On the State of the British Musical (and Other Pressing Issues)

More catching up to do.

So to this Michael Billington review of a musical version of The Lady or the Tiger. Unfortunately he doesn't seem to have much time for the piece and, in the last paragraph, begins ruminating more generally on the "melancholy" state of the British musical:

"Andrew Lloyd Webber effortlessly dominates the scene. But who else is there? Howard Goodall tapped into the British choral tradition in The Hired Man but has never capitalised on that success. Stiles and Drewe wrote popular children's piece Honk!, but have yet to achieve an adult breakthrough. Whether because of economics, lack of encouragement or failure of ambition, the British musical seems a languishing, lacklustre affair."

Now I'm not altogether in disagreement with Mr. Billington. But a few quibbles:

1. Lord Andy may dominate the scene but, in recent years, it's more for his role as Graham Norton's sidekick than for his musicals. I don't know the exact financial figures but I do know that none of his recent shows made it to Broadway. And Sunset Boulevard and Aspects of Love, good works both, were never solid gold smashes in the way that Phantom of the Opera was. But that goes back to 1986.

2. Far from not capitalising on The Hired Man, the splendid Howard Goodall has written plenty more musicals. They just haven't been that successful. Then again he's always seems a wee bit indifferent about the form.

3. I'd say that Stiles and Drewe have indeed had a major breakthrough by writing half the score for Mary Poppins. (And by the way, why does something need to be "adult" to be considered a breakthrough?).

4. He didn't mention Billy Elliot.

5. If I were to take a fairly unsubstantiated guess I'd say there are probably more talented and skilled actors, singers, dancers, choreographers, stage managers and lighting designers working in musical theatre today than ever before. That may be due to all those jukebox musicals and reality TV shows but they hardly make the scene look "languishing" or "lacklustre".

And yet, and yet. There is a sense in which the hit shows, let alone the good ones, are few and far between. I can't really disagree but has it ever been any different? Even in the Mackintosh/Lloyd Webber days the hits were a trickle compared to the stream of flops. Successful musicals are always the exception. I've said it before and I say it again: nobody really, truly knows how musicals work. Not even Mr. Billington.

A Novello Fellow?

It's catch-up time.

So better late than never I've been listening to Comedy Thos over at Musical Talk. Fascinating episode, well worth a listen. He's talking about Ivor Novello and comes up with this thought:

"Andrew Lloyd Webber is, in some ways, the modern operettist"

The specific pitch here is that, had Novello lived a little longer and continued his success into the 1960s, we would see a much clearer line from him to Andrew Lloyd Webber. Instead the Broadway shows took over and the British operetta tradition was broken. But there is a tradition there if you only join the dots.

Well I'm not so sure. First of all Lord Andy doesn't usually cite Novello as any kind of influence. Yes there are lush melodies but, in truth, his music lies far from Novello's. It lies in a strange and lonely place somewhere between Richard Rogers, Puccini and the Everly Brothers. For all the accusations that Lloyd Webber's music sounds like other people's, nobody else's music tends to sound like his.

OK but what about form and content? The romance, the spectacle, the earnest lack of any funny dialogue? Surely that's operetta-ish? Yes it is, but that's putting too much on Phantom of the Opera. Lord Andy has written in a whole variety of forms - album musical, dance musical, song cycle, roller skate-orama musical - as if he was making it up as he went along. I think he was.

The main point about Lord Andy is not that he continued any kind of British operetta tradition but that he broke from the dominant Broadway tradition. Less a Novello fellow and more an antidote to Jerry Herman.

Why Don't Musicals Get the Credit They Deserve?

So asks Carrie Dunn on the Guardian website (although personally I wouldn't choose to illustrate my argument with a photo of Jason Donovan dressed as Carmen Miranda). This is in response to the Evening Standard Awards longlist:

"For the awards, both new works and revivals are lumped into a single category, Best Musical. This means that avant-garde innovations compete against tried-and-tested classics, with no rewards for new writing. The brilliant original rock score of Spring Awakening is up against the Open Air theatre's Hello, Dolly!, for instance."

Which is, of course, highly unfair. Hello Dolly!, being an old-fashioned musical comedy written in the mid-60s, is clearly the more radical and culturally transgressive. By comparison a rock musical written a few years ago is merely playing to the cultural mainstream. But I digress.

It is indeed curious. The Critics' Circle awards seem to do the same thing. Presumably the judges of these awards wouldn't think of pitting a new playwright's offering against a Tom Stoppard revival in the Best Play category. The Olivier awards do separate new musicals and revivals but, given that they once gave the gong to Return to the Forbidden Planet over Miss Saigon, they don't have the best track record. Compare this to Broadway's Tony awards which not only separates the awards for new musicals and revivals but also gives awards for Best Book and Best Score.

This shouldn't be too surprising. Broadway invented musicals and it's only right that they should understand and celebrate them the most. I suspect that most judges on British award panels would prefer not to have to spend their time weighing the theatrical merits of Priscilla Queen of the Desert against Never Forget - the Take That Musical. I can't say I really blame them. But to lump new musicals and revivals in the same category seems to deny that musicals even have authors who intentionally create them, as if they are just random happenings brought about by mere chance.

