Scores for Musical Shows

[dirac]

There is a story that “In the Still of the Night” made L.B. Mayer cry – or was that the title tune? sidwich probably knows.....

Thank you for the report – I have not seen ‘Rosalie.’ Miss Powell was always a teeny bit butch for my taste, although she is obviously a very nice person and a fine dancer. Nelson I kinda like. As an actor he gives new meaning to the adjective ‘wooden’ but I always enjoy his singing. I admit that 'Maytime' is one of my favorite movies.

Thanks also for the Nugent review. Some years later he became a screenwriter, as you may know, writing several of John Ford’s better pictures – The Quiet Man and The Searchers, others too, I think. I could be wrong but he may have been the first film critic to make that professional leap.

I haven't seen Funny Face for many years, so the song list for that indicates Audrey Hepburn sang it.

She did, charmingly. You should see it again - it's overrated IMO, but Hepburn is very appealing and the movie looks great. I understand that a special edition 50th anniversary DVD has just come out, don't know what's on it.

We have other posters out there who are interested in these high matters. Do speak up!

[papeetepatrick]

2 good Ethel CD's of Berlin, Porter and others that some may already know well: "Merman Sings Merman" and "Ethel Merman in Songs from Call Me Madam and Panama Hattie". First has a great "Alexanders' Ragtime Band" and "Everything's Coming Up Roses", the second a terrific "Hoste' with the Mostes'" and "Something to Dance About."

I'll say little about "The Full Monty" cast album I just listened to, as it barely exists as far as I can tell. The 'lyric-song' simulations have titles like "You Walk With Me" and "You Rule My World" and "Breeze from the River", the latter seemed all right till you remembered "around the corner...and whistlin' down the river...', they all sounded like one would do as well with the Rite-Aid Muzak just standing in the Cold Cream section, if they'd put the dial on the Lite-FM station during some country-cheesey hour. The 'peppy songs' have titles like "Man," "Big Black Man", "Big Ass Rock", and "The Goods"; these are all full of male and female anatomy crudeness, and are a sort of soft-porn. Very dispiriting, yet another example of television cross-pollinating not only cinema by now, but theater as well. By David Yazbek, also known for 'Bombay Dreams' and 'Dirty Rotten Scroundrels'--a certain niche, I guess.

[Anthony_NYC]

I haven't seen Funny Face for many years, so the song list for that indicates Audrey Hepburn sang it.

She did, charmingly. You should see it again - it's overrated IMO, but Hepburn is very appealing and the movie looks great. I understand that a special edition 50th anniversary DVD has just come out, don't know what's on it.

Previously, I had seen the movie only on a washed-out videocassette and an only slightly improved DVD release. The new DVD edition looks really terrific--quite eye-opening for me. It's a charming and enjoyable movie, but I agree, dirac, that it's probably overrated, partly because Astaire does so little dancing. (I've never understood why a movie that makes such a point of its Paris setting features Astaire doing an elaborate Spanish solo. Not one of his best numbers, in any event.) So we've already had at least two DVD editions of a minor (dance-wise) Astaire effort. How I wish all those other Fred Astaire movies would finally get released on DVD. I know that "Damsel in Distress" and "The Sky's the Limit" aren't great movies, but they've got major Astaire solos in them.

[papeetepatrick]

Thanks, Anthony, and give us recommendations, some of us are just getting to know some of those old things. Volcanohunter has got me ready to watch 'Lady Be Good', which I didn't know was Eleanor Parker. Have you seen 'Spring Awakening'? I plan to listen to it in week or two, at very least.

[dirac]

It's a charming and enjoyable movie, but I agree, dirac, that it's probably overrated, partly because Astaire does so little dancing. (I've never understood why a movie that makes such a point of its Paris setting features Astaire doing an elaborate Spanish solo. Not one of his best numbers, in any event.) So we've already had at least two DVD editions of a minor (dance-wise) Astaire effort. How I wish all those other Fred Astaire movies would finally get released on DVD. I know that "Damsel in Distress" and "The Sky's the Limit" aren't great movies, but they've got major Astaire solos in them.

Hi, good to hear from you. Astaire also did a Spanish dance in "The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle" to equally poor effect - it's just not his thing.

