spring awakening ending

[B Girl]

Posted: 6/19/07 at 6:08pm

I've been thinking about this for a while and while i understand the importance of "purple summer" does anyone else think it would have been more powerful if SA ended with "those you've known" ? I just feel like purple summer was too much and especially having moritz come out kind of takes away from the show. Anyone else think so?

Oh and please no one post things like "the best ending would be for it to have never been made!" i know all the SA haters out there think they're clever but...please just stop, you're embaressing yourselves.

[mortgageguy79]

Posted: 6/19/07 at 6:15pm

I get what you are saying. I love the show personally, so you don't have to worry about me hating on you I think that "Those You've Known" would make sense to close the show. It is a very powerful song and I was a little drained by that point :)

I was trying to think if "Purple Summer" could fit anywhere else...not sure if it would...hmmmmmmmmmm........

[vfd88]

Posted: 6/19/07 at 6:19pm

I think the song itself is beautiful, but the message is a little vague. Those You've Known would have been a good finale, kind of like Les Mis's. I think they put Purple Summer in so they could have one full company number.

[antiandrewx]

Posted: 6/19/07 at 6:37pm

Well I think that the show essentially does end with Those You've Known, when the lights fade on Melchior. Purple Summer isn't really a part of the Spring Awakening plot...it's more of a Children Will Listen or Seasons of Love. A song with a message that has nothing to do with the story.

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 6/19/07 at 6:57pm

Yes. That's essentially true.

The show ends with Those You've Known. Purple Summer is the tacked on coda which bears no relevence to the plot.

[BroadwayEnthusiast2]

Posted: 6/19/07 at 7:00pm

Like a song during the end credits.

[Becoz_i_knew_you21]

Posted: 6/19/07 at 7:11pm

Andrew, your so kNoWleDgEaBlE.

[mortgageguy79]

Posted: 6/19/07 at 11:16pm

"Purple Summer isn't really a part of the Spring Awakening plot...it's more of a Children Will Listen or Seasons of Love. A song with a message that has nothing to do with the story"

I agree!

and then...

"Purple Summer is the tacked on coda which bears no relevence to the plot."

Above shows why I love Yankeefan007!!!

[B Girl]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 12:43am

yea i see what you're saying and while i like children will listen and seasons of love, i just didnt like that they put in song of purple summer...oh well still love the musical.

[Laurhearts SA]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 2:09am

I have heard, "Mabey they needed a nice song to close the show so people wouldn't go home saying, wow that was depressing. I wanna cry."

I guess the song just sums up everything and brings people together on stage.

I agree it doesn't have much relevence, but I like the song.

[JulianHookbucks]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 2:24am

in a way, it is like Seasons of Love, or Children Will Listen, but it also is the esential ending of all the character's stories. The show begins in winter, symbolizing the ignorance, and totaly lack of knowlege of their adult selves, and their sexual selves. The bulk of the show happens in their spring, which is their coming into their adult lives. At the end, Spring has ended. They are now entering the summer, and most fruitful part of their lives. It's called purple summer because purple is one of the most fruitful and fertile colors. The lyrics are about the beauty of the sensuality of the new side of themselves they've discovered, in no profain way at all... but it's about the joy of fully knowing yourself, and reveling in the knowlege they've learned over the course of the show.

just my take. :)

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 2:36am

I think The Song of Purple Summer is one of the best songs in the show, but in context, it feels like a rip-off of Rent's ending. I can't figure out why that tactic works for me in Rent and not SA, though.

And no, I don't hate SA, so that's not why.

[auggie]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 9:32am

Fan of Spring Awakening but not a fan of "Purple Summer". I just cannot relate to the words and the images like I can with most of the other numbers.

[Yankeefan007]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 9:44am

I agree with Emcee - Purple Summer is one of the (if not THE) best song in the score. It's too bad it can be so easily excessed.

I do know that the show was without it (and an ending, itself) early on at the Atlantic.

[think_of_me2007]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 9:51am

thank god for you people.

i've always thought Purple Summer was a great song, and I understood it (the meaning and all), but every time I listen to the CR, or when I saw the show, I wondered how they just transitioned to that point. It doesn't fit, and I think it was random because the concept of Purple Summer had not been mentioned before, they just started singing about it.

[LittleFish8386]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 10:08am

Although I liked JulianHookbuck's description of the meaning of the song, I still think that Purple Summer is the worst part of that musical. I think it's cheesy and just stupid. I feel like at this point in the score/show the creators had no idea what to do. I think the lyrics and cheap and trite. Ugh...yes, I agree, the show should have ended on Those You've Known ala Les Mis, since this scene is pretty much the last scene in Les Mis.

[seymour krelborn]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 10:29am

I love the song, but i feel it doesn't belong and is unnesscesary. I think they were trying to tie the show up into a neat little package and it seemed to backfire on them.

[luvtheEmcee]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 10:36am

I think the issue for me (which I couldn't put a finger on last night) is that like several of the songs in Spring Awakening, the lyrics in Purple Summer are too abstract for it to fit tightly into the musical. They're beautiful, but they don't quite work in the context of telling the story. And even though Rent does something very similar with its ending, I think the difference is that Rent, thematically, is pretty solid in that it's very easy to "sum up" with that final song, whereas Spring Awakening is much more scattered and all over the place with what it's trying to say (largely the fault of the adaptation from the original play, I think). So then the result is that you just have a song that feels arbitrary and detached, as opposed to something conclusive... a final reminder to the audience, or something, like you get in Rent. I'm not sure if that makes sense.

[Tom1071]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 11:50am

I think PURPLE SUMMER should be looked at as more of an epilogue...a look toward the future. It has nothing to do with the plot but I think the creators were trying to leave the audience with some hope rather than draining them emotionally with THOSE YOU'VE KNOWN and just sending them home.

The verse that isn't on the cast recording says "...the sadness, the doubt, the loss, the grief will belong to some play from the past as a child leads the way to a dream, a belief, a time of hope through the land."

That's just my opinion.
Updated On: 6/20/07 at 11:50 AM

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 12:22pm

Exactly - it's not necessarily part of the show, but it's more of a parting message for the audience.

It kind of reminds me of "The More I Cannot Wish You" from GUYS AND DOLLS - it's basically saying to the audience "A paridise and a place of beauty and peace DOES exist - so I wish you the best of luck in finding it."

[Paul Bertolino]

Posted: 6/20/07 at 11:40pm

I love this show... but I find it odd that they removed the entire character of "The Masked Man." I read the play before I saw the musical and loved it. I thought that the show did an amazing job but I really liked the idea that this mysterious man came to convince Melchior that he shouldn't kill himself. I guess they could have added "Song of Purple Summer" while Melchior is writing in his journal about how "shame is but a result of education" or something like that. But i like it where it is better.