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Pal Joey (1940)
Rodgers. Hart. 1940. And the first musical-theatre antihero, apparently. Based on a novel written as a series of letters from a dodgy nightclub entertainer to his friend. I knew nothing about this, but then I look at the song list. I’ve at least heard of several of the songs here, including “I Could Write A… Continue reading
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Parade (1998)
My introduction to Jason Robert Brown’s songwriting: I was in the audience for the 2005 Voice Of Musical Theatre final when Tom Solomon came out and sang “Big News” as the second of his three songs, and we all stared at one another and said, “Well, fuck, he’s won, hasn’t he?” (He won. Talk about… Continue reading
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Passing Strange (2006)
“I let my pain fuck my ego and I call the bastard art”… It’s difficult to tell exactly what’s going on in this one. From the songs, you can tell that a musician goes off on a journey, taking in Amsterdam, where he spends some time getting high, and he has some relationships which help… Continue reading
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Phantom – The American Musical (1993)
Hmmm. OK. Regular readers will know I have a bit of a blind spot when it comes to Maury Yeston musicals. They just don’t suit me, let’s put it like that. He can definitely write nice music, but I’m not convinced that he can write a gripping musical. This is his version of the Phantom… Continue reading
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The Phantom Of The Opera (1986)
Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “The Phantom Of The Opera”. For my own benefit as much as yours, let me just recap what I’ve thought of ALW shows so far, in three words apiece. Aspects Of Love: WTF. Long. Eh.The Beautiful Game: Strained. Average. Tuneless.Bombay Dreams (he produced it): Percussion. Bollywood. Approved.By Jeeves: Wodehouse. Excellent. Surprising.Cats: WTF.… Continue reading
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Pickwick (1963)
This show channels a considerable amount of English nostalgia, and comparisons with “Oliver!” are appropriate as they both source from Dickens and date from the sixties. But “Pickwick” is far more successfully defined by its title role, which in turn was defined by Harry Secombe, of The Goon Show and a subsequent metric tonnage of… Continue reading
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The Pirate Queen (2007)
I refer you to the plot summary here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pirate_Queen – got that? OK, now I refer you to Grainne Ni Mhaille’s bio here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gr%C3%A1inne_N%C3%AD_Mh%C3%A1ille – compare and contrast. Oh OK, I’ll do it for you. God, talk about rewriting history. In the show, the seafaring daughter of an Irish chieftain falls for an attractive young… Continue reading
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Priscilla – Queen Of The Desert (2006)
Bah. This soundtrack is basically an album of camp classics, so you can pick your own rating for it. You all know I don’t usually care for covers of pop songs, particularly when musical theatre gets hold of them (it’s mostly down to the instrumentation) and this doesn’t really change my mind on that. I’m… Continue reading
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The Producers (2001)
You probably know the plot. Fifty words or less: crap Broadway producer meets corruptible accountant, a plan is hatched to raise money for a deliberate flop, the appalling musical “Springtime For Hitler” is evolved, the audience loves it as a satire, and the producers end up in prison… doing the same thing again. Wikipedia says… Continue reading
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The Pajama Game (1954)
(Pajama? Pyjama? Whatever…) This is a musical from Three Million Years BC – er, 1954. I have the 2006 revival recording with new songs. You know how I sometimes grumble about revivals over-egging the pudding by updating the orchestrations? It doesn’t happen here that I can tell. Brilliantly, this show has a female lead called… Continue reading