Nancy Walker and Harold Lang in Look Ma, I’m Dancin’!
Welcome back to the site! Why don’t you stay for the night? I could show you my favourite obsession…. Well, it isn’t The Rocky Horror Show. That’s not a forgotten musical. On the other hand, Look Ma, I’m Dancin’! is, one that is so charming that it would be churlish not to shine the spotlight on it here.
Look Ma, I’m Dancin’! is a show that is little more than a footnote on the careers of a whole bunch of entertainment industry legends. Composer-lyricist Hugh Martin had already been nominated for two Academy Awards for his contributions to Meet Me in St Louis and Good News. Book-writers Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee would go on to write the Broadway classic, Mame. Producer-director George Abbott was in the middle of his extraordinary career, while co-director and choreographer Jerome Robbins would go on to help create a string of Broadway classics like West Side Story, Gypsy and Fiddler on the Roof, having already had significant success with On the Town.
While the show wasn’t a great hit, at least it didn’t flop. Although it closed within six months after 188 performances at the Adelphi Theatre in New York, it turned a small profit. Listening to the delightful cast recording makes one wonder why the show has slipped into obscurity because if it has nothing else, Look Ma, I’m Dancin’! has the most wonderful score. There are a number of high points: the characterful tour de force “Gotta Dance,” the hilarious novelty song “I’m the First Girl,” and the jaunty “Shauny O’Shay” among them. Every song is charming and the performances from Harold Lang, Nancy Walker, Sandra Deel and Bill Shirley are fantastic. And yet, Martin felt that the songs he wrote didn’t represent his best efforts and were – in his words – ‘OK.’ He attributed this to his knowledge that he had written some great tunes upfront and that he ‘relaxed a little’ when writing the rest. See the liner notes from the cast album for more details on that.
One also wonders how the Lawrence and Lee book landed? With some autobiographical elements contributed by Robbins, who had already pitched his original ideas to Arthur Laurents, the show follows the wacky misadventures of an heiress who uses the money from the Milwaukee brewery she has inherited to produce a ballet for herself. This puts her on a collision course with an egotistical dancer and choreographer, who is helping to shake up the ballet in his own way. It does recall the joyous comic nonsense of shows from the twenties, so were Lawrence and Lee not able to tailor the free-wheeling content to the taste of audiences in the late 1940s? Would Laurents have brought things together in a way that would have propelled Look Ma, I’m Dancin! to the status of other musical comedy classics? Or was Look Ma, I’m Dancin’ a casualty of the post-Oklahoma! push for integration?
Whatever the reason, it’s a pity this show hasn’t been rediscovered, even if only for a staged concert or something of that nature. If you haven’t listened to the score before, catch some of the highlights in the playlist below – then share your thoughts in the comments section. You won’t regret it!
Mirrors are powerful symbols in Tommy. Just what can he see in them?
March 2022 at Musical Cyberspace is all about songs with people’s names in the title.
The Who’s Tommy features several name songs, but none is as simple and all the more interesting for that than “Tommy, Can You Hear Me?” This is especially true in The Who’s original version of the song, which transports its listeners to – please forgive me, Pete Townshend – the summer of ’69. Those guitars just take you back in time.
When it comes to the stage show from the 1990s, the song is sung by some local lads as they accompany Tommy back from the street to his home after a doctor’s appointment. The kicker comes when the 10-year-old Tommy appears in the mirror, echoing the calling of his name. It’s a super moment that pays off well theatrically. This is somewhat different from the rendition of the song in the 1975 film in which Ann-Margaret, who plays Tommy’s mother, shows just how willing she was to give it her all, even more so as the number escalates into “Smash the Mirror.”
If you’re keen to share your thoughts on “Tommy, Can You Hear Me?”, then head on to the comment box at the end of this post. Feel free to browse through the playlist of various versions of the number as you do!
Viviane Blaine and Sam Levene in the original Guys and Dolls.
March 2022 at Musical Cyberspace is all about songs with people’s names in the title.
