what musicals change trends?- Page 2

[Smaxie]

Posted: 8/19/15 at 2:46pm

The true trendsetters of the past two decades would be Beauty and the Beast and Mamma Mia; Beauty, as Disney's first theatrical venture ushered in corporate producing on Broadway, as well as inspiring movie studios to raid their vaults for inspiration and then Mamma Mia for the first of the many jukebox musicals that followed.  Shows like Hamilton that come along every decade or so may be artistic triumphs, but they tend to be one-offs, with Broadway soon returning to business as usual.  

[tazber]

Posted: 8/19/15 at 2:58pm

Totally agree with that assessment Smaxie.

 

 

 

 

[SonofRobbieJ]

Posted: 8/19/15 at 3:36pm

In terms of style and substance and even sound, RENT was not a trendsetter.  But in terms of capturing the youth audience that would then be tapped for shows like WICKED, AVENUE Q, SPRING AWAKENING and even NEXT TO NORMAL?  I'd give the phenomenon known as RENT the credit.  

[HogansHero]

Posted: 8/19/15 at 3:58pm

@tazber I don think the OP meant tech at all. That was my point (or so I thought).

@Ranger Unquestionably innovative marketing is significant, but it is the tail, not the dog. The subject line asks about musicals, not the business. I agree that the reference to the history of Broadway could be read more broadly to include the business side. But before any of those things happen, you have to have a show.  

[A Director]

Posted: 8/19/15 at 11:41pm

Lin-Manuel Miranda on seeing RENT and how it influenced him.

“Rent” rocked my perception of what musical theater could be in several ways. It was the first musical I had ever seen with a cast as diverse as the subway riders I saw on the way to school. It was the first musical I had ever seen that took place in the present day, and sounded like the present day. The characters were worried about the things I worried about: finding a community, being an artist, surviving in New York.

More than anything, it gave me permission to write about my community. I grew up in a predominantly Spanish neighborhood in Upper Manhattan that burst with music and characters, and “Rent” whispered to me, “Your stories are just as valid as the ones in the shows you’ve seen.” These were not Phantoms or revolutionaries in Paris, or cats. They lived in the Village. Right downtown.

I began writing one-act musicals in high school because of “Rent.

[Fantod]

Posted: 8/20/15 at 12:05am

I feel like Hair might have been the most influential post-Oklahoma! musical. It completely changed the concept of what a musical could be, and it has had lasting impact to this day.

Other good ones:

Very Good Eddie

Lady, Be Good!

Show Boat

Oklahoma!

Cabaret

Company

Les Miserables

 

[firebolts]

Posted: 8/20/15 at 12:20am

This is a really good question. 

 

In style/structure: Oklahoma!, Hair,  A Little Night Music (the complexity of those lyrics, wow - I love how lyricists attempt to follow Sondheim's patterns, e.g., Fun Home, which Lisa did wonderfully), Beauty and the Beast (THE Disney musical - inspired so many others).

 

Social impact: Wicked ($$), RENT (I love that Lin quote @A Director posted), In the Heights (that diverse cast and Lin's rapping - I loved it), Les Mis, The Phantom of the Opera ($$), Grease, Hamilton (the diverse cast, but I can't see it necessarily impacting Broadway in terms of style; I thought that would happen with "In the Heights" and it never did; but Hamilton might? I don't remember a show receiving this much buzz in a while.). 

 

I know I'm forgetting many, but these are the my top ones so far. 

Updated On: 8/20/15 at 12:20 AM

[ZellMorrowsPledge]

Posted: 8/20/15 at 12:22am

Rent

In The Heights was a new type of musical

The Lion King and its puppetry and African culture introduction to broadway audiences

 

[Elfuhbuh]

Posted: 8/20/15 at 1:52am

Say what you want about the show, but didn't CATS start the mega musical trend from the 80s?

[g.d.e.l.g.i.]

Posted: 8/20/15 at 2:59pm

In what sense do you people who point to Cats mean "mega-musical"? If you're going by the rough definition of "a fully or an almost entirely sung-through musical drama, produced on a very large scale in which the staging, spectacle and specific special effects are equally important as (if not more so than) the plot, characters, book and score" (to quote the late but not forgotten Margo Channing), then well before the trends of the Eighties and Nineties, Jesus Christ Superstar (in its original Broadway mounting by Tom O'Horgan) more than fit the definition.

 

(Incidentally, I'd also like to nominate JCS as a show that changed trends by being the first rock oratorio on Broadway. [I know opera is a technically incorrect term for it.])