I once asked the following question in my BroadwaySpace.com group discussion for Bookwriters and Songwriters:
If you look at some of the big shows that have succeeded in the recent past, you find many non-traditional shows . . . puppets, spelling bees . . . or big film-based hits the average joe could never get rights to . . . Disney shows, Spamalot, Legally Blonde, The Wedding Singer.
Can the traditional book musical without a snappy hook be a hit?
Perhaps a better phrasing would have been “Can the traditional book musical without a snappy hook get produced?,” but the meaning of the question is still the same—What constitutes a produce-able new work these days?
For some thoughts, we turn to the 2007-2008 season.
In the Heights—The big winner is an original book musical—a rarity these days—but it probably got noticed for its hook, a contemporary hip-hop infused pop score accompanying a traditional book.
It’s also important to note that the show also got some pretty good reviews, if I am remembering correctly.
A Catered Affair—Because the source material is so obscure (at least to the under-50 crowd), A Catered Affair could almost be considered a completely original work. The rumor on the street is that the music wasn’t so great. While I would like to experience the OBCR, I would have to say seeing Tom Wopat and Faith Prince chatting on The View sold the show much better than the drippy song the producers selected to showcase their work on the Tonys telecast, which probably only worked to strengthen any hesitation future audiences may have had.
Kudos to the show for a beautiful advertising campaign, though it may have worked better with the older folks in the matinee crowd that the average New York theatergoer.
Cry-Baby—Best Advertising Campaign of the Year Award goes to Cry-Baby which balanced hip with a retro look. Honestly, other than In the Heights, Cry-Baby was probably the new musical showcased on the Tonys I wish I could have seen. If only those reviews hadn’t done it in (or, perhaps, if only the people creating the show hadn’t done it in by earning the reviews).
If we categorize Cry-Baby, it’d definitely be a movie adaptation, though it is curious to think that Cry-Baby never would have happened had it not been for Hairspray.
Passing Strange—Okay, so I still don’t really get this show, but if you were categorizing it, something unique and eye-catching this would be. This show—or is that concert?—definitely stood out from the crowd.
The Little Mermaid—Disney does kind of get its own category. Yes, The Little Mermaid is a movie adaptation complete with “lift him up on your shoulders like a cheerleader” choreography that, I swear, was lifted right from the Chugwater High School musical last year, but it deserves its own categorization because only a Disney show could be as bad as Tarzan was and actually survive.
Young Frankenstein—This is a movie adaptation. How it remains open after showcasing “Deep Love” on the Tonys telecast, I’ll never know, but I truly wish Beth Leveal the best of everything.
Glory Days—Four people, young show creators—now that’s unique! Closing on opening night? Not as unique but certainly different.
Looking over that list, we have two extremely unique, stand-out they’re so different types of shows—Glory Days and Passing Strange. If you look at what catches people’s eyes, what stands out, these two shows would be it . . . but oddly enough, they didn’t.
The movie adaptations didn’t fare much better—The Little Mermaid will run for years, but A Catered Affair, Cry-Baby, and Young Frankenstein have not been big hits. Young Frankenstein will probably turn a profit and tour successfully, but the other two will probably not. We’ll all be fortunate if we can even buy a Cry-Baby OBCR, which it sounds like will not be released.
As for original works—We have the big winner of In the Heights, which is also pretty unique, though it is traditional at heart. If we consider A Catered Affair original, it didn’t fare so well.
Interestingly enough, what matters most about the shows, what it boils down to most, was—get this shocker—the quality of the storytelling. Name recognition saved Young Frankenstein and The Little Mermaid from their reviews, but the show that cost less to produce and could very well end up grossing the most was an original show with, get this, a great story! Just like Hairspray succeeded based on its storytelling, as did Wicked, Urinetown, and pretty much every other hit has. Some of the successful shows were unique and bold—Rent, Avenue Q, Spring Awakening; some successful shows have had name recognition—Hairspray, Beauty and the Beast, The Color Purple; some just had were original—Urinetown, In the Heights, The Drowsy Chaperone. But the key is that they found their audiences because they were great shows. No gimmicks, no stunts, no super-creative marketing campaigns to cover up flaws. They were great shows.
Let’s repeat that.
The key is that they found their audiences because they were great shows.
If I had money to invest in Broadway or was looking for a show to produce, that’s what I’d look for.