“Adelaide’s Lament” is a fantastic character piece. Crafted by Frank Loesser for the 1950 musical Guys and Dolls, the song helps to define precisely who the character is, an insecure, neurotic showgirl with pretensions to intellectualism, and it does so in a way that makes us simultaneously laugh and feel sympathetic for her. Vivian Blaine put an indelible stamp on the song as its original performer and, many recordings of the show later, it’s only Faith Prince that offers any real competition for a definitive reading of the song.
There is, of course, a range of takes on the song on studio albums, from concerts and on social media challenges, including performances by the likes of Barbra Streisand, Jessie Mueller and Megan Mullally. Check some of those out in the playlist below.
Keen to share your thoughts on “Adelaide’s Lament”? Is there a particular version to which you’re married? Head on to the comment box at the end of this post.
The original Broadway cast of Sweeney Todd. Attend their tale.
March 2022 at Musical Cyberspace is all about songs with people’s names in the title.
Written by Stephen Sondheim as the theme tune for Sweeney Todd, “The Ballad of Sweeney Todd” is a moody piece of work that establishes the milieu against which the action takes place. It’s also a great conceptual piece that tells the audience what the show will be about. While the song appears on most recordings of the show, the performance of the tune as captured by the original Broadway cast tops the bill. It’s truly effortless and organic and therefore, the one that is the most thrilling.
“The Ballad of Sweeney Todd” also has a number of reinterpretations, including Lea Delaria’s jazzy take on the number, Eleri Ward’s folk-indie interpretation and Dee Snyder’s thrilling metal adaptation of this piece. Take a scroll through the YouTube playlist below to enjoy a range of different iterations of the song.
Keen to share your thoughts on “The Ballad of Sweeney Todd?” What’s your favourite recording? Head on to the comment box at the end of this post.
Three iconic Jerome Robbins shows: Gypsy, West Side Story and Fiddler on the Roof
Today is the anniversary of the opening of Jerome Robbins’ Broadway, the great revue showcasing iconic numbers from shows that Jerome Robbins either directed or choreographed. Jerome Robbins’ Broadway won six Tony Awards, including a fifth Best Director nod for Robbins himself, and ran for 633 performances. To commemorate this anniversary, this week’s Saturday List takes a look at the five best Robbins shows, all of which were featured in this iconic production.
5. The King and I
The King and I is one of those classics that sits on the edge of a knife. In a world where we recognise the damage that colonialism has done to people in countries around the globe, a show that tells the story of a king who is resisting colonialism might seem like an easy win. The thing is that The King and I tells King Mongkut’s story from the perspective of Anna Leonowens, a British woman whose political influence makes it seem like she’s doing the job from the inside. Bartlett Sher did a fantastic job of walking the treacherous path of putting this show on in a twenty-first-century context, but it is difficult to get away from what is woven into the writing. Still, the score from Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II gives us some classic Broadway songs, of which the choreography-driven showpiece “The Small House of Uncle Thomas” is seen in Jerome Robbins’ Broadway alongside “Shall We Dance?”
4. On the Town
On the surface, On the Town is what they call a bop, but it is a musical comedy from the 1940s that packs a punch even today in a world that continues to be torn apart by war. With Jerome Robbins’s own ballet Fancy Free serving as a basis, Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden and Adolph Green fashioned a show that doesn’t show the audience any of the major events of World War II. Nobody dies. There isn’t a great battle on stage. And yet, the sense of the war permeates every second from the joyous “New York, New York” through the plaintive “Some Other Time,” both of which are showcased in Jerome Robbins’ Broadway. The way it reflects so much about the world through inference is pure genius.
3. Fiddler on The Roof
I’m sure there are some of you, dear readers, who will have qualms about Joseph Stein, Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick’s masterpiece ranking only third on this list, but what is a show queen to do when three such legendary shows as these appear in one body of work? Fiddler on The Roof is great because it just works anywhere and everywhere. It doesn’t matter whether you’re Jewish or not, because the story is universal and resonates beyond its cultural specifics because of the integrity with which it handles that very specificity. Jerome Robbins’ Broadway revisited some of the high points of this show in an extended sequence consisting of “Tradition,” “The Dream,” “Sunrise, Sunset” and the “Wedding Dance.”
