What if.....

[FranklinShepard-Inc.]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 3:35pm

I thought it is time to open a humorous "what if..." thread and hope many are going to join in.

My start:

What if ... 1) Stephen Sondheim had written "Wicked" (Anyone possible Storyline or possible lyrics)?
2) Rodgers and Hammerstein II. (living today) had written Rent (same Task)?

I hope, you join the task and enjoy

[FranklinShepard-Inc.]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 3:42pm

hmm, lol, okay, pardon for putting the thread in, I didn't expect that many people taking part

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 3:42pm

here's to the witches who lunch. everybody dies! dies! dies! dies! dies!!!!!!!!!!

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 3:49pm

but anyway believe it or not this whole what if stephen sondheim had written wicked or stephen sondheim should have written wicked thing has just been discussed to death can't we stop now?

[FranklinShepard-Inc.]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 3:50pm

Sorry I didn't know that. Haven't found that thread.

Edit: My point was never to just put together Sondheim and any Show. I just thought to offer some food for thought. Sorry if I bored anyone... Updated On: 3/10/05 at 03:50 PM

[melissa errico fan]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 3:58pm

If Sondheim wrote "Wicked," Elphaba would wear her ugly green skin as a badge of honor, and use it to guilt Fiyero into loving her.

[bwaybaby891]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 4:40pm

If Sondheim had written "Wicked" there would've been murderous barber, a storyline too hard to understand, and songs that made no sense. If Rodgers and Hammerstien had written "Rent" there would've been a duet at the beginning about not being sure if you love someone, it would've had a ballet dance session and a dopey female lead who needs a man to protect her. I wouldn't want to see that if it happened.

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 4:47pm

(sings) people will say we're on drugs!

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 4:52pm

bwaybaby: Since when do Sonheim's shows have pointless songs and incomprehensible plots?

[SDJTactress]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 5:10pm

Rent would be the worst show, and nothing innaprpriate would happen.

and if Stephen Sondheim wrote wicked, it would be worth it to pay $80 to see it in LA!

[FranklinShepard-Inc.]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 5:23pm

So let's go on with some new ones:

What if .... 3) Jonathan Larson had written "Ragtime"?
4) Andrew Llyod Webber had written "The Producers"?
5) Loewe and Lerner had written "Cabaret" (aka "Eliza in Berlin")?

Any ideas?

[bwayballerina]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 6:26pm

If Sondheim had written Wicked, it probably would have been a little... darker? Glinda would be sort of Mrs. Lovett-ish (a la Worst Pies in London), and Elphaba would be a tad bit more complex. I don't think there'd be as much belting, since the Sondheim I'm familiar with seems sort of opera-ish.

Out of choices 3, 4 and 5, I think Lerner and Loewe writing Cabaret would have the best result of the three. I'm not necessarily saying it would be a good result, but it'd be better than the other two shows, I'd think.

[jonartdesigns]

Posted: 3/10/05 at 10:54pm

beginning of fiyero's big number in sondheim's wicked

I feel you, elphaba, i feel you
i was half convinced you're wicked...

[leomaxfrank]

Posted: 3/11/05 at 1:13am

Boy, I wish half the people who were answering Franklin Shepard's questions had any idea what they were talking about or at least knew about the composers' writing styles.

p.s. Not every Sondheim show is like Sweeney Todd (contrary to 95% of broadwayworld belief).

[redhotinnyc2]

Posted: 3/11/05 at 7:47am

If Stephen Sondheim had written Wicked - it would have been excellent - and worth the price of admission.

[Justice]

Posted: 3/11/05 at 9:01am

1. If Sondheim had written Wicked, it would have stayed true to the book. There would have been no happy ending. Everyone would have died (including Glinda, write at the moment where she has her self-discovery), there would be not one hummable tune, it would be a four hour show (He's staying true to the book, remember?), Bernadette Peters or Donna Murphy would have been Elphaba, while William Perry, Chris Groenendal, and Robert Westenberg would have been in the cast, somewhere. It would have been directed by James LaPine, who would have also written the book, and there would be no choreography. Also, it would have won the Tony, and would have closed a month later.

