Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that combines songs, spoken dialogue , acting and dance. The story and emotional content of a musical – humor, pathos , love, anger – are communicated through words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an integrated whole. Although musical theatre overlaps with other theatrical forms like opera and dance, it may be distinguished by the equal importance given to the music as compared with the dialogue, movement and other elements. Since the early 20th century, musical theatre stage works have generally been called, simply, musicals .
226-574: Flower Drum Song was the eighth musical by the team of Rodgers and Hammerstein . It is based on the 1957 novel, The Flower Drum Song , by Chinese-American author C. Y. Lee . It premiered on Broadway in 1958 and was then performed in the West End and on tour. It was adapted for a 1961 musical film . After their extraordinary early successes, beginning with Oklahoma! in 1943, Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II had written two musicals in
452-479: A Best Actress Oscar nomination for leading lady Dorothy Dandridge . Rodgers and Hammerstein also received a special Pulitzer Prize in 1944 for Oklahoma! . The original production of Carousel was directed by Rouben Mamoulian and opened at Broadway's Majestic Theatre on April 19, 1945, running for 890 performances and closing on May 24, 1947. The cast included John Raitt , Jan Clayton , Jean Darling , Christine Johnson and Bambi Linn . From this show came
678-495: A Tonkinese (Vietnamese) woman, Bloody Mary, in South Pacific . Another African-American performer, Diahann Carroll , was considered for the cast but not hired. Rodgers later wrote, "what was important was that the actors gave the illusion of being Chinese. This demonstrates one of the most wonderful things about theatre audiences. People want to believe what they see on a stage, and they will gladly go along with whatever
904-405: A Chinese Life with Father ". Hammerstein consulted with Rodgers, and they agreed to make it their next work, to be written and produced in association with Fields. Hammerstein began work in mid-1958. In July, however, he fell ill and was hospitalized for a month. This forced him to hurry his writing, as the production team had hoped to have the show in rehearsal by the start of September; this
1130-565: A Little Christmas", "I Am What I Am", "Mame", "The Best of Times", "Before the Parade Passes By", "Put On Your Sunday Clothes", "It Only Takes a Moment", "Bosom Buddies" and "I Won't Send Roses", recorded by such artists as Louis Armstrong , Eydie Gormé , Barbra Streisand , Petula Clark and Bernadette Peters. Herman's songbook has been the subject of two popular musical revues, Jerry's Girls (Broadway, 1985) and Showtune (off-Broadway, 2003). The musical started to diverge from
1356-481: A Shadow ", " Something Wonderful ", " I Have Dreamed ", and "Shall We Dance?" The King and I was followed by Me and Juliet , which opened at the Majestic Theatre on May 28, 1953. When Oklahoma! returned to Broadway on August 31, 1953, with The King and I , Me and Juliet and South Pacific all still playing, Rodgers and Hammerstein had four shows appearing on Broadway at once. The King and I
1582-456: A Western dress ("Like a God"). Linda comes to Madam Liang's graduation party from citizenship school with Linda's "brother" (actually the comedian from Sammy's nightclub) and presents herself as Ta's intended, with her "brother" giving his consent for the marriage. The extroverted, Americanized woman is not what Wang has in mind for his elder son, and Wang and Ta argue. Sammy Fong arrives and quickly penetrates Linda's scheme: Linda, frustrated by
1808-548: A bestseller in 1957. Lee's novel centers on Wang Chi-yang, a 63-year-old man who fled China to avoid the communists. The wealthy refugee lives in a house in Chinatown with his two sons. His sister-in-law, Madam Tang, who takes citizenship classes, is a regular visitor and urges Wang to adopt Western ways. While his sons and sister-in-law are integrating into American culture, Wang stubbornly resists assimilation and speaks only two words of English, "Yes" and "No". Wang also has
2034-579: A book musical are its music , lyrics and book . The book or script of a musical refers to the story, character development and dramatic structure, including the spoken dialogue and stage directions, but it can also refer to the dialogue and lyrics together, which are sometimes referred to as the libretto (Italian for "small book"). The music and lyrics together form the score of a musical and include songs, incidental music and musical scenes, which are "theatrical sequence[s] set to music, often combining song with spoken dialogue." The interpretation of
2260-518: A completely new genre – the musical play as distinguished from musical comedy. Now ... everything else was subservient to that play. Now ... came complete integration of song, humor and production numbers into a single and inextricable artistic entity." As the Great Depression set in during the post-Broadway national tour of Show Boat , the public turned back to mostly light, escapist song-and-dance entertainment. Audiences on both sides of
2486-520: A few exceptions, compared with London runs, until the 1920s. Gilbert and Sullivan were widely pirated and also were imitated in New York by productions such as Reginald De Koven 's Robin Hood (1891) and John Philip Sousa 's El Capitan (1896). A Trip to Coontown (1898) was the first musical comedy entirely produced and performed by African Americans on Broadway (largely inspired by the routines of
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#17327798622642712-402: A few players . Rock musicals usually employ a small group of mostly rock instruments, and some musicals may call for only a piano or two instruments. The music in musicals uses a range of "styles and influences including operetta , classical techniques, folk music , jazz [and] local or historical styles [that] are appropriate to the setting." Musicals may begin with an overture played by
2938-641: A five-minute song than are spoken in a five-minute block of dialogue. Therefore, there is less time to develop drama in a musical than in a straight play of equivalent length, since a musical usually devotes more time to music than to dialogue. Within the compressed nature of a musical, the writers must develop the characters and the plot. The material presented in a musical may be original, or it may be adapted from novels ( Wicked and Man of La Mancha ), plays ( Hello, Dolly! and Carousel ), classic legends ( Camelot ), historical events ( Evita and Hamilton ) or films ( The Producers and Billy Elliot ). On
3164-434: A job befitting their education, plans to go to law school , postponing the likely career struggle by three years. The impetuous Ta asks Linda to marry him. She agrees, but she needs family consent and lies, saying that she has a brother who will approve the marriage. Ta returns home and meets Mei Li, who is immediately attracted to him ("I Am Going to Like It Here"), though Ta is unimpressed. That changes when Ta sees her in
3390-517: A love relationship sanctioned and restricted by Protestant ideals of marriage; that a married couple should make a moral home with children away from the city in a suburb or small town; that the woman's function was as homemaker and mother; and that Americans incorporate an independent and pioneering spirit or that their success is self-made. The 1950s were crucial to the development of the American musical. Damon Runyon 's eclectic characters were at
3616-550: A love triangle and lame jokes." Michael Kuchwara commented in his lukewarm review for Associated Press: "Then there's Linda Low's gay confidante, Harvard. Talk about stereotypes. If you are going to perpetuate one at least give him better jokes." On the other hand, both USA Today and Time magazine gave it positive reviews. The CurtainUp review was mostly positive and observed that Hwang and Longbottom "were able to keep numbers like 'Chop Suey' and milk it for its razzle-dazzle fun while using its condescending stereotyping as
3842-510: A musical adaptation of Oscar Wilde 's 1895 hit The Importance of Being Earnest . West Side Story (1957) transported Romeo and Juliet to modern day New York City and converted the feuding Montague and Capulet families into opposing ethnic gangs, the Jets and the Sharks. The book was adapted by Arthur Laurents , with music by Leonard Bernstein and lyrics by newcomer Stephen Sondheim . It
4068-491: A musical based on Lynn Riggs ' stage play Green Grow the Lilacs . When Jerome Kern declined Hammerstein's offer to work on such a project and Hart refused Rodgers' offer to do the same, Rodgers and Hammerstein began their first collaboration. The result, Oklahoma! (1943), marked a revolution in musical drama. Although not the first musical to tell a story of emotional depth and psychological complexity, Oklahoma! introduced
4294-424: A musical drama or even to invest their comedic approach with dramatic counterpoint of the sort that Jud Fry had given Oklahoma! ... [They] took the safest commercial route by following the eldest son's search for love – the most popular theme at the time with Broadway audiences." Lewis notes that Chao's role, though diminished in the musical, nevertheless gives it some of its darkest moments, and she serves much
4520-416: A musical generally became more expensive. Shuffle Along (1921), an all-African American show, was a hit on Broadway. A new generation of composers of operettas also emerged in the 1920s, such as Rudolf Friml and Sigmund Romberg , to create a series of popular Broadway hits. In London, writer-stars such as Ivor Novello and Noël Coward became popular, but the primacy of British musical theatre from
4746-497: A musical is the responsibility of its creative team, which includes a director, a musical director, usually a choreographer and sometimes an orchestrator . A musical's production is also creatively characterized by technical aspects, such as set design , costumes , stage properties (props) , lighting and sound . The creative team, designs and interpretations generally change from the original production to succeeding productions. Some production elements, however, may be retained from
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#17327798622644972-467: A musical style more aptly suited to twentieth-century society and its vernacular idiom. It was from America that the more direct style emerged, and in America that it was able to flourish in a developing society less hidebound by nineteenth-century tradition." In France, comédie musicale was written between in the early decades of the century for such stars as Yvonne Printemps . Progressing far beyond
5198-547: A new Broadway record. In Britain, Me and My Girl ran for 1,646 performances. Still, a few creative teams began to build on Show Boat ' s innovations. Of Thee I Sing (1931), a political satire by the Gershwins, was the first musical awarded the Pulitzer Prize . As Thousands Cheer (1933), a revue by Irving Berlin and Moss Hart in which each song or sketch was based on a newspaper headline, marked
