"Musical Theater Elitists" Who Think The Play They Like Is Extremely Obscure...

[Cruel_Sandwich]

Posted: 8/14/06 at 11:25pm

POMPOUS PETER: Ahoy there, dirt under my foot!
APATHETIC ALLISON: hi.
POMPOUS PETER: I have another reason why I am still better than you. I have discovered a musical...
APATHETIC ALLISON: woot.
POMPOUS PETER: A musical entitled RENT! Absolutely nobody has heard of it!

I'm sorry, I couldn't think of a better way to start this topic.

[aspen]

Posted: 8/14/06 at 11:31pm

We don't have that problem here in Texas... today in Theatre Arts we played the 'three-headed expert' game and I made the offhand remark that I felt like Alice Ripley in Sideshow. Perhaps I should've just said, "Cue the blank looks."

Later, pulled out a copy of "History Boys" in Study Hall. The teacher saw the book cover full of hot guys and asked if the author was anything like Janet Dailey. Ouch.

[JailyardGuy]

Posted: 8/14/06 at 11:33pm

"Side Show" is two words.

By the by, you just illustrated the point of the post. "Side Show" isn't exactly an unknown show amongst the theatrically oriented...yet for some reason, everyone under the age of 21 that I've ever encountered who knows the show is UTTERLY shocked that anybody but them has heard of it.

[aspen]

Posted: 8/14/06 at 11:50pm

Two words? Whoops, I'm a dork. But that was kinda the thing... I just started at a new school with a much bigger theatre program, so I kind of expected everybody to get the reference. Ya know, I felt a need to prove that us kids from 1A schools aren't total hicks who know nothing about the arts. When they didn't get it, not even the teacher =(, I wasn't really sure what to say.

I mean, it's not like it would be funny anymore if I tried to explain the fact that I was making a semi-witty reference which they would've found amusing if they were more culturally literate...

[Elphaba]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 12:02am

cruel, is there an award for most threads this summer?

[Caroline-Q-or-TBoo]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 12:20am

I had a similar History Boys expierence, Aspen. And i'm in texas, as well!

[feinstein9]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 12:21am

oh you know it, man. the world is full of them, but it seems most prevelent at high schools. there was this cheeky chap a year younger than me, and he was like, the school hero in terms of theater. he thought he knew everything, he was in every show, arrogent as hell. so anyway he goes to ny for the first time, and he's talking to our assistant principal, who's also going to ny, and she says to him "well i know the *only* show to see is wicked." and he says "oh yes, that's really the only one, i mean idina menzel is MESMERIZING, it's just incredible." and she says "well it was sold out, so we're seeing some off-broadway show." and he says, "well you should really see tick tick boom!" and this in 2004. and so i'm in the office, so i pipe in, "actually, that's been closed for a while." and he's very adiment that it's open. and i say, no, it's closed. and he says, "but i just bought the cast recording." and i say, that's great but i got the cast recording sept 01. and neither he nor the assistant believed me, so i went ahead and told her wicked was crap and that idina screams through the role... they gave me that "you don't know what you're talking about look. so i talk to him later and I said, "now norbert isn't still in wicked is he? i really havne't kept up with it." and he looks puzzled. "norbert leo butz," i say. "fierello? the love interest?" "i don't know," he says looking shocked. "ooooooookay... he was in the last five years?" "has the show been running that long?"
"no, the musical called the last five years, by jason robert brown."
"oh, that... um well no jason's not in it anymore."
"mmm okay."

then i did a show with this kid and found out he didn't know who stephen sondheim was.

his myspace profile says he favourite show is "the fabulous last five years, a real rare gem of a piece!"

.... that every theater-loving college kid in america knows.

where is he now? nyu. stupid muthafocker.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 12:31am

"yet for some reason, everyone under the age of 21 that I've ever encountered who knows the show is UTTERLY shocked that anybody but them has heard of it."

Perhaps you spend too much time among the 21-and-under set.

Why don't you hang out with my OLD friends the next time we get together and argue which was better: "Yip, Yap, Yaphank" or "The Black Crook"

Updated On: 8/15/06 at 12:31 AM

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 1:59am

Oh, please, PJ...

...The Black Crook, hands down!

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 2:03am

Fierello?

[feinstein9]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 5:35am

Fiyero... it's all the same when it's late... sorry i should've thought about what i was writing before i wrote it...

[ZONEACE]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 5:38am

this has happened to me a couple times, in one case it was because for the first few years i like the play i still lived in Portland, Oregon, and so it wasn't as known there, so it wasn't because of elitism. and the other time it was because, well, the play is actually unknown. I got my copy directly from the playwright (in word format in an email)

[Fiction Writer]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 5:47am

I don't remember ever having this problem in Denison.
Most of the theatre kids were pretty smart.

[colleen_lee]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 7:42am

A little less than a month ago I was working on a show and there was a girl who insisted that Norbert Leo Butz was still in Wicked. She kept saying how amazing it was that he had stayed all that time.

I kept trying to explain that, no, he left a rather long time ago and has created a new role in a new show since then, won a damn Tony Award for the portrayal, and has since left THAT show and is now with the touring production.

She didn't believe me and insisted that he was still with the show.

She also thought TL5Y was the most obscure thing ever and was amazed that I had ever heard of it. Yet, she couldn't remember Jason Robert Brown's name, or name a single other show he had ever written.

[Fiction Writer]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 7:43am

Not only have I not heard anything from Last Five Years, I have no idea what Jason Robert Brown's written.

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 8/15/06 at 7:49am

Please, the Black Crook was only good for one thing: creating musical theatre as we know it today.