WEST SIDE STORY at Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade

This was definitely my favourite performance from the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Yes, we’ve seen “America” countless times before and, sure, it would have been great to see a number like “Cool” instead. But putting that point to one side, the performance of this number was super and I may like Natalie Cortez even more than Karen Olivo. The dancing is super and, except for some weird angles from the way they’ve had to use the performance space, this extract was just about perfect – even if one moment of choreography was made a little more family friendly than usual. The “location” performances really do deal with many of the same challenges in the context of this parade, and this one faced them head on and came out tops for me.

BILLY ELLIOT at Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade

Of the performances I’ve watched so far, Billy Elliot is one that I’ve enjoyed more than many of the others. Strange, perhaps, as this song has never been one of my absolute favourites in the score and I only really appreciate it when I see the staging, which makes it work despite any inconsistencies that might be found in the number itself. In this clip, it’s sold by the cast in terms of energy, which is all you can really ask for from one of these Thanksgiving Day performances can get. Polished in spite of the difficulties inherent to performing the number in this kind of setting; all it’s lacking is the dynamic of seeing it live in the theatre – and since that’s an impossibility, this is absolutely fine.

BYE BYE BIRDIE at Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade

So this is the Bye Bye Birdie clip from Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. It’s quite fun watching Uncle Jesse go though the moves, although director-choreographer Robert Longbottom hasn’t done anyone any favours with his lame choreography – although the idea of all the girls being sad is nice. John Stamos is perhaps not ideal, but he is doing the best Dick van Dyke impersonation I think he can and, since it’s clear that Longbottom isn’t a(n actor’s) director, who can blame him?

RAGTIME at Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade

I found the Ragtime performance in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade underwhelming. The setting is lovely, but the lip synchronization is very out at the beginning and I found the performer’s bodies lacking in energy, which is fine when the camera is on their faces but as soon as it pulled out to show their whole bodies… well, it was just dead. It kicks into a higher gear when the camera pans to the ensemble for a chorus or two of the opening number, but even this doesn’t look like a fully energised or committed performance, particularly from the folks in white and the African Americans.

I realise it’s difficult and early for the performers and all that, but… I just didn’t find it as thrilling as I think it should be.

THE PRINCESS AND THE FROG

The Princess and the Frog represents Disney’s return to their filmmaking roots – the animated musical. We’ve already had a teaser trailer:

A trailer:

And a sneak peak:

And I think all look very promising indeed. It’s obviously not a traditional retelling (though it seems not to be quite as subversive of fairy tale conventions as Shrek or Enchanted, which is a good thing to my mind).

I remember when I first heard that The Princess and the Frog would replace The Frog Princess, the original working title of the film, I was a bit skeptical. I felt it was a bit bulky (clunky – ?) and perhaps less effective, as the film is a kind of riff on the end of the original fairy tale and now that reference is lost. I also feel its too obvious a ploy to tap into the “Beauty and the Beast” dichotomy that is inherent to the content of the film and is therefore, perhaps, a bit too spot on – a bit too academic, if you will – and I suppose that is what caused my uncertainty about it. But… it’s grown on me, especially after seeing the publicity material.

Of course, this will also mark the first African American princess from the Disney studios and the as yet unreleased film has been followed with controversy in this regard. Take, for example, this article in the New York Times: “Her Prince Has Come. Critics, Too” by Brookes Barnes.

The article says, “For years, Disney has been lambasted by some parents for not having a black princess. Now, some of those same voices are taking aim at the company without seeing the finished product.” Some of the criticism is just ridiculous; one of the most damning comments seems to be this one, from Angela Bronner Helm at Black Voices:

Disney obviously doesn’t think a black man is worthy of the title of prince. His hair and features are decidedly non-black. This has left many in the community shaking their head in befuddlement and even rage.