Re: Funny Face, I think the Hepburn-as-mannequin factor plays an important role in its continuing popularity - there's also the Avedon factor, too.

I know that "Damsel in Distress" and "The Sky's the Limit" aren't great movies, but they've got major Astaire solos in them.

Not to mention the music. “Damsel” has that charming Gershwin score, and “The Sky’s the Limit” has Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer going for it – not only “My Shining Hour” but “One for My Baby (and One More for the Road”).

[papeetepatrick]

“One for My Baby (and One More for the Road”).

One of the greatest songs by Arlen, my personal favourite of all Broadway composers. I want to see 'The Sky's the Limit' now. This song is also superbly sung by Lena Horne, but I don't know if in a film. She's so elegant I can hardly believe it--am right now watching 'Panama Hattie', and she did 'Just One of Those Things' and will do another later. 'One for My Baby' is also sublime in Frank Sinatra's hands--as a lounge singer in 'Young at Heart.' (as is 'Just One of Those Things' in that film. His version probably surpasses Lena's in 'Panama Hattie', but not because she's not capable of it, more the way it was framed in the film.)

[sidwich]

Re: Funny Face, I think the Hepburn-as-mannequin factor plays an important role in its continuing popularity - there's also the Avedon factor, too.

I agree. I think for the general public, it's an excuse to indulge in as much "Hepburn as gamine with a trunkful of Givenchy" as you can before your stomach aches. (It's a bit precious for me, Astaire + Gershwin notwithstanding).

For film afficionadoes, it's also fondly remembered as the film Roger Edens helmed in his own name as producer after many years as Associate Producer and Musical Director at MGM under Arthur Freed.

[Anthony_NYC]

“One for My Baby (and One More for the Road”).

One of the greatest songs by Arlen, my personal favourite of all Broadway composers. I want to see 'The Sky's the Limit' now.

Ah, so you haven't seen it yet... You're in for a treat. Astaire does a smashing solo to that great song. You'll never forget it.

[papeetepatrick]

Ah, so you haven't seen it yet... You're in for a treat. Astaire does a smashing solo to that great song. You'll never forget it.

Can't wait to see this one, will have it in few days. Just got two of the old lesser-known R & H CDs to listen to--'Allegro' and 'Pipe Dream' and should have 'Me and Juliet' in a week or two. Anyone know these scores? I just looked at the song lists and some sound like familiar titles, but I haven't ever heard anything about these shows, and NYT theatre review archives has none of them written up. IBDb has them all three running between 215-less than 400 performances, which is a flop for R & H, but not the worst for other writers. Will report later, in the mean time, if anyone is familiar with these shows and their history, let us know.

[papeetepatrick]

Listening to Pipe Dream, I finally began to realize that I've always thought there was an interesting striking difference in Rodgers of Rodgers & Hammerstein and Rodgers of Rodgers & Hart. Not that it takes any great genius to realize this, and certainly people usually do. But what is it? It's not obvious everywhere, but you can tell what in R & Hart would never be in R & Hammerstein. Obviously the lyrics controlled a lot of what Rodgers came up with melodically and harmonically. In Pipe Dream I noticed it in the first song 'All Kinds of People', which is the only real reason to bring up this score, except that it is always especially strange to hear an undistinguished work by masters of a form. Pipe Dream is primarily a disaster, and the little reading I've also done on it proves something about Hammerstein's tendency to the overly proper and non-racy. Based on Steinbeck's 'Cannery Row', it's banal and so is the score. Not that one expects from Hammerstein anything in the particular realm of excitement as is provided by Hart in 'After one whole quart of brandy, like a daisy I'm awake...with no Bromo-Seltzer handy, I don't even shake.' and 'I'll sing to him.. each spring to him [that always cracks me up about the spring]...and worship the trousers that cling to him...', but they've got a brothel in Pipe Dream and you wouldn't know it. I'm not quite Pauline Kael on this kind of thing, but I'd take the above excerpt anyday from Pal Joey to 'Climb ev'ry Mountain...ford every stream...follow every byway...till you find your dream...' I thought 'All at Once You Love Her' was going to be something familiar, but I think I am confusing it with a Vegas favourite with lyrics something like 'When somebody loves you, it's no good unless they love you.....ALL THE WAY...' which I guess Steve Lawrence and Tony Bennett must have put in their sets. So it isn't. I didn't recognize any song on Pipe Dream, and wouldn't care to see any version of it; I read it's been revived somewhere in 2002.