2. West Side Story
West Side Story, which was showcased in an extended sequence in Jerome Robbins’ Broadway, is a landmark musical. It was a show that brought Broadway up to the minute in 1957 and even though we look at it now through a different lens, where we acknowledge its shortcomings in not being created with an authentic Puerto Rican perspective, it remains a piece of theatre that has a great deal to teach about prejudice and systemic racism. Beyond that, it is just so moving, with the marriage of Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim’s perfectly deepening moments set up in Arthur Laurents’s book. Is it possible today not to start weeping for Maria as soon as the opening bars of “Something’s Coming” strike up?
1. Gypsy
It’s not difficult to place a show in the top spot because Gypsy, quite simply put, is a perfect show. Arthur Laurents’s book perfectly crafts a legend around the story about ‘Madame Rose… and her daughter, Gypsy,’ while Jule Styne and Stephen Sondheim punctuate it with one of the greatest scores ever written for a musical, period. Every number achieves something in this show and it gave us both “Some People” and “Rose’s Turn!” In Jerome Robbins’ Broadway, we are treated to “You Gotta Get a Gimmick,” a great comic number in which Mazeppa, Electra and Tessie Tura teach Louise everything they know about stripping. Something wrong with stripping? Well, maybe there’s something wrong with your bumper!
Robbins was, of course, involved in many other shows that haven’t made this list. The Ethel Merman extravaganza Call Me Madam and the joyous Bells are Ringing. There are also several shows on which he worked, uncredited, as a show doctor and instances like The Pajama Game, which he co-directed, with George Abbott and Bob Fosse doing the heavy lifting. There’s also Peter Pan, perhaps more famous as a television production than a Broadway show, as well as the minor pieces, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, High Button Shoes and Billion Dollar Baby. But if we’re really going for an honourable mention here, that goes to Look Ma, I’m Dancin’!, which offers one of the most charming forgotten scores of the 1940s. How about rediscovering that show for a revival today?
Any thoughts you’d like to share about Robbins’ work? Head on to the comments section and sound off!
This Friday I bring to you the forgotten musical; One Touch of Venus. When I stumbled on this little gem (looking for some comedic golden-age songs that I could sing), I was thoroughly entertained and amused while listening to the score and reading the libretto. I have definitely received a Touch of Venus and hope that you can too!
Very loosely based off of the myth of Pygmalion, One Touch of Venus, a romantic comedy of errors, was quite successful on Broadway with a run of 567 performances. Unfortunately for this musical debuting in 1943, it was largely overshadowed by a game-changing musical that also hit Broadway that year- Oklahoma!
With a script by Ogden Nash and S.J. Perelman, One Touch of Venus tells the story of a fairly normal barber named Rodney Hatch who is engaged to his domineering and cruel fiancé, Gloria. Rodney, visiting a local art museum, is overcome by the beauty of a statue of Venus that is on display. He slips his engagement ring onto the finger of the Venus statue and from that point, his life turns upside down. The statue of Venus turns into a real woman who immediately falls in love with Rodney. Rodney, being engaged, tries to lose Venus, but she does not give up without a fight. What follows is a series of comical events as Rodney ditches his fiancé of five years for Venus, Venus then magically sending Gloria to the North Pole and Rodney getting suspected of stealing the Venus statue and the murder of his wife. The script is refreshingly hilarious thanks to Nash, who was known for his light-hearted and humorous poetry at the time. The plot takes you on a wild ride of ups and downs and a bit of absurdity sprinkled in between; it reminded me a bit of the chaos of Mel Brooks’s The Producers.
Nash was also responsible for the lyrics and thus the songs are also a source of good chuckles as well as very clever and playful lyrics. A song where Nash’s playfulness really shines is “How Much I Love You,” where Rodney goes on a comparison spree to show how much he loves Gloria. The lyrics are accompanied by a score written by Kurt Weill, who was best known for his play with music, The Threepenny Opera. The sound of One Touch of Venus felt a bit more contemporary than I expected and gave me hints of Stephen Sondheim and even sometimes a bit of Alan Menken?! I can’t quite place my finger on it but either way, it was a hit with audiences back then. The big hit out of the show was the song “Speak Low,” which has since been covered by several famous singers including Barbara Streisand. Another song from this musical, “I’m A Stranger Here Myself,” was highlighted by a cover by Kristen Chenoweth.