The New York Times goes on to report that “Prince Naveen hails from the fictional land of Maldonia and is voiced by a Brazilian actor; Disney says that he is not white.” They also say that there has been some backlash against the backlash. This quotation from Levi Roberts:

This is one of those situations where I am ashamed of the black community. Are we being racist ourselves by saying this movie shouldn’t have a white prince?

That just brings us full circle, doesn’t it?

Poor Disney seems to be in a “damned if they do, damned if they don’t” position with this film. I understand that people would like something like this to be racially sensitive, but some of the points raised just lack any kind of perspective. Thank goodness there seem to be some rational people in the middle ground too.

Lastly – the score, by Randy Newman. Newman had an interview in Variety yesterday in which he discussed the film:

New Orleans in the early part of the 20th century – the setting of Disney’s animated The Princess and the Frog – is territory that composer Randy Newman has trod before. “I’ve been dredging those 30 months I spent in New Orleans for all I could in my life,” he quips, referring to the summers of his youth.

I’m very interested to hear what the full score is like, especially as it seems to offer an alternative to the kind of songs Newman has created for the Pixar films.

I think what Randy Newman has done for the Pixar films – created a score and one song that epitomizes the thematic core of the film – really works for those films, which are all fish-out-of-water cum coming-of-age films told in a fairly loose, comedic style. Of course, there are slight variations to the ‘Newman formula’ – Toy Story, for example, has three songs but still focuses on one big thematic number, “You’ve Got a Friend in Me”. Toy Story 2 of course featured “When She Loved Me”, which is a very moving song, not least because of the vocal performance by Sarah McLachlan. But it’s still a voice-over reflection on an event long after the it has passed.

While I think that Newman’s Pixar scores (for Toy Story, Toy Story 2, A Bug’s Life, Monsters, Inc and Cars) have largely served those films and the mode in which those films tell their respective stories, I feel that they are more obviously functional as scores – serving the action on screen literally without delving too deeply into the metaphorical, emotional core of what’s going on, in the way that Alan Menken did particularly well in his scores for The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast. I don’t really have any problems with this, as I think the kind of scoring created for these projects is appropriate to the films, although, as some have mentioned around these boards before, there tends to be certain sameness that has characterizes the songs, which was also evident in Disney’s part-live action part-stop motion version of James and the Giant Peach, which also featured songs by Newman. The only songs that really came anywhere close to working in that film were “My Name is James” and “Family” but even these weren’t consistent in the quality of their lyrics. The rest of the score was disposable. My reaction mainly was – nice tunes. But I think an animated musical needs something more than that, score that is a truly intrinsic element of the film as a whole.

But I’m glad that Newman has had to shift his mode into a different style of scoring for The Princess and the Frog and that John Lasseter (as the “big boss”) or the directors, Ron Clements and John Musker chose not to reflect something of that Pixar tone and style in this film.

I’m really looking forward to it.

Michael Kunze and “Dramamusicals”

BroadwayWorld recently published an interview with Michael Kunze about his musical adaptation of Rebecca, which is aiming for an English language transfer to the a major commercial centre like the West End or Broadway. Kunze takes great pains to try and distinguish his work from traditional Broadway fare, so let’s take what he says, put it under a microscope and see if it holds up. The boxed sections below are all quotations from the interview.

The dramamusical is a tool to make clear that this is not a typical Broadway-type musical, which is more a musical-comedy. In what I do, we do drama with music. The way I write the shows is that I basically write the drama, of course with the music in mind, but the music is something that comes next, like a movie. The music is a very important element, but the most important element of the drama is the story, so the music really serves the story, and the music doesn’t really have a right in its own beside the story, like a number that is just made for the music and the dance.

