Posted 11:10 AM by Gene

John Simon has been writing for too long:

``Follies'' is the amazing expanding show: With every decent new production it gets bigger and bigger. The last time I saw it, it struck me as one of the top three or four musicals. Seeing it now at Encores!, at Manhattan's City Center, I think it may be the best of all.

This is Exhibit A in why no one takes reviewers seriously anymore -- and we regret to say it because John Simon deserved to be taken very seriously. They have their (we've said this before) enthusiasms -- for Mr. Taxi Driver, for THE GREATEST POP-CULTURE ACHIEVEMENT OF THE LAST QUARTER CENTURY, for Herr Doktor -- and they wonder why so few people like their pet favorites. When ad-blurbists write of their obsessions and especially with their hoity-toity style they should expect no one to believe them. Certainly the Branson East crowd never has; THE BEST MUSICAL OF ALL has not been successfully revived since its HISTORIC production 36 years ago -- and that was a money-loser. Perhaps these morons think the culture can survive on the cheering of a tiny crowd of cri-TICs and fans for CULT properties, but its woeful state reflects in no small way on their enthusiasms, and their thorough abandonment of sense.

P. S. Of course the larger audience must share the blame -- especially those who must laugh at a female impersonator in a fat suit.