5424-450: A novel about Chinatown, The Flower Drum Song (originally titled Grant Avenue ). Lee initially had no success selling his novel, but his agent submitted it to the publishing house of Farrar, Straus and Cudahy . The firm sent the manuscript to an elderly reader for evaluation. The reader was found dead in bed, the manuscript beside him with the words "Read this" scrawled on it. The publishing house did, and bought Lee's novel, which became
5650-464: A number of blockbusters, like Fiddler on the Roof (1964; 3,242 performances), Hello, Dolly! (1964; 2,844 performances), Funny Girl (1964; 1,348 performances) and Man of La Mancha (1965; 2,328 performances), and some more risqué pieces like Cabaret , before ending with the emergence of the rock musical . In Britain, Oliver! (1960) ran for 2,618 performances, but the long-run champion of
5876-628: A number of new storytelling elements and techniques. These included its use of song and dance to convey and advance both plot and character, rather than act as a diversion from the story, and the firm integration of every song into the plot-line. Oklahoma! was originally called Away We Go! and opened at the Shubert Theatre in New Haven in March 1943. Only a few changes were made before it opened on Broadway, but three would prove significant:
6102-521: A river ... with lots of obstacles and mishaps along the way". As transportation improved, poverty in London and New York diminished, and street lighting made for safer travel at night, the number of patrons for the growing number of theatres increased enormously. Plays ran longer, leading to better profits and improved production values, and men began to bring their families to the theatre. The first musical theatre piece to exceed 500 consecutive performances
6328-552: A run of 931 performances. Gilbert and Sullivan's influence on later musical theatre was profound, creating examples of how to "integrate" musicals so that the lyrics and dialogue advanced a coherent story. Their works were admired and copied by early authors and composers of musicals in Britain and America. A Trip to Chinatown (1891) was Broadway's long-run champion (until Irene in 1919), running for 657 performances, but New York runs continued to be relatively short, with
6554-518: A score directly for film. It was a great success, winning Rodgers and Hammerstein their lone Oscar together, for the song " It Might as Well Be Spring ", but it was also unadventurous material for them, compared with several of their Broadway shows. In 1962, an unsuccessful remake of the musical film was released. In 1969, the St. Louis Municipal Opera presented the world stage premiere of State Fair starring Ozzie and Harriet Nelson. The production
6780-525: A secret soft spot for the movie version. 'It was kind of a guilty pleasure ... and one of the only big Hollywood films where you could see a lot of really good Asian actors onscreen, singing and dancing and cracking jokes.'" Ted Chapin, president of the Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization, announced that an unnamed "Asian playwright" had approached him about revising Flower Drum Song . Chapin called
7006-517: A secretary mark on the script any sound of the chairs squeaking, as indicating that the audience was restless. Hammerstein rewrote some of the book to expand the focus from Ta himself to the romantic relationships of the two couples. After the Boston tryouts, Flower Drum Song opened on Broadway at the St. James Theatre on December 1, 1958. Sets were designed by Oliver Smith , costumes by Irene Sharaff and lighting by Peggy Clark. C.Y. Lee sat in
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7232-544: A series of 2.5D musicals based on popular anime and manga comics has developed in recent decades. Shorter or simplified "junior" versions of many musicals are available for schools and youth groups, and very short works created or adapted for performance by children are sometimes called minimusicals . The antecedents of musical theatre in Europe can be traced back to the theatre of ancient Greece , where music and dance were included in stage comedies and tragedies during
7458-547: A series of successful Broadway shows, including On Your Toes (1936, with Ray Bolger , the first Broadway musical to make dramatic use of classical dance), Babes in Arms (1937) and The Boys from Syracuse (1938). Porter added Du Barry Was a Lady (1939). The longest-running piece of musical theatre of the 1930s in the US was Hellzapoppin (1938), a revue with audience participation, which played for 1,404 performances, setting
7684-637: A series of workshops, the new version was presented at two well-attended workshops for potential backers. The show failed to raise enough money for an immediate Broadway run, but Hwang hoped that an extended Los Angeles run would lead to raising additional funds. The revival was originally planned for the 2,000-seat Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles, but to save money he moved it to the nearby 739-seat Mark Taper Forum . Producer Gordon Davidson engaged an all-Asian cast, including Broadway star Lea Salonga as Mei-li. When it finally opened on October 14, 2001,
7910-557: A severe cough, which he does not wish to have cured, feeling that it gives him authority in his household. Wang's elder son, Wang Ta, woos Linda Tung, but on learning that she has many men in her life, drops her; he later learns she is a nightclub dancer. Linda's friend, seamstress Helen Chao, who has been unable to find a man despite the shortage of eligible women in Chinatown, gets Ta drunk and seduces him. On awakening in her bed, he agrees to an affair, but eventually abandons her, and she commits suicide. Impatient at Ta's inability to find
8136-525: A short tour and has since been produced regionally . C.Y. Lee fled war-torn China in the 1940s and came to the United States, where he attended Yale University 's playwriting program, graduating in 1947 with an M.F.A. degree. By the 1950s, he was barely making a living writing short stories and working as a Chinese teacher, translator and journalist for San Francisco Chinatown newspapers. He had hoped to break into playwriting, but instead wrote
8362-526: A song for Sammy Fong to explain to Mei Li that they should not wed. In the span of a few hours, they wrote the lyrics and music to "Don't Marry Me". Once the songs were finalized, Robert Russell Bennett , who had orchestrated several of the creators' most successful previous shows, did the same for the score of Flower Drum Song . The musical opened for tryouts on October 27, 1958, at Boston's Shubert Theatre . The audience gave it an enthusiastic response, causing Rodgers to leave his seat repeatedly and race to
8588-446: A springboard to satirize attitudes towards Asians." Brantley disagreed, writing, "because the show's satiric point of view is so muddled, there's no verve in such numbers, no joy in the performing of them." In 2006, David Lewis compared the original script to Hwang's version: History never completely goes away. Hwang's champions are unlikely to fade away, either, in rhetorical defeat. Dick and Oscar and Joe mined C. Y. Lee's novel for
8814-434: A stage director with the musical and scoured the country for a suitable Asian – or at least, plausibly Asian-looking – cast. The musical, more light-hearted than Lee's novel, was profitable on Broadway and was followed by a national tour. After the release of the 1961 film version, the musical was rarely produced, as it presented casting issues and fears that Asian-Americans would take offense at how they are portrayed. When it
9040-428: A star. Because the efforts of Rodgers and Hammerstein were so successful, many musicals that followed contained thought-provoking plots with mature themes, and in which all the aspects of the play, dance, song, and drama, were combined in an integrated whole. Stephen Sondheim has cited Rodgers and Hammerstein as having had a crucial influence on his work. Rodgers and Hammerstein also use the technique of what some call
9266-404: A stop to his drinking. Hammerstein, meanwhile, was in Los Angeles at the filming of South Pacific . While at the commissary, he met longtime friend, Joe Fields , who mentioned that he was negotiating for the rights to The Flower Drum Song . Intrigued by the title, Hammerstein asked for a copy of the novel, and decided that it had potential as a musical – the lyricist described it as "sort of
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9492-789: A story-telling device in On Your Toes in 1936, which was followed by Agnes de Mille 's ballet and choreography in Oklahoma! . After Abbott collaborated with Jerome Robbins in On the Town and other shows, Robbins combined the roles of director and choreographer, emphasizing the story-telling power of dance in West Side Story , A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962) and Fiddler on
9718-725: A supporting alto lead. Although there are exceptions to this generalization, it simplifies the audition process and gives audiences an idea of what to expect vocally from a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical. However, this formula had been used in Viennese operetta , such as The Merry Widow . William A. Everett and Paul R. Laird wrote that Oklahoma! , "like Show Boat , became a milestone, so that later historians writing about important moments in twentieth-century theatre would begin to identify eras according to their relationship to Oklahoma! " In The Complete Book of Light Opera , Mark Lubbock adds, "After Oklahoma! , Rodgers and Hammerstein were
9944-478: A wedding gift of a pair of his mother's earrings that she wore on her wedding day and tries unsuccessfully to hide the fact that he is now deeply in love with her. The wedding procession moves down San Francisco's Grant Avenue with the bride, heavily veiled, carried on a sedan chair ("Wedding Parade"). Sammy drinks from the traditional wedding goblet, then offers the goblet to his new bride. Unveiled, Mei Li confesses to Sammy's mother that she cannot marry Sammy as she
10170-461: A wife, Wang arranges for a picture bride for his son. However, before the picture bride arrives, Ta meets a young woman, May Li, who with her father has recently come to San Francisco. The two support themselves by singing depressing flower drum songs on the street. Ta invites the two into the Wang household, with his father's approval, and he and May Li fall in love. He vows to marry her after she
10396-414: A young Chinese woman who illegally comes to America in hopes of marrying a wealthy young Chinese-American man, who is already in love with a Chinatown nightclub dancer. The young man's parents are traditional Chinese and want him to marry the new Chinese immigrant, but he is hesitant until he falls in love with her. Though this musical did not achieve the popularity of the team's five most famous musicals, it
