What made you get into Musical Theatre- Page 2

[BrOadWayCraZy2]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 3:24pm

Since as long as I can remember it has been a family ritual of ours to see a broadway show every christmas. its gotten a little extreme lately , since we know take weekly trips to the city and see a show every other week. My entire family is into musical theater and I was completely truned onto musicals after I saw Grease when I was younger, adn then many more to follow.

[Albin]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 3:27pm

I'm gay.

[WonderBoy]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 3:32pm

That's easy. My family was in the business. My Mom did a couple national tours before settling down with my dad and opening her own dance studio. You should hear about some of my cousins!

[hyperchet]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 4:06pm

My grandmother used to take me to see shows on tour, and I loved the movies...Oklahoma, EPSECIALLY The Sound of Music.

I really got into theatre in the last year or so...

[StephanietheStar]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 4:13pm

That was my favorite answer so far!!
"I'm gay" LOL

[Eliza0114]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 4:13pm

I saw a peformance of JCS where my theatre teacher at the time was playing Judas. I wasn't really into theatre...theatre classes were just like ballet for me...just for the heck of it. Towards the end, when Judas hangs himself, Chaz fell from the ceiling on a noose, and was suspended there. To an eight-year old girl, it was scary as hell, but I thought, "This is the magic of theatre." I asked him, during the next class, how he did that, but he wouldn't tell me. After that, I did theatre religiously in a desperate attempt to discover how this magic happened, and I got addicted.

And that in a nutshell is how it happened.

[freeadmission]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 4:15pm

I was obsessed with the band No Doubt when I was around 11 or 12 and found out Gwen Stefani's favorite movie was The Sound of Music. My mom, God bless her, had been trying to get me to watch the movie for YEARS, but failed miserably because it was "old" (now I LOVE old movies). So I watched it and Julie Andrews became a goddess to me and I was like, "Oh my gosh! THEY SING!" and it became my favorite movie. Then I (begrudgingly) saw my first Shakespeare play a few months later, enjoyed it immensely, and my logical mind went, "Wouldn't it be so cool to have a musical ON STAGE?!?! And be in it?!?!" But I gave up on that because all I listened to was Julie Andrews and stupidly thought that you had to have a stratospheric soprano in order to be sucessful in musical theatre.

Then, at 17 years old, I watched the 2004 Tony's. *g* And I went, "Holy sh*t, that green chick has a range like mine!!!" Wicked was the first musical I ever saw and I've been taking classes and getting parts in shows ever since. *dances*

Updated On: 6/16/05 at 04:15 PM

[XOsweet_dancerOX]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 4:18pm

well i always watched the Sound of Music. Then one day i was asked to be in a musical and i was like "ok then." So I did it and I really liked our musical director. She was amazing. She did one on one's with us and I liked how much she cared for us. She inroduced me to a few musicals during my one on one and told me about BWW and I came to like it more. That's how I got here! and I thank her so much for it because it is wonderful!

[XOsweet_dancerOX]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 4:18pm

well i always watched the Sound of Music. Then one day i was asked to be in a musical and i was like "ok then." So I did it and I really liked our musical director. She was amazing. She did one on one's with us and I liked how much she cared for us. She inroduced me to a few musicals during my one on one and told me about BWW and I came to like it more. That's how I got here! and I thank her so much for it because it is wonderful!

[Joelbeans]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 4:35pm

Wow what a great question. I am amazed nowadays to see how early some kids are getting started in theatre and hooked in theatre. I am 37 years old and when I was growing up I really had no theatre in my life I didn't even think of it. I would always sing in church, no solos just sing in church. I loved music would try to sing each voice part in every hymn and was always singing. It wasn't until high school that I even helped with a musical. I used to play piano in the pit, and then I saw some of my best friends onstage and I knew I had better voices then them at least singing wise. Our senior year we did Our Town and I thought well I'll audition for the Stage Manager I could do that easily. Well I was one of the dead people in the cemetery and the ironic thing was that I had the part that talked about his son Joel...well my name is Joel. In college I did a couple of chorus roles and then after my junior year in college I auditioned for a theme park job, and got cast in one of their shows. I loved it. I know it is cheesy but I had a blast that summer, and that is what got me interested in performing the most. Since then I have worked with various community theatres, worked with a couple of children's theatres and done some semi-professional stuff here in St. Louis. I always wanted to go to NYC and try it but I weighed the prospects and I stayed in here and stayed a big fish in a little pond. Now I am the president of one of the community theatre groups here in St. Louis and now I am a little upset to see that people arent' giving to the theatre to have the experiences that I have. I just wish some of these kids could feel the way about theatre the way that I do. Thank you all for all this wonderful chat about theatre. I feel like I belong.

[Enjolras77]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 4:44pm

Geez...The Sound of Music is a very popular starting point. In a way it is mine too. I have always loved singing and performing for people. I was in chorus and in choirs all throughout my childhood and in high school. I had seen touring companies of Man of La Mancha and Camelot (both with Goulet), but never really was hooked. When I was 16 my mother convinced me to audition for the Sound of Music. At first I thought I was going to be Rolf...but then came the dance audition...so I ended up being in the chorus (and as a nazi due to my blonde hair and blue eyes). The actor who played Rolf in the movie version (Dan Truhitte) played the Captain in our production. Entertainment Tonight came and did a story on the show, so I got to be on national TV. The show was a big success, so I guess all of that got me hooked. Later that year I saw the national tour of Les Miserables and was cast as Hero in a production of FORUM at the same theatre that I did Sound of Music at. By that time I was addicted to singing and peforming on stage!

