ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals. — Page 2

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#26

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 7:30am

Gak! I just can't win!

"I am special, I am special! Please, God, please, don't let me be normal!" ---Louisa, The Fantasticks --- --- Intolerant of intolerance.

#27

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 8:40am

No Lael, no you can't.
I won't let you
muahahahahaha

#28

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 8:42am

*hangs head in shame*

"I am special, I am special! Please, God, please, don't let me be normal!" ---Louisa, The Fantasticks --- --- Intolerant of intolerance.

#29

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 8:49am

Chicago's based on a play.

Musical theater is an adaptive form. Original shows are the exceptions and always have been.

#30

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 9:19am

"We used to get them all the time in Broadway's Golden age."

There were a lot of musicals during that time that were also based on other material like plays, books and movies:

"The King and I"
"South Pacific"

Just to name two.

"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!"

#31

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 9:24am

Did Rogers and Hammerstein write any 'original shows?

#32

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 9:28am

"Oklahoma!" was based on the book 'Green Grow the Lilacs' by Lynn Riggs.

"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!"

#33

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 9:37am

"A Chorus Line" was based on a series of interviews with chorus members for Broadway shows... not original
"Guys and Dolls" was not based on someone's life, it was taken from a series of short stories... by... oh, I forget, but I am sure someone here knows.

#34

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 9:41am

"South Pacific" was based on "Tales of the South Pacific", by James A. Michener.

"Carousel" was based on "Liliom", a play by Ferenc Molnar as adapted by Benjamin F. Glazer.

"The King and I" was based on Margaret Landon's novel, "Anna and the King of Siam".

"The Sound Of Music" was based on the book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse. That book was in turn based on Baroness Maria von Trapp's 1949 autobiography "The von Trapp Family Singers".

"Flower Drum Song" was based on the novel "The Flower Drum Song" by CY Lee.

"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!"

#35

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 10:43am

Even during the Golden Age, most musicals were based off books or plays. Now more musicals are based off films because there are simply a lot more films now than there were 50 years ago. Art is constantly evolving and will continue to do so. I really don't think there are that much fewer orignal shows now than in the past. Completely original shows have always been rare.

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

#36

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 10:58am

This stems back even further than musicals. Most operas and operettas are not original either. Some are based off of each other. I have always believed that since these forms (along with musiclas) are written or started by composers, they find it easier to adapt an already written plot, stitch together several different plots, or use a person's life. Composers are usually not writers (at least no many I know) and they feel safer using something that is already structured. Most of the time a composer thinks of an idea (hmmm I want to do a musical about say George Washington) and then contacts a book writer. (Hey Joe do you want to write the book to my musical about George Washington, we'll call it George W!) Usually they don't ask if the book writer can write a whole new story. It is just too time consuming and problematic when you try to write music and a book, completely new, at the same time. I don't blame musicals for being adapted, based on, or taken from. It is just how the genre works best.

#37

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 10:58am

Damon Runyon wrote the source material for "Guys and Dolls".
"Allegro" and "Me and Juliet" were two original Rodgers & Hammerstein musicals.

#38

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 11:28am

Ironic that two of the three R&H "flops" -- Allegro and Me & Juliet (Pipe Dream was the other one, based on Steinbeck) -- had original books.

Here's a few I don't think were mentioned yet:

The Music Man
How To Succeed In Business (the eponymous book by Shepard Mead is a comedy "How To" manual -- it doesn't contain any of the characters or plot of the musical)
No Strings
Hair
Hallelujah Baby!
Ain't Supposed To Die A Natural Death
Don't Bother Me I Can't Cope
Runaways
They're Playing Our Song
Grease
I Love My Wife
Company (those Furth short plays were unproduced and the first place they were presented anywhere was as the musical COMPANY; he went to Prince with them for advice as to what to do with them and that's how the musical was born)
City of Angels
The Life
Blood Brothers
Falsettos
Me and My Girl
Sarafina
Starmites
Hedwig

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

#39

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 1:04pm

"A Chorus Line" was based on a series of interviews with chorus members for Broadway shows... not original

I count Chorus Line as original, becuase those interviews were done with the goal of creating a musical.

Ok so I guess this lack of originality is nothing new. But doesnt anybody see what im trying to get at here? Do we WANT practicaly all Broadway shows to be replicas of movies with a few mediocere songs added. I dont know about you, but im getting nervous.

#40

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 1:07pm

Assassins
ALMOST all sondheim
All Jason Robert Brown
The original "The Wild Party" (I think I am not positive about that one)
Avenue Q
Babes in Arms? (that is kind of a guess)
Chicago?

When someone blunders, we say that he makes a misstep. Is it then not clear that all the ills of mankind, all the tragic misfortunes that fill our history books, all the political blunders, all the failures of the great leaders have arisen merely from a lack of skill in dancing. - Moliere

#41

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 1:15pm

Sondheim:
Sweeney Todd was based on a popular tale and was also a silent film.
A Little Night Music was based on Ingmar Bergman's film Smiles of a Summer Night.
Forum was based on the plays of Plautus
Frogs was based on the play by Aristophones
Passion was based on the novel Fosca, which was also a film entitled Passione d'Amore
Into the Woods was based on several fairy tales
Merrily We Roll Along was based on a Kaufman and Hart play of the same title

The Wild Party was based on a poem
Chicago was based on a play

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

Updated On: 12/13/04 at 01:15 PM

#42

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 3:52pm

Isn't Parade based on a true story? And isnt there a book and movie with the same plot?

#43

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 4:00pm

1776 and TITANIC were based on historical events and not on andy particular previous literary or dramatic work.

RIP glebby <3

#44

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 4:07pm

Sunday In The Park With George (if this has not been mentioned) is based on the life (if a majority of it fictionalized) of Georges Seurat and his painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Isle of La Grande Jatte...I believe that is the name, I am probably wrong however.

BSoBW2: I punched Sondheim in the face after I saw Wicked and said, "Why couldn't you write like that!?"

#45

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 4:37pm

Given that next to nothing is known about Seurat's life, his family, his mistresses or his process of painting and that the plot and characters in the musical come almost entirely from James Lapine and Sondheim's imaginations (Act One is probably 95% fiction; Act Two, 100%), Sunday In The Park certainly qualifies as a original work.

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

#46

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 4:39pm

I was thinking along the lines that it is credited as "based on the life of George Seurat" which to me makes it not an original musical persay.

BSoBW2: I punched Sondheim in the face after I saw Wicked and said, "Why couldn't you write like that!?"

#47

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 5:01pm

Is Starlight Express original? Most of the ALW stuff is based on something, but I'm not sure about SE.

I have my books and my poetry to protect me...

#48

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 5:02pm

I believe it's based on The Little Engine Who Could.

BSoBW2: I punched Sondheim in the face after I saw Wicked and said, "Why couldn't you write like that!?"

#49

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 5:09pm

FLOYD COLLINS, THE GOLDEN APPLE (yes, I know, it's based on Homer, but really...it's original)
THE RINK
ASSHEADS OF LOVE
FALSETTOS
BABY

"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

#50

re: ORIGINAL Broadway Musicals.

Posted: 12/13/04 at 5:12pm

Parade was based on a true story. My grandmother recited a rhyme she learned as a child about Mary Fagan, so it's pretty well known. I think The Last Five Years is loosely based on Brown's own life. The Wild Party is based on a poem written in the 1920s. Sorry to be a killjoy.

As far as original musicals...A New Brain?

"Wilkins, after all these years, are you trying to be funny?"

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