May Madness: Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “I Want” Songs

Posted on May 3, 2011 by David Fick
THE MUSICALITY OF RODGERS AND HAMMERSTEIN

To purchase the THE MUSICALITY OF RODGERS AND HAMMERSTEIN, click on the image above.

May is a mad month. A month of random musings about various topics related to musical theatre. Feel free to share your thoughts on each topic in the comment box below.

Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “I Want” Songs

The “I Want song” is a song category that gained a huge amount of street cred when it was re-popularised by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman in their movie musicals for Disney. Yet the term is perhaps wider than people generally understand it to be from the way it has been used in The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin. Bob Fosse, who coined it, meant the term to refer to any song that reveals a characters desires and it’s the variations on the formula that make the songs and the shows they come from unique and interesting. Otherwise, one is just stuck with a formula, a child’s set of building blocks rather than the expert architecture of a virtuoso theatremaker.

So for the sheer sake of making a list, here are some of the Rodgers and Hammerstein contributions to the list, theme and variation:

  • “Out of my Dreams” – Oklahoma!
  • “Mister Snow”, “When the Children Are Asleep” and “The Highest Judge of All” – Carousel
  • “It Might as Well Be Spring” – State Fair
  • “So Far” – Allegro
  • “Twin Soliloquies” and “There is Nothing Like a Dame” – South Pacific
  • “A Puzzlement” and “We Kiss in a Shadow” – The King and I
  • “A Very Special Day” – Me and Juliet
  • “Everybody’s Got a Home But Me” – Pipe Dream
  • “In My Own Little Corner” – Cinderella
  • “Sunday” – Flower Drum Song
  • “The Sound of Music” – The Sound of Music

Any others you’d like to add?

Posted in Alan Menken, Howard Ashman, Oscar Hammerstein II, Richard Rodgers | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

May Madness: Is Bobby Gay?

Posted on May 2, 2011 by David Fick
COMPANY

To purchase the Original Broadway Cast Recording of COMPANY, click on the image above.

May is a mad month. A month of random musings about various topics related to musical theatre. Feel free to share your thoughts on each topic in the comment box below.

Is Bobby Gay?

Stephen Sondheim says no. Arthur Laurents says yes – even though it’s George Furth’s book, not his. Some people say it doesn’t matter. But of course it matters.

Company isn’t a coming out story. If it were, the show wouldn’t be focused on Bobby’s observations on the marriages of his friends, it would be focused on something else. If Bobby is avoiding making a commitment to one of the women in his life because he’s gay – put otherwise, simply because he’d rather be in a relationship with a man – then the point of the show is moot. Bobby is afraid of the idea of commitment, of losing himself within the dynamic of marriage. That’s why he doesn’t commit to one of the many women in his life, not because he’s gay. If being gay was the reason for Bobby’s reluctance to marry a woman, then we’d have a different play on our hands. Unless we also saw him struggling with the idea of commitment within a male-male relationship too, the show would not be able to make the meaning it was intended to make – and there simply isn’t enough in the text as written to support that kind of a reading.

So, no, Bobby is not gay.

Where do you stand on the issue? Offer your opinions in the comment box, please!

Posted in Arthur Laurents, George Furth, Stephen Sondheim | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

May Madess: Are Darker Musicals Better?

Posted on May 1, 2011 by David Fick
PHANTOM FANTASTICKS

THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA and THE FANTASTICKS: is the obviously "darker" show the better one?

May is a mad month. A month of random musings about various topics related to musical theatre. Feel free to share your thoughts on each topic in the comment box below.

Are Darker Musicals Better?

I have heard plenty of people articulate, generally erroneously, the idea that “darker is better” when it comes to any kind of form of literature or perfomance. Some people seem to think that “darker” stories are better stories, that they are better told stories (in musicals, this might equate to having a book and score that are better integrated) or that they are more emotionally engaging stories.

This is a problem that is, I think, tied up to some extent in the history of musical theatre. Historically, the older musical comedies were not seamless because of the nature of musical theatre at the time and I suppose it is easy to leap to the conclusion that the serious musicals that emerged after the Rodgers and Hammerstein revolution are better shows because they are serious, rather than because their books, lyrics and music are more organically linked than would have usually been the case prior to Oklahoma!.

But this is a fallacy, for there are many examples of musical comedies (as opposed to what are termed musical plays), post-1943, that are very well integrated, where the songs are seamlessly inserted into the storyline. That the characteristics of these musical comedies differ from those of the musical play doesn’t automatically make them less compelling.