10622-474: A young Chinese-American man living in his father's house in San Francisco's Chinatown, discusses the problems of finding a wife with his aunt, Madam Liang ("You Are Beautiful") before hurrying off on a blind date. Nightclub owner Sammy Fong arrives with an offer for Ta's immigrant father, Master Wang, a very old-fashioned Chinatown elder. Sammy's picture bride has just arrived from China, illegally, but
10848-606: Is a big fat Rodgers and Hammerstein hit, and nothing written here will have the slightest effect on the proceeds." The New York Daily Mirror termed it, "Another notable work by the outstanding craftsmen of our musical theatre ... a lovely show, an outstanding one in theme and treatment." Less enthusiastic, however, was the longtime New York Times critic, Brooks Atkinson , who repeatedly described it as merely "pleasant". UPI's drama critic, Jack Gaver, scored it as "well north of Me and Juliet and Pipe Dream " but "well south" of Oklahoma! , Carousel , South Pacific and even
11074-436: Is an illegal alien – a tactic she learned by watching American television. The contract is void, and that gives both Sammy and Ta the opportunity to marry their true loves, Linda and Mei Li. According to Rodgers biographer Meryle Secrest, Rodgers, Hammerstein and Fields had hoped to engage Yul Brynner as director. Brynner, who had gained fame in the team's 1951 hit, The King and I , was an accomplished director. However, he
11300-794: Is based on the story of the Austrian Von Trapp Family . Starring Mary Martin as Maria and Theodore Bikel as Captain von Trapp, it opened on Broadway at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on November 16, 1959, garnering much praise and numerous awards. It has been frequently revived ever since. The show was made into a film in 1965 starring Julie Andrews as Maria and Christopher Plummer as the Captain. It won five Oscars , including Best Picture and Best Director , Robert Wise . Hammerstein died in August 1960, before
11526-526: Is based upon two short stories by James A. Michener from his book Tales of the South Pacific , which itself was the winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1948. For their adaptation, Rodgers and Hammerstein, along with co-writer Joshua Logan , won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1950. The song " You've Got to Be Carefully Taught " was controversial due to its support of interracial marriage . Rodgers and Hammerstein refused to remove it from
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#173277986226411752-489: Is becoming attracted to Mei-li, who now serves as a waitress, but he has competition from fortune cookie factory worker Chao, whom Mei-li met on the slow journey from China, and who is rapidly becoming discontented with America. Wang is also unhappy, despite the club's success, and it is no consolation the crowd is having a good time – after all, in the old country, no crowd ever came to his theater expecting to enjoy themselves. Outraged at Harvard's poor acting skills, Wang takes
11978-453: Is beginning to accept American culture. Rodgers and Hammerstein , despite extraordinary successes earlier in their partnership, such as Oklahoma! , Carousel and South Pacific , had suffered back-to-back Broadway relative failures in the mid-1950s with Me and Juliet and Pipe Dream . While Oklahoma! had broken new ground in 1943, any new project in the late 1950s would have to compete with modern musicals and techniques, like
12204-431: Is distressed to see Ta's dinner jacket there. Mei Li jumps to conclusions and leaves horrified. Ta leaves the lonely Helen, totally oblivious to her attempts to interest him. Wang wants the bar and its "evil spirits" shut down; his sister-in-law informs him that free enterprise cannot be shut down, and the two wonder at the foibles of the younger generation ("The Other Generation"). Ta arrives home to admit that his father
12430-482: Is done to achieve the desired effect. Ask them to accept Ezio Pinza as a Frenchman [in South Pacific ], Yul Brynner as Siamese and they are prepared to meet you nine tenths of the way even before the curtain goes up." When rehearsals began in September 1958, Hammerstein was absent, still recuperating from his surgery. Rodgers was present, but kept falling asleep. Hammerstein was told by his son James that Kelly
12656-416: Is falsely accused by the household servants of stealing a clock, though his father forbids it. Wang struggles to understand the conflicts that have torn his household apart; his hostility toward assimilation is isolating him from his family. In the end, taking his son's advice, Wang decides not to go to the herbalist to seek a remedy for his cough, but walks to a Chinese-run Western clinic, symbolizing that he
12882-451: Is frequently longer than the second. The first act generally introduces nearly all of the characters and most of the music and often ends with the introduction of a dramatic conflict or plot complication while the second act may introduce a few new songs but usually contains reprises of important musical themes and resolves the conflict or complication. A book musical is usually built around four to six main theme tunes that are reprised later in
13108-508: Is learned in songs and dialogue, but describes the ballet in Flower Drum Song as "pleasant but not memorable". Although Hischak describes Rodgers as "the greatest waltz composer America has ever seen", Flower Drum Song was the first Rodgers and Hammerstein musical not to feature one. Musical theatre Although music has been a part of dramatic presentations since ancient times, modern Western musical theatre emerged during
13334-470: Is leaving for Los Angeles, as Wang's "Sammy Fong" act has effectively taken over the show, and she has received a better offer. Ta intercepts Mei-li at the docks and persuades her to remain in America; Ta leaves Club Chop Suey and the two become street performers as Chao departs for Hong Kong. Harvard announces his intention to return home and attempt a reconciliation with his disappointed parents. Despite his irritation at Ta, Wang allows him to marry Mei-li at
13560-416: Is not. Mei-li joins the opera company ("I Am Going to Like It Here") and is soon attracted to the indifferent Ta, who favors Linda. Mei-li is fascinated by Linda, who urges her to adopt the American lifestyle ("I Enjoy Being a Girl"). Linda is soon signed by talent agent Rita Liang, who pushes Wang to turn the theater into a club full-time ("Grant Avenue"), and he reluctantly opens Club Chop Suey. Ta slowly
13786-477: Is often difficult to distinguish among the various kinds of musical theatre, including "musical play", "musical comedy", "operetta" and "light opera". Like opera, the singing in musical theatre is generally accompanied by an instrumental ensemble called a pit orchestra , located in a lowered area in front of the stage. While opera typically uses a conventional symphony orchestra , musicals are generally orchestrated for ensembles ranging from 27 players down to only
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#173277986226414012-457: Is presented by her father's old friend Wang Chi-yang and Wang's foster brother Chin. One night a week, Wang's son Ta turns the theater into a nightclub, starring the very assimilated Linda Low, a Chinese-American stripper from Seattle . Linda's constant companion is a gay costume designer, Harvard (so named by his success-obsessed Chinese parents). The nightclub is profitable; the Chinese opera
14238-464: Is primarily a singer and only secondarily an actor (and rarely needs to dance), a musical theatre performer is often an actor first but must also be a singer and dancer. Someone who is equally accomplished at all three is referred to as a "triple threat". Composers of music for musicals often consider the vocal demands of roles with musical theatre performers in mind. Today, large theatres that stage musicals generally use microphones and amplification of
14464-441: Is so humiliated that he does not know what to do. He is led away by childhood friend Helen Chao, a seamstress who fits Linda's costumes for her, and whose love for Ta is unrequited. Linda, goaded beyond endurance when Sammy raises his glass to her, dumps a champagne bucket over his head. Act II: The drunken Ta spends the night at Helen's apartment ("Ballet"). In the morning, Mei Li delivers Master Wang's coat for Helen to mend and
14690-490: The Los Angeles Times called the show "wholly revised and gleefully self-aware ... a few tons short of a mega-musical – no fake helicopters here, no power ballads saccharine enough to stop Communism in its tracks." The Hollywood Reporter thought the revival was, "while not perfect, an exhilarating accomplishment". Variety called it "a bold theatrical operation, an artistic success". Critics reviewing
14916-567: The New York Post found it no more memorable than the earlier version. The review in Talkin' Broadway is scathing, criticizing Hwang's use of the songs and characters, and the orchestrations, and commenting: "Hwang's book lacks much of the charm, warmth, and wit of the original, and never takes the high road where the low road will do. ... Hwang felt it necessary to reduce the original, uniquely colorful story into just another backstager with
15142-676: The Albert Hall " and judged that " Flower Drum Song makes the more stimulating experience." Prologue: In 1960, Wu Mei-li, a performer in Chinese opera , flees China with a flower drum after her father dies in prison for defying the Communists ("A Hundred Million Miracles"). Act I: On arrival in the United States, Mei-li goes to the Golden Pearl Theatre in San Francisco's Chinatown, where little-attended Chinese opera
15368-471: The New York Times' mixed review, and unusually bitter winter weather" for the unexpectedly short run. Lee also felt that the influential Times review had hurt the show's acceptance, but commented that Hwang added some dialogue to Act II after the Los Angeles run that Lee felt slowed the show down. The closing was followed by a national tour that garnered mixed reviews, although Hwang stated that it
15594-640: The Roaring Twenties , borrowing from vaudeville, music hall and other light entertainments, tended to emphasize big dance routines and popular songs at the expense of plot. Typical of the decade were lighthearted productions like Sally ; Lady, Be Good ; No, No, Nanette ; Oh, Kay! ; and Funny Face . Despite forgettable stories, these musicals featured stars such as Marilyn Miller and Fred Astaire and produced dozens of enduring popular songs by Kern, George and Ira Gershwin , Irving Berlin , Cole Porter and Rodgers and Hart . Popular music
15820-408: The St. Louis Municipal Opera in 1961 and 1965 and revivals in the San Francisco area in 1963 and 1964, both times with Soo as Sammy Fong. The musical proved difficult to produce for amateur and school groups, however, because it requires a cast either Asian or made up as Asian. Even professional companies found it difficult to round up an entire cast of Asian singer-dancer-actors. By the late 1960s,
