Theatre Thursday :: examples of the musical theatre Bechdel Test? (A-L)

This probably shouldn’t be called a variant of the Bechdel Test; there are plenty of musicals where women speak to each other but don’t sing duets/trios/group numbers together.  But that’s what this list is, and I don’t think there’s an official name for it, so I’m just going with it.  Also, this doesn’t count group numbers that have individual lines sung by women and men both or songs that are sung by one woman with an all-female backup.  This is just a list of lady songs.  (Girls and women who sing musical theatre are always looking for songs like this to do in concerts with friends, it is known.)  And unfortunately, while the Bechdel Test proper excludes conversations held solely about men, this list cannot do so; since such a large proportion of the musical theatre catalogue as a whole is comprised of songs about romance, not including songs about romance on this list would make it itsy bitsy.  And this is only the musicals I am familiar with from the list.  Starred* items are ones that people I know have sung publicly in the past.

Annie by Charles Strouse: “Hard Knock Life,” sung by the orphans (I think this is why so many theatrically inclined little girls like Annie, because they can all be in it with their friends).*
Bernarda Alba by Michael John LaChiusa: is 100% ladies.  It’s an all-lady cast.  And it’s weird, but it’s fabulous.
Bye Bye Birdie by Charles Strouse: “What Did I Ever See In Him?” sung by Rosie and Kim.*
Carousel by Rodgers and Hammerstein: “You’re a Queer One, Julie Jordan,” sung by Carrie and Julie.*
Chicago by Kander and Ebb: “Cell Block Tango,” sung by Velma and the merry murderesses (this counts because they all have solos), “My Own Best Friend,” sung by Roxie and Velma (not in the film).
A Chorus Line by Hamlisch and Kleban: “At the Ballet,” sung by Sheila, Bebe, and Maggie.
Fiddler on the Roof by Bock and Harnick: “Matchmaker,” sung by Hodel, Chava, and Tzeitel.*
Grease by Casey and Jacobs: “It’s Raining On Prom Night,” sung by Sandy and a radio singer.*
Hairspray by Shaiman and Wittman: “Mama, I’m a Big Girl Now,” sung by Tracy, Penny, Amber, and their mothers.*
Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim: “A Very Nice Prince,” sung by Cinderella and the Baker’s Wife.*
Legally Blonde by Benjamin and O’Keefe: “Ohmygod You Guys,” sung by Elle, Serena, Margot, Pilar and Company.*
The Light in the Piazza by Adam Guettel: “Statues and Stories,” sung by Margaret and Clara.
Little Women by Howland and Dickstein: “An Operatic Tragedy,” sung by all four sisters, “Our Finest Dreams,” sung by all four sisters, “I’d Be Delighted,” sung by Marmee, Meg, Beth, and Jo, and “Some Things Are Meant To Be,” sung by Beth and Jo.
Little Shop of Horrors by Menken and Ashman: the “Prologue,” sung by the Do-Wop Girls.*

–your fangirl heroine.

Theatre Thursday :: a play-by-play of just how functional the romances in the 10 most performed musicals by high schools are

I was looking back and I realized I hadn’t actually discussed this before, and I think it’s definitely worth doing. Using the same Playbill.com list as before.

1. Beauty and the Beast by Alan Menken, Howard Ashman, Tim Rice, and Linda Woolverton. Yes and no.  I’ve seen people accuse Belle of suffering from Stockholm syndrome, because she falls in love with the person keeping her captive; I’ve seen people joke about bestiality, for obvious reasons.  To both of these I say, reasonable concerns, but… not quite?  Belle doesn’t start to care for the Beast until he stops treating her like a prisoner and starts treating her like a person.  This doesn’t entirely invalidate the first, but it helps.  And they didn’t do any more than dance until the Beast was a person.  And they loved each other’s insides more, anyway.  And… well, it’s not perfect.  But it’s hardly the worst.

2. Seussical by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty.  A bird and an elephant fall in love.  I’ll leave it up to you to decide this one.

3. Grease by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey.  In short: ugh.  Grease has the most terrible moral message of all time: you have to change yourself to fit in with the person you love.  Danny tries to become “cool” and “normal” by joining an athletic team, which isn’t focused on that much; Sandy tries to become “rebellious” and “cool” by… wearing tight clothing?  Now, if Sandy was just dressing like that because she wanted to, because she was into it, I’d say go for it.  That’s her choice.  But stepping outside of yourself and essentially putting on an act because you think it will make you more sexually attractive to someone is just not a good idea.

4. Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim.  Most of the usual fairy tale problems ensue.  By the end, Cinderella’s prince sleeps with the Baker’s Wife, and she realizes that she shouldn’t have done that right before being killed by a giant.  Which, again, up to you to analyze.  Cinderella tells off her prince for being a cheating d-bag, so good for her.

5. Footloose by a whole bunch of people, including Tom Snow, Dean Pitchford, Kenny Loggins, and Walter Bobbie.  I’m not familiar with it, so I couldn’t say; I do know the song “Holding Out For a Hero,” which is… not really super-functional, nope.

6. The Wizard of Oz by John Kane, Howard Arlen, E. Y. Harburg, Herbert Stothart, Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allen Woolf.  Not really applicable.

7. You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown by Clark Gesner.  Again, largely not applicable.

8. The Music Man by Meredith Wilson.  Well, Harold lies to Marian from the get-go.  Marian’s whole white knight thing is problematic.  A lot of the minor subplots aren’t super-functional.  Also, let’s just look at the lyrics to one of the songs, “Shipoopi” (which is the most ridiculous song ever anyway):

Well a woman who’ll kiss on the very first date
Is usually a hussy.
And a woman who’ll kiss on the second time out
Is anything but fussy.
But a woman who waits ’til the third time around,
Head in the clouds, feet on the ground!
She’s the girl he’s glad he’s found–she’s his
Shipoopi!  Shipoopi!  Shipoopi!  Shipoopi!

A) What on Earth is a shipoopi anyway?  B) Seriously, what is the difference between one or two dates and three dates?  C) Slut shaming, please go away, I understand this was from a different time but it’s still really gross.

9. Once Upon a Mattress by Mary Rodgers, Marshall Barer, Jay Thompson, and Dean Fuller.  Yeeeah.  Not so much with the functional.  Dauntless is so gullible that any princess seems great and Winnifred seems extra-great because she stands up to his mom.  That’s not really love.  The King and Queen, well.  Ha.  Larken and Harry, they’re in love, maybe they’ve been together a while, but if they’re threatening to break up forever over stupid mistakes, that’s maybe not good.  You argue about said stupid things, sure, but you don’t run away forever without listening to the other person.  And everyone in the kingdom is so hideously desperate for sex that they can’t make appropriate decisions, anyway.

10. Thoroughly Modern Millie by Jeanine Tesori, Dick Scanlan, and Richard Morris.  Not initially, because Millie’s “I’ll marry for money!” plan isn’t that modern, really.  She goes to be a working girl to… make a rich husband.  Icky.  She eventually finds true love with Jimmy, after some failings in logic, and it’s okay that he has money but it was okay when he was poor, too, so she learns.  Miss Dorothy has a fly-by-night infatuation with Mr. Trevor, but she winds up with Ching Ho, which doesn’t really make a lot of sense either, but I guess go for it?  Not super-functional as a whole, either.

–your fangirl heroine.

Theatre Thursday :: a play-by-play of the top 10 most performed plays and musicals in high schools

As of December 2010, as reported by Playbill.com; this is the most recent list I can find.

This play-by-play will go as follows: italicized titles will be ones I’m familiar with (I’ve read the script and/or heard the score).  Bolded titles will be ones I’ve seen performed.  Underlined titles will be ones that I was involved in sometime during my school theatre career of yore.  Expect much commentary.  And titles I have nothing to do with will not be listed here.  Numbers pertain to their place on the Playbill list.

PLAYS
2. A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare.  I feel like when I say that oh, I know this play, I should be doing the smug Roxy Richter voice/face.  That’s how intimate I’ve been with this play.  It was my first (and really my only, excepting in-class monologues) Shakespeare, though the language was toned down for schoolkids; I was Robin Starveling, because, why not?  And I played her as a 1970s groupie (obviously a la Almost Famous; I even had the furry leather coat), despite the fact that the rest of the production ended up being styled a la the vague 1700s/1800s (we were planning some weird decade mash-up; the fairies, who wore whatever they wanted, danced to songs of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s randomly throughout the play, so it was a concept that made sense, but time constraints made us go for the Generic High School Period Piece look).  And I have many feelings about this time.  Some less-fond memories, but some fond ones, too.
3. You Can’t Take It With You by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart.  My high school did this play, though I wasn’t in it; I did hang out backstage, though, so I’m fairly familiar with it.
7. The Crucible by Arthur Miller.  Which I read for class and saw, but have not been involved in, unless you count that time my friend and I learned the ridiculous “Hold It In” song from Speech & Debate (and even then, I played Gay Abraham Lincoln, so it doesn’t count).
8. Our Town by Thornton Wilder.  Seen it several times.  Did tickets for it once.  Didn’t really care that much.  (It’s sappy.  And me and sappy don’t get on too well.)