Allegro, mentioned by Mel on Sander0's thread 'Opera about Ballet' due to having Melissa Hayden and other important dancers in it, and DeMille choreography, is another thing. Very beautiful score, whatever the shortcomings of the show, which is inspired by Wilder's 'Our Town'. Sad fate, especially since there was such anticipation of this show after 'Oklahoma!', 'Carousel' and 'State Fair.' Songs like 'So Far', the title song 'Allegro', and 'A Fellow Needs a Girl' are all quite winning tunes. This is a favourite of Sondheim, I believe, and he has also described the disasters that occurred on opening night in terms of injuries, falling into the orchestra pit (Lisa Kirk). Concert version by Encores! in 1994.

I've just got the cast recording, which was itself a revival, of 'On Your Toes', with Vera Zorina and Bobby Van, which will get me to some more of the pithy Rodgers and Hart shortly. Also have the 1983 CD coming in. Has anyone seen the film with Zorina, which has the Balanchine but the music only as background? I'd like to see that.

A few quick observations on film musicals recently seen: Panama Hattie has Lena Horne worthwhile (as always) in two numbers ('Just One of Those Things', 'The Spring), Ann Sothern trying really hard on 'I've Got My Health So What do I Care?' and just makes you want to hear Ethel do the number. Virginia O'brien is funny in 'Let's Be Buddies', but they've left out 'Make it an Old-Fashioned, Please', although there may be a whiff of it as background music. Silly sailors, Red Skelton, etc., Ann Sothern doing total early Barbie-bimbo or something like that. Some Cole Porter from other shows, and additional music by Roger Edens, Burton Lane, etc.

Goldwyn Follies tres necessaire for BTers because of divine Zorina doing Balanchine. Introduces 'Love Walked in' and 'Our Love is Here to Stay', and was Gershwin's last film musical.

The Chocolate Soldier is wretched, except when Nelson Eddy and Rise Stevens sing 'My Hero' in numerous reprises, also a snatch of the title song, otherwise not much of the operetta by Oskar Straus is to be found here. I'm going to listen to a recording to see what the rest of this sort of thing sounds like, but this is one of the most boring movies I've ever seen, and no reason to make Ms. Stevens's hair so incredibly unattractive and frumpy.

Will watch Maytime in honour of dirac, and the earlier RoseMarie with Eddy/MacDonald. Also have finally got copies of Spring Awakening and Avenue Q to listen to and see what they sound like when you can't see the action. Some things seem okay score-wise when you've got the rest of the show. Some critics like the Broadway The Full Monty (including the score) but I thought it was a big bust just listening to the score alone.

[papeetepatrick]

Many thanks to dirac and anthonynyc for 'The Sky's the Limit', which I watched last night. Anthony, Fred is indeed marvelous in the 'One for My Baby...' when he dances on the bar, perhaps some of his most dazzling work in film. I don't know if the song was introduced in this film, but 'my Shining Hour', which is heard and danced to several times and pretty nicely too, with Joan Leslie, was. As for Astaire's singing of 'One for my Baby and One More for the Road', it is a nice rendition, but I'm too used to a much darker version, and Frank Sinatra is the best for me on that: In 'Young at Heart', he not only sings it richly, but the way Doris Day walks in the club toward the end of the number is very poetic. An unusual pairing, Sinatra and Day, and I hear she wasn't crazy about him, but it worked. I like that film.

I fully intend to turn this into a NOTEBOOK, short of legislation precluding it, as I make my way through this domain which is much larger than I ever imagined when I started out, both methodically and chaotically, and both of which continue to be the practice. But I hope the Show Biz Dept. will tell me how they agree with my exemplary taste or how I have grossly misjudged things like 'On the Twentieth Century', which I half-listened to the other day, and was not struck by anything in it the way I am most Cy Coleman scores. 'Will Rogers Follies' is not all that hot either, although the record is made worthwhile because of Keith Carradine's perfection at this sort of thing; there's a PBS special of B'way numbers in which he sings 'Oh What a Beautiful Mornin' and it is easily the best I ever heard--he should have done Curly in a big revival of 'Oklahoma!' while he was young enough. At that time, hardly anybody was better-looking nor sang this kind of song better either.

