicious Broadway debut, but for every “Belong to Someone” and “Wild” they deliver a real clunker. Star’s big solo, “War,” is a female power ballad that’s pushed into being a declaration of, yes, war. Wirries’ Star emerges as the town’s most tiresome beard, and she deserves Benet’s Michael, who runs the emotional gamut from angry to angst.

The show ends with the anthem “If We Make It Through the Night.” It succeeds in turning the nun’s anthem “Climb Every Mountain” from “The Sound of Music” into something very cutting edge.

Michael Arden directs “The Lost Boys” as if it were an obstacle course I would not wish on any contestant of “Wipeout.” Even the Met Opera hasn’t used this many elevators to facilitate scene changes. Much scarier than the vampires is that set: will somebody fall into an elevator shaft, be crushed by a descending living room? Dane Laffrey’s scenic design can best be described in two words, ‘dangerous’ and ‘humongous.’

That aesthetic is contagious. Arden takes a relatively innocuous but sweet song, “Superpower,” and supersizes it. Sam tells us that young gay guys (those few who are not vampires) can be heroes, too. Pajak is a charming performer, and while he could handle the number on his own, Arden mucks up it with a lot of choristers dressed up as comic-book characters (garish costumes by Ryan Park).

“The Lost Boys” doesn’t know what it wants to be: a shocker, a tear-jerker or a parody. We’re supposed to find the vampire gang frightening, but at one point Arden sends Ronald Reagan, dressed up as Dracula, across the stage.

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Ben Jones Dead: Cooter On ‘Dukes Of Hazzard,’ Georgia Congressman Was 84

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Ben Jones, known to millions as the affable — if mischievous — mechanic Cooter on The Dukes of Hazzard, died today at the age of 84. His wife, Alma Vitor, said that Jones had died of a massive heart attack while “resting in his favorite chair waiting for the Braves to come on and whoop the Yankees.”

Jones played “Crazy” Cooter Davenport on all seven seasons of the original show from 1979-1985 as well as in the made for TV “Reunion” movie in 1997 and the 2000 one-off Hazzard in Hollywood. While many may remember Cooter as a gregarious good ‘ol boy, the character had a wild, rebellious side in the first season of the show. Often called an “honorary Duke,” he owned the local garage which just happened to be across the street from the Sheriff’s station, allowing him to keep an eye on the comings and going for the Duke cousins.

Jones’ second act was an auspicious one. After serving as president of SAG’s Georgia Branch and as chairman of the Georgia Film Commission, Jones won the race for Georgia’s Fourth Congressional District in 1988. He was re-elected in 1990. While on Capitol Hill, Jones was Democratic whip, a member of the Committee on Veteran’s Affairs and a member of the Committee on Public Works and Transportation. In 1994, he ran against Newt Gingrich in another district and lost.

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Here is the full text of Alma Vitor’s statement on social media:

I lost the love of my life today. Ben passed from a massive heart attack. He was home resting in his favorite chair waiting for the Braves to come on and whoop the Yankees. Ben had the most amazing rich full life. He loved and was loved by so many. He will be missed. I loved him so so much.

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Melissa Barrera Says ‘a Lot of People’ Got Fired for Palestine Support

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Melissa Barrera has shared that her firing from the “Scream” franchise by producers over her social media posts relating to Israel and Gaza wasn’t “the first time that that has happened to someone, and it won’t be the last.”

Speaking in a podcast interview with Latino USA, Barrera agreed with host Maria Hinojosa’s assertion that she had been “blacklisted” by the series producers, but added that “a lot of people got fired from their jobs, not just in the entertainment industry … for basically saying Palestinians deserve human rights and they shouldn’t be getting bombed and attacked in this way.”

“It’s sad to me that there are interests that are more important to certain people, of power and money … They will do everything they can to shut people up from saying that people deserve to live, that children deserve to grow up,” Barrera continued. “I try to continue to have hope because I do feel that there’s a lot more people out there that care — that actually do care about each other — and that understand that we’re all connected. We can’t turn a blind eye to something that is happening on the other side of the world just because it’s on the other side of the world, because, before we know it, it’s right here on our doorstep. People, especially in this country, realized that this year.”

