New Poll: Is CINDERELLA a New Musical or a Revival?- Page 2

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 5:24pm

It won't win either award, so what does it matter?

In my opinion, it's a revival, although the book should obviously be eligible for Best Book.

[BroadwayFan12]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 5:38pm

How the hell is it a revival when it's never been on Broadway before. By that logic, The Producers, Mary Poppins, Throughly Modern Millie, etc. should have been considered revivals because they had also been around a long time before they came to Broadway. *eyeroll*

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 5:43pm

When was the last time a show in this situation was deemed a new musical/play? I guess what I'm asking is where is the inconsistency? As of late, any show that has been considered anything of a previously written vehicle (that has had stage productions) was deemed a revival.

Flower Drum Song might as well have been a completely new musical. New story using songs from the original score. It was deemed a revival. Assassins made its Broadway debut 14 years after it was Off-Broadway. It had far less exposure than a Rodgers & Hammerstein musical, but it too was deemed a revival. I think the Tony committee has been pretty consistent in this respect since they've added the "classic" rule (which, if I'm not mistaken, is pretty new in terms of Tony history). Of course, any new elements specific to the production should be deemed eligible, Cinderella's book for example.

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 5:48pm

The Producers, Mary Poppins, and Thoroughly Modern Mille (and Once and Newsies and...) had their stage debut on Broadway (after any out of town tryouts). Those musicals had never been written for the stage before.

R&H's Cinderella, on the other hand, has had many stage incarnations that have played all over the world. This just happens to be the first that reached Broadway.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 5:49pm

Are the people who are asking how on earth this could ever be a revival even reading the damn thread?

[BroadwayFan12]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 5:52pm

Yeah, I feel like an idiot. Guess I didn't think it through. My bad.

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 5:58pm

Broadwayfan, that defense makes no sense at all.

The last time this happened was with ASSASSINS and it was deemed a revival. http://www.playbill.com/news/article/86039-Tony-Rulings-Assassins-Deemed-a-Revival

CINDERELLA has been produced around the world in stage productions for forever. Even though it's never been mounted in NY, I don't see much that is "new" about it to be considered a "new" musical. None of the songs are "new," they are all old R&H songs, even the new additions to the score. The only thing about it that is "new" is the revised book.

The examples you list are wildly different cases. Updated On: 3/8/13 at 05:58 PM

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 6:19pm

Can you imagine if Assassins were deemed new (which was less far-fetched than the Cinderella argument)? Avenue Q would have been Tony-less and there may have been a bigger push in the other design categories for Assassins to win, rivaling Wicked.

[Trish2]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 6:20pm

PIPPIN will win revival. "jazz" hands down !

[AEA AGMA SM]

Posted: 3/8/13 at 6:28pm

"Even though it's never been mounted in NY"

Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella has been mounted in New York. New York City Opera did a production a few years back with Ana Gasteyer and Lea DeLaria as the step-sisters, John Epperson (aka Lypsinka) as the Step-Mother, Dick Van Patten and Renee Taylor as the King and Queen, and Eartha Kitt reprising her role as the Fairy Godmother from the NETworks tour, which also played Madison Square Garden several years before the City Opera production.

[goldenboy]

Posted: 3/9/13 at 12:59pm

To answer your question

Yes.

[PatrickDennis92]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 1:24pm

The producers should campaign for the show to be a revival-- at least then they might win.

[Kad]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 1:52pm

The score has certainly been around. But the book isn't just revised- it's brand spanking new. That complictes things.

Little Shop and others were known commodities prior to their Broadway "debuts". That's the difference.

But this is half-known commodity, half-new. It's almost akin to something like Nice Work if You Can Get It. Sure, the score has been used to tell the same general story. But now there are additional songs, not to mention a new script. The show is NOT what people would know R&H's Cinderella is based on its prior incarnations.

[Smaxie]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 2:23pm

WickedRocks is correct that Cinderella will not win in either category. So that said, it makes better business sense for them to campaign for the New Musical category. The four new musicals get more press attention, buzz and coverage in the weeks leading up to the Tony Awards, the new musicals get more airtime on the Tony Awards broadcast irself (four minutes for new musicals, three minutes for revivals), plus in selling the show, "new" is always more attractive to theatergoers than "revival," which is seen as a bit of a diminishment or pejorative.

[Broadway61004]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 3:47pm

Don't forget that one of the first arguments about adding the "classic" rule to revival was in 1996, when State Fair was eligible for new musical and everyone agreed it was ridiculous that Rogers and Hammerstein were nominated for score. Who knows, but something tells me the Tonys won't make that same mistake again with another classic R&H show.

[Kad]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 4:12pm

It could still be considered a new production without being eligible for score.

[TheGingerBreadMan]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 4:20pm

It's new.

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 5:21pm

I'll reiterate that Flower Drum Song had a completely new book with a new story than the original. The characters didn't have the same arc nor did the book of the musical follow the story of the original novel. It was deemed a revival and no one questioned it.

Nice Work If You Can Get It was written in the style of old Gershwin musicals but is basically a "jukebox musical," which made it eligible for Best Musical.

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 9:58pm

AEA AGMA SM, sorry I meant specially on Broadway in NY.

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 3/10/13 at 10:21pm

I think it would be different if Rodgers and Hammerstein were alive, if they were still on the creative team and made significant and deliberate changes themselves. Just how Menken and Feldman were involved with Newsies. Or the new songwriting team behind Mary Poppins. But Cinderella is already an entity. It's never had a definitive book or script, so the fact that this is a new book shouldn't be a deciding factor, nor should this being its Broadway debut be a factor either since many shows that haven't played the Great White Way have been eligible as revivals. Even if they petition to be a new musical, I can't imagine the Tony committee agreeing.

[rorschach37]

Posted: 3/11/13 at 1:02pm

Godspell never played Broadway until the most recent production and it was classified as a revival.

[AEA AGMA SM]

Posted: 3/11/13 at 1:07pm

Godspell opened on Broadway at the Broadhurst in June of 1976, transferred to the Plymouth 3 months or so later, and moved a third time to the Ambassador in January of 1977 where it ran until that September.

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 3/11/13 at 1:12pm

GODSPELL was originally mounted on Broadway in 1976.