If I was looking for a project to adapt into a musical or was starting from the ground up, that’s what I’d be most concerned about.
the Broadway Mouth
June 26, 2008
Showing posts with label A Catered Affair. Show all posts
Showing posts with label A Catered Affair. Show all posts
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Promoting the Hat: Guidelines for Selecting Showcase Scenes
An employee at work recently called and left a message like the following:
“I’m just calling to let you know that I won’t be able to see my client tomorrow, but if he wants to, I can see him on Friday instead. Just let me know.”
What is wrong with this picture? If you were in charge of staffing 200 people, would you know what to do? We sure as heck didn’t.
It’s amazing what a simple piece of information can do. A first name somewhere in the message would have given us enough to go on to figure out what the message was about.
Xanadu on Live
To me, this message was a little, er, a lot like the recent Xanadu performance on Live With Regis and Kelly in which members of the cast performed “All Around the World.” I haven’t seen the show (though I do have a good idea of what it’s about), and I was totally and completely lost as to what was going on. There was some specific choreography happening, and there was some reason why the chorus was dancing, but because there was no dialogue and no proper set-up, the performance was as engaging as the telephone message above was informative.
This is something good English teachers understand clearly. People need to have enough context so that when they receive new information, they know how to organize it. Imagine reading The Crucible without understanding Puritan America, seeing The Dairy of Anne Frank without knowing what the Holocaust was, or watching The Client without knowing what the mob is. It would be confusing, and you would quickly lose interest.
When Broadway shows give performances on the morning shows, the producers are trying to sell the show. To do so effectively, the audience needs to be able to grasp what is happening in a moment. The performance Xanada gave on The View when it first opened provided that, quickly letting the audience know what Cheyenne Jackson’s character was doing, giving context for the song. The performance on Live did not.
One of the worst Tony performances I’ve seen was from the Into the Woods revival, in which the show was basically thrown into a blender and presented to the audience as a mishmash of color and sound. I’m very familiar with the show, and I was completely lost. What a wasted opportunity for that show!
When producers are provided the opportunity to showcase their musical, it’s crucial to think like a viewer, asking yourself the following questions:
1. If someone doesn’t know the show, what will they need in order to appreciate what is happening?
2. Is there enough set or costumes to provide context?
3. What scene can be comprehended with the shortest introduction?
When you look at how cast recordings have change over the decades, you’ll notice the role intro dialogue plays on many contemporary recordings. Why? Because the dialogue helps provide context for the song to follow.
A Catered Affair on The View
Interestingly enough, the segment with Faith Prince and Tom Wopat on The View was extraordinarily effective in selling the show. Prince and Wopat came off as exceedingly genial and fun, and they were given the chance to speak impassionedly about the project to the point where it felt like seeing A Catered Affair would be the experience of a lifetime. If I was heading to New York, I’d be putting A Catered Affair high on my “Must See” list based upon what they had to say alone.
What might this say about the best ways to promote a show?
the Broadway Mouth
June 15, 2008
“I’m just calling to let you know that I won’t be able to see my client tomorrow, but if he wants to, I can see him on Friday instead. Just let me know.”
What is wrong with this picture? If you were in charge of staffing 200 people, would you know what to do? We sure as heck didn’t.
It’s amazing what a simple piece of information can do. A first name somewhere in the message would have given us enough to go on to figure out what the message was about.
Xanadu on Live
To me, this message was a little, er, a lot like the recent Xanadu performance on Live With Regis and Kelly in which members of the cast performed “All Around the World.” I haven’t seen the show (though I do have a good idea of what it’s about), and I was totally and completely lost as to what was going on. There was some specific choreography happening, and there was some reason why the chorus was dancing, but because there was no dialogue and no proper set-up, the performance was as engaging as the telephone message above was informative.
This is something good English teachers understand clearly. People need to have enough context so that when they receive new information, they know how to organize it. Imagine reading The Crucible without understanding Puritan America, seeing The Dairy of Anne Frank without knowing what the Holocaust was, or watching The Client without knowing what the mob is. It would be confusing, and you would quickly lose interest.
When Broadway shows give performances on the morning shows, the producers are trying to sell the show. To do so effectively, the audience needs to be able to grasp what is happening in a moment. The performance Xanada gave on The View when it first opened provided that, quickly letting the audience know what Cheyenne Jackson’s character was doing, giving context for the song. The performance on Live did not.
One of the worst Tony performances I’ve seen was from the Into the Woods revival, in which the show was basically thrown into a blender and presented to the audience as a mishmash of color and sound. I’m very familiar with the show, and I was completely lost. What a wasted opportunity for that show!