The musical was adapted to film in 1948, where a couple of things were changed about the characters, story and score. This did not serve the movie well, however, and it was met with mediocre reviews. Since the film was made, One Touch of Venus has been restaged a couple of times but has largely been forgotten.
This musical is a small gem of a golden age musical theatre comedy that, with a bit of “TLC” and a contemporary lyric rewrite here and there, could easily see a successful revival on Broadway so that everyone could experience One Touch of Venus.
Have you listened to One Touch of Venus? What do you think? Share your ideas in the comment box below!
With Valentine’s Day that just passed the world is still in the afterglow of red hearts, flowers and decorations used to celebrate this love-filled day. For a lot of people, however, this day can be a cruel reminder of heartbreak, hurt and scorn. This list is for all those who have loved, lost and decided to shoot Cupid’s arrow right back at him.
1. “Burn” from Hamilton
After Alexander cheats on his wife, Eliza, and then tells the world about it to clear his name, Eliza is left in heartbreak and ruin. In “Burn,” Eliza reminisces about their love and grieves the husband she has lost as she burns the many love letters that Alexander wrote to her. Going from the burn in her heart when she first fell in love, to the burning of the letters and then finally her hope that he, himself, will burn for what he has done to her and their family, Eliza writes Alexander off and ‘erases herself out of the narrative.’ I am sure she speaks the truth of many who have been the victims of unfaithful partners.
2. “All I Ask Of You (Reprise)” from Phantom of the Opera
“All I Ask of You” is probably the most well-known love duet by Andrew Lloyd Webber, with Raoul promising to protect Christine from the Phantom and both of them confirming their love for each other. The reprise to this beautiful duet, however, has the Phantom looking on as Christine ‘denies and betrays’ his love for her. As the first act closer, this song is a turning point for the Phantom as his heartbreak and jealousy turn to rage and he swears to take his revenge on everyone who has wronged him. I think we can all relate to this feeling of unreciprocated love and the feelings of rejection, hurt and even anger that goes with it.
3. “On My Own” from Les Misérables
In Les Mis, Éponine is also suffering from the hurt caused by unreciprocated love. Éponine falls in love with her best friend, Marius, as they grow up. She soon realizes, however, that Marius won’t ever feel the same way. What hurts more is that Marius does care for Éponine, but as a dear friend and nothing more. When Cosette and Marius’ love starts to blossom, Éponine’s heart is shattered. As a last effort to be with him, she disguises herself as a boy to fight next to him at the barricade. Marius discovers her and wanting to protect her, he sends her away with a letter for Cosette. Wandering the streets of Paris, Éponine dreams of being loved by Marius, knowing that this will never be a reality. In modern terms, you could say Éponine was “friend-zoned” and “On My Own” shows that even though it doesn’t seem so bad to friend-zone someone, it does still hurt – sometimes more than flat out rejection.
4. “Still Hurting” from The Last Five Years
Jamie decides to move on and Cathy is left hurting. The Last Five Years introduces Cathy at the peak of her heartbreak while telling the story from the opposite perspective (Jamie meeting Cathy) at the same time. In “Still Hurting,” Cathy shares how Jamie seemingly just dropped her and left with no hurt or regret. This is oftentimes how it feels in a breakup – that you are the only one that is suffering a loss while the other person is out enjoying their best life. But as The Last Five Years shows us, there are always two sides to the break-up story – and sometimes there is no right or wrong side.
5. “Mr Cellophane” from Chicago
Ever felt invisible in a relationship? Well, Amos Hart definitely does and expresses this feeling in the quirky, seemingly light-hearted “Mr Cellophane.” Having been ignored and in all sense of the word forgotten by his wife, Roxie, Amos tries to get her attention by stating he is the father of her (unbeknownst to him) fake child. He is however shut down by Billy Flynn who tells him that he can’t be the father since he hadn’t slept with his wife in more than four months. Feeling betrayed, forgotten and ‘see-through,’ Amos compares himself to ‘unimpressive’ and ‘undistinguished’ cellophane. Unlike Amos, it is sometimes better to know your worth and cut off those who make you feel invisible.
