Hot takes are all over the Internet these days – and hot takes on musicals are no exception. Often, they’re pretty tame. In the Heights is a better musical than Hamilton? That’s pretty low-hanging fruit. Much better are Sweaty Oracle-level hot takes, which are often interspersed in his scalding Broadway tea posts. A lot of the time, I think, “Facts.” All in all, my hot takes aren’t likely to be as earth-shattering – but then again, I suppose that musical theatre hot takes aren’t hot currency in the bigger scheme of things. Nonetheless, here’s my attempt at a few.

The remixed Kritzerland reissue of the original Broadway cast recording of Follies makes it the best recording of the show; although it’s not as complete as other recordings, there’s no beating that original cast.

Legally Blonde deserved a nomination in the Best Musical category at the 61st Tony Awards.

David Yazbek is underappreciated as a contemporary musical theatre composer-lyricist.

Michael John LaChiusa is underrated as a contemporary musical theatre composer-lyricist.

Individual moments in The Colour Purple outshine the musical as a whole.

The Woman in White makes complete sense as a musical when you realise that it’s Andrew Lloyd Webber channelling Benjamin Britten.

Aida would have made a great rock opera, but it’s a mediocre book musical.

Cats has the same plot as A Chorus Line; criticising one but not the other is just, as the hip folk say, basic. (A Chorus Line will always be the greater of the two, but even so….)

My Fair Lady lost its social impact when it became a musical theatre piece. Lerner and Loewe transformed it into a love story, and that’s all the better for My Fair Lady.

The original Merrily We Roll Along didn’t fail because it was misunderstood by the audience; it failed because it was misunderstood by Harold Prince.

The Wild Party deserved to win Best Musical at the 54th Tony Awards, and one of the other three nomination spots in the category should have gone to Marie Christine.

Jamie Lloyd’s re-interpretation of Sunset Boulevard won Nicole Scherzinger her Tony Award; Audra McDonald’s re-interpretation of Rose should have won her the Tony Award.

If we treat the Golden Age like a museum, it will soon become a morgue.

Rigorous craft matters more than conceptual novelty, but first-class theatricality can make a musical work in spite of itself.

Musicals should challenge audiences, but not punish them; opacity presented as rigorous craft is just as bad as something that has the depth of a teaspoon.

None of these are hills I’ll die on. All right, all right, some of them are. But generally they’re more like things I’d happily argue over a cocktail, halfway through an interval or three posts deep in a group chat that’s gone off the rails. Sure, some of them kind of contradict each other, and some of them probably contradict things I’ve written elsewhere too. Sounds about right….

At any rate, if there’s a throughline to be found here, it’s not contrarianism for its own sake. It’s a belief that musical theatre is worth thinking about. Hot takes are fun, but the most fun thing about them is that they often can make you think about something more interesting than the heat itself.

Feel free to disagree with anything I’ve said here today. In fact, I hope you do – and I hope you feel free to share your hot takes too. Musical theatre is far healthier when we keep it real, preferably with specificity, curiosity and a show tune blasting in the background.