Sister Act Score

[justafan2]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 9:45am

Why didn't the score of Sister Act include any of the numbers from the original film? Is there a rights issue? I personally would've have enjoyed hearing those songs included in the show. (Haven't seen it yet---so I'm just projecting)

[tazber]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 9:52am

No, it's all original.

There is a teeny snippet of a famous disco song (the name escapes me right now) in Take Me To Heaven, but it's literally just a couple of bars.

The score is a lot of fun though. I swear some of those songs would have been hits had they been released in the 70s.

[TheKandyLife]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 10:01am

I think they wanted to use the original songs from the film in the musical, but i think it was Menken who said that if he is going to take this prject on then he wants the whole score.

Which i'm glad he did! I do wish the film songs were in it, but put together with the new show songs...they would clash, in my oppinion. Great show though!

[justafan2]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 12:41pm

Thank-U for those comments---I feel better about seeing this show (I have tix for June). I actually have a CD of the original cast recording---someone gave it to me, but haven't listened to it yet. (just got it yesterday) I think I want to see the show before listening to it.

[Disneyland Magic Man]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 12:43pm

Sister Act Movie - Set in the 90s.

Sister Act Musical - Set in the 70s.

The only thing that stays the same is a black person becomes a nun. Otherwise, anything enjoyable in the film wasn't kept for the musical. It's a completely different story, concept, setting, etc.

[TheLadyoftheWood]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 1:58pm

The little snippet of the song that you are speaking of is "The Best of My Love" by the Emotions which is featured very shortly in Take Me To Heaven and its Reprise.

[songanddanceman2]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 2:04pm

Actually originally they did want to sue many songs from the film but the company who owns them had already sorted out a deal with the touring show 'The Songs From Sister Act' which has toured the Uk and europe (its dreadful) so they decided to write a musical from scratch.

I saw Sister Act in London and was left underwhelmed by the score, it has some good moments but its stuffed with songs that sound so bland to me

Just my opinion

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 2:22pm

The only thing that stays the same is a black person becomes a nun. Otherwise, anything enjoyable in the film wasn't kept for the musical. It's a completely different story, concept, setting, etc.

The setting was moved back a couple of decades (for no other discernible reason than to feature a 70s flavor in the score), but the basic story is the same. It was padded a teensy bit in ways that didn't really make much sense or weren't fleshed out, but the story is not a completely different. In fact, it is almost exactly the same.

[TheLadyoftheWood]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 2:36pm

What I don't understand is the fact that we are supposed to believe these women (nuns) can't sing until the song Raise Your Voice, yet they sing in the song How I Got The Calling? Big plot hole right there. Are supposed to believe that the nuns lost their ability to sing and all of a sudden find it once again later on in the Act? I hope they fix that and just make it a book scene. There is no need for the nuns to sing about their call from the lord.

[tazber]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 2:49pm

The Best Of My Love! Thanks, Lady.

I also think it's a little silly that all of the sudden the nuns sound great, but I went with it. I mean that's the story.

Plus, Raise Your Voice is such a fun number!

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 3:03pm

What I don't understand is the fact that we are supposed to believe these women (nuns) can't sing until the song Raise Your Voice, yet they sing in the song How I Got The Calling?

Because as with most musicals, the characters aren't really singing to each other in How I Got the Calling. That's how songs in the book of a musical usually work. Their voices sound different when they start learning to sing because that music is a "song within a song". It's like "Sing" in A Chorus Line. We learn she's tone deaf in the song, but the suspension of disbelief allows us to separate that from the singing she performs in the rest of the show.

[winston89]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 3:17pm

Someone commented to me as well about the whole notion of the nuns all of a sudden being able to sing in Rase Your Voice. And, My thought was, isn't it okay ofr a musical to have a song that shows a lengthy amount of time pass through the course of one song?

I didn't see a plot whole with them using one song to show something that happened over the course of several scenes in the movie.

Also, with regards to the rights of the music. I was under the impression that all of the music was owned and copyright by Motown and they didn't give the OK to use their songs in the show.

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 5:45pm

Part of the fun of the movie was the way Whoopie's character kept channeling the 80s, not the 70s.

:: sigh ::

Oh well. It's just the film with music It's just the film with music It's just the film with music It's just the film with music It's just the film with music

[Scarywarhol]

Posted: 12/2/10 at 6:08pm

I saw Sister Act a few months ago and thought the score was definitely its strongest asset. Menken did a good job of having disco pastiche while also creating some good original melodies. I also thought most of Slater's lyrics were pretty clever; "When I Find My Baby" felt like a song Menken and Ashman would have written around the time of Little Shop of Horrors. It was nice to have a new Menken show that has some edge to it, though I wish he were doing truly original material instead of allllll of these movie adaptations. That said...fingers crossed for Hunchback in the states.