2. If Rodgers and Hammerstein had written Rent, well, Hammerstein would have taken the project on his own, rewriting the lyrics to Puccini's La Boheme, yet using the same music, because he so enjoyed doing the same thing with Carmen Jones.

3. If Larson had written Ragtime, the score would be modernized, much like Wildhorn. The chorus would have been made up of six people, all doubling roles. And it would begin to snow when Sarah dies.

4. If ALW had written The Producers, the whole score would have been wriiten to the tune of his other show "Jeeves", being that no one saw it, how could anyone know?

5. If Loewe and Lerner had written Cabaret, the MC would have been very conservative, and all of the tunes would be memorable and catchy, not to mention, Julie Andrews would have played Sally Bowles.


Okay - What if...
Jason Robert Brown had written Aida?
Ahrens and Flaherty had written Cats?
Menken and Ashman had written Les Miserables?

[Glebb]

Posted: 3/11/05 at 9:04am

I saw BOUNCE and it was Wicked bad.

[FranklinShepard-Inc.]

Posted: 3/11/05 at 9:59am

If Jason Robert Brown would have written Aida, the story would begin after Aida was sentenced to die in the pyramid and we would find the story moving into two different directions at the same time while we discover all of her broken relationships before she met Radames.

If Flaherty and Ahrens had written Cats, all the cats that matter would be introduced in the first song, and there would not really be any point in continuing the show Perhaps Grizabella would move to the sky in the second song "on the wheels of a dream".

If Menken had written Les Mis, Jean Valjean would be a Beast who is hunted for his life long by Javert who in fact fancies Eponine and plans to marry her by putting Valjean into the Maison de Lunes. It would not play in Paris though but in a little french Village.... And in the end all will be eaten by a huge plant that Valjean feeds with his Blood. Updated On: 3/11/05 at 09:59 AM

[FranklinShepard-Inc.]

Posted: 3/11/05 at 4:22pm

Well, time to get the topic running again

Anyone else suggesting a "what if" example? Until then:

What if... 9) Elton John & Tim Rice had written "City of Angels"
10) Kander & Ebb had written "Carrie"
11) Bock & Harnick had written "Hairspray"

[jonartdesigns]

Posted: 3/11/05 at 7:01pm

leomaxfrank- if that was directed at me, i am fully aware the not all sondheim sounds like sweeney todd, i'm actually a sondheim fan however thats the first parody that came to mind and didn't require alot of effort (elphaba and johanna have the same # of syllables)

[Justice]

Posted: 3/11/05 at 7:32pm

9. If Elton John and Tim Rice had written City of Angels, every song would be a top ten hit played on the radio. Stine would be gay, and Stone would be Eminem, as it would take place in the present.

10. If Kander and Ebb had written Carrie, there'd be a lot more dancy numbers and not solos or duets. Debbie Allen would have never been involved, as Ann Reinking would have probably been hired to choreograph (Or was Bob still alive then?) Chita Rivera would have been the mother and Joel Gray would have been Carrie.

11. If Bock and Harnick had written Hairspray, every character, including the black people, would be Jewish - except for Link, which would cause a conflict with Tracy about dating a Goy.



What if...
12. Stephen Schwartz had written Phantom of the Opera
13. Jeff Marx and Robert Lopez had written Into the Woods
14. Marvin Hamlisch had written Caroline or Change

[FranklinShepard-Inc.]

Posted: 3/12/05 at 7:42am

Great examples, justice

If Stephen Schwartz had written Phantom of the Opera, the show would play in biblical times in the first place. He would be a green-skinned baker living below the opera house of Oz. The whole score would be rock flavoured except for the songs of the phantom who would receive vaudeville tunes. Chrstine would be Idina Menzel and Carlotta Kristin Chenoweth, who then would have no problem to display possible hatred to each other (if they ever had). In the Christine would have to die and the whole opera house would be damn glad she did.