Huh? It seems that Mr Kunze hasn’t seen any musical since 1926. He doesn’t seem to be aware of – for example – Show Boat, South Pacific, Sweeney Todd, Marie Christine, The Light in the Piazza. He doesn’t seem to be aware that musical theatre in the American tradition extends beyond the tradition of musical comedy that was dominant until the 1940s, but which made way for the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical play, in which music is most certainly in the service of the drama and for the various forms of the concept musical, in which the music is often related most clearly to the ideas that are being communicated in the show from the very moment of its inception. Even if we look at the musical comedies that have appeared after the Rodgers and Hammerstein revolution, many are far more integrated than their counterparts in the 1920s and 1930s. So I’m left to wonder whether this is a case of ignorance or self-importance.

It really isn’t something that I’ve invented. Jesus Christ Superstar [and] the other Andrew Lloyd Webber stuff, if you exclude Cats, follows the same kind of basic idea. Well, Andrew would never say that the music only serves the story, but that’s what it really is. He uses the music to tell the story, and that’s what all dramamusicals do.

All right, so he seems to know something about British musical theatre and deems it of a high enough standard to rank alongside his “dramamusicals”. But is it true of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musicals that the music serves the story? Without engaging in an elaborate discussion on the matter, I’d be willing to bet that there is at least one example in each of the Lloyd Webber musicals where the music does not serve the drama fully. Off the top of my head – and to keep in line with the example Kunze himself cites – there’s “King Herod’s Song” in Jesus Christ Superstar, although the newer, rock-flavoured arrangement does help its cause somewhat. So it seems that perhaps the music does not need a particularly profound dramatic agency for it to serve the drama in these “dramamusicals”, which of course contradicts Kunze’s original thesis, that ‘the music doesn’t really have a right in its own beside the story’. What other purpose does a song like “You Can Get Away With Anything” in The Woman in White, for example, have if it doesn’t really serve the character and the humour comes not from the lyrics but from a pair of rats that clamber in and out of the actor’s costume? Or is Kunze saying that the music in a case like this still serves a dramatic purpose, even though the song as a whole is a failure because of the lyrics?

I think all the shows that concentrate on a dramatic story are dramamusicals. Billy Elliot is a dramamusical. Wicked is a dramamusical. I just want to distinguish where theatre is more theatrical than in a classical Broadway musical which is based on the vaudeville tradition, on dance, on spectacular things happening, and this is not what I look for…. I think (Wicked is) a milestone in the development of the musical, because in the history of the musical, this show will be regarded as the first one that really combines the European tradition with the Broadway tradition.

Now I’m just beginning to chuckle. Wicked being taken as a prime example where the music exists in service of the drama? The book of Wicked was forced to fit in with Stephen Schwartz’s ideas regarding the way the story should be told. The book in its best moments is competent, but completely falls to pieces in the second act, completely ignoring the very concept that Maguire had in the first place: to fill in the gaps of the story behind The Wonderful Wizard of Oz without contradicting the basic mythology in that particular book in the series and its iconic movie musical adaptation and thereby offer a different perspective on the story. Winnie Holzman, spurred on by Schwartz, creates a story that prides itself in tying itself all up very neatly, but it does so with little sense of logic and the songs that punctuate the book become less and less credible as dramatic building blocks as we speed towards the final curtain. This doesn’t even begin to engage with ideas around the way the music is orchestrated, which separates it out even further from the given circumstances of the show. It doesn’t even work to access the show from the perspective of post-modern deconstruction, which is surely the very point of creating a musical of this nature, because the choices are so inconsistent – and in contradiction to Kunze’s view on the show, constructed around “spectacular things happening” rather than on any firm set of dramaturgical principles. Perhaps Wicked is a milestone, but it’s not one that develops musical theatre as an art form. In what is commercial, yes; in what is popular, sure. In what artistically successful and dramatically compelling; most certainly not. And I’m still not clear on what specifically European musical theatre traditions are incorporated into this hybrid form, but based on what Kunze has said about the “dramamusical”, I’m convinced they do more harm than good.