That's a very odd judging standard from the Evening Standard.

Sams' Theory of The Second Act Dream Ballet

Last week The Sound of Music Tour reached Southampton.

Some time ago I actually heard the director, Jeremy Sams, discussing this show and the structure of musicals. His Big Idea was that, structurally speaking, all two-act musicals have a problem. The problem can be stated thus:

1. Act I is longer than Act II. Act I is normally around 1 hour 15 minutes and Act II around 30-40 minutes.

2. During Act I we get introduced to all the main characters, shown the main relationships and conflicts and reach a partial resolution for a suitably climactic finale. All well and good. But, says Sams, this means that...

3. Act II has 30-4o minutes to fill and not much story left to tell.

His solution is The Second Act Dream Ballet. This is the idea that every Act II requires a Dream Ballet. Not a literal Dream Ballet (although it could be) but some kind of biq sequence that doesn't further the plot much but does serve to run down the clock; a time-filling bit of theatrical padding. In his production of The Sound of Music, the Second Act Dream Ballet is the wedding sequence. In terms of plot, this sequence is telling us nothing more than that Maria and Captain von Trapp get married. But fill it up with singing nuns, processional children, vows, rings and a big white dress and, bingo, you've got ten minutes' worth of stage time.

Other examples might be (and these are my own random thoughts, not Sams'):

Carousel - a literal Dream Ballet sequence
The King and I - the Uncle Tom's Cabin sequence
Guys and Dolls - the Luck Be a Lady number
My Fair Lady - the Embassy Ball sequence
Hello Dolly - the Hello Dolly number
The Producers - the Springtime for Hitler sequence

I'm not sure it works for every show (I can't see where it fits in Oklahoma or Cabaret) and in some ways it sounds similar to the traditional "11 '0' clock number" (as in Hello Dolly) but there does seem to be a basic truth to it. Of course, all this theatrical padding still needs to be integrated. It should still be consistent with character, themes, comedy, emotion and so on. But (and this is the important bit) it should do little or nothing to further the plot in any way, shape or form.

So, in summation:

Sams' Theory of The Second Act Dream Ballet = more nuns.

Quote for the Day

David Mamet in the NY Times (via Mr Stage Right at Big Hollywood):

"I have never spent much time thinking about the themes of my plays, as, I have noticed, when an audience begins to talk about the play’s theme, it means the plot was no good."

The Jukebox Keeps Playing

Broadwayworld tells us that the Spice Girls' back catalogue is being lined up as the next big jukebox musical. Many will groan. But many more will go and see it.

It begs the question, how many more pop catalogues are there left that can be turned into commercially viable musicals? There has to be limiting factors. For starters there has to be a solid fan base, willing and able to make a trip to the theatre (so not too rock 'n' roll). Secondly, there needs to be enough material to make up an evening's entertainment. That means at least a dozen hit songs. By my reckoning that there are only a small number of potential jukebox musicals left:

Forever the Young One - the Cliff Richard musical
Hello, Yellow Brick Road - the Elton John musical
Desperately Seeking Something - the Madonna musical
When Irish Guys are Smiling - the Westlife musical
Retirement Plan - the Girls Aloud musical

I'd give 'em 5 more years. Tops.

Conceptions

Recently caught a show performed by the Guildford School of Acting. The show was Baby with a book by Sybille Pearson and songs by David Shire and Richard Maltby Jnr. It was first performed on Broadway in the 1980s. As the strory of three couples and their reactions to pregnancy, it was a small-scale, intimate show in an era of megamusicals. Lovely performances, sweet songs.

But one the most notable aspects of the show was coming out at the interval and not knowing what the ending would be. This doesn't happen often in musical theatre. Most succesful musicals are based on something else - a book, a play, a film, Argnetinian dictators' wives. There are exceptions (The Music Man, Company, A Chorus Line) but they are in the minority. Even the great Rodgers and Hammerstein only managed two musicals based on original ideas and they were two of their least succesful (Allegro and Me and Juliet).

Why should this be the case? Well, in commercial terms, having an already-established element may help with the advance sales. It's easier to sell Mathilda, the new Roald Dahl musical, than an entirely original musical. In practical terms, I'm sure it helps to have a focal point. Musicals are such a curious mix of competing elements and personalities, having an unchanging source material might help give a certain coherence.

But perhaps there's more to it. Perhaps there is something inherently difficult in conceiving ideas for musicals. Ideas often start small - a character sketch, a scene outline - and then get fleshed out. But musical ideas tend to require a certain size, of character, of emotion. In short, there needs to be a reason to sing. Maybe there is a discontinuity between the "smallness" of how ideas begin and the "bigness" required.

I admit this is all very vague. But along with the obvious commercial and practical considerations, it may explain why original idea musicals tend to come from smaller-scale shows. Shows like Baby are simply easier to conceive.