When producers are provided the opportunity to showcase their musical, it’s crucial to think like a viewer, asking yourself the following questions:
1. If someone doesn’t know the show, what will they need in order to appreciate what is happening?
2. Is there enough set or costumes to provide context?
3. What scene can be comprehended with the shortest introduction?
When you look at how cast recordings have change over the decades, you’ll notice the role intro dialogue plays on many contemporary recordings. Why? Because the dialogue helps provide context for the song to follow.
A Catered Affair on The View
Interestingly enough, the segment with Faith Prince and Tom Wopat on The View was extraordinarily effective in selling the show. Prince and Wopat came off as exceedingly genial and fun, and they were given the chance to speak impassionedly about the project to the point where it felt like seeing A Catered Affair would be the experience of a lifetime. If I was heading to New York, I’d be putting A Catered Affair high on my “Must See” list based upon what they had to say alone.
What might this say about the best ways to promote a show?
the Broadway Mouth
June 15, 2008
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
From the Mouth of Harvey Fierstein
I love being a genius. It’s hard going undiscovered for so long and all, but I’ll take that over never having been a genius any day.
How can you tell if you’re a genius? If smart people say things you have been holding firmly to for some time or have put into words that which you’ve already written, then you are a certifiable genius without ever having to take an IQ test. Trust me. Being an undiscovered genius, I’m an expert on these things.
Barbara Hoffman’s interview with Harvey Fierstein in The New York Post contains just one of those genius-inducing quotes:
Why turn a creaky flick like A Catered Affair into a musical?
That's why. I don't believe that you take something incredibly great and finished and then make something else out of it. I'm always asked to write a new version of Stage Door. But that film is genius. You can't do better than that cast—Katharine Hepburn, Lucille Ball, Ginger Rogers, Ann Miller. Leave it alone! I saw Catered Affair and I loved how human it was. Paddy Chayefsky's like that. Think of Marty. But Marty is perfect - a dance number isn't going to make it better. A Catered Affair had all this humanity and didn't quite go as far. I thought I could take it to the next level. Debbie Reynolds [one of the film's stars] came to our opening in San Diego and said, "Honey, it's a much better musical than it ever was a movie!"
To steal Hal Prince’s phrasing, there are some exceptions—big ones, like Mame and Les Miserables—but Fierstein has spoken something I have felt for a long time. It’s difficult for me to pull many concrete examples from big musicals simply because I don’t usually bother with the source material, which is often hard-to-find or just not of interest, but I have often contemplated this when thinking of source material to adapt. If you’re just going to plug in songs, then it’s kind of a why-bother proposition. If the adaptation is super faithful, I earnestly wonder where’s the fun in it for the writer, though I’m sure cashing big royalty checks is delightful.
A case in point: I loved The Wedding Singer, but even though I had never seen the film, the second act didn’t feel much like a stage musical. It felt like an after-school special plotted on a stage. I then acquired a copy of the movie and was surprised how literal the musical’s book was, including the whole “Julia thinks Robbie’s slept with Linda” drama which, in part, prevented the second act from lifting from the stage.
Of course, you don’t want to take a beloved work and screw it up either. Mame, Les Miserables, and Jane Eyre are all examples of shows that remained faithful to their source works that not only worked well but would have been doomed had any other direction been taken. I admired the creators of Little Women for attempting some of their own touches, but with a work so beloved, you risk the “Jo never took Beth to the sea!” reaction or the “I want to see Beth die on stage in song!” cliché they worked so hard to avoid but for which the audience, at least I, was craving.
Perhaps it’s like on American Idol. You have to not only follow what the judges tell you but also understand how to apply it. Many a singer has taken a risk at the behest of the judges, only to fail because they took the wrong risk or didn’t have enough of a mastery of their talents to fully grasp how to change. You have to be able to inherently know when and when not to change.
Let’s also address the idea of change. Changes should not be made for the sake of making changes. I always admired Thoroughly Modern Millie for not simply duplicating the movie, but the changes from it are, at times, perfunctory. The fact that Dorothy doesn’t choose Trevor Graydon in the end or that Jimmy starts out a rude jerk isn’t necessary, but giving Mrs. Meers a clear motivation for her dirty deeds or Graydon’s delightful typing test for Millie are. There are changes that are required for the sake of structure, to adjust for the medium of the stage, to flesh out the work, to incorporate musical moments, or to develop or change theme—those are the important ones. Tacking on alterations for the sake of making an interpretation your own isn’t enough.
Even in a strong source work, I would say that it’s important to have some sort of interpretation, something to focus on or add. I recently wrote about this in an entry quoting Arthur Miller.