Otherwise, listened to Ethel Merman's CD of wonderful old recordings--with terrific twin-piano work by Fairchild and Carroll for 'Red, Hot and Blue' and even splashier stuff by Al and Lee Reiser for Schwartz/Field's 'Stars in Your Eyes', although the interest for the tunes for me is all the Porter songs for the former--in particular Ethel is everything she's supposed to be for the title song, which somehow I didn't know so well. 'Red, Hot and Blue' has some of Porter's best songs, including 'Ridin' High' and 'Down in the Depths', and 'It's de-Lovely', and made me remember again what a range of song styles he has--by accident, I discovered that he wrote 'True Love', which I'd never imagine as having been written by the composer of 'Just one of those Things' or 'Let's Do it'. But then, while I always knew 'Blue Room' was Rodgers & Hart, I would never have guessed without Ella Fitzgerald's R & Hart songbook that 'Blue Moon', which always sounds so syrupy, was also their handiwork.

[sidwich]

I thought 'All at Once You Love Her' was going to be something familiar, but I think I am confusing it with a Vegas favourite with lyrics something like 'When somebody loves you, it's no good unless they love you.....ALL THE WAY...' which I guess Steve Lawrence and Tony Bennett must have put in their sets. So it isn't. I didn't recognize any song on Pipe Dream, and wouldn't care to see any version of it; I read it's been revived somewhere in 2002.

I actually rather like the score to "Pipe Dream." It's not the best by Rodgers and Hammerstein, but I enjoy it for some reason. I've heard the original lead actress was quite charming in it as well, although R&H really weren't suited to the Steinbeck sensibility.

The song you're thinking of is "All the Way" by Sammy Cahn and Jimmy van Heusen, and was made famous by Frank Sinatra in one of his films.

Very beautiful score, whatever the shortcomings of the show, which is inspired by Wilder's 'Our Town'. Sad fate, especially since there was such anticipation of this show after 'Oklahoma!', 'Carousel' and 'State Fair.'

"Allegro" was probably ahead of its time, which is unfortunate since the relative failure (not a real failure, but only about 500 performances which was far short of the 2,000+ of "Oklahoma," the nearly 1,000 of "Carousel" and the Academy Award for "State Fair") seemed to put R&H off experimenting much further. They rather turned into the GM of theatre.

Goldwyn Follies tres necessaire for BTers because of divine Zorina doing Balanchine. Introduces 'Love Walked in' and 'Our Love is Here to Stay', and was Gershwin's last film musical.

"Goldwyn Follies" is quite a mish-mash, and it's funny how if you blink, you'll miss "Our Love is Here to Stay" which is used as a throwaway song that comes over the radio. It didn't really become a hit until Gene Kelly used it as the music for the pas de deux in "An American in Paris."

Many thanks to dirac and anthonynyc for 'The Sky's the Limit', which I watched last night. Anthony, Fred is indeed marvelous in the 'One for My Baby...' when he dances on the bar, perhaps some of his most dazzling work in film. I don't know if the song was introduced in this film, but 'my Shining Hour', which is heard and danced to several times and pretty nicely too, with Joan Leslie, was.

"One for my Baby..." was indeed written for the film. And fun fact... the glass that Astaire is dancing in is real glass. With WWII sugar rations, there wasn't enough sugar to go around to make sugar glass.

An unusual pairing, Sinatra and Day, and I hear she wasn't crazy about him, but it worked. I like that film.

I like Day and Sinatra, but I'm not crazy about them together which is the usual knock on "Young at Heart." I adore "My Love," though.

by accident, I discovered that he wrote 'True Love', which I'd never imagine as having been written by the composer of 'Just one of those Things' or 'Let's Do it'.

I don't think that Porter was ever that fond of "True Love." He was said to have been quite embarrased that it was nominated for an Academy Award.

But then, while I always knew 'Blue Room' was Rodgers & Hart, I would never have guessed without Ella Fitzgerald's R & Hart songbook that 'Blue Moon', which always sounds so syrupy, was also their handiwork.