I believe in drama as the key entertainment in theatre, and I think I’m not the only one who does. I didn’t even invent the name dramamusical, that was invented by a journalist. I just think it’s more European because I think the tradition of opera with the highly dramatic stories lent more to that kind of art-form, and I think that also our audiences in Europe, and I really include here in England, are more interested in going to theatre and have a real theatrical experience, a real emotional experience at last, not just an entertaining evening, but something they can discuss after the show.

Well, at least Kunze displays some humility by admitting that he did not come up with the idea of a dramatically integrated musical. I wonder who the journalist who coined the term is; I’d love to have a look at what he has to say about this potent new musical theatre form he has identified….

The comparison with opera that follows is not one that works for Kunze’s argument either. Opera by its nature is led by the music; it is music theatre rather than musical theatre and, as long as it is technically well-performed, opera often manages to be excused in its shortcomings as drama. This is, of course, a generalisation as there are operas, particularly those that are more contemporary that do integrate dramatic aspects more successfully into the theatrical whole and certainly even many traditional operas have a strong narrative and thematic thrust – but they are still led first and foremost by the music, hence the prominence of the composer and the conductor in any discussion of any opera.

Then we get to what effect Kunze believes a musical should have on its audience. In his eyes, musicals like Wicked, The Phantom of the Opera and his own shows offer a rare, real emotional experience that delivers a sense of enlightenment hitherto unseen in the musical theatre canon and one to which the American musical theatre tradition holds no claim. Clearly, he’s never heard of Carousel, Cabaret or Pacific Overtures. Obviously, there is no such experience to be had in Camelot, Follies, Fiddler on the Roof.

I’ve never really engaged with Kunze’s musicals, but his work must be truly phenomenal if it is what he implies they are: impeccable examples of musicals in which all other elements are in service to the drama. I must get my hands on Elisabeth, Tanz der Vampire or this impending masterpiece of the musical stage, Rebecca, and see for myself – but they had better live up to the high expectations that Kunze has created for them….

5 Cookin’ Musicals of the 1950s

What’s buzzin, cuzzins? This is a list of 5 of my favourite musicals of the 1950s, with slang courtesy of Fifties Web.

1. Gypsy

Gypsy is one of the greatest musicals of all time. Word from the bird, my friends, it is. A great book complemented by a great score. Take any song out and it leaves a big gaping theatrical gap in the show. Even a seemingly silly list number like “Mr Goldstone” shifts the show dramatically. Without it, we’d never know how genuinely thrilled Rose and her cohorts are, nor would we gain the insight that we do into Rose’s personality and capabilities that the song reveals. “Together Wherever We Go” shows us how the relationship between Rose, Louise and Herbie has shifted since the end of the first act. “Little Lamb” tells us almost everything we need to know about Louise. The vaudeville numbers provide period, yes, but their design also tells us about Rose and their performance reveals insight into June and Louise that a conventional scene couldn’t convey. And then we get Rose’s trio of numbers: the seductive “Some People”, the chillingly ironic “Everything’s Coming Up Roses” and the masterful “Rose’s Turn”. Every number has its purpose; there’s a perfect balance between the elements of musical theatre in this show. We could also get into the great “best Rose” debate, but that’s a no-brainer really: it’s Angela Lansbury, of course!

2. West Side Story

West Side Story is cool. A musical that fully integrated acting, singing and dance, that was set in contemporary urban society and that dealt with topical issues that are still relevant today – well, it’s groundbreaking in its conception any way you look at it. Then we get to the stunning Jerome Robbins staging, with choreographic contributions by Peter Gennaro. What was going through Arthur Laurents’s head when he cut down the “Somewhere” ballet, I’ll never know. That decision communicates a misunderstanding of the role of dance in live musical theatre that I simply can’t understand. (Yes, it was cut from the film, but it wouldn’t have worked there. It’s too abstract and is designed for the live energy of musical theatre performance in front of a real audience who is experiencing the show in the moment.) The original cast recording is an essential for any musical theatre fan’s collection and for a comparison of different recordings of the show, I’d refer to you a previous blog on this site dealing with that very issue. Sometimes the show is criticized these days for being dated, miscast with models or actors that are too old or both and so on, but it still has an ineffable magic that hits home when you see it. Perhaps a recent review I read sums it up: “it is after all West Side Story.

