Songs/Scenes Cut for Amateur Productions

[Enjolras77]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 9:52pm

After years of watching, performing, and directing amateur musical productions I have noticed that in a lot of cases songs or scenes which should be in the show have been dropped for whatever reason. A couple of examples:

1) Both times I have done The Pajama Game the "Jealousy Ballet" has been cut. Obviously this is not unheard of since this sequence was permanently cut in this past year's revival.

2) I have never seen an amateur production of Little Shop of Horrors that has included "Call Back in the Morning".

3) In several amateur productions of Oklahoma! I have seen "It's a Scandal, It's an Outrage" cut.

4) Many productions of The Sound of Music have replaced "An Ordinary Couple" with "Something Good". I think in this case it is legal and is an option.

5) In several productions of The Mystery of Edwin Drood there are numerous song cuts (and I am referring to all of the songs BEFORE the audience votes. Look at all the songs missing from this production done at East Carolina University:
http://www.theatre-dance.ecu.edu/Productions/Mystery_of_Edwin_Drood/program.html
They have dropped "A Man Could Go Quite Mad" and "Never the Luck" which are both pretty familiar numbers from the show. I went to Tams-Whitmark who licenses the show and they do list "A Man Could Go Quite Mad" as an optional number -- but "Never the Luck" is not.

Anyway...have any of you been in productions that have dropped songs or cut scenes that are supposed to be included in the show? If so what were they and how did it affect the overall show?

[Piazzaslight]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 9:55pm

My school productions of "My Favorite Year" and "Bye Bye Birdie" cut some stuff. MFY cut, "If the World were Like the Movies" or whatever, and made some musical parts dialogue, and BBB cut out "Hymn for a Sunday Morning (Ed Sullivan)" and the ENTIRE scene before it.

[ljay889]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 9:59pm

What? How is cutting HYMN FOR A SUNDAY MORNING even allowed? That is not just a little/unimportant scene/song to cut.

And sadly TICK TOCK is not avaiable for amateur productions of Company..

[Alex LaVelle]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 9:59pm

The worst was my sophomore year of high school, we did Into the Woods, and our director cut the entire affair sequence between the prince and the Baker's Wife. It was so obvious and so bad. Losing that kills the whole second act, if not the whole show.

[JoMarch]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 10:01pm

A few productions (And both movies...Boo! ) have cut The Herbert Hoover song from Annie. I think it's one of the show's better songs but...

[singingwendy]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 10:14pm

2) I have never seen an amateur production of Little Shop of Horrors that has included "Call Back in the Morning".

Interesting......a local high school did this show this year, and yes, they did "Call Back in the Morning"

When I was in high school, we did Jesus Christ Superstar, and they cut out the whole Simon the Zealot song (Christ You Know I Love You). I don't know why they did it, but it really didn't make much of a difference, since it's not incredibly important to the "plot".

[neddyfrank2]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 10:37pm

Usually when a school does cabaret I believe that Two Ladies is cut, I have also seen Meeskite (sp?) added. I have also seen High School Production's were the whole thing about Cliff being gay is cut.

From Oliver!, That's Your Funeral and I Shall Scream.

Also I think More I Cannot Wish you is almoust always cut from Guys and Dolls and My Time of Day because that is three Sarah and Sky songs in a row and doesn't add much to the plot. Updated On: 6/9/06 at 10:37 PM

[QueenS]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 11:40pm

As far as "Drood" goes, "A Man Can Go Quite Mad" has been eliminated from the show. "Ceylon" was replaced by another song, scenes have all been rewritten and even some re-ordering. I'm not sure when these changes were implemented (perhaps the tour or Kennedy Center version?) but they are all official.

A lot of companies change "West Side" to match the movie (swaping "Krupke" and "Cool") which I find annoying.

There are so many versions of "Camelot" out there that it seems to be a veritable potpourri of scenes and songs from which to choose and piece together one's own selection.

[inlovewithjerryherman]

Posted: 6/6/06 at 11:47pm

I actually recently saw a professional production of Seussical that cut everything about the military, completely eliminating the character of the general, and in turn, necessitated the removal of the Who's christmas party scene and Havin' a Hunch (which is one of my favorite parts, I was pissseeeeddddd).

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 12:10am

My high school cut out "My Time of Day" from Guys and Dolls for no apparent reason. Because the musical director didn't like the song. I certainly was upset. After all, I was Sky Masterson.

~Steven

[The Distinctive Baritone]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 12:19am

I don't know why "A Man Could Go Quite Mad" has been offically cut. It's a good song. But then again, these people changed the name of their show in the middle of the original Broadway run, so who knows how their minds work. However, the one time I saw it (in a summer stock production), they did do the song, and produced the show under the original title, THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD, rather than just "DROOD."

Also, Neddyfrank: Most likely, the whole Cliff being gay thing was NOT cut, because (I believe) the only version of CABARET that is being licensed is the original version, rather than the "revisal." However, I do wish they would license the new version, as it is so much better.

[bare_nakedlady]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 12:20am

JoMarch - I HATE when they cut that number too. 'We'd Like to thank you Herbert Hoover' sets up the entire atmosphere/time period of the show. Much like nowadays where the rich get richer and the poor... well... you know the rest.

