Patti LuPone can’t wait to see ‘Lumbering’ musical ‘Sunset Blvd.’ to see

Patti LuPone, famously fired by Andrew Lloyd Webber for her role as Norma Desmond in the 1993 London production Sunset Boulevardputting aside old grudges – sort of, sort of – and plans to see the new Jamie Lloyd-directed Broadway production on Wednesday.

In a wonderfully sharp LuPone performance on ABC’s The view Today the former Evita was in candid form by giving a side ‘compliment’ about the hot new Broadway Sunset revival starring Nicole Scherzinger as Norma.

First a little background. In 1993, LuPone created the role of Norma Desmond in the original London production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Sunset Boulevarddirected by Trevor Nunn. The project was a renewed collaboration between LuPone and Lloyd Webber after their enormous success with Evitabut history did not repeat itself: LuPone was abruptly fired by the composer, who then hired Glenn Close to open the show in Los Angeles and eventually on Broadway.

LuPone was contracted to open both the LA and Broadway productions, and the money she got from the deal went to charity: she has since called the pool on her Connecticut estate the “Andrew Lloyd Webber Memorial Pool” .

On The view today, with LuPone promoting both Disney+s Agatha all the time and her Broadway two-hander with Mia Farrow The roommatethe Broadway icon was asked if she had seen the new largely re-imagined – and very well-reviewed – Broadway production Sunset Blvd.

“I can’t wait to see it!” she called and added that she will see the show next Wednesday.

“I’m really curious to see what Jamie Lloyd has done with this,” she said, adding that she wishes talented directors like Lloyd would focus on “original material, supporting new playwrights and new composers and lyricists rather than stuff that we’ve seen.”

“But I’m curious to see it,” she said, adding, “It’s a cumbersome musical” – here she spoke the word cumbersome as if it were a Agatha all the time curse. “It’s always been that way, so I’m curious to see what he’ll do to make it less so cumbersome.”

With that, she burst into her signature laugh, but stopped when co-host Joy Behar mentioned the good reviews of the new production.

“Well, we’ll see,” LuPone said. “There’s no accounting for taste.”