[Broadwaygirl22]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 5:01pm

When I was in the 8th grade, I had a music class where what we basically learned about was musicals. After a while, when my teacher played clips of songs for parts of our tests I knew what they were right away! It was a really fun class. The year before I had that class, I saw a production of The Producers and it was really excellent! I think that the music class I had made my interest of musical theatre rise though. Now I have lots of Broadway soundtracks and love acting in my school's drama club and the young company at the local theatre.

[MusicalDirector109]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 5:02pm

A high school production of "Oklahoma!" when I was in fourth grade and the other Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals that followed.

[Therese]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 7:13pm

LOL, another "Sound of Music" testimony here! My parents had the OBC with Mary Martin, which was (along with the movie soundtrack from "Oklahoma") one of the earliest records I can remember listening to. Then, we went to see the movie when it first came out. (I was 5 or 6, and remember being scared when they were hiding from the Nazis.) More movies, soundtracks, cast recordings, then, starting when I was 13 or 14, seeing live regional theatre on a regular basis. I cannot remember a time when I didn't love musical theatre.

[ikmbway]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 7:23pm

Wicked :) and sitting in the front row dead center for Mamma Mia (that changed my life) Also Idina also brought me into it since I thought she was amazing but then a went to find other things and now I'm not obsessed with either Idina or Wicked and Mamma Mia is just uhh okay?

[gavrochegirl]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 7:29pm

A production of Annie. I was six years old, and we got autographs from EVERYONE. That was a blast. But the real thing that got me hooked was RENT...believe it or not, I was around seven, and I loved the music. So, that's my story...

[stylinbohemian]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 7:36pm

Since I was really little my mom would show me musicals cause I loved singing, and I had good stage presance so she wanted me to get into acting and stuff, and I just fell in love with musicals, Bye Bye Birdie, Sound of Music, Gypsy, and Cinderella, i loved them! Then when I was in 2nd grade i made it into the high school talent show singing the Bye Bye Birdie theme and a high schooler that was running it was in a prodution at The Fulton Opera house of Bye Bye Birdie and she invited me to go, and that beinging the first musical I ever saw preformed and seeing how happy she was after the performance made me decide then and there thats what i wanted to do... (I know long story but you asked!)

[muscle23ftl]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 7:36pm

KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN,THE MUSICAL...LIFE CHANGING.

[muscle23ftl]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 7:38pm

BY THE WAY....A LOT OF GAYS ARE NOT INTO MUSICAL THEATRE...MOST OF MY FRIEND ARE GAY AND I CAN NEVER TAKE THEM TO SEE ANY SHOW..SO THE MYTH IS NOT TRUE.

[One Song Glory]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 7:44pm

Don't laugh or anything but when was like four or five, my family just moved and we were buying things from Costco. I bought this small, blue rocking chair (which I still have today where my dog sits on it to look out the window). I was carrying it around and I was trying to catch up with my mom when I found this video that I thought looked cool. It was the 'Cat's video and I begged my mom to buy it. After watching it once I fell in love with it. My mom also bought me the 'Joseph' video and that started my getting into musicals. So basically I started with Lloyed Webber musicals.

Updated On: 6/16/05 at 07:44 PM

[suddenlyseymour]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 7:50pm

kerry butler!

[BroomstickBoy]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 9:48pm

As a kid, I always wanted to entertain, mostly act and sing. When I was in grade school I thrived on musical-esque Disney movies and Muppets, and from then through middle school occasionally of course my classmates and I had to watch a bunch of movie-musicals or taped productions because it was obviously part of the curriculum way back when. Those movies being "Sound of Music", "West Side Story", "Cats", etc. Regardless of whether I liked them or not, there was always something about that whole process and production that stuck with me, whether it was a character or a song. And of course I would constantly hear marching bands playing Phantom of the Opera in their marching shows, but it wasn't until the Lion King came to Broadway, when I was in 6th grade I think, that I was introduced to theatre and music put together. I never saw the show, but hearing Jason Raize (God rest his soul) interpret a role in the way he did was just amazing to me. And then I got into Deborah Gibson's music and read that she had been doing theatre, because it had kept her sane over the years and was another good way for her to express herself. And like the emerging gay man in me I decided to follow suit.

[MissElphie]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 9:50pm

Hearing Phantom when I was like 8. I learned the entire show in a few days and wouldn't let up till my parents took me.

[Dirty Rotten Scoundrel]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 9:51pm

my cousins took me to see rocky horror show and i was hooked.

[Aigoo]

Posted: 6/16/05 at 10:04pm

Wicked. Yeah, big surprise, huh?

My friend brought in the OBC to art class (our teacher lets us put in CD's in her boombox while we work) and I fell in love with the intervals in "Defying Gravity". I thought they were genius. Now I've only been hooked on Broadway and musical theatre for about two, three months now, but I really can't remember a time where I didn't know what Broadway was. Now I'm a bigger freak than my friend who brought in Wicked in the first place.

I've made myself familiar with many recent and contemporary musicals, but I've yet to acknowledge the art that is known as "classical" musical theatre.