MUSICALS
1. Beauty and the Beast by Alan Menken, Howard Ashman, Tim Rice, and Linda Woolverton.  Obviously.  And I’m underlining one whole word to represent the time that I accompanied an entire musical revue on the piano and played this opening number.  (I still can’t hear “Belle” without my fingers wanting to jump around frantically playing chords.)
2. Seussical by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty.  Seen it more times than I really should have seen it, all amateur (which isn’t the source of my distaste; I just don’t like the material).
3. Grease by Jim Jacobs and Warren Casey.  Which I’ve seen professionally, and I also regret this.
4. Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim.  Seen it at schools, seen a tape of the original cast.  Was in another school musical revue doing the prologue from this (as the Witch, as per she doesn’t actually have to sing ever in that number).  Yep.
6. The Wizard of Oz by John Kane, Howard Arlen, E. Y. Harburg, Herbert Stothart, Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allen Woolf.  I guess.  I know the music.  I know the movie.
7. You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown by Clark Gesner.  Seen it amateur, yep.
8. The Music Man by Meredith Wilson.  I know the music.  I know the movie.
9. Once Upon a Mattress by Mary Rodgers, Marshall Barer, Jay Thompson, and Dean Fuller.  Oh, this experience.  I don’t ever need to see this play again (even the 2004 movie is only worth turning on to hear Zooey Deschanel sing, and barely worth that since she sings other places).  But I have good memories, despite the fact that I really don’t like the material that much if I think about it too hard.  I do like that it’s a play about sex, though.  I, being the token chorus whore, was of course the kitchen wench, which I’m sure I’ve mentioned.  And because I’m me, there were ~18 pages of text about my character and how she was a lady and a kitchen wench because of her affair with the king and a magic spell and… yes.  It was insane, but a brilliant exercise in headcanon and extrapolation.
10. Thoroughly Modern Millie by Jeanine Tesori, Dick Scanlan, and Richard Morris.  This was my very first Broadway show, so it holds many fond memories, as I’ve before said.  And I feel like I can never actually see it again, because I’m afraid it wouldn’t measure up.  And that would be disappointing.

Okay, I’m actually shocked that Bye Bye Birdie isn’t on this list.  Seriously shocked.

–your fangirl heroine.

Things in Print Thursday :: stop bastardizing fairy tales.

Dear Hollywood,

We get it.  It’s fun to do wacky twists on fairy tales.  I’m not opposed to wacky twists that are snarky like Enchanted, or ones that would be completely and totally dark or messed up or something.  Sondheim’s Into the Woods is a good example of this.  It’s completely wonky.  Also, it debunks the happily ever after myth pretty strongly.  (And I can’t stand brick-wall happy endings.)

I am opposed to wacky twists that are basically just excuses for Disney stars to make a big movie or for Twilight fans to have something new to like.  (Actually, on that note I’m also opposed to that line of repackaged romance books that’s got the covers all done up Twilight-y, because that’s just an insult to a lot of classic literature.  I mean, I’m no Romeo and Juliet obsessee, they’re twerps, but still.  SMeyer is not Shakespeare, world.)

It just hurts me to see that these stories that have existed for centuries are being used to A) make money blatantly and B) try and convince adolescent girls what is and isn’t romantic.  I know that to an extent, fairy tales have done this for eons (sure, in their original form they were morality stories that involved a surprising amount of gore.  Would Cinderella’s sisters cut off their own toes now?  Probably not, and that is a shame) and it’s never really been all right.  But in the last ten, fifteen years, it’s gotten worse, I think.  It could just be that the cynic in me refuses to believe that you really can meet your One True Love when you’re, what, sixteen?  It could just be that the cynic in me sort of hates stories about One True Love in any great sappy detail.  Or it could be that I’m just tired of seeing it rehashed over and over.

Making Red Riding Hood about werewolves doesn’t make it new and exciting.  It just makes it Catherine Hardwicke ridiculous.  (This is not because I’m entirely anti-werewolf.  They can be a-okay.  But you can’t just shove them, a fairy tale, and The Village in a blender.)  Making the beast a bitchy high school boy who suddenly has tattoos and no hair (ohnoes) is not nearly as satisfying as, you know, an actual beast who has to overcome actual problems somewhat.  And the heroines are as blank-faced and wide-eyed as always.  Snooze.

I’m serious, Hollywood.  Next fairy tale remake I see you attempt?  Someone better be cutting their toes off.

 

–your fangirl heroine.