16046-491: The Tudor period that involved music, dancing, singing and acting, often with expensive costumes and a complex stage design . These developed into sung plays that are recognizable as English operas, the first usually being thought of as The Siege of Rhodes (1656). In France, meanwhile, Molière turned several of his farcical comedies into musical entertainments with songs (music provided by Jean-Baptiste Lully ) and dance in
16272-557: The minstrel shows ), followed by ragtime -tinged shows. Hundreds of musical comedies were staged on Broadway in the 1890s and early 20th century, composed of songs written in New York's Tin Pan Alley , including those by George M. Cohan , who worked to create an American style distinct from the Gilbert and Sullivan works. The most successful New York shows were often followed by extensive national tours. Meanwhile, musicals took over
16498-399: The revues and other frothy entertainments of the early 20th century and led to such groundbreaking works as Show Boat (1927), Of Thee I Sing (1931) and Oklahoma! (1943). Some of the most famous musicals through the decades that followed include My Fair Lady (1956), The Fantasticks (1960), Hair (1967), A Chorus Line (1975), Les Misérables (1985), The Phantom of
16724-554: The spoonerism , "a world of woozy song". When the national tour of the show visited the city of its setting, most San Francisco reviewers gave the show very positive reviews, though the Oakland Tribune critic described the musical as one "which has little by way of witty dialogue, outstanding songs or vigorous choreography". Nevertheless, she called the touring production superior to the Broadway one. Michael Phillips of
16950-563: The title song , " Do-Re-Mi ", " My Favorite Things ", " Climb Ev'ry Mountain ", " So Long, Farewell " and " Sixteen Going on Seventeen ". " Edelweiss " was the last song that Rodgers and Hammerstein wrote together. Rodgers and Hammerstein re-worked the musical theater genre. Early 20th-century musicals, except for the Princess Theatre musicals and a few important examples like Hammerstein and Jerome Kern 's Show Boat , were usually whimsical or farcical, and typically built around
17176-543: The "Golden Age" of American musical theatre. Americana was displayed on Broadway during the "Golden Age", as the wartime cycle of shows began to arrive. An example of this is On the Town (1944), written by Betty Comden and Adolph Green , composed by Leonard Bernstein and choreographed by Jerome Robbins . The story is set during wartime and concerns three sailors who are on a 24-hour shore leave in New York City, during which each falls in love. The show also gives
17402-409: The "formula musical". While some hail this approach, others criticize it for its predictability. The term "formula musical" may refer to a musical with a predictable plot, but it also refers to the casting requirements of Rodgers & Hammerstein characters. Typically, any musical from this team will have the casting of a strong baritone lead, a dainty and light soprano lead, a supporting lead tenor, and
17628-622: The 1850s to the 1870s and Johann Strauss II in the 1870s and 1880s. Offenbach's fertile melodies, combined with his librettists' witty satire, formed a model for the musical theatre that followed. Adaptations of the French operettas (played in mostly bad, risqué translations), musical burlesques , music hall, pantomime and burletta dominated the London musical stage into the 1870s. In America, mid-19th century musical theatre entertainments included crude variety revue , which eventually developed into vaudeville , minstrel shows , which soon crossed
17854-504: The 1910s, the team of P. G. Wodehouse , Guy Bolton and Jerome Kern , following in the footsteps of Gilbert and Sullivan , created the " Princess Theatre shows" and paved the way for Kern's later work by showing that a musical could combine light, popular entertainment with continuity between its story and songs. Historian Gerald Bordman wrote: These shows built and polished the mold from which almost all later major musical comedies evolved. ... The characters and situations were, within
18080-581: The 1920 Varsity Show , Fly With Me . The songs for the show were originally written by Rodgers (a freshman) and Lorenz Hart . Hammerstein, who was on the judging committee, added two songs in the revising stage. The three men collaborated again on the 1921 Varsity Show, You'll Never Know , with Hammerstein as "Director of Production". Although Rodgers did not work with Hammerstein again until Oklahoma! , they achieved success independently from each other. Rodgers continued to collaborate for more than two decades with Hart. Among their many Broadway hits were
18306-489: The 1950s that did not do well and sought a new hit to revive their fortunes. Lee's novel focuses on a father, Wang Chi-yang, a wealthy refugee from China, who clings to traditional values in San Francisco 's Chinatown . Rodgers and Hammerstein shifted the focus of the musical to his son, Wang Ta, who is torn between his Chinese roots and assimilation into American culture. The team hired Gene Kelly to make his debut as
18532-490: The 1958 version of the musical was rarely revived, the film "would in future years come to stand for the stage musical it so crassly misrepresented" and would serve as the version that academics and latter-day theatre critics would judge when they analyzed the musical. The film was the only Hollywood adaptation of a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical to lose money. Nevertheless, it was nominated for five Academy Awards and featured choreography by Hermes Pan . As early as mid-1961,
18758-499: The 19th century through 1920 was gradually replaced by American innovation, especially after World War I, as Kern and other Tin Pan Alley composers began to bring new musical styles such as ragtime and jazz to the theatres, and the Shubert Brothers took control of the Broadway theatres. Musical theatre writer Andrew Lamb notes, "The operatic and theatrical styles of nineteenth-century social structures were replaced by
18984-412: The 19th century, such as music hall , melodrama and burletta , which were popularized partly because most London theatres were licensed only as music halls and not allowed to present plays without music. Colonial America did not have a significant theatre presence until 1752, when London entrepreneur William Hallam sent a company of actors to the colonies managed by his brother Lewis . In New York in
19210-523: The 19th century, with many structural elements established by the light opera works of Jacques Offenbach in France, Gilbert and Sullivan in Britain and the works of Harrigan and Hart in America. These were followed by Edwardian musical comedies , which emerged in Britain, and the musical theatre works of American creators like George M. Cohan at the turn of the 20th century. The Princess Theatre musicals (1915–1918) were artistic steps forward beyond
19436-810: The 5th century BCE. The music from the ancient forms is lost, however, and they had little influence on later development of musical theatre. In the 12th and 13th centuries, religious dramas taught the liturgy . Groups of actors would use outdoor Pageant wagons (stages on wheels) to tell each part of the story. Poetic forms sometimes alternated with the prose dialogues, and liturgical chants gave way to new melodies. The European Renaissance saw older forms evolve into two antecedents of musical theatre: commedia dell'arte , where raucous clowns improvised familiar stories, and later, opera buffa . In England, Elizabethan and Jacobean plays frequently included music, and short musical plays began to be included in an evenings' dramatic entertainments. Court masques developed during
19662-551: The Angry Inch and other shows in recent decades. Parade is a sensitive exploration of both anti-Semitism and historical American racism, and Ragtime similarly explores the experience of immigrants and minorities in America. After the success of Hair , rock musicals flourished in the 1970s, with Jesus Christ Superstar , Godspell , The Rocky Horror Show , Evita and Two Gentlemen of Verona . Some of those began as " concept albums " which were then adapted to
19888-677: The Atlantic had little money to spend on entertainment, and only a few stage shows anywhere exceeded a run of 500 performances during the decade. The revue The Band Wagon (1931) starred dancing partners Fred Astaire and his sister Adele , while Porter's Anything Goes (1934) confirmed Ethel Merman 's position as the First Lady of musical theatre, a title she maintained for many years. Coward and Novello continued to deliver old fashioned, sentimental musicals, such as The Dancing Years , while Rodgers and Hart returned from Hollywood to create
20114-425: The Atlantic to Britain, and Victorian burlesque, first popularized in the US by British troupes. A hugely successful musical entertainment that premiered in New York in 1866, The Black Crook , combined dance and some original music that helped to tell the story. The spectacular production, famous for its skimpy costumes, ran for a record-breaking 474 performances. The same year, The Black Domino/Between You, Me and
20340-481: The Broadway set and costume designs, but was directed and supervised by Jerome Whyte. Both the production and the London cast album were well received. Following the closure of the Broadway production, a U.S. national tour began on May 10, 1960, in Detroit . Four of the New York leads, Hall, Soo, Kenney and Luke, joined the tour. By this time, Hammerstein was in his final illness (he died in August 1960), and none of
20566-468: The City of New York." They were also honored in 1999 with a United States Postal Service stamp commemorating their partnership. The Richard Rodgers Theatre in New York City is named after Rodgers. Forbes named Rodgers and Hammerstein second on its list of top-earning dead celebrities in 2009 at $ 235 million. In 2010, the original film arrangements of the team's music were restored and performed at
20792-756: The English-speaking stage by competition from the ubiquitous Edwardian musical comedies, operettas returned to London and Broadway in 1907 with The Merry Widow , and adaptations of continental operettas became direct competitors with musicals. Franz Lehár and Oscar Straus composed new operettas that were popular in English until World War I. In America, Victor Herbert produced a string of enduring operettas including The Fortune Teller (1898), Babes in Toyland (1903), Mlle. Modiste (1905), The Red Mill (1906) and Naughty Marietta (1910). In
21018-586: The Golden Age, automotive companies and other large corporations began to hire Broadway talent to write corporate musicals , private shows only seen by their employees or customers. The 1950s ended with Rodgers and Hammerstein 's last hit, The Sound of Music , which also became another hit for Mary Martin. It ran for 1,443 performances and shared the Tony Award for Best Musical. Together with its extremely successful 1965 film version , it has become one of
21244-503: The King of Siam —the story of Anna Leonowens , governess to the children of King Mongkut of Siam in the early 1860s—Rodgers and Hammerstein's musical The King and I opened at the St. James Theatre on Broadway on March 29, 1951, starring Gertrude Lawrence as Anna and the mostly unknown Yul Brynner as the king. This musical featured the hit songs " I Whistle a Happy Tune ", " Hello, Young Lovers ", " Getting to Know You ", " We Kiss in
