It’s all over for Surf The Musical. That’s the word coming from multiple, credible sources in Strip entertainment circles. Cast members allegedly just got their two-week notice for the bloated extravaganza that basically consisted of wall-to-wall Beach Boys songs, with little Band Aids of dialogue to feebly bind them together … and sometimes not even that. It was evident the show was in trouble when “twofer” offers went out to locals in the show’s second week. When you’re discounting deeply to locals for a show that’s supposed to pull in the tourists, it’s a Very, Very, Bad Thing. For all the heavy propping in the Las Vegas Review-Journal, itinerant R-J reviewer Carol Cling could do no better than to damn Surf with faint praise. (A good thing they were spared the all-but-certain wrath of the R-J‘s drama critic Anthony del Valle, who takes no prisoners.) Jacob Coakley of the Las Vegas Weekly really nailed Surf‘s failings. Despite three weeks of preview performances, Surf was in ‘show doctor’ mode well past opening night.
Of course, what ultimately did Surf in — and Planet Hollywood‘s Web site shows no performances past Aug. 19 — was the cynical, camp low-sensibility of director Kristin Hanggi (who clearly wasn’t around for the Sixties), aggravated by 
garish production design that stank to the eye. The flippant attitude of the production team suggested a closed-feedback loop of people telling each other how awesome they were. The tissue-thin nature and “tab” format of Surf also strongly suggested contempt for the Vegas audience and condescension toward it. Audiences here can suss out a dog and it didn’t take them long to send Surf to the pound.
Considering the money spent and the technical resources deployed, Surf surely counts as the biggest showbiz failure in Strip history. Finally, and perhaps most fatally of all, Surf aimed at the wrong demographics. Its eye-candy cast was clearly meant for the Justin Bieber generation (which probably wouldn’t know “Good Vibrations” from “Stardust Memories”) but most people who remember the heyday of the Beach Boys are probably in their sixties by now, if not older. Eighties rock rules the Las Vegas Strip — try to find a casino or buffet that doesn’t play it — and Surf reached back a generation too far in its lowest-common-denominator commerciality. So long, Surf. You won’t be missed.