6. “Someone Else’s Story” from Chess
Depending on what version of the musical you watch, you will either see Svetlana or Florence lament their loss of love – Svetlana the loss of her husband, Anatoli, and Florence her loss of Freddie. In both cases (even though the lyrics are slightly altered) the root of the song stays the same: reminiscing about a girl who met a boy, fell in love and had her heart broken by a man who changed and forgot about her. They both wish they could warn that girl who foolishly fell in love and tell her to walk away and spare her from the hurt. The twist, of course, is that they are singing about themselves. They don’t want to associate with this story that they are telling and thus distance themselves by singing ‘someone else’s story.’ Sometimes it is easier to just escape the pain by simply removing yourself from it, but one day you must realize the hurt from every broken heart is part of your own story.
7. “Getting Married Today” from Company
For some, the idea of marriage seems unnecessary and for others simply horrifying. A lot of the time the fear only seems to set in the day of the marriage, i.e. cold feet. In this vignette from Company, Amy (or Jamie in the recent revival) is stuck in the midst of a cold-feet-freak-out. While being serenaded by their future husband, Paul, they quickly start to spiral in a perfectly pattered word vomit about all their fears of marriage, like potentially ruining a wonderful husband like Paul, losing their identity in marriage or simply realizing that they married a ‘nut-job.’ So the song barrels through to the point that Amy/Jamie calls off this wedding and storms out. Love is a strong commitment and marriage seems to make that commitment very official, too official for some. So if you find yourself in the shoes of Amy or Jamie just remember; in the end, marriage or not, what is most important is retaining that love that the relationship started with.
8. “Forget About The Boy” from Thoroughly Modern Millie
After being kissed by and seemingly cheated on by Jimmy in one night, Millie is through with him and tells this to her co-workers at Sincere Trust. They give her the advice just to ‘forget about the boy’ and so Millie tries to do exactly that, convincing herself that Jimmy is no good. Soon the rest of her co-workers join in and sing about their own mister wrongs and how they are all much better off without them. A very important part of the breakup process is the last step of acceptance and letting go. Even though Millie does end up with Jimmy, “Forget About The Boy” is still a great anthem for those who broke up and are ready for someone better.
9. “Without You” from My Fair Lady
Eliza Doolittle is taken in by professor Higgens to be “made proper” and to speak like a lady. This process proves to be very difficult and even though they succeed, no recognition is given to Eliza. Insulted and hurt, Eliza leaves Higgins’ house. Later on, Higgins out of confusion complains that women are too irrational and emotional and states that men are the superior sex. The song that follows is Eliza finally standing up to the egotistical and misogynistic Higgens, saying that she’s realized that he isn’t the beginning and the end and stating all the things that will continue existing without his presence. Higgens tries to turn this argument in his favour saying that he has finally made a true woman out of Eliza, but Eliza simply leaves saying that he would not be seeing her again. Eliza found her worth in herself and left the person she once adored to find someone who will truly appreciate her.
10. “In Love With You” from First Date
Casey is traumatized by his past relationship having been left at the altar by his fiancé, Allison. With the help of the girl he is currently on a date with, Casey tries an exercise where he actually breaks up with his ex since he never got the chance to say to her what he felt. In this subverted rock love-ballad, Casey goes off, listing everything he hated about his ex and finally overcomes the trauma of the relationship. Sometimes we harbour feelings towards people in our past without realizing it and this affects our current relationships. Having a chance to vent those feelings and get rid of them is crucial to getting over that ex and moving on!
And there you have it, my top ten picks for best anti-love songs in the musical theatre world and some added relationship advice that came to me as I was writing it. If you have any other good anti-love songs to suggest or good break-up advice, please make yourself heard in the comments down below!