21470-528: The Kralahome in the 1996 revival of The King and I , but Kim was unavailable for the Los Angeles run. Hwang considerably altered and trimmed his long script during Broadway rehearsals and previews; "The Next Time It Happens" was removed from the show. During the runup to the Broadway opening, the show received mostly positive publicity. Opening night at the Virginia Theatre on October 17, 2002,
21696-583: The London stage in the Gay Nineties , led by producer George Edwardes , who perceived that audiences wanted a new alternative to the Savoy -style comic operas and their intellectual, political, absurdist satire. He experimented with a modern-dress, family-friendly musical theatre style, with breezy, popular songs, snappy, romantic banter, and stylish spectacle at the Gaiety and his other theatres. These drew on
21922-560: The Mountains (1,352 performances) and especially Chu Chin Chow . Its run of 2,238 performances was more than twice as long as any previous musical, setting a record that stood for nearly forty years. Even a revival of The Beggar's Opera held the stage for 1,463 performances. Revues like The Bing Boys Are Here in Britain, and those of Florenz Ziegfeld and his imitators in America, were also extraordinarily popular. The musicals of
22148-475: The New York production generally gave it poor reviews. Ben Brantley of The New York Times applauded the creative team's "honorable intentions" in bringing back a work thought to be "terminally out-of-date", but felt both the new Mei-li and the show in general lacked personality. Howard Kissel of the New York Daily News termed it "an entertaining, albeit vulgar revival", and Clive Barnes of
22374-612: The Opera (1986), Rent (1996), Wicked (2003) and Hamilton (2015). Musicals are performed around the world. They may be presented in large venues, such as big-budget Broadway or West End productions in New York City or London. Alternatively, musicals may be staged in smaller venues, such as off-Broadway , off-off-Broadway , regional theatre , fringe theatre , or community theatre productions, or on tour . Musicals are often presented by amateur and school groups in churches, schools and other performance spaces. In addition to
22600-602: The Post was the first show to call itself a "musical comedy." In 1874, Evangeline or The Belle of Arcadia , by Edward E. Rice and J. Cheever Goodwin , based loosely on Longfellow’s Evangeline , with an original American story and music, opened successfully in New York and was revived in Boston, New York, and in repeated tours. Comedians Edward Harrigan and Tony Hart produced and starred in musicals on Broadway between 1878 ( The Mulligan Guard Picnic ) and 1885. These musical comedies featured characters and situations taken from
22826-631: The Proms concerts in London's Royal Albert Hall by the John Wilson Orchestra . Rodgers and Hammerstein appeared on live telecasts several times. They were guests on the very first broadcast of Toast of the Town , the original name of The Ed Sullivan Show , when it debuted on CBS in June 1948. In 1954, they appeared on a memorable TV musical special, General Foods 25th Anniversary Show: A Salute to Rodgers and Hammerstein . They were
23052-582: The Roof (1964). Bob Fosse choreographed for Abbott in The Pajama Game (1956) and Damn Yankees (1957), injecting playful sexuality into those hits. He was later the director-choreographer for Sweet Charity (1968), Pippin (1972) and Chicago (1975). Other notable director-choreographers have included Gower Champion , Tommy Tune , Michael Bennett , Gillian Lynne and Susan Stroman . Prominent directors have included Hal Prince , who also got his start with Abbott, and Trevor Nunn . During
23278-463: The Shrew for Kiss Me, Kate (1948, 1,077 performances). The American musicals overwhelmed the old-fashioned British Coward/Novello-style shows, one of the last big successes of which was Novello's Perchance to Dream (1945, 1,021 performances). The formula for the Golden Age musicals reflected one or more of four widely held perceptions of the "American dream": That stability and worth derives from
23504-497: The Times Square area until the 1920s and 1930s. New York runs lagged far behind those in London, but Laura Keene 's "musical burletta" Seven Sisters (1860) shattered previous New York musical theatre record, with a run of 253 performances. Around 1850, the French composer Hervé was experimenting with a form of comic musical theatre he called opérette . The best known composers of operetta were Jacques Offenbach from
23730-414: The United States and Britain, there are vibrant musical theatre scenes in continental Europe, Asia, Australasia, Canada and Latin America. Since the 20th century, the "book musical" has been defined as a musical play where songs and dances are fully integrated into a well-made story with serious dramatic goals and which is able to evoke genuine emotions other than laughter. The three main components of
23956-486: The West End in the 21st century have been presented in one act. Moments of greatest dramatic intensity in a book musical are often performed in song. Proverbially, "when the emotion becomes too strong for speech, you sing; when it becomes too strong for song, you dance." In a book musical, a song is ideally crafted to suit the character (or characters) and their situation within the story; although there have been times in
24182-507: The actors' singing voices in a way that would generally be disapproved of in an operatic context. Some works, including those by George Gershwin , Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim , have been made into both musical theatre and operatic productions. Similarly, some older operettas or light operas (such as The Pirates of Penzance by Gilbert and Sullivan ) have been produced in modern adaptations that treat them as musicals. For some works, production styles are almost as important as
24408-452: The addition of a show-stopping number , " Oklahoma! "; the deletion of the musical number "Boys and Girls Like You and Me", which would soon after be replaced with a reprise of " People Will Say We're in Love "; and the decision to re-title the musical after the song. The original Broadway production opened on March 31, 1943, at the St. James Theatre . Although the typical musical of the time
24634-476: The audience on the first night; he later stated that he had been nervous and was "bowled over" by the positive audience reaction. The show attracted considerable advance sales; even when these were exhausted, sales remained strong and sellouts were the norm. Cast album sales were similar to previous Rodgers and Hammerstein hits. The show received six Tony Award nominations, but won only one Tony (Best Conductor and Musical Director, for Salvatore Dell'Isola ). It
24860-445: The back of the theatre, looking for someone to hug. The Boston critics thought well of the work, stating that after the show was polished, it was likely to be a hit. Shortly after the Boston opening, Fields suffered a heart attack, and, after his release from the hospital, he had to return to New York to recuperate. Author C. Y. Lee, who had quietly watched the rehearsals, recalled that, at the Boston performances, Hammerstein would have
25086-524: The ballet was cut for lack of rehearsal time; a more heavily censored 1996 production in San Mateo also did well at the box office. In 1996, while attending the successful revival of The King and I , Chinese-American playwright David Henry Hwang considered whether other Rodgers and Hammerstein shows could be revived and decided to work on Flower Drum Song . To Chinese Americans, the musical "represented political incorrectness incarnate. But [Hwang] had
25312-597: The broadcast, and Julie Andrews was nominated for an Emmy Award for her performance in the title role. Rodgers and Hammerstein originally signed to work with NBC , but CBS approached them, offering the chance to work with Julie Andrews, and the two quickly agreed. Rodgers stated, "What won us over was the chance to work with Julie." Andrews played Cinderella, with Edith Adams as the Fairy Godmother, Kaye Ballard and Alice Ghostley as stepsisters Joy and Portia, and Jon Cypher as Prince Christopher. Though it
25538-493: The brutal realism in West Side Story , and with other Broadway musical hits such as The Music Man , My Fair Lady and The Pajama Game . Rodgers and Hammerstein had made it their rule to begin work on their next musical as soon as the last opened on Broadway, but by the start of 1957, six months after Pipe Dream closed, the pair had no new stage musical in prospect. They had, however, been working since 1956 on
25764-444: The cast, an idea that was, at the time, considered "very risky". In the 1950s, there were relatively few Asian-American actors; Rodgers believed that Asians avoided acting because of shyness. Critics note, in any case, that Asian-Americans "had found few opportunities in mainstream theatre." Joshua Logan recommended a young Japanese actress, Miyoshi Umeki , whom he had discovered and cast the previous year opposite Marlon Brando in
25990-414: The characters and story, as compared with Rodgers and Hammerstein's most popular musicals. Flower Drum Song came to be seen by some as stereotypical and patronizing towards Asians, and that it was "inauthentic, even offensive in its relentlessly upbeat picture of a big-city Chinatown". In 1983, the announcement that it would be produced in San Francisco started a furor; the producers pointedly stated that
26216-474: The characters express their ideas. It defied musical conventions by raising its first act curtain not on a bevy of chorus girls, but rather on a woman churning butter, with an off-stage voice singing the opening lines of Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin' unaccompanied. It drew rave reviews, set off a box-office frenzy and received a Pulitzer Prize . Brooks Atkinson wrote in The New York Times that
26442-398: The club (which now features Ta's Chinese opera one day a week), as the company celebrates how Chinese and American cultures have converged to create this happy moment (Finale: "A Hundred Million Miracles"). Of the seven major New York newspaper drama reviewers, five gave the show very positive reviews. For example, New York Journal American critic John McClain stated, " Flower Drum Song
26668-509: The comparatively frivolous musicals and sentimental operettas of the decade, Broadway's Show Boat (1927) represented an even more complete integration of book and score than the Princess Theatre musicals, with dramatic themes told through the music, dialogue, setting and movement. This was accomplished by combining the lyricism of Kern's music with the skillful libretto of Oscar Hammerstein II . One historian wrote, "Here we come to
