the reused pop/rock musical invasion!

If you think about it... in "singing in the rain" there are some songs that were reused... so it's nothing new.
In other hand, Taboo is a great example of how a show with non-original music could be great. But to me the best musical with reused songs was "our house" the musical with songs of the english group madness... I love that show! Is one of my favourites, and I didn't care that the music isn't original.

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POLisPOL--
Boy George composed all new songs for TABOO (the exceptions were "Karma Chameleon" and "Do You Really Want To Hurt Me" -- neither of which were used as "book" songs).

Theatreboy33--
I agree completely with your point, but I don't agree that "most musical theatre goers have a keen eye for what's good and what's bad." Most theatregoers are tourists who come into town to see light mindless entertainment -- only a fraction have anything I would describe as a "keen eye." Give them big splashy numbers based on songs they already know going into the theatre (ABBA, Elton John, Billy Joel) and they're happy. They're not demanding as far as plot or subject matter or even performances are concerned as long as they get to hear the hit tunes.

Mind you, if you were to give them a show that actually made sense, with a good, tuneful original score and high production values, they'd like that too -- there just aren't a lot of those being created so they apparently don't mind settling for karaoke at $100 a ticket.

It is worrisome in terms of the future of musical theatre on Broadway, but given the financial model where, with a few exceptions, new musicals cost $10-15 million to produce, producers are understandably a little gun shy about spending that kind of money on something that doesn't have some sort of built in hook to attract the folks from Peoria when they're in town (i.e. music by a big pop composer; a huge star a la Hugh Jackman; a show "related to" on one of the most beloved movies of all time a la "Wicked"). Shows like "Avenue Q" and "Urinetown" with original stories and original scores and no big stars that recoup and become big hits are increasingly rare commodities (it helped that they were both very cheap to produce by Broadway standards) and may become even rarer commodities in the future.

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Updated On: 8/2/04 at 07:55 PM

In the Broadway version, "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?" is just the song that Boy George sings during his first recording session (it's not really part of the plot). "Il Adore" is sung in the 2nd Act during a video retrospective of Leigh Bowery after he dies (again, it doesn't serve to advance the plot -- great song, though). Marilyn doing "Genocide" is sort of integrated plot-wise, though.

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-ironic mode on-
me too! I prefer much more to put a cd of cole porter in my player than seeing kiss me kate.
-ironic mode off-

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And if this songs and people all together makes a good story with a good music... who cares where the music come from?

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Yes, I know. Honestly, people, just trying to make a point!

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I understand your feelings and somedays I agree, but I'm currently working on an Elton John musical so I'm on the fence for the time being. More on the topic MC is absolutely right, these shows are made because Broadway noticed revivals were making most of the money. The same reason lots of movies are being made into musicals. Tourists like even new things to seem familiar. Like with movie to musical converts, sometimes you get ones that work and sometimes you don't. There's my opinion.

But as with a lot of older shows (for example Gershwin, and some Porter) the songs were not really written to serve what little plot there was, but as a showcase for the composers and/or performers talents. Like We Wil Rock You, entertainment came first, coherent narrative came second.
The composers popular hits from less well known shows were then later squeezed into other musicals (the revised Antyhing Goes for example) and made very little difference to any on-going narrative. Taking it even further was Crazy for you, which in a way started this whole 'weave a plot round some songs' trend.

And sadly, there was no cast recording of Our House, but there is a full length DVD coming out in November in the UK - available for pre-order from Play.com