[The Distinctive Baritone]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 12:23am

Oh, and let me add that changing ANYTHING in the script, whether it's a professional or amateur production, is ILLEGAL and MORALLY WRONG unless you get permission from the licensing company or the authors themselves (if they're still alive). What an insult to a writer to just cut something because you don't like it!

I just had to make sure that point was included in this discussion somewhere

[ChrisLK]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 1:27am

Well... we cut "The Rumor Song" from Fiddler, but that was becasue it was dragging horribly, and so it was killing the momentum in the show.

Then, when we did Music Man, "The Sadder-But-Wiser Girl" got the axe.

But, I heard somewhere that cutting numbersscenes is perfectly legal, directors perrogative or something. It's just adding or changing things that is decidedly illegal.

As for immoral, I would be rather angry if I wrote a show and someone decided to delete a song that I loved... but at the same time, I would rather someone cut material that would

a) Hurt the production
or
b) Make it impossible for the school to perform the piece (for us more convervative high schools)

than not liscence my work at all. Although, I guess if you're Stephen Sondheim, a royalty check isn't very important to you!

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 1:36am

Baritone, I believe that the '87 revival of Cabaret is also licensed, which includes the songs "I Don't Care Much," "The Money Song," and "Don't Go," deleting "Meeskite" and "Why Should I Wake Up". Cliff in this version is "sort of bisexual," as Joe Masteroff put it. I wish the '98 script were licensed, though. I think it's the best version of the show. Ah well...

~Steven

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 1:36am

I don't like when songs are cut. but I especially don't like it when songs are added and then cut. The first time I saw The Fantasticks "The Perfect Time to Be in Love" was incorporated into the production and then the second time I saw it at a different theatre they chose not to include it and I missed it to the point of irritation...

[theatreguy]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 2:36am

As far as the Seussical cuts someone mentioned, MTI recently starting licensing a shorter version for schools and/or children's theaters that eliminates Genral Ghengis Kahn Schmitz and the whole army thing. So it's likely those cuts were legal.

[bjivie2]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 2:47am

There are some shows that allow things to be cut. Tommy allows Acid Queen and Fiddle About to be cut, but that takes a lot away from the show.

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 4:24am

O, my college's production of Hair cut "Hippie Life." It's supposed to be an encore for "The Flesh Failures (Let the Sunshine In)." I think that's one cut that's completely beneficial to the show. It wasn't even in the original show.

~Steven

[HeyMrMusic]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 4:26am

Grease is also a huge one where people just do what they want. Script changes, songs added and removed, repositioning of scenes, etc. My goodness, I don't remember a single production that was close to the original script.

~Steven

[algy]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 5:16am

Admittedly I'm in the UK, so things maybe different here with regards to licensing.

When we did Cabaret at my high school (about 10 years ago), Cliff being gay was cut (as our Max was played by a woman) and it retained more than a hint of the movie. We had Two Ladies, but were missing a couple of others such as Maybe this time.

I've never seen Cabaret on stage, just the film and I know that there are a lot of differences between the two, so forgive me for any mistakes in the above - it doesn't help that I was in the band and so didn't see the cast rehursing the show until we got to dress rehursal stage!

[aegeusrocks]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 5:21am

My high school cut "The Rumor" from Fiddler as well. It just doesn't work well as a number, and serves no real purpose in the show. I've heard that a lot of professional productions sometimes cut it as well...

[QueenS]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 9:19am

Baritone:

The official title is back to being "The Mystery of Edwin Drood." The song was cut because Rupert Holmes didn't want to give too much away in that first scene. Jasper's menacing, Jekyl/Hyde side should come out gradually, not be obvious from the beginning. He felt the song spelled it out a bit too obviously.

It still exists in part at the end, though, during his last song).

Sorry for the hijack. Back to the previous discussion...

[Enjolras77]

Posted: 6/7/06 at 9:36am

One thing I left out of my original post, which Baritone was so kind to bring up, is that without specific permission from the licensing agency many of these changes are illegal. A good example of this coming back to bite a director is in a story that I posted a while back in another thread about a local high school that tried to do A Chorus Line. Here is that post:

About 13 years ago a school in the area was going to do A Chorus Line (which I thought was brave to begin with) but caught lots of flak because of the homosexual characters in the show and because of the song "Dance 10, Looks 3". The teacher caved in and cut one of the characters and the entire song. A local gay rights organization got wind of the changes and protested that the show should not be changed. Tams-Witmark was then notified and since the changes were not approved the rights to the show were pulled the day before opening night. I don't think they should have ever done the show to begin with knowing that parents would find some of the material offensive and obviously the teacher should never have cut anything without approval from the licensing organization. However, the real losers here were all the kids who had worked long and hard on the production only to have it cancelled on the eve of opening night.

[The Distinctive Baritone]

Posted: 6/8/06 at 1:00am

Yeah, I heard about a similar situation at a high school in New York that changed/cut all of the "dirty" parts of A CHORUS LINE. However, when Marvin Hamlisch attended the show (unannounced, I'm assuming), he wasn't too happy. The school ended up getting fined thousands of dollars. Oops.

P.S. I'm glad they changed they officially changed the title of DROOD back to its original form.