Theatre / Things in Print Thursday :: 5 more musicals based on works of literature

Last week was five musicals based on works of literature that I am/was really deeply attached to in some weird, significant way (probably circa high school).  This week?  Just five more that I’m halfway familiar with.

5. Seussical, derived from the works of Dr. Seuss (musical by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty)
I actually… kind of hate Seussical.  Have I mentioned this before?  I’m not sure if I have, but it’s true.  I of course read Dr. Seuss stories when I was little, and I’ve seen the How the Grinch Stole Christmas cartoon a bunch of times, because when I was a child, I watched Christmas cartoons over and over during the holidays.  I wouldn’t say I was ever a big Seuss person, though, and the musical is really not my thing.  I don’t begrudge anyone their enjoyment of it, of course, but I’ve seen it twice and that’s two times too many.  (Of course, this may have something to do with the fact that both times were the junior version, and junior versions are often disappointing overall.)

4. Big River, derived from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (musical by William Hauptman and Roger Miller)
I have no real problems with Big River.  I was not a fan of Huckleberry Finn when I was in high school (though this could have been because most of the things I read in that particular English class were not things I enjoyed to read, largely because of the way the class was structured) and I don’t really feel compelled to ever read it again, but the musical is all right.  Not something I listen to for fun, but pretty interesting to watch.

3. Peter Pan by J. M. Barrie (musical by Mark “Moose” Charlap, Jule Styne, Carolyn Leigh, Betty Comden and Adolph Green)
I have never seen this staged, but oh my gosh, I think I almost wore out my copy of the VHS tape of the Mary Martin production when I was a kid.  I watched it over and over and over again.  I loved this tape so much, and despite loving the tape, liking the Disney movie okay, and the book being technically for children, I didn’t read it until I was in high school.  I’m sort of over the Peter Pan mythos as a whole now (okay, a lot over it, actually; I reread it for a class last term and sighed many times) but I do have fond memories of the production on tape from when I was little and didn’t know any better.

2. Les Miserables by Victor Hugo (musical by Claude-Michel Schönberg, Alain Boublil and Jean-Marc Natel, and Herbert Kretzmer)
I never finished reading Les Mis, as I’ve said before.  And I’m thinking that maybe someday I should; I’ve seen so much meta on tumblr lately that I’m starting to think that I’d actually kind of like Cosette if I knew her better, but without having read the book or anything, I don’t, really.  The advantage of a book being 1000+ pages is that it has more time to get into the intricacies of things that a 2-3 hour musical cannot really get into properly.  So, someday.  Maybe.  I have a few other 1000+ page books to get done first, but someday.

1. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (musical by Allan Knee, Mindi Dickstein, and Jason Howland)
It’s been made abundantly clear to you all how strongly I feel about Little Women, and this hasn’t waned as I’ve gotten older.  Little Women is a beautiful book.  The musical is pretty okay, too.  It’s not anything overwhelmingly showstopping or particularly memorable, but it’s solid.  It’s good.  It didn’t change too much of the original story, and the songs are nice, and also “Some Things Are Meant to Be” has occasionally gotten me choked up before, so that’s a high compliment.

–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.