Rock Of Ages Wastes No Time Coming To London — Page 2

I don't imagine many people are going to War Horse for the plot either. Does that make it "just a puppet show" or something? If We Will Rock You counts as a musical, then so does Rock of Ages. Rock music, completely preposterous plots, and an opportunity to see straight men in a theatre without sheepish looks on their faces. Good heavens, it's almost like they're the same show. XD

No one has to go and see Rock of Ages if they don't want to. But if people want to see it, and people want to put it on, then why the hell shouldn't they? This show has almost single-handedly broken down all my reservations about jukebox musicals, first by seeming like such fun in spite of its unoriginal score, and secondly by getting me arguing *against* the people who are anti-jukebox!

I don't understand why a show existing is such an insult, and I don't know why some people (on WOS more than on here) are so downright condescending. La Cage may be an artistically better show than Mamma Mia!, for instance, but if someone WANTS to see Mamma Mia!, then it's patronising and insulting to say "oh, but you'd have just as much fun at La Cage, a REAL musical, so you SHOULD see that and NOT Mamma Mia!, even though you WANT to see Mamma Mia!". If I went to buy the latest Harry Potter book, and someone was standing outside the bookshop saying "but it's rubbish, you should be reading Lord of the Rings! You'll love it just as much, and it's a REAL fantasy novel!", then I'd be hard-pushed not to punch them in the face. This is exactly the same. No one asked you (again, I have a lot of rage here, and it's at least 95% because of a similar discussion on WOS XD) to hold my hand and baby me with regards to my theatre choices. Let me see my Rock of Ages dammit!

Can the rest of the pro-Rock of Ages crowd get their asses over to WhatsOnStage.com please? I wouldn't mind a little more back-up.

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Updated On: 9/7/09 at 05:30 PM

I certainly wouldn't presume to tell people who may like Rock of Ages that they don't have a right to like it. Good luck to them if they do - and anything that gets people into a theatre is fine by me.

It's just that Juke Box musicals are generally not my cup of tea. (And they ARE a major threat to new writing in musical theatre because producers see them as an easy investment and that makes it increasingly difficult for new writing to get to the stage.) Still, I have a reasonably open mind and have been to see a number of Juke Box shows - some of which (like Jersey Boys) I kind-of enjoyed. But the major reason I can't force myself to spend the huge amount of money a ticket to Rock of Ages would cost is that I know I will hate the music. (I've listened to clips of the songs it uses and they are the kind of songs that would send me screaming from the theatre.lol. It's the same reason I have not been to see Priscilla - I hate the music I've heard from that too.)

But like everything else - some people will love what I hate. And there's room for all tastes - as long as I can avoid having my ears attacked by music I don't like LOL.

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Updated On: 9/8/09 at 06:50 PM

Mister Matt i take my hat off to you. That was a valued argument and opened my eyes to see things in a different light and i really enjoyed reading your post. I can't say i agree with you whole heartedly. I just feel that an original book musical is slowly becoming more and more rare. I'm not saying it's a quick process but it is slowly becoming more common for a 'juke box musical'. Personally i don't like them and that's my opinion. Although i'm also a hypocrite because i love Legally Blonde... although that's a 90s film so it's ok :p. This has proven to be a really interesting thread so kudos to Frapperira for starting it.

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I have a lot of time for 'book musicals', they are my favourite genre of musicals, that's why I had a lot of time for Margerite, also a show I did not see, but I wish I did was The Pirate Queen, but heard the score and its very good, I know I used examples of 2 musicals from the same stable, but wanted to use shows that flopped, another flop book musical would be The Woman in White, there are other great book musicals out there such as Spring Awakening or Les Miserable. I have a lot of time also for movie to stage theare such as Sister Act or Billy Elliot, these are my second favourite.

I am not too impressed with Jukebox or Tribute Shows, thats why I will give a wide birth to Dreamboats and Petticoats, Thriller and The Rat Pack.

I did say Woman in White is good, did not say it was brilliant, there was definitely issues with Woman in White, namely inferior lyrics and over use of projections, instead of using sets, projection did have its place though and thought the train at the end was amazing.I would prefer to see a show of that genre, rather than the Rat Pack etc.

Bob, bet you agreed with Spring Awakening and another flop but very good book musical was Martin Guerre.

I liked Woman In White. Thought it was clever. I think if i'm being honest though i was a little star struck as was my first time seeing Ruthie live... and she was great!!

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I just left New York and this was the only thing I really liked - both book and score. It was the only thing I saw that left me smiling afterwards, that energised me and made me want to return again. So long as there's good casting on this, this could really take the West End by storm.

^Rock of Ages, in my opinion, is much better than We Will Rock You and even Hair. next to normal is in a different league altogether though.

I didn't have that, but when I saw the show, there were two middle-aged women in the front row wearing fluorescent wigs who had obviously seen the show numerous times. At the beginning of each ballad, they would choreograph waving their mock lighters in a slow, ceremonious manner as if trying to deliberately cue the audience to follow along. It came off quite pretentious and annoying. What made it so irritating is that it wasn't as if they were particularly enthusiastic or that the movement was in any way inspired by the music at all. Their bodies were utterly still for the entire show until it came to the ballads and they would just robotically move their arms back and forth, always starting together perfectly cued to the music. It was as if they believed they were there simply to direct the audience when to pull out their lighters and when to put them away. If they were just having fun with the show like most everyone else, it would have been much less distracting.

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