I don't think that Rodgers & Hart were ever that fond of "Blue Moon," either. Actually, I think Hart hated it, and hated that it became one of their biggest hits. Legend has it that a film executive asked them why they kept writing all these weird intellectual pieces, and couldn't they just write a song about June and moons, and so they wrote a parody of such a song. If you watch the sequence that it comes from in the film that it was written for (I can't remember the name), it's supposed to be a stupid song and not supposed to be taken seriously at all.

[bart]

"Goldwyn Follies" is quite a mish-mash, and it's funny how if you blink, you'll miss "Our Love is Here to Stay" which is used as a throwaway song that comes over the radio. It didn't really become a hit until Gene Kelly used it as the music for the pas de deux in "An American in Paris."

That's a fascinating bit of history. Did anyone know, at the time of its release, that this song would become such an instantly recognizable, lovely, and danceable standard?

[dirac]

If they had, they would have plugged it as hard as they did ‘Love Walked In,’ which is reprised in ‘The Goldwyn Follies’ with a Lloyd Webber-ish aggressiveness. Sometimes it takes years to ‘discover’ a song; the Gershwins were always pulling ‘The Man I Love’ hopefully out of their trunk, and it would get cut. ‘Begin the Beguine’ wasn’t a hit until Artie Shaw produced his version several years after its introduction in ‘Jubilee.’

"Allegro" was probably ahead of its time, which is unfortunate since the relative failure (not a real failure, but only about 500 performances which was far short of the 2,000+ of "Oklahoma," the nearly 1,000 of "Carousel" and the Academy Award for "State Fair") seemed to put R&H off experimenting much further.

Allegro never would have arrived on schedule for my timetable, but then I’m not the world’s biggest R&H fan. It may also be, however, that they realized that ‘contemporary’ and ‘edgy’ just wasn’t going to be their thing; Rodgers’ musical style had changed a lot since the days of ‘Pal Joey.’ I believe it was the last time they worked with Agnes de Mille, too.

As for Astaire's singing of 'One for my Baby and One More for the Road', it is a nice rendition, but I'm too used to a much darker version, and Frank Sinatra is the best for me on that:

I agree. Astaire is just congenitally not dark. There was something ineffably jeune premier-ish about him even as he aged, and he can’t invest it with the melancholy you’re used to if you’re accustomed to Sinatra, who really hits a peak with that song. Maybe Fred should have moved in with Ava Gardner for awhile.

Thank you for that bit of information about the sugar, sidwich. I didn't know that.

[carbro]

Maybe Fred should have moved in with Ava Gardner for awhile.

Ouch! I'm too fond of Fred to wish that on him, even to expand his expressive range.

[papeetepatrick]

Maybe Fred should have moved in with Ava Gardner for awhile.

Ouch! I'm too fond of Fred to wish that on him, even to expand his expressive range.

Carbro, dear friend, I'm afraid we're from different planets sometimes. Ava Gardner is a form of Female Perfection and Charm that has rarely been equalled in all of History. The problem might be whether Fred really could expand his expressive range in this venue sufficient for it to improve his art, although Sinatra was said by Ava herself to have already determined enough range, and from her that was a serious compliment: One of the most wonderful things about her personality was that she was so confident that she'd tell Frank where to go at the drop of a hat. She just wasn't scared of people, and had one of the best senses of humour of the 20th century. I read that Phyllis McGuire, also into gangster types, of course, talked about how boring Sinatra was when drunk, and one of the things he always did was force people to agree with him that Ava was the most beautiful woman in the world. I'm sure Ava thought this was hilarious, and paid about 2 seconds attention to it. And you can see the warmth of her persona in one of her best movie roles, as Mrs. Faulk in 'The Night of the Iguana'.

Frankly, I am sure that if Fred had spent intimate time with Ava Gardner, you couldn't have found a gentler lady. Lena Horne absolutely adored her, even after she lost the role of Julie in 'Showboat' to her. Lena would have inevitably been better, due to her incredible musical gift, but Ava was pretty damned impressive too.

For pure biological perfection at exactly the right ages for both, refer to 'My Forbidden Past' in which Ms. Gardner and Robert Mitchum are the ultimate representatives of their species.

[dirac]

For pure biological perfection at exactly the right ages

I’d also nominate in this category Gardner in Pandora and the Flying Dutchman, shot by Jack Cardiff in color, where she is gaspingly beautiful.

