Disney’s Aladdin is missing some magic at DC’s National Theatre

Deen van Meer

Disney’s animated feature film Aladdin was released in 1992, and it was remade as a live action feature film in 2019 … which was the same year I first saw the national tour of the hit Broadway musical based on the animated film. The Broadway musical earned five Tony Award nominations, winning one for James Monroe Iglehart, Featured Actor in a Musical, for his role as Genie. Since then there have been many productions and tours (even a filmed version of the West End production that was to debut on Disney Plus last year but has been put on hold indefinitely, perhaps until the current tour ends its run). The show I saw in 2019 was stupendous, probably a pretty accurate representation of the Broadway show which is still playing as of this writing. Aladdin was one of the last shows I saw before the world shut down in 2020, and now that it’s back on the road I was very eager to take in the spectacle again, to revisit the Cave of Wonders, to marvel at Aladdin’s flying carpet. And now with the show taking up residence at the National Theatre in Washington D.C., there was no way I could pass up seeing it again.

The story is the same as the movie: street urchin Aladdin bumps into a beautiful woman in the market and learns she’s the princess of Agrabah. Princess Jasmine wants nothing more than to be an independent woman and not just a daughter forced into a marriage by her sultan father but, by law, she must marry a prince so that leaves Aladdin out of the equation no matter how much they like each other. Enter the sultan’s vizier Jafar, a schemer who sees himself next in line to the throne. Needing a magic lamp from a cave that only the ‘Diamond in the Rough’ can enter, Jafar learns Aladdin is the diamond and enlists his services. He finds the lamp but touches a necklace which seals the cave as he was told to touch nothing else but the lamp. Trying to read something on the lamp, Aladdin rubs it and out pops the Genie, ready to grant him three wishes. After tricking Genie into getting them out of the cave, Aladdin wishes to be a prince so he can marry Jasmine but you should always be careful what you wish for. You probably know the rest of the story.

Now … I probably need to preface what follows by saying having seen the show four years ago may have colored my perception for what is currently being seen. I’m unfortunately going to be comparing the two shows — it’s unavoidable — but I will say that if you are a newcomer there is still plenty here to satisfy your expectations. So let me start with all that is good. The cast, for the most part, is giving it their all. Adi Roy is a delight as Aladdin, working his buns off from beginning to end, with the glistening sweat of his labors clearly visible. Roy makes Aladdin a joyful character and he’s got a powerful voice to deliver all the songs you know from the movie, particularly shining in ‘A Whole New World’. He gives Aladdin such an infectiously upbeat attitude that you can easily see why the princess falls for him and why his friends will risk their own lives for him.

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And Roy has a great partner to work off of in Marcus M. Martin as Genie. It’s hard to top Robin Williams’ voice work in the animated film — and the animation certain enhanced his performance, something impossible to do with actual humans who can’t shapeshift — but Martin has a quick wit and can toss off one-liners and asides to the audience like no one’s business. And he’s working just as hard, if not harder, than Roy given some of the show’s biggest numbers including the opening ‘Arabian Nights’ song that introduces all the characters; ‘Friend Like Me’, which is a ‘Be Our Guest’ tour de force number, and the Act II opener ‘Prince Ali’ that involves the whole cast and numerous costume changes in the space of just a few minutes. Martin is just a bundle of energy from start to finish and you really do miss him when he’s not on stage. The performances of Roy and Martin are well worth the price of admission.

Anand Nagraj is appropriately cartoony as the villainous Jafar, and Aaron Choi is even more of a cartoon as Iago (the parrot in the movie, and there is a delightful pun referencing that for those in the know). Sorab Wadia gets some laughs as the supposedly stern Sultan who turns to jelly around his daughter Jasmine. It was a wonderful surprise to see Ben Chavez and Colt Prattes back in their roles as Omar and Kassim (both were in the 2019 tour and Hotchka conducted an interview with Prattes before the show’s stop in Baltimore), still with the same energetic performances they had four years ago. Here they are joined by Jake Letts as Babkak, and the three of them work together like a well-oiled machine. The only weak link among the main characters is Senzel Ahmady as Princess Jasmine. She has a lovely voice, when you can hear her, but I just didn’t feel the chemistry between her and Roy that tells us they have a love greater than the laws of the land that say they can’t be together. I don’t like being too critical of someone’s performance because you never know what’s going on in someone’s personal life that may be affecting their performance but at opening night I just wasn’t feeling it from her.

And that takes us to the not-so-great parts of the show. When I saw Aladdin in 2019, I basically sat through the entire show with my jaw on the floor. It was epic, it was a spectacle, it was … magical. The marketplace of Agrabah had several buildings and was full of people, the Cave of Wonders magically transformed into a golden room before our eyes, Genie popped up high atop a pillar of golden items, the flying carpet was unexplainable as we were sitting just four rows from the stage, willing to accept that it was truly magic (Disney magic at its best). The sets were huge, the choreography was tight, the sword fights were thrilling and nail-biting. But now … it all felt so low budget, the sword fights seemed like everyone was counting their moves. I’d love to know what happened between the 2020 shutdown and the 2022 relaunch. Were the original sets destroyed and replaced by fairly reasonable facsimiles? Did someone think the sword fights were too intense? Or perhaps a truck with the rest of the sets got lost on the way to the theatre? Sadly even the magic carpet was less magical than it was in 2019. Then, it flew around the stage, the backdrop full of ‘stars’ and a full moon, no evidence of anything physically holding that thing in the air. Now only the top part of the sky had stars, there was no moon, the carpet didn’t even have a spotlight on it like it did before (and the carpet also did not reappear at the end of the show as it did in 2019), and this time I think I could make out something aiding in its flight. It was disappointing, but again if you have never seen it you will probably think it’s pretty cool. The only thing that really seemed to remain from the previous tour is the costumes (and the neat trick with Jafar’s costume near the end of the show is still pretty cool) which don’t seem to have changed at all (and note that Prattes is wearing red harem pants which may signify he’s playing the human version of Abu the monkey, and he’s the voice of the Cave of Wonders).

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So, yeah, I’m really torn about this current tour of Aladdin. I really, really wanted to experience the show again like I did in 2019, but it just didn’t completely deliver. I’d like to eventually find out that there was something off and we didn’t see the show as intended for whatever reason. I saw through a production of 42nd Street years ago that got hit with a strike of the stagehands union right in the middle of loading the show into the theatre, so half the sets and costumes didn’t make it onto the stage, but the cast made it work. And that’s the highest praise I can give for the performance I saw — the cast did all they could to make it work. It’s just that the production let them, and the audience, down a bit. I will reiterate that if you have never seen Aladdin on stage, you will have a very enjoyable time at the show. If you have seen it in the past, you may be a bit disappointed with the technical aspects, but that cast will almost make up for it. I will certainly tip my turban to them.

Aladdin runs about 2 hours and 30 minutes with one intermission, and is intended for ages 6 and up (please don’t bring a baby to the theatre!).

Aladdin runs through April 30 at Washington DC’s National Theatre. Other cities on the schedule include Nashville, Chicago, Albuquerque, Denver, Vancouver, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Norfolk, Atlanta, Seattle, and more. Visit the official Aladdin website for more information.

Aladdin – 2023 North American Tour

Disney Theatrical Productions

 
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