When I first started to look at the origin of the hit musical Les Miserables I was surprised to find that it was up against unfavorable odds from its very beginning.
Les Miserables was based on a book of the same title from the author Victor Hugo and changed into a concept play in a Paris sports arena in 1980 but then quickly died down. If not for someone sending the producer Cameron Mackintosh a copy of the concept album it would have disappeared from the theater.
Once Mackintosh agreed to produce an English production of the show, he managed to get the esteemed Royal Shakespeare Company to co-produce it. This then caused the play to gain a lot of British public interest. For the next two years, it went into production at the Barbican Center in London starting Oct. 8, 1985, gaining extreme praise from audiences. Critics, on the other hand, disliked it.
Many critics suggested that Les Mis had very little going for it. For example, British critic Benedict Nightingale wrote in the New York Times in 1986, ¨According to most of the rules, customs, and formulae, Les Misérables ought to be a mega-flop. After all, how many hit musicals originated in France at all, let alone been adapted by Frenchmen from one of their nation’s longer 19th-century classics? How many have been given their British premieres by the Royal Shakespeare Company in its main Barbican Theater? How many have been cruelly trashed by leading critics? And yet in spite of all this, Les Misérables has managed to transfer to the West End, become as hot a ticket as the eternally resilient Cats.”
After its surprising British success, Les Miserables transferred to Broadway and it became even more popular and gained great notoriety. Although it had a shorter run time in the U.S. than in Britain, going from March 17, 1987, to May 18, 2003, and racking up 6,680 performances, Les Mis was wildly popular in America. This just added to the amazing feats that Les Mis has unpredictably had.
After being away from Broadway for five years, a revival opened at the Broadhurst Theatre in 2006. It lasted until 2008. In 2012, a film version was released, giving the work a new injection of life. It starred Hugh Jackman as Valjean, Russell Crowe as Javert and Anne Hathaway as Fantine.
The awards given to Les Mis are none to scoff at either, being nominated for 12 Tony Awards and winning eight of those, including Best Musical. Universal Pictures’ Les Misérables earned three top awards at the Golden Globes on Sunday, Jan. 13, 2013 including Best Picture. The film also took home the award for Best Actor – Musical or Comedy (Hugh Jackman) and Best Supporting Actress – Musical or Comedy (Anne Hathaway). It was the only film to win three awards that year.
Despite the odds, Les Mis became a worldwide sensation.
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