Last night, NBC aired a live version of The Sound of Music, which I sat through because (A) I’ve never seen the movie or the musical before, and I wanted to see what all the fuss was about, and (B) I had to write a musical opening sketch, and I figured it would inspire me. Turns out, writing music while listening to other music is damn near impossible. But I digress. I thought they did a decent enough job, and everyone was at least putting their all into it, so I don’t have too much negative to say about it. Except I’m in the minority here because plenty of people, including Kym Karath who played Gretl in the original, threw beaucoup shade all over the show. TMZ reports …
During the special Kym tweeted, “Mystified & disappointed so far by SOM special. So far only happy with Stephen Moyer” … then followed up by saying, “Must admit some scenes are actually painful to watch.” That’s when Karath kicked things up a notch by roasting Underwood’s performance adding, “Love Carrie Underwood but this role is just not right for her. She is lovely her voice is beautiful but acting is wrong.” For what it’s worth … the special brought in HUGE ratings for NBC with 18.5 million viewers.
Look, I never saw the original so I don’t have much a benchmark with which to grade this, but you know what? At least they actually tried to do something cool. They tried to bring back live specials, and musicals, and they put a ton of work into it. Yes, Carrie Underwood might not be the best actress, but dammit, they tried to do something great, tried their hardest, and created something that was actually pretty good. I really can’t say anything bad about ambition.