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Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

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#1

Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 3:33pm

When these shows lost I felt like throwing my shoe at the TV. What shoes do you think should have won the award?
1. Ragtime
2. Into The Woods
3. Secret Garden
4. Miss Saigon
5. Parade
#4

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 3:43pm

Dreamgirls & Follies
"What a story........ everything but the bloodhounds snappin' at her rear end." -- Birdie [http://margochanning.broadwayworld.com/] "The Devil Be Hittin' Me" -- Whitney
#6

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 3:58pm

definitely WSS in 57, when it was beat out by the Meredith Willson gem "The Music Man" - tough competition. but i guess it holds true for many comedies defeating dramas - even to this day.

ragtime
saigon
sunday in the park

But I won't live alone in a house of regret.
#8

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 4:03pm

As much as I love love love the lush score to NINE, I have to go with DREAMGIRLS as well. It's just so wonderfully constructed...the most important musical of the 80's.
"I'm so looking forward to a time when all the Reagan Democrats are dead."
#9

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 4:07pm

those are some big words robbiej - i'm certainly not saying i disagree with you, but can you explain a bit why you think its the most important? it's a fantastic show - i'm just curious to hear why...
But I won't live alone in a house of regret.
#12

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 4:21pm

LaChiusa's "Wild Party" should have won over "Aida".
"Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing.” ~ Muhammad Ali
#15

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 4:29pm

I most certainly can, leo oh leo (you're right here beside me, ya know)

The first point is maybe my weakest...cause I may be wrong. But to my knowledge, this was the first 'black' musical to deal with color issues within that minority (light-skinned black vs. dark-skinned black...soul sound vs. smooth 'whiter' sound). It did so in a way that made it accessible to everyone.

second, it is the most fully-successful 'pop opera' we have. The score achieves a robust Broadway sound without ever bastardizing the pop music that is its source. For me, there was always something odd about Jesus or Jean-Valjean singing so 'pop'y. And the music in RENT never fully achieves a true rock sound. DREAMGIRLS tells the story of that time through its music. It's a wonder of a score.

This show also proved that serious themes can still be discussed in a show that has a sense of humor and is very entertaining.

Finally, Michael Bennett's staging proved that theatre could be as visually striking and as fast-moving as film. A quarter century after the fact, WEST SIDE STORY finally found its descendant.
"I'm so looking forward to a time when all the Reagan Democrats are dead."
#17

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 4:44pm

I'm sure there is a tape at Lincoln Center.

Will it be revived? Absolutely. And quite soon. Isn't Jerry Mitchell attached?
"I'm so looking forward to a time when all the Reagan Democrats are dead."
#18

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 4:47pm

ONCE ON THIS ISLAND is certainly a better show than WILL ROGERS FOLLIES. The NINE/DREAMGIRLS argument is a little dicier but I side with DREAMGIRLS. SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE is 10 times better than LA CAGE AUX FOLLES I don't care what anyone says. Must the biggest error of all time was giving the Tony to TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA over FOLLIES.
"You got the same dress I got?" "Yes.""You got the same wig I got?" "Yes." THEN SHUT UP!
#19

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 4:58pm

USActorSinger - Miss Saigon and Secret Garden were the same year. One of them had to lose.

And yes, I would include:
West Side Story
Sunday in the Park With George
The Most Happy Fella
Dreamgirls
Blood Brothers
Call Me Madam
Paint Your Wagon
Of Thee I Sing
Gypsy
Oliver
She Loves Me
Hair
Purlie
Jesus Christ Superstar
On the Twentieth Century
Black and Blue
The Wild Party
Jane Eyre

"What can you expect from a bunch of seitan worshippers?" - Reginald Tresilian
#20

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 4:58pm

To follow up one of RobbieJ's points (well done by the way), Dreamgirls managed a feat that only a couple of rock/pop musicals have ever been able to accomplish (and nearly all aspire to) -- the composers created a score so authentic that tracks taken directly from the original cast album (unremixed) actually hit the Top 40 on the Billboard charts. Jennifer Holliday's original track of "And I Am Telling You I'm Not Going" went to Number One on the R&B charts and stayed there for 4 weeks and ranked as high as #22 on the Pop Chart. Ben Harney and Sheryl Lee Ralph's "When I First Saw You" also hit the R&B Top 40. While there have been covers done of songs from Broadway shows by mainstream pop artists that have had chart success (several songs from "Hair," "Memory" from Cats, "Don't Cry For Me Argentina" to name a few), "And I Am Telling You" and "Day By Day" from Godspell (which hit #1 on the pop charts) I believe are the only two tracks directly from cast album to top any of the Billboard Charts in the rock era (or at least the last 40 years or so). Truly remarkable. And if we had more shows that actually had a true authentic sound that reflected what is going on in the musical mainstream (which was the case for decades -- until the 60's, songs from Broadway shows regularly made it to the top of the charts) Broadway wouldn't have to resort to casting faded boy band members in order to attract the youth audience and the theatre as a whole would be healthier (rather than the bastard child of the entertainment world in terms of economics).
"What a story........ everything but the bloodhounds snappin' at her rear end." -- Birdie [http://margochanning.broadwayworld.com/] "The Devil Be Hittin' Me" -- Whitney

Updated On: 5/20/04 at 04:58 PM

#21

re: Best Musicals to not win Best Musical (Tony Award)

Posted: 5/20/04 at 5:04pm

USActorSinger said:
"When these shows lost I felt like throwing my shoe at the TV. What shoes do you think should have won the award?
1. Ragtime
2. Into The Woods
3. Secret Garden
4. Miss Saigon
5. Parade"

But Secret Garden and Miss Saigon couldn't have both won. They were nominated the same year.

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