3. The Boy Friend

Sometimes I forget about The Boyfriend. But when I play the cast recording on Itunes, I always remember how much it razzes my berries. There is a notoriously bad film adaptation of the show, but this was my first exposure to the show and I watched it almost on a permanent loop when I was a child. For those who are not in the know, The Boyfriend is a 1950s show about the 1920s. Polly – Julie Andrews in the original Broadway cast – meets Tony and in true romantic comedy style, we know they will be together by the fall of the final curtain. Along the way, there’s a lot of fun to be had – camp fun, witty lyrics, mixed messages, cross purposes. It’s commedia dell’arte filtered through an English pastiche of the American musical. A true hybrid, then, and a winning one.

4. Guys and Dolls

Guys and Dolls. One of the most popular musicals of all time; people go ape for it. Even I’ve been involved in two productions: in high school I played the drunk and the Hot Box MC and danced in “Havana” and “The Crap Shooter’s Ballet” and a couple of years ago I choreographed a high school production of the show. In the decade in between, I’ve seen countless productions announced and produced. Generally, there’s a perception that it’s flop-proof, but I guess the most recent Broadway revival proved that theory wrong. People are ambivalent about the film and, while it’s not perfect, there’s much to enjoy: Brando as Sky, the stunning scene between Sarah and Sky in the mission, Michael Kidd’s choreography and so on. The show itself has a super book by Abe burrows and the score is – in a word – fantastic. Every number is memorable. For a special treat, get yourself a copy of the African-American 1976 Broadway Revival’s cast recording. It’s super, and the numbers are reborn in their new disco and gospel influences arrangements. Of course this is a supplement to either the original Broadway cast recording or the excellent 1995 studio recording of the complete score – one that perhaps sets the standard for all Guys and Dolls recordings.

5. My Fair Lady

Some people will tell you that My Fair Lady is perfect. I hate to be the party pooper, but it isn’t. It’s almost perfect and is certainly excellent for the most part, but in the opening number Higgins says that people who use English badly should be hung. And with that one lyric, Alan Jay Lerner contradicts every given circumstance of the character. In, say, Paint Your Wagon the mistake might not matter, given the character in whose mouth the words might be put. But here it matters in spades. It’s not the only linguistic error given to Higgins either, but I suppose we should just remember that Lerner was the Tim Rice of his day and be done with it. After all, there is a great deal to appreciate in the show: one of the most joyous overtures ever created, a book that is literary in its quality (thanks to the source material, natch) and many great songs (“I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face”, “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly?”, “Show Me”, and the list goes on.) It’s a classic, and it deserves to be. But it’s not perfect.

5 Smashing Musicals of the 1940s

This is a list of 5 of my favourite musicals of the 1940s. Anyone who is even vaguely interested in musical theatre should know about these shows and if you don’t… well, there’s no better time than the present to begin!

1. South Pacific

South Pacific is my favourite of the Rodgers and Hammerstein shows. To take a couple of short stories and weave them into a full length musical is no mean feat, but to do it with a book that really stands on its own feet dramatically and a score in which there are no bad songs is simply amazing. Only one minor problem exists in the last half of the second act, when the score tapers away to allow the action to wrap itself up, but the montage of scenes that tells what what happens with De Beque and Cable is probably the only way that part of the story and the reprises probably serve the show better by reinforcing theme, character and development than introducing a number of new songs would. It’s perhaps the prefect representation of the classic Rodgers and Hammerstein musical.

