In the script notes for the licensed version of the material, Holmes describes why he re-wrote several of the confessions. When the show was revised for the (very brief) original London production, Holmes sought to address what he thought were some musical flaws on Broadway -- mainly that the second act didn't include enough 'new' songs and that "Ceylon" didn't completely work for musicalizing the Landless twins.
Holmes replaced "Ceylon" for the London production with "A British Subject" (briefly heard in the original production at the Delacorte) and added a song called "A Private Investigation" to Act 2 (Holmes felt that "Settling Up the Score" was repetitive, given that its essentially the same melody as "Don't Quite While Your Ahead.")
Given these changes, Holmes decided that the confessions would be more specifically character driven if they reflected the new musical changes, rather than (almost) all of the confessions being rooted in the same piece of music ("No Good Can Come from Bad").
Thus, the Landless twins's confession was changed to be underscored by "A British Subject". They are really the only confessions that are markedly different from the Original Broadway production. The character of Durdles was not a candidate for murder in the Broadway production. He was added to the line up in that London revision.
For reasons I'm not sure of, Holmes (or perhaps Rivera and Scott Ellis) decided to revert back to "Settling Up the Score" rather than "A Private Investigation." But the most of the other changes to the score reflect that London revision. For this production (key changes, alternate notes) were simply made to accommodate this cast's vocal talents.
Updated On: 2/15/13 at 11:23 AM