Another Friday, another forgotten Rodgers and Hart gem from the 1920s. This week, it’s all about Peggy-Ann, one of the six shows that would credit Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart as composer and lyricist respectively in 1926. We’ve already taken a look at The Girl Friend and Lido Lady, while two revues – The Fifth Avenue Follies, a new version of The Garrick Gaieties – had also made their bow. Their final show of the year, Betsy, would open the day after Peggy-Ann premiered. Quite a busy year!
Historians are inclined to frame Peggy-Ann as a twist on Alice in Wonderland, although given its American nature, I’m inclined to think of it more as a distant cousin of The Wizard of Oz. This is due to the use of an extended dream sequence that was central to the story of the titular heroine, whose everyday life was, like so many Cinderella-type heroines of the 1920s, characterised by drudgery. In this case, Peggy-Ann works in her mother’s boarding house and dreams of a better life for herself, which includes a marriage to her boyfriend, who is a grocery store clerk. By the time the dream sequence ended and the curtain fell, nothing much had happened other than Peggy-Ann making up her mind to go for it.
Peggy-Ann was scripted by Herbert Fields, who based the tale on a 1910 musical called Tillie’s Nightmare, which his father, Lew Fields, had produced. Written by Alfred Baldwin Sloane, John Golden and Edgar Smith, Tillie’s Nightmare had been a star vehicle for Marie Dressler, who would go on to star in a film adaptation alongside Charlie Chaplin and Mabel Normand under the direction of Mack Sennett. Dressler would go on to star in three sequels, Chaplin would become one of the greatest film legends of all time and Normand and Sennett would become the subjects of the Jerry Herman musical Mack and Mabel. There are incredible intersections between showbiz greats when you dive into the world of Peggy-Ann.
Peggy-Ann was also a show of firsts – or at least of significant lapses from the traditions of the time. The opening chorus that was a staple of 1920s musicals was cast aside in favour of fifteen minutes of dialogue before the show’s first number. The chorus girls were used to establish the situation and plot when they arrived. Also, dream sequences weren’t really a feature of musical theatre at the time and would continue to be an underused mode of storytelling until Kurt Weill, Ira Gershwin and Moss Hart’s Lady in the Dark in 1941 and Rodgers’s own exploitation of the conceit in collaboration with Oscar Hammerstein II in 1943’s Oklahoma!
Two hit songs emerged from the show, “A Tree in the Park” and “Where’s That Rainbow?” The latter has perhaps kept the memory of the show alive, albeit faintly, thanks to its inclusion in the 1949 film, Words and Music, and several cover versions by the likes of Barbra Streisand and Betty Buckley. These and other highlights from the score are available to hear in the playlist at the end of this post. The 42nd Street Moon company in San Francisco also revived the show in a staged concert version in 2002.
Perhaps the biggest win for Rodgers and Hart was the critical response to Peggy-Ann, which ran for 333 performances. Reviews of the time referred to them as a modern Gilbert and Sullivan, indicating that they were now a known quantity on the Broadway scene even as they continued to refine their approach and style.
Want to add your own thoughts about Peggy-Ann? Share your ideas in the comment box below!
Nobody I know enjoys dating. In fact, everyone I know who is married or in a stable relationship constantly seems to go on about how glad they are that they don’t have to date anymore. Of course, that seems to indicate that bad dates come around more often than good dates. But experience tells us that there are good dates to be had. And so do musicals. So let’s take a look at ten great musical theatre dates – just in time for Valentine’s Day – all of which are available to see in the YouTube playlist at the end of the post.
1. Carousel
The bench scene in Carousel is a landmark scene in musical theatre history, owing to Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II’s seamless integration of scene and song. But it’s also a great date, and arguably the high point of Billy Bigelow and Julie Jordan’s relationship. While blossoms are falling and stars twinkling, Billy and Julie can’t help but wonder what would happen if they loved one another, having already lost their hearts to one another.
2. South Pacific
South Pacific starts off with a great date. Nellie Forbush is visiting Emile de Becque. She is a naive US Navy nurse and he is a worldly French plantation owner. Having met on the island in the South Pacific where Nellie is stationed, Emile wines and dines the young nurse and in the blink of an eye, she’s gone from being “A Cockeyed Optimist” to understanding just about everything “Some Enchanted Evening” can provide. Of course, they have a whole lot of Nellie’s ingrained racism to work through, but if anything can shift your beliefs that the world isn’t what you thought it was, it’s a war.