One of the most wonderful things about her personality was that she was so confident that she'd tell Frank where to go at the drop of a hat. She just wasn't scared of people, and had one of the best senses of humour of the 20th century.

Gardner seems to have been in some ways shy and insecure, hence the need for alcohol as a social lubricant. (Artie Shaw bullied her relentlessly during their brief union, made her feel dumb which she clearly wasn’t, she was very smart and funny as you say, and then dumped her rather brutally although technically she left first.) She did begin behaving badly in later years after drink and time began doing their work but by all accounts she was essentially a very lovely and decent person.

Shaw was married briefly to Jerome Kern's daughter, as it happens.

[bart]

Ava Gardner definitely stays in the memory. While reading the last couple of posts, the three performances that came to mind immediately were NOT anything particularly hot or tempestuous. Instead, they were sad, rather elegiac, and quite dignified. In each case, Gardner was depicted as a woman in the autumn of her beauty.

(Because this is Ballet Talk, I'll include dance references for each.)

-- On the Beach: with Fred Astaire. This was an amazing and powerful film of the 50s, taking place in a peaceful Australia as people face the impending consequences of a global nuclear war which has already killed off most of humanity.

-- 55 Days in Peking, with Robert Helpmann as a Chinese Imperial official;

-- Mayerling (not the Macmillan ballet, of course; the one with Omar Sharif and Catherine Deneuve). Gardner she played the mother (!): a touching yet imperial Empress Elizaabeth.

I also remember reading a long and touching article in something like Vanity Fair or the old Esquire about her declining years in London.

[papeetepatrick]

Just listened once to 'Spring Awakening', but what was described as 'rock score' is definitely not hard rock in any sense. Much very pretty stuff, although the first impression is that it's not so struggling for attention by loudness, but that it's more interesting and has much more poetic lyrics than 'Light in the Piazza', which is at least not screamy and throwing out magic-mountain vapours in your face every few seconds. Songs like 'The Word of Your Body' and 'The Song of Purple Summer' are euphonious, but almost all of it is very pleasant; if anything, a song or two with a little more energy wouldn't be unwelcome here, but much better this than 'Wicked'. 'The B**** of Living' is even intelligent, and is the first time I've heard a Broadway show seriously try to let itself be mediated by times which have heavy and recurring strains of nihilism in them. Anybody see it yet? I'd think many of these songs would be quite enhanced by live performance, which is not nearly always the case. I'll say more after another listen, but this was hopeful. I'd say it was the best new B'way score I'd heard since 'The Life', but not quite up to that level musically, even if the show is likely better. Of newer things, I've still got to make my way through 'Avenue Q', ' The Color Purple', and 'Urinetown.' Interested to hear anyone else's opinions before I say mine. Not yet convinced Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater's music and lyrics ascend to the level of 'Hair' yet, at least in terms of musical variety--it does seem to need a song like 'Good Mornin' Starshine' to throw a bit of a cold shower on what is a kind of 'rock lite' for the most part.

In the meantime, thanks sidwich for those marvelous details about the individual tunes themselves--just loved the info on 'Blue Moon' and 'Young Love', and would never have known it. And dirac, thanks for 'Maytime', which is truly lovely, I agree. The best is the ending reprise of 'Sweethearts', because they really make it long, instead of winding things up with a shortened reprise. This lengthening has a magical effect in letting the old lovers take their place beside the new ones, rather than merely giving way to the new. I hadn't realized how beautiful Jeannette MacDonald was, and Nelson Eddy is much more effective here and he seems much less wooden with MacDonald than with Eleanor Powell. Strangest is that chameleon John Barrymore, who looks so much more worn than he had 5 years earlier in 'Grand Hotel'. I don't know anything else except 'Twentieth Century', but it seemed strange to find him in this role. That flowered swing Jeanette swings in earlier at the fair is wonderfully Fragonardian, there is no dearth of flower petals throughout.

[dirac]

No dearth of flowers (or ruffles- Adrian really went to town).

It’s all right if you didn’t like it, really. I’d understand perfectly. I do think it’s good on its own terms, though.

Of newer things, I've still got to make my way through 'Avenue Q', ' The Color Purple', and 'Urinetown.' Interested to hear anyone else's opinions before I say mine.

