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Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

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#1

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 4:38pm

I’m doing a timeline project depicting the beginning of the 20th century to present (1900 to 2013). However, it is not the year the musical was first written/produced, but when it is set. The time period has to influence the story heavily or have some real people or background (such as WWII in Sound of Music). Here’s what I have so far:

1. Bonnie & Clyde (1934)
2. The Sound of Music (1939)
3. Dogfight (1963)
4. Thoroughly Modern Millie (1922)
5. South Pacific (1944)
6. Miss Saigon (1975)
7. Rent (1980s) (Anyone know the actual year???)
8. Titanic (1912)
9. The Music Man (1912)
10. Cabaret (1931)
11. Oklahoma! (1906)
12. Scandalous (1906-1944)
13. Nice Work if You Can Get It (1927)
14. Chicago (1920s) (Anyone know the actual year???)
15. Memphis (1950s) (Anyone know the actual year???)
16. Rock of Ages (1987)
17. Motown: The Musical (1983)
18. Sister Act (1978*)
19. Hair (1960s) (Anyone know the actual year???)
20. Hairspray (1962)
21. Evita (1952)
Thanks in advanced, everyone!


*I just put a star there so it would not make it into a smiley face with sunglasses...

Updated On: 6/6/13 at 04:38 PM

#3

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 5:01pm

Evita also covers a period of time, roughly 1934-1952.

I'm confused about the criteria you're looking for though. Would you take something like Fiddler on the Roof, which is set in 1905 and features the all-too-common pogroms? I would also say that A Chorus Line is influenced by its time period because Broadway has changed so much since that premiered.
When I see the phrase "the ____ estate", I imagine a vast mansion in the country full of monocled men and high-collared women receiving letters about productions across the country and doing spit-takes at whatever they contain. -Kad
#4

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 5:26pm

It is not so much about the musical itself but the history infused into it. "Fiddler" I can use because of the cultural aspect, so thank you. Does that help at all?
#5

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 5:59pm

Lots to add here. Of the shows I've seen:

Gypsy. 1920-30's
Ragtime. 1906-1914
Annie. 1933 (I think)
On the Twentieth Century. mid-30's
West Side Story. 1957
42nd Street. 1933
My One and Only. 1920's
The Rink. 1984 (with flashbacks to 70's)
Grind. 1930's
Rags. 1910-11
City of Angels. 1940's
The Will Rogers Follies. 1920's to '35
Sunset Boulevard. 1951
Showboat. 1880's to 1920's
Mack and Mable. 1911-1930
Damn Yankees. 1955
Steel Pier: 1930's
Side Show: 1920's-1930's
The Life. 1970's
Parade. 1913-15
The Wild Party. 1928
Follies. 1971
Assassins. 1865-1982
Wonderful Town. 1930's
Caroline, or Change. 1963
Hairspray. 1962
Billy Elliott. 1984-85
Jersey Boys. 1950's - '90's
Newsies. 1899.

Also I'd put Rent in 1990, when AZT was the common treatment for AIDS.


#7

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 8:38pm

Not sure if A Chorus Line will fit within your criteria. But there are several references through out that show that are very 1970's. Examples..Robert Goulet, Peyton Place (which was a soap opera, late 60s), you could even argue the reference to darvon (pain killer) is very 70s. Cassie references "toilet paper squeezing" ...definitely a 70s tv commercial.
#9

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 9:04pm

The Scottsboro Boys!
If we're not having fun, then why are we doing it? These are DISCUSSION boards, not mutual admiration boards. Discussion only occurs when we are willing to hear what others are thinking, regardless of whether it is alignment to our own thoughts.
#10

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 9:17pm

So, basically, any period musical fits your criteria. That's a lot. The Wedding Singer, High Fidelity, Fiorello!, Mack and Mable, Etc etc etc ,
"Through The Sacrifice You Made, We Can't Believe The Price You Paid..For Love!"
#11

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 9:20pm

RENT actually takes place in 1992.

The movie THELMA & LOUISE, which was referenced in the song "Today 4 U" was released in May 1991. This would mean that RENT takes place from December 1991 thru December 1992.
"The Spectacle has, indeed, an emotional attraction of its own, but, of all the parts, it is the least artistic, and connected least with the art of poetry. For the power of Tragedy, we may be sure, is felt even apart from representation and actors. Besides, the production of spectacular effects depends more on the art of the stage machinist than on that of the poet."
--Aristotle
#13

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 9:47pm

Rent is difficult because it exists in a time warp. The raid on Tompkins Square Park was in August 1988. The park was actually closed for renovation from June 1991 to July 1992, a possible time for Rent to be taking place.

It's difficult to place Rent in the early 1990s though because the neighborhood was already gentrifying and we need to believe that it still had some run down sections, especially since Tom Cruise, Cher and several other stars were living in the East Village.
If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.
#14

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 9:51pm

"Falsettos- someone will know they exact year (s) but it's got to be late 70's/early 80's."

One of the songs mentions the Reagans so it has to be the 80s.
If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.
#15

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 10:15pm

""Falsettos- someone will know they exact year (s) but it's got to be late 70's/early 80's."

One of the songs mentions the Reagans so it has to be the 80s."

Well, since Whizzer is dying of AIDS in Falsettoland (or act 2 of Falsettos), then it has to be at least 1981, when HIV was first clinically observed in the US, and probably not much later than 1982 or 83. In "Something Bad Is Happening" Charlotte is singing about this new, never before seen disease that seems to be sweeping amongst gay men, describing what we the audience recognize as AIDS without fully knowing what it is herself.
#16

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/6/13 at 10:27pm

"and probably not much later than 1982 or 83"

This is another time warp musical.

Mendel sings: half my patients, yuppie pagans

The word yuppie was first used in 1981, but I don't remember it being a commonly used word until the mid 1980s. In the early 1980s, the US was still trying to recover from the Carter years, so the yuppie ideology wasn't in full swing until later.
If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.
#19

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/7/13 at 4:01pm

To be up to the minute, you could add HERE LIES LOVE (60's to 80's), GIANT (1950's), and FAR FROM HEAVEN (1950's).

Somehow I missed GREY GARDENS (1941, 1973).

Updated On: 6/7/13 at 04:01 PM

#20

Help with a Timeline of 20th/21st Century Musicals

Posted: 6/8/13 at 1:51am

THE SCOTTSBORO BOYS is incredibly specific to what the time period was.
1931 I believe is the year it begins.

RAGTIME begins in 1906 ("and there were 94 years to go...")

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