26894-500: The composer conducting the New York Philharmonic Orchestra . In 1945, a Technicolor musical film version of Phil Stong 's novel State Fair , with songs and script by Rodgers and Hammerstein, was released. The film, a remake of a 1933 non-musical Will Rogers film of the same name , starred Jeanne Crain , Dana Andrews , Dick Haymes , and Vivian Blaine . This was the only time the pair ever wrote
27120-508: The continent, singspiel , comédie en vaudeville , opéra comique , zarzuela and other forms of light musical entertainment were emerging. The Beggar's Opera was the first recorded long-running play of any kind, running for 62 successive performances in 1728. It would take almost a century afterwards before any play broke 100 performances, but the record soon reached 150 in the late 1820s. Other musical theatre forms developed in England by
27346-452: The controversy surrounding it, ran for 108 performances. Rodgers and Hart's I'd Rather Be Right (1937) was a political satire with George M. Cohan as President Franklin D. Roosevelt , and Kurt Weill 's Knickerbocker Holiday depicted New York City's early history while good-naturedly satirizing Roosevelt's good intentions. The motion picture mounted a challenge to the stage. Silent films had presented only limited competition, but by
27572-548: The core of Frank Loesser 's and Abe Burrows ' Guys and Dolls , (1950, 1,200 performances); and the Gold Rush was the setting for Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe 's Paint Your Wagon (1951). The relatively brief seven-month run of that show did not discourage Lerner and Loewe from collaborating again, this time on My Fair Lady (1956), an adaptation of George Bernard Shaw 's Pygmalion starring Rex Harrison and Julie Andrews , which at 2,717 performances held
27798-625: The country to seek out talent. Agents were sent to other cities; in Honolulu, they found nightclub singer and native Hawaiian Ed Kenney , who would originate Wang Ta. Meanwhile, in New York, the three producers were visiting dance schools. An advertisement in New York Chinatown newspapers received one response. No formal audition was held in San Francisco's Chinatown, and the only find was Forbidden City nightclub comedian Goro "Jack" Suzuki (who soon changed his name to Jack Soo ), who
28024-406: The crown prince, Chulalongkorn. A talented dancer, he was cast as Wang San, Ta's thoroughly Americanized younger brother. Pat Suzuki , a Japanese-American who had been interned during World War II , was a recent arrival in New York who had made strong positive impressions for her singing on such television programs as The Tonight Show (with Jack Paar ) and The Ed Sullivan Show . She became
28250-494: The decade was The Black and White Minstrel Show (1962), which played for 4,344 performances. Two men had considerable impact on musical theatre history beginning in this decade: Stephen Sondheim and Jerry Herman . The first project for which Sondheim wrote both music and lyrics was A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962, 964 performances), with a book based on the works of Plautus by Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart , starring Zero Mostel . Sondheim moved
28476-403: The earlier musical forms of comic opera and operetta. The Geisha (1896) was one of the most successful in the 1890s, running for more than two years and achieving great international success. The Belle of New York (1898) became the first American musical to run for over a year in London. The British musical comedy Florodora (1899) was a popular success on both sides of the Atlantic, as
28702-460: The elder Wang, who is central to Lee's novel, to his son Ta. They also removed darker elements of Lee's work, including Helen Chao's suicide after her desperate fling with Ta, added the festive nightclub subplot and emphasized the romantic elements of the story. This made the musical more lighthearted and comedic than the novel. According to David Lewis in his book about the musical, "Mr. Hammerstein and his colleagues were evidently in no mood to write
28928-409: The end of the 1920s, films like The Jazz Singer could be presented with synchronized sound. "Talkie" films at low prices effectively killed off vaudeville by the early 1930s. Despite the economic woes of the 1930s and the competition from film, the musical survived. In fact, it continued to evolve thematically beyond the gags and showgirls musicals of the Gay Nineties and Roaring Twenties and
29154-544: The end of the Golden Age, several shows tackled Jewish subjects and issues, such as Fiddler on the Roof , Milk and Honey , Blitz! and later Rags . The original concept that became West Side Story was set in the Lower East Side during Easter-Passover celebrations; the rival gangs were to be Jewish and Italian Catholic . The creative team later decided that the Polish (white) vs. Puerto Rican conflict
29380-409: The everyday life of New York's lower classes. They starred high quality singers ( Lillian Russell , Vivienne Segal and Fay Templeton ) instead of the ladies of questionable repute who had starred in earlier musical forms. In 1879, The Brook by Nate Salsbury was another national success with contemporary American dance styles and an American story about "members of an acting company taking a trip down
29606-511: The film Sayonara (for which she won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar); she was cast as Mei Li. They cast Keye Luke , well known as Charlie Chan 's Number One Son, as Master Wang. Rodgers and Hammerstein considered young talent from The King and I who might fit the parts, and came up with teenager Patrick Adiarte , a Filipino-American who had played several of the young princes as he grew up, before finishing as
29832-416: The film version of South Pacific in 1958. While Rodgers and Hammerstein's work contains cheerful and often uplifting songs, they departed from the comic and sentimental tone of early 20th century musicals by seriously addressing issues such as racism , sexism and classism in many of their works. For example, Carousel concerns domestic violence, while South Pacific addresses racism. Based on
30058-406: The film was made, so when Rodgers was asked to create two new songs for the film (" I Have Confidence " and " Something Good "), he wrote the lyrics as well as the music. The Sound of Music contains more hit songs than any other Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, and the film version was the most financially successful film adaptation of a Broadway musical ever made. The most enduring of these include
30284-438: The first Broadway show in which an African-American, Ethel Waters , starred alongside white actors. Waters' numbers included " Supper Time ", a woman's lament for her husband who has been lynched. The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess (1935) featured an all African-American cast and blended operatic, folk and jazz idioms. The Cradle Will Rock (1937), directed by Orson Welles , was a highly political pro- union piece that, despite
30510-401: The first Linda Low, as Ta's nightclub love interest was renamed. The team found it difficult to fill the remaining places in the company with Asian performers, especially in the chorus. Four other shows with Asian themes had opened or were in rehearsal in New York, and the demand for the few Asian actors was strong. Kelly and the show's choreographer, Carol Haney , journeyed to cities across
30736-453: The five years she has been seeing Sammy, is determined to marry someone , and if Sammy won't step forward, she will settle for Ta. Sammy quickly strikes back by inviting the Wangs, Mei Li and her father to watch the show at his "Celestial Bar" ("Fan Tan Fannie"). Linda does her striptease, realizing too late who is sitting at the best table. Sammy's special guests storm out, except for Ta, who
30962-515: The founding of the state of Israel, and continuing with the blockbuster hits Hello, Dolly! (1964, 2,844 performances), Mame (1966, 1,508 performances), and La Cage aux Folles (1983, 1,761 performances). Even his less successful shows like Dear World (1969) and Mack and Mabel (1974) have had memorable scores ( Mack and Mabel was later reworked into a London hit). Writing both words and music, many of Herman's show tunes have become popular standards, including " Hello, Dolly! ", "We Need
31188-401: The generational conflict and for the three women who substantiated Ta's honorable search for love. Those themes, like it or not, still resonate today. Rodgers and Hammerstein sought to give the new work an Eastern flavor, without using existing oriental music. According to Ben Brantley in his review of the 2002 Broadway revival, the use by Rodgers "of repetitive Eastern musical structures gives
31414-471: The greatest of the 20th century. Their popular Broadway productions in the 1940s and 1950s initiated what is considered the "golden age" of musical theater. Five of their Broadway shows, Oklahoma! , Carousel , South Pacific , The King and I and The Sound of Music , were outstanding successes, as was the television broadcast of Cinderella (1957). Of the other four shows the pair produced on Broadway during their lifetimes, Flower Drum Song
31640-472: The history of the musical (e.g. from the 1890s to the 1920s) when this integration between music and story has been tenuous. As The New York Times critic Ben Brantley described the ideal of song in theatre when reviewing the 2008 revival of Gypsy : "There is no separation at all between song and character, which is what happens in those uncommon moments when musicals reach upward to achieve their ideal reasons to be." Typically, many fewer words are sung in
31866-662: The hit musical numbers "The Carousel Waltz" (an instrumental), " If I Loved You ", "June Is Bustin' Out All Over", and " You'll Never Walk Alone ". Carousel was also revolutionary for its time – adapted from Ferenc Molnár 's play Liliom , it was one of the first musicals to contain a tragic plot about an antihero; it also contained an extended ballet that was crucial to the plot, and several extended musical scenes containing both sung and spoken material, as well as dance. The 1956 film version of Carousel , made in CinemaScope 55 , again starred Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones,
32092-527: The impression of a country with an uncertain future, as the sailors and their women also have. Irving Berlin used sharpshooter Annie Oakley 's career as a basis for his Annie Get Your Gun (1946, 1,147 performances); Burton Lane , E. Y. Harburg and Fred Saidy combined political satire with Irish whimsy for their fantasy Finian's Rainbow (1947, 725 performances); and Cole Porter found inspiration in William Shakespeare 's The Taming of
32318-447: The interplay of lyrics and music in his shows. Some of Sondheim's notable innovations include a show presented in reverse ( Merrily We Roll Along ) and the above-mentioned Anyone Can Whistle , in which the first act ends with the cast informing the audience that they are mad. Jerry Herman played a significant role in American musical theatre, beginning with his first Broadway production, Milk and Honey (1961, 563 performances), about