3. Guys and Dolls
Sarah Brown doesn’t know what’s waiting in store for her in Havana. On the arm of Sky Masterson, she falls in love for the first time to the sound of some pulsating Latin American rhythms. Loosened up after knocking back a few Dulce de Leches, she even survives a bar brawl and comes up singing about what she would do if she were a bell. The film version jettisons the subsequent lush and heady “I’ve Never Been in Love Before” in favour of a new song by Frank Loesser, “A Woman in Love”, which has its own merits, but would never work in the stage show. This has to be one of the greatest nights out for a couple in the musical theatre canon.
4. The King and I
Rodgers and Hammerstein were great at date nights, it seems. In The King and I, things get going at a ball hosted by the King of Siam for some British visitors who are in dire need of being convinced that his country is not a barbaric one. Mrs Anna Leonowens dances with Sir Edward Ramsay at the ball, which puts the King’s nose out of joint – but only long enough for him to convince her that he needs to learn the polka. Before you can say count to ‘and’, the ballroom is brimming with sexual tension as Mrs Anna confronts her desire for what post-colonialists might term the ‘erotic exotic.’ What a pity it is, then, when the King’s guards arrive with Tuptim just as things are about to get interesting.
5. West Side Story
He’s just met a girl named “Maria”, but that doesn’t stop Tony from calling at her home and climbing up her fire escape for a late-night rendezvous. Maria doesn’t mind, of course, because she’s the Juliet to his Romeo and they don’t know what lies in store for them yet. For now, the giddiness of “Tonight” will suffice. Admit it, you’d also be seduced if there were are ‘suns and moons all over the place’. Like Stephen Sondheim himself, you might not admit that ‘the world is just an address’ (cringe) that was ‘no better than all right’ (cringe) – but at least Leonard Bernstein’s soaring music might distract you from that rather awkward analogy.
6. Gypsy
Sometimes you have to wait for the kids to disappear so that you can get some quality time in with your lover. So when June and Louise run upstairs to put on their night cream, Rose and Herbie are left behind. First, they fight a little, then they dance a little, music courtesy of Jule Styne. But they are happy to accept – as Rose dictates to Herbie – that “You’ll Never Get Away From Me”, lyrics courtesy of Sondheim. And then they take home all of the silverware.
7. The Fantasticks
“Try to Remember” a time when you didn’t know what love was yet, and you’ll remember a time when you went on a date that your parents expressly forbade you to go on. You probably didn’t sing out a “Metaphor” that was a fantastic parody of operetta and musical theatre love scenes, but you probably do remember how you felt on that night, filled with the anticipation of true love’s kiss and the thrill of forbidden love. That’s what Harvey Schmidt and Tom Jones capture in this classic scene from The Fantasticks, which despite being a tiny show manages to give you two dates for the price of one! I’d tell you more about the second, but I have to run to a hideaway with my own love, because “Soon It’s Gonna Rain.”
8. Beauty and the Beast
Love at first sight was not to be for Belle and the Beast. In fact, it takes quite a bit of manoeuvring for them to get to the night of their big date, when Belle dons her iconic golden dress and the Beast dresses up and the two dance to the sound of Alan Menken and Howard Ashman’s title song. The journey to that moment takes much longer in the shamelessly padded stage version of the almost perfect film, but when Mrs Potts toots a ‘tale as old as time’ through her spout, it’s time for some first-class romance.
9. RENT
There’s only one couple really worth rooting for in RENT, and that’s Angel and Collins. Roger and Mimi have to bear the brunt of being the hetero-normative, show-thesis-crushing centre of Jonathan Larson’s musical and Maureen and Joanne’s on-again-off-again dynamic gets a bit tiresome, even if they do get a fabulous break-up song. There’s nothing quite as moving as Angel’s funeral in the second act and as Collins sings his eulogy, a ballad version of their date song, “I’ll Cover You.” you realise just how profound their love was. And it’s all because of that first, joyful, effervescent version of the song. That’s all a date has to be: coat-shopping and one helluva tune.