2. Oklahoma!

Oklahoma! It’s all about a picnic, right? A simple romance with the lovers working at cross purposes until they finally get together before the final curtain falls. I suppose that’s the easy way to look at it, but in the hands of Rodgers and Hammerstein, Oklahoma! transcends its humble narrative and becomes and allegory for a time in American history that was fraught with conflict and uncertainty, the mileau against which the show itself is set. What else does it have to offer? One – a charming score with songs that sound so much like the American landscape that one wonders at the fact that they didn’t exist before Rodgers and Hammerstein created them for this show. Two – a mode of storytelling that uses dance as an inextricable part of the action, not just in the famous dream ballet but throughout the show. Three – when it’s done right, a show that really rises to the mark in terms of dramatic tension; just who is going to win that auction on the picnic basket? Don’t know? Well go and buy the DVD of the RNT production and find out!

3. Carousel

Carousel offers us the rawest emotional experience of any Rodgers and Hammerstein musical. As in Oklahoma!, we have a largely excellent score and an engaging multi-modal storytelling experience. It’s true that perhaps some elements of the show fall just short of knitting into a perfect whole, but almost perfect is good enough for me. The highlights of this show are breathtaking: the opening “Carousel Waltz”, the flawlessly constructed bench scene, Louise’s heart-wrenching ballet in the second act and one of Rodgers’ most dynamic scores. If you don’t have a cast recording of this show, you need to get at least one. Not sure which? Read this blog which compares the various recordings of the show and get one now!

4. On the Town

“Finally”, I hear you say, “We are out of Rodgers and Hammerstein territory!” And the show that gets us there is On the Town. On the Town is haunted by two tragedies: firstly, the original Jerome Robbins choreography was never notated so all we have on record is what he could remember when he reconstructed his work for Jerome Robbins’ Broadway and, secondly, the film version chucked out the heart of the score leaving us with all entertainment and no enlightenment and hoofing instead of dance. (That said, the film version is very entertaining, but it is so different that it is an entirely separate entity.) Leonard Bernstein’s score (with lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green) is by turns thrilling (“New York New York”), comical (“Come Up to My Place”, “I Can Cook Too”) and deeply moving (“Lonely Town”). It’s the classic show from the 1940s that perhaps deserves more recognition that it receives.

5. Kiss Me, Kate

Last show on this list is another not quite perfect show: Cole Porter’s Kiss Me, Kate. What’s wrong with it? Well, conceptually, there’s no real clear choice made regarding what the show within the show is supposed to be, resulting in some moments in which require one to push to the limits of one’s suspension of disbelief, not the least of which involves two gangsters suddenly performing a musical number within the scope of the show within the show. That’s one of the very few things the film adaptation got right, shifting the song into the alley behind the theatre as a non-diegetic piece of advice for leading man Fred Graham. But once you’re that conceptual flaw, there’s a great love story being told here with a great score, offering some of Porter’s most moving work (“So in Love”) and some of his wittiest lyrics (“Wunderbar, “Tom, Dick, or Harry” and “Where is the Life that Late I Led?”). It’s a gem.

Longest Running Broadway Musicals

This is the list as it stands at present. You can find out more about most of the shows on this list by visiting the pages in the links bar above.

1. The Phantom of the Opera – 9027 performances, still running
2. Cats – 7485 performances
3. Les Misérables – 6680 performances
4. A Chorus Line – 6137 performances
5. Oh! Calcutta! (Revival) – 5959 performances
6. Beauty and the Beast – 5461 performances
7. Chicago (Revival) – 5356 performances, still running
8. Rent 5124 performances
9. The Lion King – 4941 performances, still running
10. Miss Saigon – 4097 performances
11. 42nd Street – 3486 performances
12. Grease – 3388 performances
13. Mamma Mia! – 3304 performances, still running
14. Fiddler on the Roof – 3242 performances
15. Hello, Dolly! – 2844 performances
16. My Fair Lady – 2717 performances
17. Hairspray – 2641 performances
18. Avenue Q – 2534 performances
19. The Producers – 2502 performances
20. Wicked – 2462 performances, still running

5 Great Musicals of the 1990s

This is a list of 5 of my favourite musicals of the 1990s. If you don’t know them – head straight to Amazon and pick up a cast recording! These are definitely shows that should be on your radar.