32544-548: The late 17th century. These influenced a brief period of English opera by composers such as John Blow and Henry Purcell . From the 18th century, the most popular forms of musical theatre in Britain were ballad operas , like John Gay 's The Beggar's Opera , that included lyrics written to the tunes of popular songs of the day (often spoofing opera), and later pantomime , which developed from commedia dell'arte, and comic opera with mostly romantic plot lines, like Michael Balfe 's The Bohemian Girl (1845). Meanwhile, on
32770-402: The limitations of musical comedy license, believable and the humor came from the situations or the nature of the characters. Kern's exquisitely flowing melodies were employed to further the action or develop characterization. ... [Edwardian] musical comedy was often guilty of inserting songs in a hit-or-miss fashion. The Princess Theatre musicals brought about a change in approach. P. G. Wodehouse,
32996-505: The long-run record for many years. Popular Hollywood films were made of all of these musicals. Two hits by British creators in this decade were The Boy Friend (1954), which ran for 2,078 performances in London and marked Andrews' American debut, and Salad Days (1954), which broke the British long-run record with a run of 2,283 performances. Another record was set by The Threepenny Opera , which ran for 2,707 performances, becoming
33222-484: The longest-running off-Broadway musical until The Fantasticks . The production also broke ground by showing that musicals could be profitable off-Broadway in a small-scale, small orchestra format. This was confirmed in 1959 when a revival of Jerome Kern and P. G. Wodehouse 's Leave It to Jane ran for more than two years. The 1959–1960 off-Broadway season included a dozen musicals and revues including Little Mary Sunshine , The Fantasticks and Ernest in Love ,
33448-480: The most important contributors to the musical-play form – with such masterworks as Carousel , The King and I and South Pacific . The examples they set in creating vital plays, often rich with social thought, provided the necessary encouragement for other gifted writers to create musical plays of their own." In 1950, the team of Rodgers and Hammerstein received The Hundred Year Association of New York 's Gold Medal Award "in recognition of outstanding contributions to
33674-445: The most observant, literate and witty lyricist of his day, and the team of Bolton, Wodehouse and Kern had an influence felt to this day. The theatre-going public needed escapist entertainment during the dark times of World War I , and they flocked to the theatre. The 1919 hit musical Irene ran for 670 performances, a Broadway record that held until 1938. The British theatre public supported far longer runs like that of The Maid of
33900-585: The most popular musicals in history. In 1960, The Fantasticks was first produced off-Broadway. This intimate allegorical show would quietly run for over 40 years at the Sullivan Street Theatre in Greenwich Village , becoming by far the longest-running musical in history. Its authors produced other innovative works in the 1960s, such as Celebration and I Do! I Do! , the first two-character Broadway musical. The 1960s would see
34126-423: The music for a story about Rose Thompson Hovick , the mother of the titular stripper Gypsy Rose Lee . Although directors and choreographers have had a major influence on musical theatre style since at least the 19th century, George Abbott and his collaborators and successors took a central role in integrating movement and dance fully into musical theatre productions in the Golden Age. Abbott introduced ballet as
34352-423: The musical "a naive, old fashioned, anti-feminist story with a truly great score. ... It's one that ... needs changes." Rodgers' will urged his heirs to do what they believed he would have agreed to (Hammerstein's instructions are unknown), but during her lifetime, his widow Dorothy had refused to countenance major changes in the plays. Hwang's involvement was soon revealed, and in 1997, C. Y. Lee announced that
34578-480: The musical beyond its concentration on the romantic plots typical of earlier eras; his work tended to be darker, exploring the grittier sides of life both present and past. Other early Sondheim works include Anyone Can Whistle (1964, which ran only nine performances, despite having stars Lee Remick and Angela Lansbury ), and the successful Company (1970), Follies (1971) and A Little Night Music (1973). Later, Sondheim found inspiration in unlikely sources:
34804-401: The musical finally was given a Broadway production, with a revised book by Douglas Carter Beane , and incorporating four songs from the Rodgers and Hammerstein catalog, in 2013. Based on a 1957 novel by C. Y. Lee , Flower Drum Song takes place in San Francisco's Chinatown in the late 1950s. The original 1958 production was directed by dancer/singer/actor Gene Kelly . The story deals with
35030-511: The musical was licensed for local productions. That summer, the San Diego Civic Light Opera filled the 4,324-seat Balboa Park Bowl to overflowing for a highly successful run of the musical. It was less successfully revived by that company five years later; though it still attracted large crowds, local critics complained that Hammerstein's view of Asians was outdated. Other early productions included successful revivals by
35256-421: The musical was rarely staged, and was often relegated to dinner theater productions. The Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization, which licenses the partnership's works, believes that the work's loss of popularity was due in part to increased racial sensitivity in the U. S. after the civil rights movement . In addition, producers found the show to be thinly plotted, and the songs not integrated as organically with
35482-501: The mystery guests on episode number 298 of What's My Line , which first aired on February 19, 1956; blindfolded panelist Arlene Francis was able to correctly identify them. The pair made a rare feature film appearance in MGM's 1953 production Main Street to Broadway , in which Rodgers played the piano and Hammerstein sang a song they had written. They also appeared in the trailer for
35708-418: The necessary encouragement for other gifted writers to create musical plays of their own". The two collaborators created an extraordinary collection of some of musical theatre's best loved and most enduring classics, including Carousel (1945), South Pacific (1949), The King and I (1951) and The Sound of Music (1959). Some of these musicals treat more serious subject matter than most earlier shows:
35934-457: The new regime) advises Ta to pursue her ("My Best Love"). He finds her in a fortune cookie factory working alongside Chao. Mei-li tells Ta that she and Chao have decided to return to China together, or at least to Hong Kong , then administered by the British. Meanwhile, Wang now finds himself attracted to Madam Liang, and the two have dinner together, though they decide not to marry ("Don't Marry Me"). They marry anyway. Linda announces that she
36160-413: The numbers a sing-song catchiness that, for better or worse, exerts a sticky hold on the memory." The most oriental-sounding song in the work is "A Hundred Million Miracles", which provides the eight-note drumbeat which is the musical signature of the work from overture to curtain. Hammerstein wrote Mei Li's first act song, "I Am Going to Like It Here", in a Malaysian poetic form called pantoum in which
36386-766: The opening of Japan to Western trade for Pacific Overtures (1976), a legendary murderous barber seeking revenge in the Industrial Age of London for Sweeney Todd (1979), the paintings of Georges Seurat for Sunday in the Park with George (1984), fairy tales for Into the Woods (1987), and a collection of presidential assassins in Assassins (1990). While some critics have argued that some of Sondheim's musicals lack commercial appeal, others have praised their lyrical sophistication and musical complexity, as well as
36612-502: The orchestra that "weav[es] together excerpts of the score's famous melodies." There are various Eastern traditions of theatre that include music, such as Chinese opera , Taiwanese opera , Japanese Noh and Indian musical theatre , including Sanskrit drama , Indian classical dance , Parsi theatre and Yakshagana . India has, since the 20th century, produced numerous musical films, referred to as " Bollywood " musicals, and in Japan
36838-454: The original cast record the music from the show with the original orchestrations. This became the first musical to have an original cast recording, which is now a standard practice. In 1955 it was made into an Academy Award -winning musical film , the first feature shot with the Todd-AO 70 mm widescreen process. The film starred Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones , and its soundtrack
37064-526: The original production by Carol Haney. The ballet dramatizes the confused romantic longings of Wang Ta towards the women in his life, and ends as he awakens in Helen Chao's bed. Thomas Hischak, in his The Rodgers and Hammerstein Encyclopedia , notes that the ballets in Oklahoma! and Carousel (choreographed by Agnes de Mille ) broke new ground in illustrating facets of the characters beyond what
37290-464: The original production, for example, Bob Fosse 's choreography in Chicago . There is no fixed length for a musical. While it can range from a short one-act entertainment to several acts and several hours in length (or even a multi-evening presentation), most musicals range from one and a half to three hours. Musicals are usually presented in two acts, with one short intermission , and the first act
37516-643: The other hand, many successful musical theatre works have been adapted for musical films , such as West Side Story , My Fair Lady , The Sound of Music , Oliver! and Chicago . Musical theatre is closely related to the theatrical form of opera, but the two are usually distinguished by weighing a number of factors. First, musicals generally have a greater focus on spoken dialogue. Some musicals, however, are entirely accompanied and sung-through, while some operas, such as Die Zauberflöte , and most operettas , have some unaccompanied dialogue. Second, musicals usually include more dancing as an essential part of
37742-578: The part of "Dream Laurey". In Oklahoma! , the story and the songs were considered more important than sheer star power. Nevertheless, the production ran for a then-unprecedented 2,212 performances, finally closing on May 29, 1948. Many enduring musical standards come from this show, among them " Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin' ", " The Surrey with the Fringe on Top ", " I Cain't Say No ", the aforementioned " People Will Say We're in Love ", and " Oklahoma! ". The popularity of these songs prompted Decca Records to have
37968-418: The popular television version of Cinderella , which was broadcast on CBS on March 31, 1957. Rodgers was still recovering from an operation for cancer in a tooth socket, and he was drinking heavily and suffering from depression. In June 1957, Rodgers checked himself into Payne Whitney Psychiatric Clinic , and he remained there for twelve weeks. According to his daughters, Mary and Linda, this did not put