I admire your intestinal fortitude. I rarely listen to anything new or even newish myself. I’m not proud of it but there it is. I'll catch it if it's televised or go to the theatre on occasion, but I can't sit down with most of it at home. I’m sure sidwich and others can respond (and I hope they do, maybe I'll learn something).

[papeetepatrick]

No dearth of flowers (or ruffles- Adrian really went to town).

It’s all right if you didn’t like it, really. I’d understand perfectly. I do think it’s good on its own terms, though.

Of newer things, I've still got to make my way through 'Avenue Q', ' The Color Purple', and 'Urinetown.' Interested to hear anyone else's opinions before I say mine.

I admire your intestinal fortitude. I rarely listen to anything new or even newish myself. I’m not proud of it but there it is. I'll catch it if it's televised or go to the theatre on occasion, but I can't sit down with most of it at home. I’m sure sidwich and others can respond (and I hope they do, maybe I'll learn something).

But I did really like it. I was quite surprised. It was hardly the nightmare of 'The Chocolate Soldier', and although also somewhat lightweight and simple a plot, it's moving. Printscess raved about 'Avenue Q', and I have to agree with you that I admire my digging through these new things, because I have like little of it. There's a weird sense of relief, in my case, when I really can know what 'Beauty and the Beast', 'The Lion King', 'Les Miserables', and 'Miss Saigon' are about instead of 'knowing I wouldn't like them', and basically I don't much....now what I may 'deprive myself of' is 'Dirty Rotten Scoundrels', I think I can live with just one Yazbek score, which I've already disliked intensely. Also just got the full CD of 'The Chocolate Soldier', which is bound to heal the damage of that terrible movie, but also found that there is a CD of 3 original casts from the 20's of Romberg--'Desert Song', 'New Moon', and one other, this should be interesting.

You'd rather see it at the theater for the reasons I gave with 'The Full Monty' and 'Wicked': The music doesn't sound nearly so horrible if there's something else to distract you from it. But I much prefer the Ethel CD's I also mention, and I've put some holds on the original 'One Touch of Venus' and some other Kurt Weill.

[Anthony_NYC]

Just listened once to 'Spring Awakening', but what was described as 'rock score' is definitely not hard rock in any sense. Much very pretty stuff, although the first impression is that it's not so struggling for attention by loudness, but that it's more interesting and has much more poetic lyrics than 'Light in the Piazza', which is at least not screamy and throwing out magic-mountain vapours in your face every few seconds. Songs like 'The Word of Your Body' and 'The Song of Purple Summer' are euphonious, but almost all of it is very pleasant; if anything, a song or two with a little more energy wouldn't be unwelcome here, but much better this than 'Wicked'. 'The B**** of Living' is even intelligent, and is the first time I've heard a Broadway show seriously try to let itself be mediated by times which have heavy and recurring strains of nihilism in them. Anybody see it yet? I'd think many of these songs would be quite enhanced by live performance, which is not nearly always the case. I'll say more after another listen, but this was hopeful.

My recommendation: Go see it--it's been around long enough that discounts or TKTS tix must be easily available. Stories of teenage angst are not a huge draw for me (I had my share, thank you very much), but in this one the young performers are just so appealing, and the score is very enjoyable--as you suggest, for rock it's very retro, and live in the theater it is delightfully not-over-amplified. Plus, there's choreography by Bill T. Jones. I don't know if you saw Jonathan Franzen's recent criticism of it somewhere or other (New York Magazine?), where he complains, probably justifiably, that it waters down the Wedekind play (his own translation was recently published). Who cares? Take it on its own terms and enjoy.

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Thanks, AnthonyNYC, and I found today that you can also get those onstage tickets for $31.00. This is hardly a hardship, considering that they all have to turn around and to the side from time to time. I most likely will go in the next couple of months, and, without going into too much detail, I'm not very interested in Jonathan Franzen's opinions on anything--he's too bratty. By contrast, the cheapest tickets for 'Wicked' in the B'way production are over $50. I might go see it the next few months in Los Angeles anyway, it's much cheaper there and I am less vulture-like on vacation. I think there are no tickets less than $115 for the current 'Les Miserables', which I've never seen and don't particularly care to, but the tourists will pay for it, no question.