Barrera was the lead of the “Scream” franchise in the 2022 series revival and its 2023 follow-up “Scream VI.” As a seventh sequel was being developed, producers at Spyglass Media announced that Barrera would not be a part of future entries, describing the actor’s posts about recent military attacks by Israel on Gaza as “antisemitism” that “flagrantly crosses the line into hate speech.” In turn, Barrera released a statement condemning antisemitism, Islamophobia and “hate and prejudice of any kind” and that she would “continue to speak out for those that need it most and continue to advocate for peace and safety, for human rights and freedom.”

“We just have to name things for what they are, even if there’s consequences,” Barrera said on her Latino USA interview. “I was one of a lot of people that faced consequences, but I’m on Broadway now. I’m still here. … It took me in a direction of actually taking more control of my life and not allowing other people to have control over my life.”

Barrera went on to discuss her coming production banner and her role as an executive producer on the documentary “Traces of Home,” which follows a Mexican-Palestinian family. The film will be distributed by Watermelon Pictures.

“If you go to Mexico City, there’s Palestinian flags everywhere. There’s graffiti everywhere that says ‘Palestina libre’ It’s very much ingrained in our culture. The indigenous people of Mexico are leading that charge,” Barrera said. “Even though the the specifics of the struggles are different, I think we see ourselves in them.”

Barrera appeared on Latino USA to promote her role in the ongoing Broadway production “Titanique,” which is now roughly halfway through its run at the St. James Theatre. The production earned four nominations at June’s Tony Awards, including best musical.

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‘Scream’: Matthew Lillard, Skeet Ulrich Also Don’t Know Tatum’s Killer

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Matthew Lillard and Skeet Ulrich addressed one of the long-standing mysteries in the “Scream” franchise Saturday: Who was in the Ghostface costume when Tatum Riley (Rose McGowan) was killed?

During the “Scream” 30th reunion panel at Midsummer Scream in Long Beach, Calif., Lillard and Ulrich, who played knife-wielding best friends Stu Macher and Billy Loomis, respectively, in Wes Craven’s “Scream,” were asked point-blank if they knew who was responsible for the fan-favorite character’s brutal slaying.

Their answer? “To be honest, not even [screenwriter] Kevin Williamson knows who killed [Tatum]. And he wrote the damn thing,” Ulrich, who appeared alongside original “Scream” stars Lillard, Jamie Kennedy, Joseph Whipp, as well as stunt actor Lee Waddell and Ghostface voice performer Roger L. Jackson.

“And we never discussed it,” he continued. “So, it’s really fan theory, which I think is great. But, I don’t know. No one knows.”

As fans of the iconic horror film will recall, McGowan’s death is one of the more memorable ones in the movie, as she’s killed by a closing garage door while trying to escape the Ghostface killer – who is later revealed to be two people (the aforementioned sinister BFFs).

Over the decades, it has never been formally confirmed whether Lillard’s Stu or Ulrich’s Billy dealt the final blow to Tatum, with fans making cases for both bad guys online.

However, Lillard indicated that he believed his character was responsible for the slaying, telling the crowd at the famed horror convention, “I always say it’s because she said ‘no’ to going to prom.”

This wasn’t the only behind-the-scenes tidbit shared during Saturday’s panel, as Lillard and Ulrich recalled how demanding the final sequence of the movie was to film.

The 42-minute stretch, known as “Scene 118” or the house party face-off, required 21 consecutive night shoots to complete.

“When you see the film, the energy that he and I and Neve [Campbell] and everybody is producing, we had to do daily for all that time,” Ulrich shared. “So, that sticks out to me as being most memorable. And fun, because I got to hit [Lillard] with a phone.”

Lillard co-signed this comment, chiming in with, “We shot at night. So, we were living a nocturnal life. And also, back then, we only had one camera … you would have to do a take on every angle, every set-up multiple times. So, that sequence is really brutal and stands out in my memory.”

Fans will get to see this iconic sequence on the big screen again this fall, as Paramount Scares, the dedicated horror brand for Paramount Pictures, confirmed at the panel that the movie would be re-released in theaters in October in honor of the 30th anniversary.

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