So, in the end, I guess the best that can be said is that musical theatre is an art, not a formula. Master your art, and you have a better chance of making the choices that lead you to success. Master your art, and you also know when to break the “rules.” Perhaps that the best kind of genius of all.
the Broadway Mouth
March 26, 2008
(Note: Interestingly and contradictorily enough, I think film versions of books and plays must fight to be faithful in order to be great. I won’t go into detail on theories why except to say that the best movie adaptations of books and plays are almost always the ones that are the most faithful.)
How can you tell if you’re a genius? If smart people say things you have been holding firmly to for some time or have put into words that which you’ve already written, then you are a certifiable genius without ever having to take an IQ test. Trust me. Being an undiscovered genius, I’m an expert on these things.
Barbara Hoffman’s interview with Harvey Fierstein in The New York Post contains just one of those genius-inducing quotes:
Why turn a creaky flick like A Catered Affair into a musical?
That's why. I don't believe that you take something incredibly great and finished and then make something else out of it. I'm always asked to write a new version of Stage Door. But that film is genius. You can't do better than that cast—Katharine Hepburn, Lucille Ball, Ginger Rogers, Ann Miller. Leave it alone! I saw Catered Affair and I loved how human it was. Paddy Chayefsky's like that. Think of Marty. But Marty is perfect - a dance number isn't going to make it better. A Catered Affair had all this humanity and didn't quite go as far. I thought I could take it to the next level. Debbie Reynolds [one of the film's stars] came to our opening in San Diego and said, "Honey, it's a much better musical than it ever was a movie!"
To steal Hal Prince’s phrasing, there are some exceptions—big ones, like Mame and Les Miserables—but Fierstein has spoken something I have felt for a long time. It’s difficult for me to pull many concrete examples from big musicals simply because I don’t usually bother with the source material, which is often hard-to-find or just not of interest, but I have often contemplated this when thinking of source material to adapt. If you’re just going to plug in songs, then it’s kind of a why-bother proposition. If the adaptation is super faithful, I earnestly wonder where’s the fun in it for the writer, though I’m sure cashing big royalty checks is delightful.
A case in point: I loved The Wedding Singer, but even though I had never seen the film, the second act didn’t feel much like a stage musical. It felt like an after-school special plotted on a stage. I then acquired a copy of the movie and was surprised how literal the musical’s book was, including the whole “Julia thinks Robbie’s slept with Linda” drama which, in part, prevented the second act from lifting from the stage.
Of course, you don’t want to take a beloved work and screw it up either. Mame, Les Miserables, and Jane Eyre are all examples of shows that remained faithful to their source works that not only worked well but would have been doomed had any other direction been taken. I admired the creators of Little Women for attempting some of their own touches, but with a work so beloved, you risk the “Jo never took Beth to the sea!” reaction or the “I want to see Beth die on stage in song!” cliché they worked so hard to avoid but for which the audience, at least I, was craving.
Perhaps it’s like on American Idol. You have to not only follow what the judges tell you but also understand how to apply it. Many a singer has taken a risk at the behest of the judges, only to fail because they took the wrong risk or didn’t have enough of a mastery of their talents to fully grasp how to change. You have to be able to inherently know when and when not to change.
Let’s also address the idea of change. Changes should not be made for the sake of making changes. I always admired Thoroughly Modern Millie for not simply duplicating the movie, but the changes from it are, at times, perfunctory. The fact that Dorothy doesn’t choose Trevor Graydon in the end or that Jimmy starts out a rude jerk isn’t necessary, but giving Mrs. Meers a clear motivation for her dirty deeds or Graydon’s delightful typing test for Millie are. There are changes that are required for the sake of structure, to adjust for the medium of the stage, to flesh out the work, to incorporate musical moments, or to develop or change theme—those are the important ones. Tacking on alterations for the sake of making an interpretation your own isn’t enough.
Even in a strong source work, I would say that it’s important to have some sort of interpretation, something to focus on or add. I recently wrote about this in an entry quoting Arthur Miller.
So, in the end, I guess the best that can be said is that musical theatre is an art, not a formula. Master your art, and you have a better chance of making the choices that lead you to success. Master your art, and you also know when to break the “rules.” Perhaps that the best kind of genius of all.
the Broadway Mouth
March 26, 2008
(Note: Interestingly and contradictorily enough, I think film versions of books and plays must fight to be faithful in order to be great. I won’t go into detail on theories why except to say that the best movie adaptations of books and plays are almost always the ones that are the most faithful.)
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