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A second listening-to of 'Spring Awakening' has shown me rather that getting to know the score at least this well serves my own purposes of research, which I am currently writing about elsewhere and through which I can perceive well-enough in this form to see how certain cultural trends are evolving. This is one of the important ones, because it has been given so much attention and awards, etc. I intend to listen to the others from which I've expected much less, but on second hearing, this one is not useful in itself, but can be inducted into theory much more easily than I would have hoped, because without it, there really is no new score I've been impressed with since Cy Coleman's 'The Life'. That is the last score in which you could still hear Broadway electricity that wasn't just graceless loudness, although the short-lived Marvin Hamlisch show 'Sweet Smell of Success' had a moment of sparks here and there. For the most part, outside the much more common loud thing borne of Webber, Disney, Schonburg, etc., you get something like this, which is more varied and imaginative than 'Light in the Piazza', if possibly not quite even as suave, but it still has that very contemporary thing you find in so many fields and domains of culture--a kind of 'insulatedness' in which a full soaring, a full electricity never break through. New York is still the city these things are supposedly made with production in mind, and that city itself is far less electric, and rather more electronic and with its own newly-weird insulated sensation, than it used to be.

In 'Spring Awakening' you get all these old echoes of the Christy Minstrels, of actual folksong maybe of Scotch-Irish mountain tune, of Judy Collins, of a little bit of 'Alice's Restaurant', of Neil Diamond, but you don't get anything like 'Hair' or 'Company' or 'City of Angels' or 'Nine' or 'The Life' (not even bothering with the periods in which there were several startling Broadway moments a year) and there's not one song that really stands up straight. Sometimes it sounds like singing around some camp bonfire. The lyrics are much better than the music, so it's too bad. Frankly, it sounds like a kind of ashram, viz., it is always somewhat virtual and ersatz and over-controlled. As such, this High Ashram Muzak, rather like a low hum of a fax, computer, or vacuum cleaner, has served it's purpose for me, and will probably enable the elimination of both 'Wicked' and 'The Color Purple' from my L.A. time as well. Except for the Blind Boys of Alabama Gospel singing at the Disney Theater and the L. A. Ballet 'Nutcracker', I think I'm just gonna SHOP, just like any other dyed-in-the-wool Hollywood bimbo.

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Although less sophisticated and 'groundbreaking' than Spring Awakening I found I liked--at least from the listening--both Avenue Q and the Color Purple better because of being open and fully themselves. They did not have this weird quality of automatism and insulation some of the less-loud scores have. I think what threw me off the most about Spring Awakening is calling it a 'rock musical.' It is LITE FM if I ever heard it, and by most 60s standards it is strictly Easy Listening. Even Rent, much as I don't care for it, could legitimately be called a 'rock musical', but I really don't see how this score is recognizably rock in any sense I understand it.

There's no rhapsodic lyricism in Avenue Q, but it's the funniest score I ever listened to, with wonderfully juvenile lyrics that are hilarious as well as raunchy, unlike Yazbek's reached-for and crude lyrics to The Full Monty. This was a big surprise, as I think I would thoroughly enjoy seeing Avenue Q, and did not expect to. The Color Purple has a lot that's quite wonderful to it as well, and I thought it a much better and more impassioned score than the NYT critic did (I suppose that was Brantley, but don't think it worth looking up.) All three of these shows are good signs, though, and after listening to Urinetown in the next couple of days, I'll have familiarized myself with all the last 6 years of Tony winners, both score and show and many others.

Incidentally, even though I enjoyed the movie of Hairspray, the 2002 winner, I think Avenue Q is much livelier and more imaginative. I think The Color Purple is a better score than Hairspray too, and it doesn't seem too false when Shug Avery sings 'Too Beautiful for Words'. You probably need to have liked the movie, although the book's fans may not like any of this. But Avenue Q has got things in it that are so funny I couldn't even believe it, especially that song that ends slowly edging with the 'I've got a Canadian girlfriend and I can't wait....' etc., etc., (unprintable). It's so unexpected that you can't resist it despite its extreme lowness. I think Avenue Q will surely be made into a movie and will be a very good one. But these shows all have something in them that will make not bother with Wicked, which I would find useless without a big star in it.

I know printscess loved Avenue Q, would love to hear others' views on these and also feel free to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about, because I might not.