13: La comédie musicale

Evan Goldman (Eli Golden) is a 12 year old Jewish boy in New York City preparing for his bar mitzvah when his life is torn asunder by his parents Jessica (Debra Messing) and Joel (Peter Hermann) divorcing following Joel's affair. Jessica and Evan move to Walkerton, Indiana to live with Jessica's mother and Evan's grandmother Ruth Weiss (Rhea Perlman) which means that Evan will leave behind his friends and life and be forced to have his bar mitzvah in a new town. Evan befriends next door neighbor Patrice (Gabriella Uhl) over the Summer, but once they start school in September Evan is determined to get the cool kids to come to his party which puts strain on his relationships.

13 is an adaptation of the 2007 musical of the same name with music and lyrics by Jason Robert Brown and book by Dan Elish and Robert Horn. Attempts had been made as far back as 2014 when the now defunct CBS Films acquired the rights only for nothing to be done with them before the company folded in 2019. Following the reversion of the rights to the original creators, Netflix along with producer Neil Meron best known for the adaptations of Hairspray and Chicago acquired the rights and Tamra Davis hired to direct and Robert Horn. Now having been released 13 is competently made and easy enough viewing, but it's also not all that substantive and I think despite its title the film will probably appeal best to those whose ages are a few digits below 13.

I'll preface this by saying I know next to nothing about the original stage show as I've not seen it so I can't speak to how successful the film is at recreating the experience audiences got from the stage production aside from Robert Horn having credit on both the stage work and the film. When I was watching 13 it felt very much like the same level you'd expect from something like High School Musical or other similar Disney Channel musical fare and much to my surprise came to find Horn does indeed have a number of credits on such productions one of which is a spin-off from High School Musical and director Tamara Davis also directed three episodes of the Disney+ TV series High School Musical The Series. There's really nothing 13 The Musical does all that wrong exactly, but if you're familiar with the petty drama seen in stuff like Saved by the Bell or High School Musical where tween to teen problems are presented in over the top fashion but with a softer edge you're pretty much going to see all of that on display here only the linking element of Evan's forthcoming bar mitzvah used as a centerpiece around which the story is constructed. In terms of the actors most of them are perfectly fine with Reha Perlman probably my favorite as I've always been a fan of her comedic delivery and it's still very much on point here. Most of the young cast are relative newcomers with the exception of JD McCrary who was previously heard as the voice of young Simba in the 2019 Lion King Remake and they're perfectly serviceable if understandably a little green given for many of them this is their first feature production. The two standouts were probably Ramon Reed as Eddie and Jonathan Lengel as Archie who despite being supporting players did give me some of the funnier moments of the movie and did show a natural screen presence and energy to their roles so it's possible they may be ones to watch out for.

To say "this movie wasn't made for me" is an understatement. While the movie will be perfectly serviceable to the same tween demographic who indulge in various Disney channel films or other inoffensive musical fluff, there's not much here that will compel those whose ages are the title or above with the best hope being tolerance as it plays in the background to possibly mild annoyance. I understand I'm not the target audience for this movie, but I do have to be honest about my thoughts and I really didn't enjoy this.

...but I didn't like that they took out half the songs.

The one good thing they did change though is that the popular kids weren't absolute jerks to Archie though. Growing up, disabled kids were completely off limits to even the worst bullies.

Though the film highlighted many teen issues, the dialogue often felt way too mature. This came across in the musical numbers as well. Granted, many teens today feel as if they know everything, but they're still very immature beings- which makes them intriguing subjects. This film, in its mission to replicate "high school musical" I guess, missed this mark terribly. Other than being cute, these kids lack real depth.

A lot of reviewers on here have commented on how the film is a sanitized version of the stage play. Perhaps this is the overarching issue (I haven't seen the stage play, so can't say for sure).

The acting's pretty good but subpar in some scenes, although the kids do a really good job for their first lead/supporting roles! It portrays high school nowadays pretty well. The soundtrack has some good tunes and the casting is diverse without it being forced.

But these things can't fix the main issues of this movie. The pacing is fast and quite off-putting; songs after songs can be tiring, relationships fluctuate every scene, you name it. The dialogue can be a bit forced and dramatic at times. There are also a bunch of weird cinematography & editing choices within this movie that I can't bother getting into.

Evan's Jewish identity also gets quite undermined in this movie, which was a huge part of the story both in the musical and in the book. Most parts of the movie also say a lot of things about Jewish culture (bar mitzvahs being parties and nothing more) which aren't necessarily true.

All in all, a decent movie that had a lot of potential but failed to meet it.

I do not accept this as a movie adaptation of 13 The Musical. I really love the stage production because it's super funny and has so many great songs. This movie was not funny at all. In some weird effort to make the movie more family friendly than the stage production, the writers of the movie changed a lot of the funny lyrics and lines which provides no jokes and no laughs. The show is called 13, it was originally written to be PG-13, not PG.

Another complaint I have is how the movie changed a lot of the songs and cut all of the really good ones. They changed lyrics and added verses. Like babes, WE DID NOT have to add a rap verse to Opportunity, it's already good on its own. They shortened my favorite song Getting Ready from 4 minutes to 1 minute. And in that 1 minute, they cut all of the amazing harmonies and overlapping parts. Not only did they cut verses, they cut ENTIRE SONGS. To list a few: Becoming A Man, Hey Kendra, Get Me What I Need, WHAT IT MEANS TO BE A FRIEND <3, All Hail The Brain, Terminal Illness, Any Minute, It Can't Be True, and IF THATS WHAT IT IS! I love all of these songs dearly, so please go listen to them instead of watching this movie.

Even worse than cutting these songs, replacing them with the worst songs I've ever heard. The one between Brett and Kendra was right out of the movie Trolls and the duet between Evan and his mom had me almost falling asleep from not caring.

They also changed the music production to try to have a more modern sound, but it just sounded like a cringey video of 8 year olds on youtube trying to sing some olivia rodrigo song. The acoustic guitar and piano of the original music created a coming of age feel, and now there is just too much reverb for me to take the music seriously.

Another thing, they added the mom/dad as actual characters?? And with the most boring storylines ever?? One of the cool things about the stage production is that it's all kids, no adults, so I thought that was weird. But the grandma slayed so I'm not mad about that.

I had been looking forward to this movie since it was announced, and I was so disappointed. I was about to turn it off but then Bad Bad News started playing. That song is the one reason why I gave this movie 2 stars. It was amazing, it did the original justice, and I loved it so much.

And there is your very opinionated review from a theatre loser who loves this show (the staged production) so much.