Top Ten Musicals

As in being very familiar with, or knowing every line and lyric?

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I am the history junkie. I believe that you must understand the past to know the present. So my top ten are pretty old.

1. Showboat (1927). The first musical to really fully integrate the score INTO the script. All songs arise naturally from conversation and each one adds one element to the story to propel it along.

2. Of Thee I Sing (1931). It richly deserved its Pulitzer Prize, although George Gershwin was robbed by not being included. One of the first shows about politics and the current situation. And the idea that the vice-president is so much of an unknown that he has to take the tour to get into the White House could be something straight out of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

3. Pal Joey (1941). A very bold move for Rodgers and Hart, to make a show about a piece of excrement (they'll edit me otherwise). Really stretched the boundaries of musical comedy into musical theater.

4. Carmen Jones (1943). Okay, it's Bizet. It's opera but that's the wonder of it. It allows anyone to see an opera and understand it. It allows anyone to sing opera (please in the tub only. Let the professionals handle this). Another brilliant idea by Hammerstein which just shows what a visionary he was.

5. Carousel 1946). Best R&H. Best songs. Drama, drama, drama.

6. Guya nad Dolls (1948 ). The best musical comedy ever written. An utter joy from the moment your butt hits the seat until you walk out of the theater humming the tunes. This show is SO well written that it cannot be destroyed by amateur theater groups no matter how hard they try (and I've seen some try really hard!)

7. Gypsy (1959). The best musical drama wever, ever, ever. The best overture, one of the greatest performances and the best performance by two girls in a cow and "Rose's Turn." It has never, will never get any better.

8. The Crooked Mile (1959). Music by Peter Greenwell. I know many of you have never heard of it, but this is the acid test for the true believers. This is a totally astonishing show from England, sort of Sondheim crossed with Guys and Dolls but utterly unlike anything you've ever heard before. If you seek out this show (library collections or the internet) you will never forget what you hear AND you'll be able to casually drop it into conversation then look around to see whose eyes light up. THAT person will be someone worth getting to know...

9. Dreamgirls (1981). They'll never leave you. They have never left me.

10. Sweeney Todd (1980). This is the show I would love to take a recording of back in time and play it for Jerome Kern, just to see the look on his face. Obviously, Kern wouldn't know what to make of it at first, but by the time we get to "The Beautiful Sea" I'll bet my life he'd be beaming. Sondheim's masterpiece and Broadways greatest classical piece.

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Oh so in Ave Q Rod yells out Pal Joey because it is a musical from the 1940's. I always wondered what that meant.

I've never heard of The Crooked Mile in my entire life and I've imagined myself a "true believer" for a while now. I suppose I've been wasting a lot of time! Random Obscure Musical Number 96 is hardly the "acid test for true believers". Although I'll admit I'm intrigued, now that I've looked it up a bit.

Why do you want to play Sweeney Todd for Jerome Kern? I'm curious. I think he'd hate the blue note.

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Updated On: 4/21/06 at 03:24 AM

I agree with musicman, although I would exchange "Carosel" for "Oklahoma!" and "The Phantom of the Opera" for "Ragtime".

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I could only think of 8 (In no particular order)

Cabaret
Into the Woods
Rent
Les Miserables
Hair
Phantom of the Opera
Chicago
West Side Story

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1. Gypsy
2. Sweeney Todd
3. The King and I
4. The Sound of Music
5. Sunday in the Park with George
6. West Side Story
7. The Woman in White
8. Les Miserables
9. Evita
10. Sweet Charity

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i'm not too educated with past shows, so it's interesting to read these!
i agree with the SWEET CHARITY and RENT remarks, but I think I'll need to start shopping for some of these older musical cast recordings to become a better thespian...

nice info, guys!

:)

Rent
Wicked
The Color Purple
Dracula
The Producers
Phantom of the Opera
Thou Shalt Not
Cinderella
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
In My Life

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Gypsy
Sweeney Todd
Sweet Charity
The Sound of Music
The King and I
Guys and Dolls
A Chorus Line
West Side Story
Sunday in the Park with George
Pal Joey

bigrab, your list is pretty...pathetic, I must say...

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Allofmylife, I'm sorry. I'm not sure why I bitched at you, I must have been very tired.

I rather like Kern. I think he finds little popularity with today's generation since his music is more operetta than musical theater, but he was a great composer.

I can't imagine how he'd feel about Sondheim though. I know the man was capable of writing deceptively complicated songs, so he might really like it. Composers tend to be pretty down on each other though. I don't know if it's jealousy or just the feeling of competition.

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I'm surprised that shows like Merrily and Company have not appeared more. Especially Company; the musical was ground breaking when it premiered.