...you do know The Baker's Wife is based on a movie, right? Wasn't a trifle for late Thirties/early Forties French cinema. Even won a couple of major awards.
Now, as to the topic of the thread -- Pippin as a movie? I don't personally think it would work, it's very stage-bound. I know Fosse was indifferent to the very idea (having been burned by his experience on Sweet Charity and not especially wanting to relive other of his Broadway catalogue on the silver screen), but the producer, Stuart Ostrow, couldn't let go of the notion. Kevin Winkler's Big Deal includes excerpts from a memo titled "PIPPIN Motion Picture Impressions" where he took the notion of "a boy searching the world over for fulfillment" and opened it up by going all Godspell on it, setting each sequence in a different, instantly recognizable theatrical venue: "Magic to Do" at the Acropolis or Stonehenge, the "War" sequence everywhere from the Roman Coliseum to Bob Hope's USO tours to onstage at the Palace, Pippin's introduction to sex in Vegas and at the Crazy Horse Saloon in Paris, his life with Catherine and Theo played out on an "Andy Hardy street" on a Hollywood soundstage evoking old movie images, etc. (Frankly, it sounds like Michael Sarne tripped over this treatment when he was trying to decipher Myra Breckinridge.)
That said, I think Ostrow's film ideas, which in some ways eerily presage what Bill Condon and Rob Marshall did with Chicago 30 years later, indicate he had somewhat disconnected from what property was in his hands by the time Bob had filled it with tits and glitz and feathers glued together with darkness. If it was just a boy searching for fulfillment and settling for what he could achieve, he might as well have gotten somebody with a visual sensibility to guide Hal Prince through sticking his Candide on screen.
Especially by the time Fosse had had his way with it, Pippin is "Unreliable Narrator: The Musical." He's a college grad who's given up trying to find himself in a morally and emotionally barren landscape, and his finger is on the trigger. He is considering what led him to the point of no return through the lens of cognitive distortion. To quote Stephen Schwartz, "...the way to think about the Players is to realize that they are actually in Pippin's head, just as we all have those internalized voices that tell us we're not good enough, rich enough, beautiful enough, etc., and that we have to make our goals conform to the shallow and misplaced goals we see touted by the media and our so-called societal leaders. The Players are not so much malevolent as they are eternally cynical and dissatisfied, because nothing in real life can be glamorous enough or spectacular enough to achieve the sort of romanticized perfection we carry in the movie in our heads."
The whole show is Pippin's fever dream, a hallucination full of the magic he never found in his life, all happening in the moment before he kills himself. He's his own tormentor, revving himself up to take the final step. There's a reason his family is populated by perverse stereotypes, his fantasies filled with frightening characters of his own creation. The spectacle is symbolic of what Pippin is building "extraordinary" up to be in his head, of what he thinks he must achieve.
The Players greet his straightforward heartfelt anthem of individuality and drive, "Corner of the Sky," with sarcastic applause, muted laughter, and rolling eyes... of course they do! When you're getting ready to shuffle off the mortal coil, you'll see that earlier version of you, so confident, so youthful, as immature, self-involved, clueless, cocky, too-earnest, with zero self-awareness. "If you knew then what you know now..."
If you're laughing knowingly at "Extraordinary," then your own inner Players are talking: "Extraordinary, huh? Hey, genius, you don't become extraordinary just because you say you are! Based on the evidence so far, not only do you not seem extraordinary, it's doubtful you ever will be!"
In this dark night of the soul, he sees himself as failing at everything he's tried in life. Trying to live up to his father's expectations didn't work; losing himself in sex didn't work; trying to do better than his father didn't work; he initially fails to realize that stepping up for Catherine and Theo did work because he doesn't think just getting through the day-to-day can possibly be enough.
But he learns what we do: yes, we face disillusionment in life. Yes, we make compromises. Everybody feels trapped in their lives to some degree. But those compromises can provide us with a sense of peace, even joy. So he'll never be a great soldier, or lead a carefree life, or be a successful politician, or succeed at anything, really, except an average life. Maybe that's all he really needs. Is it happily ever after? Who knows? But whether it's "extraordinary" or not, he now has that meaning in his life that he wanted. He has someone, something, to live for. (If only he could protect his (now-)son from the same journey...)
Does every generation have to go through it? It might, as long as we create outrageous expectations for our young people and then sabotage their chances at attaining them, increasingly asking them to grow up faster at an alarming rate, rarely offering them role models and destroying the ones they have, lying to them about how they can have anything they want. (And we wonder why murder and suicide among teenagers continues to increase, and where that "entitlement" comes from.)
To some, when everything else is trashed, all that's left is the Grand Finale. But that doesn't have to be the case. You don't have to do extraordinary things to be extraordinary. You don't have to reach the highest high to be worth something. Sometimes succeeding at average, ordinary, everyday life is enough. And you don't have to follow all the rules and get everything "right" to do that. That's what Pippin is about. That's what it means.
Formerly gvendo2005
Broadway Legend
joined: 5/1/05
Blocked: After Eight, suestorm, david_fick, emlodik, lovebwy, Dave28282, joevitus, BorisTomashevsky, Seb28
Updated On: 12/4/24 at 12:31 PM