10. Dogfight
Here’s an example of a first date that goes really, really badly. What at first seems ‘nothing short of wonderful’ soon turns out to be anything but, when Rose realises that Eddie has brought her to a dogfight, where the marine with the ugliest date wins the pot. But, this being drama – and one with a fantastic score by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, that sets things up for reconciliation and redemption, and so we get “First Date/Last Night”, which is self-conscious and endearing and everything else you’d expect a real first date to be.
So there are ten of my picks for great musical theatre dates. How about you head down to the comments box and share some of yours?
As February trundles on, it’s time to take a look at another of the forgotten musicals created by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart during the 1920s. I’ve had such a good time with Rodgers and Hart over the past six or seven weeks that I’m inclined to stick with them for a while.
This week, I’m having a look over Lido Lady (1926), which was different from the previous Rodgers and Hart musicals for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it was a project that had its origins in London. Jack Hulbert was planning to produce a play as a vehicle for his wife, Cicely Courtneidge, and himself. He wanted songs with an American flavour because the music of No, No, Nanette and Lady, Be Good was trending like a viral hashtag in London and so he hired Rodgers and Hart to write some material for the show. This was all the more remarkable because the pair had yet to have a hit in London, a city that had not seen productions of Dearest Enemy or The Girl Friend. Secondly, the script had already been written, so Rodgers and Hart were seeking out and writing for obvious song spots rather than creating original material with a collaborator as they went along or even tailoring previous songs to fit new situations as they had done before.
As per tradition when it came to musical comedies in the 1920s, Lido Lady didn’t amount to much plot-wise. Set in Venice, on the Lido, Fay Blake is the tennis-playing daughter of a wealthy sports goods manufacturer. Amidst all sorts of romantic shenanigans, there is some business about a tennis ball design going missing – and that’s about it.
Added to the songs Rodgers and Hart composed for the piece were “It All Depends on You” from Buddy de Sylva, Lew Brown and Ray Henderson’s Big Boy and “Tomorrow the Skies May Be Gray (But Not Today)” by Con Conrad. One of the highlights of the score was “Try Again Tomorrow,” which was a duet for Courtneidge and Hulbert, who played siblings in the show. It’s a catchy and witty little number that elicits an easy chuckle – Just a couple of minutes of unadulterated fun.
Rodgers and Hart also interpolated “Here in My Arms” from Dearest Enemy into Lido Lady. In fact, several songs bounced between various Rodgers and Hart projects of this period, partly because they were juggling so many projects as they hustled through the roaring twenties. Those easy shifts made me wonder why there hasn’t been a Rodgers and Hart equivalent of My One and Only, Crazy For You or Nice Work if You Can Get It. There seems to be so much material to re-envision. It’s difficult to argue for any kind of respect for the much-maligned 1920s musicals, even the ones that do hold together relatively well – but it seems that so much of what Rodgers and Hart did during this decade has been written off wholesale. Of course, there are some 1920s shows that can’t be revived for anything but pure historical interest and that’s just the way it is. Some things are meant for history books or historical reconstructions – but I can’t help wonder if there’s a missed opportunity here.
Another interesting aspect of the Lido Lady journey was the criticism that was aimed by the British critics at Hart’s lyrics, particularly at the more inventive wordplay in pursuit of rhyme, which they viewed as nonsensical, or at lyrics that required a performer to distort the word to fit the musical line, something that also happened in the pursuit of a rhyme on the page. I found this intriguing as Hart’s reputation as a lyricist appears to be based less on his technical craft but on his often cynical tone, humour and the pathos created through the apparent encoding of his life experiences into his lyrics. Perhaps that’s a good topic for a deep dive here on Musical Cyberspace sometime down the line.
Want to add your own thoughts about Lido Lady? Share your thoughts in the comment box below. While you’re doing that, check out the YouTube playlist below, which includes some of the musical highlights from the show in various forms as well as some silent film footage of the original stage production.
Musical Cyberspace 