Best Openning Numbers- Page 2
Best Openning Numbers
Jazzysuite82
Broadway Legend Joined: 2/6/05
#25re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 1:02pm
These are great openings. Openings by nature really should be fierce. It's what hooks the audience in to the show. West Side is great because it tells you EXACTLY what you'll see (dancing gang members. I'm sure WISHIHADATONY will tell you the Sondheim anecdote about the mad walking out of the opening. Others I'd like to add
Caroline Or Change
Fosse - for some reason I found the idea of a Danced Overture (an opening comprised of the all the classic moves you'll see in the entire 3 acts) to be inventive.
Chicago
Sant
Broadway Legend Joined: 9/12/04
#27re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 1:52pm
All That Jazz - CHICAGO
Prologue/Overture - THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA
#28re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 2:05pmOn The Twentieth Century
"Smart! And into all those exotic mystiques -- The Kama Sutra and Chinese techniques. I hear she knows more than seventy-five. Call me tomorrow if you're still alive!"
joeybiltmore1
Leading Actor Joined: 2/22/05
#29re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 2:41pm
Titanic!
42nd Street, On the 20th Century and A Chorus Line are close seconds.
#30re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 2:58pm
20 Million People from MY FAVORITE YEAR
The Advantages of FloatinG in the Middle of the Sea from PACIFIC OVERTURES
Joshua488
Broadway Legend Joined: 9/29/04
#31re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 3:05pm
"Comedy Tonight" from A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM
Everybody knows that song; it's great.
Bal
Leading Actor Joined: 10/19/04
#32re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 3:20pmFugue For Tinhorns is just wonderful. Yay, Guys and Dolls.
"Well, obviously Company is about the Kennedy family. Bobby is played by Raul, and JFK is played by Harvey Fierstein."
-vfd88
#33re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 3:25pm
"there you are"
from mystery of edwin drood
Be the change you wish to see in the world.
#34re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 3:56pm
Wicked
Aida
I wanted to get something that an "ex"-junkie like him would really appreciate and cherish....it's a brick of heroin shaped like a heart.
-Scrubs
#35re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 4:03pmWilkemmon (sp?) - Cabaret
And the other thing about the Phantom Lady was, Bert, she realized, in the city that never sleeps...
What did she realize, Kitten?
That all the songs she'd listened to, all the love songs, that they were only songs.
What's wrong with that?
Nothing, if you don't believe in them. But she did, you see. She believed in enchanted evenings, and she believed that a small cloud passed overhead and cried down on a flower bed, and she even believed there was breakfast to be had...
Where?
On Pluto. The mysterious, icy wastes of Pluto.
#36re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 4:05pm
Tower of Babble/Prepare Ye-GODSPELL
Overture/Jellicle Songs-CATS
Prologue-INTO THE WOODS
Company-COMPANY
Stayin' Alive-SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER (Loathed the show, loved the opening)
Ragtime-RAGTIME
All That Jazz-CHICAGO
Aquarius-HAIR
Try To Remember-THE FANTASTICKS
Runyonland/Fugue for Tinhorns-GUYS AND DOLLS
We Are What We Are-LA CAGE AUX FOLLES
"Y'all have a GRAND day now"
mattvcrewse
Understudy Joined: 3/2/05
#37re: Best Openning Numbers
Posted: 3/13/05 at 6:13pm
Some bit of trivia on "Comedy Tonight"... The original opening number was "Love Is in the Air". It took audiences half-way through the first act to realize it was a farce, not a sweet romantic comedy. Director George Abbott asked Sondheim to write a different opening, thus "Comedy Tonight".
I love that number. It even flat out TELLS you it's going to be a happy ending and the whole show is purely for entertainment value, no beating the audience in the face with themes and morals, just Zero Mostel and Jack Gilford being funny as hell. I also like the joke Jerry Zaks added in the '96 revival with the early-raising of the curtain to reveal death and wailing... "Tragedy TOMORROW, comedy TONIGHT!"
EDIT: I forgot to name others...
"Why Can't the English?" Higgins is such a bad-ass...
Sweeney had nice staging as well as great music and lyrics
Into the Woods
It's not a big, splashy opener, but "The Sound of Music"
just to name a few...
Updated On: 3/13/05 at 06:13 PM
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