What are your thoughts on the matter?

Posted in Fun Stuff, Oscar Hammerstein II, Richard Rodgers | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

30 Musicals in 30 Days: My Favourite Musical

Posted on April 30, 2011 by David Fick

Post a song from your favourite musical.

Gypsy is my favourite musical and I think it is appropriate to post the song the appears close to the top of the show that got me hooked: “Some People”. A great piece collaboration of music and lyrics by Jule Styne and Stephen Sondheim, I first saw this performed as a dance piece to the Liza Minnelli recording (the older one, not the manic one from My Favorite Broadway: The Leading Ladies), then saw it in context in the Bette Midler TV movie, then sung by Ethel Merman on LP and next by Angela Lansbury, who remains my favourite Rose to this day. I’ve heard many interpretations of this song over the years. This video plays tribute to just a few of them.

Posted in Fun Stuff, Jule Styne, Stephen Sondheim, YouTube | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

30 Musicals in 30 Days: A Musical “To Do”

Posted on April 29, 2011 by David Fick

Post a song from a musical in which you would love to be involved.

All right, so I am putting it out there. I want to direct Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Into the Woods. Next year. I have no idea how I want to do it or what it will look like or even whether the opportunity will manifest itself. But I am putting it out there.

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30 Musicals in 30 Days: A “Love to Hate” Character

Posted on April 28, 2011 by David Fick

Post a song sung by a musical character that’s so bad, cruel or evil that you love them, or sung by a musical character you love to hate.

It has to be Eva Peron, as portrayed in Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Evita. She was a bitch, said Rice, but let’s make her a fabulous bitch. Here, in the original Broadway production, is Patti LuPone getting “Rainbow High”.

Posted in Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice, YouTube | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

30 Musicals in 30 Days: Musicals for Favourite Performers

Posted on April 27, 2011 by David Fick

Post a song from a musical you’d love to see featuring/starring all your favourite performers.

This is a tough choice, because there are two shows that I’d really like to nominate here: Stephen Sondheim and James Goldman’s Follies and Michael John LaChiusa’s The Wild Party. Both are great musicals with great roles for a whole bunch of performers and I have given a shoutout to both this month. Still, The Wild Party was the more shortlived, shortchanged production and deserves a bump into the old musical theatre consicousness from time to time. Here is Toni Collette singing a number from the show:

Posted in James Goldman, Michael John LaChiusa, Stephen Sondheim, YouTube | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

30 Musicals in 30 Days: A Relatable Character

Posted on April 26, 2011 by David Fick

Post a song sung by the character in a musical with whom you can most relate.

I’m going to post “Being Alive” from Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s Company today. It’s weird how this particular song feels like a romantic idea when you’re younger, like its some kind of attainable ideal. Then you go through everything Bobby goes through, with all the perks that single life brings with it, and come out the other side understanding that it is an essential reality. Ah well, one day….

Posted in George Furth, Stephen Sondheim, YouTube | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

30 Musicals in 30 Days: Your Current Favourite Musical

Posted on April 25, 2011 by David Fick

Post a song from your current favourite.

Stephen Sondheim, Jule Styne and Arthur Laurents’s Gypsy is my all-time favourite musical. It is also my current favourite. It’s a fantastic musical, brilliantly conceived and executed. It features one of the most complex female characters in musical theatre and it is always great when another actress steps up to bat and puts her own stamp on the role.

The second-to-last major revival featured Bernadette Peters. Many disliked her in the role. Many disliked the production in which she appeared. For me, she’s not the best Rose, but she’s a long way off from the worst one. I really enjoy listening to her cast recording of the show. Here she is, boys: Bernadette doing “Rose’s Turn”, along with an overview of the production in which she appeared.

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30 Musicals in 30 Days: A Funny Musical

Posted on April 24, 2011 by David Fick

Post a song from a musical that makes you laugh.

The Book of Mormon (with book, music and lyrics credited equally to book, lyrics, and music by Trey Parker, Robert Lopez, and Matt Stone) has one of the funniest scores I have heard in a while and, when I saw it, a great deal of the show had me in tears I was laughing so hard. Yes, the book loses a momentum it never regains towards the end of the first act, with the characterful dialogue that knits the first third or so of the show together so tightly sometimes giving way to the most basic of links and song setups. Yes, the show struggles to juggle the narratives of its dual protagonists structurally. But the score is a hoot and it makes me laugh – a lot.

Posted in Fun Stuff, Matt Stone, Robert Lopez, Trey Parker, YouTube | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment