FAME

Not one to remember. (Review by Billy Suter, courtesy of The Mercury)

It’s rather strange that Hollywood would consider remaking Alan Parker’s classic Fame only to ignore its grit, tear out its heart and stamp on its soul in favour of slapping on more gloss. The beauty of Parker’s 1980 hit was that it worked well as both a musical and great drama, the music being a natural progression from the story.

It was an engrossing story that, for all its undeniable exuberance, was credibly rooted in realism, well showcasing the blood, sweat and tears experienced by students and teachers at New York’s High School for the Performing Arts.

The new version, directed by 25-year-old newcomer Kevin Tancharoen, better known as a former choreographer for Britney Spears and Madonna, is a much more sugary confection that virtually ignores all the issues of poverty, sexual exploitation and drugs that bubbled under the 1980 Fame’s surface. It comes across as a sanitised, shallow story, a churn-out for the High School Musical generation. And it’s no surprise that of its songs, the only two standouts happen to be the only songs retained from the first film – the ballad Out Here On My Own and the catchy, upbeat title track, played over the final credits.

Updated now with forgettable rap songs and some (admittedly fun) hip hop choreography among the modern-jazz, tap and ballet, the film follows a similar format to the original. It breaks the story into four years to follow a bunch of music, dance and acting students from freshman year through to graduation at a school for the performing arts.

Sadly, however, it all seems a little too rushed, too episodic, the characters never fully developing as we learn about their hopes and dreams, and share some of their successes and failures, in the build-up to an inevitable big-concert finale that, frankly, is preposterously overly produced and most unlikely to ever have been staged in a school hall.

It’s the school teachers who most stand out, played by Kelsey Grammer (Frasier), Debbie Allen (Fame), Megan Mullaly (Will & Grace), Bebe Neuwirth (Frasier) and Charles S Dutton, although they get very little to do.

Some of the young leads show promise, Asher Book exuding a strong presence as sweet-voiced Marco. He hits it off romantically with Jenny, a student whose lack of talent, constantly highlighted by teachers, makes it incongruous that she would have made it into the school in the first place – especially when, as we are told earlier on, 10,000 teens auditioned and only 200 could be enrolled. Jenny is played by petite and pretty Kay Panabaker, who has done a lot of minor television work.

The star of the show is Naturi Naughton who, coming over as a bit of a cross between Brandy and Jennifer Hudson, plays Denise, a classical pianist turned hip hop star, notwithstanding objections from her strict father. Among other students, followers of the best show on the box, So You Think You Can Dance, will spot blonde Kherington Payne as lead dancer Alice, whose snooty parents take a dislike to her affair with a fellow student, a wannabe music producer, Victor (Walter Perez).

Although it’s good that movie musicals are being made again, it’s sad that this one is such a disappointment. – Billy Suter