2008-04-02 The Problem with Musicals

[Wrench]

Les Miserables is another example of a brilliant play that should NEVER have been turned into a movie, much less a spoken-word movie.

Why not? Before it was a musical, it was a book ...

And is also a good example of how to use your songs to advance the plot.

/me tears up at the mere thought, let alone even just snatches of, A Little Fall of Rain, and thus begins to run Master of the House in his head to cheer himself up


(OH. Man of La Mancha, that was another outstanding musical)

The movie completely cut out Eponine's character, and effectively ignored many important sub-plots. I adore Liam Neeson, but I was completely unimpressed by the movie. It was just so bland and one-dimensional. I think there's just too much content for it to be a good movie, without being at least 4 hours long (and for that, it would need to star Kevin Costner). In some ways music is better at expressing a wide variety of nuances in the character and plot development that spoken word can't make up for.

Then again, since I've never had an entire year to devote to just reading, I haven't been able to get more than 100 pages into the book, so I guess I'm not one to complain...

[ampersand]

Just as an aside, the only 4 hour movie I'd truly enjoyed is Dances with Wolves, yes staring Kevin Costner. Sadly, it's been downhill ever since that movie for Costner.

One other point is that really, the operetta is the point where it transitions from Operas to Broadway Musicals.

Anyone ever seen Into the Woods? Anyone understood what it's all about? (All I know it's suppose to be a postmodernistic musical about Grimm fairy tales. Or something like that.)

And finally, I can't quite decide whether I like or dislike Rent.

[Koeniou]

I loved Into the Woods. I loved how it weaved the many different stories together.

Of all the musicals I've seen, there's only one that I remember not enjoying - West Side Story. Just was not enjoyable, although oddly enough I like the songs.

Earlier musicals typically had pointless songs with no real purpose, more recent musicals tend to have the plot driven through the songs/rely on the songs for character development etc.

[spikegirl7]

My favorite musical was an ok movie, but I haven't seen and don't know if the movie was ever made with the original broadway cast.

Camelot.

Hilarious, wonderful, and so good.

And Greg is going to movie hell.

[delney]

This thread makes me actually miss living in NY. When I was in High School my friend and I would take the train into Manhattan and hit up Tickets in Times Square and get matinee seats for whatever was available. I grew up with NY theater - saw A Chorus Line, Cats, Les Mis (twice), Phantom (twice), Little Shop of Horrors (off Broadway), Lion King, The Vagina Monologues, Sweeney Todd, and probably a dozen others over the years. I don't think there was a musical I saw on stage that I didn't like until I saw the Lion King here in Austin at UT last year - I'm told it was due to the poor sound quality in the theater, but I liked the movie better.

[Steave]

And finally, I can't quite decide whether I like or dislike Rent.

Forget Rent just go and see Avenue Q and be done with it.

[ReggarBlane]

I'm going to go with something I likely posted here before (updated for new information I received since):
*ahem*
Tight rubber clothing and whips for the lashes;
Spikes and stilettos and decor that clashes;
Black plastic packaged adult magazines;
These are a few of my favorite things.

(I just imagine Maria singing that to the children and the movie gets funnier. I used to have "Brown paper package with pr0n magazine;", but I was told that they use black plastic to cover the "good bits" now.)

Let's not forget My Fair Lady's "Nude! It would be loverly!"

[enigmak8]

Movies of musicals:

Little Shop of Horrors - Rick Moranis is good in it, but on stage is better
Sweeny Todd - The movie was good, and artistic, but really doesn't hold a candle to the original musical
Les Miserables - On stage it is great... movie is meh
Phantom - On stage is good, movie is ok.
Cats ... $!*@!$%@# - sorry, hairball
Oklahoma - Crappy musical, crappy overall
Guys and Dolls - Good musical, excellent movie
The Lion King - Good movie, but apparently the stage version is better
The Producers - Excellent stage show, decent movie

The question is where do you draw the line between musical and operetta? (aka: Gilbert & Sullivan) as things like HMS Pinafore and The Pirates of Penzance are great!, the only difference being that 90%+ of the words are sung in them.

PLEASE tell me you are not saying the original "the producers" was merely a "decent" movie. the atrocity that was not written by Mel Brooks, yes, but the original? no.

and though often times broadway shows converted to "movie musicals" tend to not translate well i'd like to note that "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" and "Spamalot" are two Broadway shows that are *AMAZING*. seriously the few times the audience is in tears from laughing so hard

and i believe musicals have both spoken words and songs, whereas operetta's are almost completely sung

[invisiblescaper]

I always hated "La, a note to follow so". It's like he just filled in "la" and was going to go back to it later on and write something really good, and just forgot and it got left in.

Are you serious? Rogers and Hammerstein didn't arbitrarily make up the solfeggio. It goes do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-ti-do for a reason.

[StruckingFuggle]

I think you missed his point. What they were 'going to re-write' was not "la" but just the "a note to follow so" part.

[invisiblescaper]

I think you missed his point. What they were 'going to re-write' was not "la" but just the "a note to follow so" part.

Oh, I see. Thanks for clarifying!

I hope you accept my apology, Wrench. I was just combating the idiots on my intro to computers online class and was still in that mindset.