1. Marie Christine

Simply put, Michael John LaChiusa is the best of the new generation of serious musical theatre composers and Marie Christine represents one of his lushest and most seductive scores. Loosely based on the Greek play, Medea, the show transposes the action to 1890s New Orleans where Marie finds herself spurned by her love, Dante, and exacts a tragic revenge. Add a touch of voodoo and a dash of history by way of the real-life figure Marie Laveau and you have the makings of a compelling tale of mythic proportions. LaChiusa’s score is filled with ravishing melodies and haunting motifs and the original cast recording preserves a tour de force performance from Audra McDonald in the titular role.

2. Passion

Passion is a haunting show, a musical of immense emotional depth and intellect. It’s not perhaps the most easily accessible of musical theatre scores: the score is not compartmentalized into extractable, toe-tapping songs, but uses a series of motifs to develop narrative and character in an immensely sophisticated manner. Emotionally we’re looking at some of the things that drive us all: the nature and meaning of love, and the thin line between passion and obsession. It’s disquieting how easily one can see something of oneself in Fosca, as broken in her soul as she is in her body, or in Giorgio, a man whose life is completely transformed by his experiences with this woman. Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine challenge conventional ideas about the relationship between love, passion and obsession from three perspectives: what people expect them to be, what they truly are and what they have the potential to become. It’s dark and brooding and brilliant.

3. Assassins

In contrast, Sondheim’s Assassins has a score that is almost immediately accessible, owing to its brilliant use of pastiche and the inclusion of a range of characters that lurk within the boundaries of our public consciousness. Even if one hasn’t heard of the assassins whose perspectives placed at the centre of this muiscal, one has surely heard of the American presidents who were their targets. From the variations on “Hail to the Chief” to the series of ballads that tell the stories of those who would see the chief fall, every number in the show is memorable. The original Off-Broadway cast recording also preserves the chilling climactic scene in full and, if you’re lucky enough to see the show live, there are other treats that await in the book: the monologues of Samuel Byck, would-be Richard Nixon assassin, and the hysterically funny scenes between Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme and Sara Jane Moore, who both attempt to assassinate Gerald Ford. It’s a satirical gem that works best without the latter day addition of “Something Just Broke”, a song that forces us back into our traditional perceptions of the assassins and their deeds and which dilutes the experience we should undergo as we experience this show.

4. Sunset Boulevard

Some people ask why Andrew Lloyd Webber turned what is considered by many to be an untouchable film into a musical. Well, I prefer my divas singing, so it suits me just fine. Sunset Boulevard is not particularly subtle, but its broadness suits its mileau and characters. There are some haunting pieces of music here: the instrumental use of “The Greatest Star of All”, for instance, or the ghostly introduction to the titular tune, or the two instantly memorable songs given to Norma Desmond, “With One Look” and “As If We Never Said Goodbye”, and even smaller numbers like “The Perfect Year” are melodic little gems that stay with you long after the last time you listened to the score.

5. Titanic

In 1997, two different versions of the Titanic story were told in two different styles in two different mediums. The film offered Leonardio DiCaprio and Kate Winslet frolicking in a fictional love story set against the backdrop of the ill-fated ship of dreams, while the musical used the stories of the real life Titanic passengers as a basis for telling its Robert Altman-like version of the tale. These days, I find myself returning to my cast album of the stage score rather than the film. It’s a moving piece of musical theatre, from the opening sequence to the haunting contra-punctual duet “The Proposal/The Night Was Alive”, from the exquisitely structured sequence at the end of the first act (where the ship hits the iceberg) to the chilling lifeboat sequence that climaxes with the stirring anthem, “We’ll Meet Tomorrow”. And any of these is many times better than “My Heart Will Go On”….