If Marx and Lopez had written Into the Woods, it would of course be all played with puppets which would help the fairy-like character of the show. It would all start though with the whole village being unemployed and thinking of going into the woods to find some work. The agony of the princes would have its reason this time not in any woman... They would find that halfway through the show, their life still sucks (as the still wish for their dreams). In the end they would have learned to live with their sucking life And it wouldn't really be a musical to bring children to anymore.

If Marvin Hamlish had written Caroline or change, Caroline wouldn't be a maid but rather a hopeful young starlet heading to Broadway. The score would be jazzy and swinging and we'd have a lot of kick line numbers. He'd have brought David Zippel along as lyricist, so we'd have clever lyrics galore. Her life would be presented to us through the column of a powerful journalist. And in fact it would have nothing to do at all with the Tresori-musical.

[riv]

Posted: 3/12/05 at 9:22am

Let's talk about shows that could have really happened...

If the proposed collaboration between Richard Rodgers and Alan Jay Lerner worked out and I Picked A Daisy actually been written, would the score have ended up being as strong as On A Clear Day You Can See Forever? And what future works would they have given us?

Here's another one...

What would Annie Get Your Gun have sounded like if Jerome Kern hadn't dropped dead on the streets of New York upon arriving to write it? Think of the magnificent Irving Berlin songs which never would have been written!! Could Kern & Fields have turned out a better score? Updated On: 3/12/05 at 09:22 AM

[FranklinShepard-Inc.]

Posted: 3/12/05 at 1:39pm

A good approach as well. Rodgers&Lerner would have been delightful I guess, though Rodgers' big time had already passed and his greatest melodies were already written. I guess they'd have handled it decently but I like the Lane&Lerner show too much to want to have it exchanged. Yeah, I know about this probability with Kern&Fields. But as much as I love Kerns melodies, Fields lyrics weren't really cheeky at that time (at least not the way she worked it out teaming up with Cy Coleman). So I guess the show wouldn't have worked to well since Kern's music would have been too luscious and Field's lyrics too tame. If they ever made a studio recording of songs that had been written already, I'd be damn curious though.

[riv]

Posted: 3/12/05 at 3:43pm

I'm sure no songwriting work had been done on Annie Get Your Gun since Kern died after only being in New York a day or two before collapsing. His approach to it would have been interesting to see since he would have been writing it realizing Ethel Merman was the star and her style would have to be stamped all over the score. I don't believe he had ever done anything with Merman before. And with Rodgers & Hammerstein producing, they must have had a direction they wanted it to go in and would have conveyed their feelings to Kern. Of course they certainly didn't object to any material Irving Berlin wrote, so they may have given Kern a lot of latitude on the project.

As for On A Clear Day, I love the Lane-Lerner score as well and would hate for it to have never existed. But one can only drool as to what may have been produced if Rodgers and Lerner were not incompatable. By that point in Rodgers' career, he probably needed a strong lyricist and book writer to work with and lead him. After Do I Hear A Waltz, he seemed at sea with A) poorly chosen projects and B) collaborators who were not strong nor up to his calibre.

Supposedly Lerner offered him three projects to consider upon first meeting. One of them was what turned into Coco in 1969 with Andre Previn. Rodgers was more intrigued by the ESP idea and I Picked A Daisy was started. Rodgers always flourished in the post-Hart works which were somewhat exotic and "timeless"--elements an ESP storyline could encompass, which may explain his interest in the idea.

I wonder if their next work might have been what became Do I Hear A Waltz? Rodgers & Hammerstein had thought about The Time of the Cuckoo but wanted some time to pass after the release of the 1955 film version, Summertime, before doing it. It may have very well been the next Rodgers & Hammerstein show if Oscar hadn't died. After working on a Lerner idea, Rodgers possibly could have convinced Lerner to be the one to work on Cuckoo. The European locale was certainly suited to Lerner's Continental style.

As much as I like the Rodgers-Sondheim Waltz score, I think it may have been a stronger and perhaps wonderful piece if Rodgers & Lerner had done it.

Updated On: 3/12/05 at 03:43 PM