38194-570: The production received rave reviews from the Los Angeles critics. The show regularly sold out and was so popular it became the first show at the Taper to extend its scheduled run. It finally closed on January 13, 2002. The success of the Los Angeles run sparked sufficient investment to move the show to Broadway. Half the cast was dismissed after the Los Angeles run for unstated reasons. Mary Rodgers later commented that Randall Duk Kim replaced Tzi Ma as Wang because she had admired Kim's performance as
38420-456: The relationships were retained, but the pair sought to be faithful to the spirit of both Lee's novel and the musical's original concept of old-world and older generation values struggling with new-world temptations and the desires of the younger generation. This concept is reflected in the struggle for survival of Wang's Chinese opera company, as it competes with the more modern, Americanized night club run by Ta. The role of Mei-li (as spelled in
38646-764: The relatively narrow confines of the 1950s. Rock music would be used in several Broadway musicals, beginning with Hair , which featured not only rock music but also nudity and controversial opinions about the Vietnam War , race relations and other social issues. After Show Boat and Porgy and Bess , and as the struggle in America and elsewhere for minorities' civil rights progressed, Hammerstein, Harold Arlen , Yip Harburg and others were emboldened to write more musicals and operas that aimed to normalize societal toleration of minorities and urged racial harmony. Early Golden Age works that focused on racial tolerance included Finian's Rainbow and South Pacific . Towards
38872-461: The revision) was expanded. The character of Madam Liang was changed "from the wise-owl aunt" to a "savvy career woman" in show business. Chinatown is portrayed as a more gritty and difficult place for new immigrants, and the pursuit of material success is given a more cynical face, especially in Act II. The song "The Other Generation" was deleted; "My Best Love", which had been cut in tryouts in 1958,
39098-451: The revolution begun by Show Boat , by tightly integrating all the aspects of musical theatre, with a cohesive plot, songs that furthered the action of the story, and featured dream ballets and other dances that advanced the plot and developed the characters, rather than using dance as an excuse to parade scantily clad women across the stage. Rodgers and Hammerstein hired ballet choreographer Agnes de Mille , who used everyday motions to help
39324-475: The rewrite had his approval. Hwang was given a free hand with dialogue; he was not allowed to change lyrics. Hwang was inexperienced at writing musicals, and the producers hired veteran Robert Longbottom to direct the production and collaborate on the new script, "really a new musical which has a pre-existing score." Only the character names, the San Francisco Chinatown setting and some of
39550-593: The same leads as the film version of Oklahoma! Carousel is also unique among the Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals for not having an overture; both the stage and film versions began with the familiar Carousel Waltz . This music was included in John Mauceri 's Philips Records CD of the complete overtures of Rodgers and Hammerstein with the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra . It was also included in Rodgers' rare 1954 album for Columbia Records with
39776-485: The same purpose as Jud Fry: to be, in Hammerstein's words, "the bass fiddle that gives body to the orchestration of the story". Though the new story was less artistically adventurous than the earlier Rodgers and Hammerstein hits, it was innovative, even daring in its treatment of Asian-Americans, "an ethnic group that had long been harshly caricatured and marginalized in our mainstream pop culture." Act I: Wang Ta,
40002-472: The same time, Stephen Sondheim found success with some of his musicals, as mentioned above. Rodgers and Hammerstein Rodgers and Hammerstein was a theater-writing team of composer Richard Rodgers (1902–1979) and lyricist-dramatist Oscar Hammerstein II (1895–1960), who together created a series of innovative and influential American musicals . Their musical theater writing partnership has been called
40228-428: The second and fourth lines of each stanza become the first and third lines of the next. One critic thought that the 2001 version's orchestrations "boast more Asian accents and a jazzier edge than the original", but another felt that they "pale in comparison" to Bennett's typically lilting sound. As with many of Rodgers and Hammerstein's musicals, the work features a ballet at the start of the second act, choreographed in
40454-415: The sentimental romance of operetta, adding technical expertise and the fast-paced staging and naturalistic dialogue style led by director George Abbott . The 1940s began with more hits from Porter, Irving Berlin , Rodgers and Hart, Weill and Gershwin, some with runs over 500 performances as the economy rebounded, but artistic change was in the air. Rodgers and Hammerstein 's Oklahoma! (1943) completed
40680-471: The show would be set in the 1930s and would have "a greater sensitivity toward the Chinese immigration problems at that time". They added a scene in which Mei Li listens apprehensively to a radio broadcast warning about the dangers to the United States caused by Asian immigration. Many lines of dialogue were cut, and producer Fred Van Patten stated that "[w]hat we've done is cut things in the show that Asians said to make white people laugh." The song "Chop Suey"
40906-463: The show would close on March 16, 2003, after 169 performances. The show's backers lost their entire investment. The production was directed and choreographed by Longbottom, with scenic design by Robin Wagner , costume design by Gregg Barnes and lighting design by Natasha Katz . Critic Karen Wada, in her afterword to the published script, blamed "the sluggish economy, post-September 11 jitters,
41132-420: The show's opening number changed the history of musical theatre: "After a verse like that, sung to a buoyant melody, the banalities of the old musical stage became intolerable." It was the first "blockbuster" Broadway show, running a total of 2,212 performances, and was made into a hit film. It remains one of the most frequently produced of the team's projects. William A. Everett and Paul R. Laird wrote that this
41358-407: The show, although it sometimes consists of a series of songs not directly musically related. Spoken dialogue is generally interspersed between musical numbers, although "sung dialogue" or recitative may be used, especially in so-called " sung-through " musicals such as Jesus Christ Superstar , Falsettos , Les Misérables , Evita and Hamilton . Several shorter musicals on Broadway and in
41584-758: The show, even if it meant the show failing. When the show was touring in Atlanta, Georgia, it offended some Georgian lawmakers, who proposed a bill to outlaw any entertainment they deemed to be inspired by Moscow. In the original production, Mary Martin starred as the heroine Nellie Forbush, and opera star Ezio Pinza starred as Emile de Becque, the French plantation owner. Also in the cast were Juanita Hall , Myron McCormick and Betta St. John . The 1958 film version , also directed by Logan, starred Mitzi Gaynor , Rossano Brazzi , John Kerr , Ray Walston , and Juanita Hall . Brazzi, Kerr, and Hall had their singing dubbed by others. Based on Margaret Landon 's Anna and
41810-457: The shows A Connecticut Yankee (1927), Babes in Arms (1937), The Boys from Syracuse (1938), Pal Joey (1940), and By Jupiter (1942), as well as many successful film projects. Hammerstein, a co-writer of the popular Rudolf Friml 1924 operetta Rose-Marie , and Sigmund Romberg operettas The Desert Song (1926) and The New Moon (1928), began a successful collaboration with composer Jerome Kern on Sunny (1925), which
42036-418: The shy Mei Li is clearly the wrong girl for Sammy, who already has an assertive girlfriend, a characteristic he likes. Sammy offers to sign the contract over to the Wang family: this would free Sammy from the contract and arrange a suitable wife for Ta. Sammy has taken the liberty of bringing the girl and her father with him; Wang is charmed ("A Hundred Million Miracles") and invites them to live in his home on
42262-578: The stage in his place, his stage instincts take over ("Gliding Through My Memories"), and he is soon an enthusiastic supporter of the change, taking the stage name Sammy Fong. Linda advises Mei-li to put on one of her old stripper dresses to attract Ta, but the stratagem backfires, since Ta is attracted to Mei-li because of her wholesomeness. Ta and Mei-li quarrel; she takes her flower drum and leaves Club Chop Suey. Act II: Several months pass, and Club Chop Suey has become even flashier ("Chop Suey"). Ta can not forget Mei-li, and his uncle Chin (a janitor under
42488-476: The stage, most notably Jesus Christ Superstar and Evita . Others had no dialogue or were otherwise reminiscent of opera, with dramatic, emotional themes; these sometimes started as concept albums and were referred to as rock operas . Shows like Raisin , Dreamgirls , Purlie and The Wiz brought a significant African-American influence to Broadway. More varied musical genres and styles were incorporated into musicals both on and especially off-Broadway. At
42714-402: The standard for what was considered a successful show. These shows were designed for family audiences, a marked contrast from the risqué burlesques, bawdy music hall shows and French operettas that sometimes drew a crowd seeking less wholesome entertainment. Only a few 19th-century musical pieces exceeded the run of The Mikado , such as Dorothy , which opened in 1886 and set a new record with
42940-515: The storytelling, particularly by the principal performers as well as the chorus. Third, musicals often use various genres of popular music or at least popular singing and musical styles. Finally, musicals usually avoid certain operatic conventions. In particular, a musical is almost always performed in the language of its audience. Musicals produced on Broadway or in the West End, for instance, are invariably sung in English, even if they were originally written in another language. While an opera singer
43166-623: The summer of 1753, they performed ballad-operas, such as The Beggar's Opera , and ballad-farces. By the 1840s, P. T. Barnum was operating an entertainment complex in lower Manhattan. Other early musical theatre in America consisted of British forms, such as burletta and pantomime, but what a piece was called did not necessarily define what it was. The 1852 Broadway extravaganza The Magic Deer advertised itself as "A Serio Comico Tragico Operatical Historical Extravaganzical Burletical Tale of Enchantment." Theatre in New York moved from downtown gradually to midtown from around 1850 and did not arrive in
43392-504: The team's first flop, Allegro . Ward Morehouse applauded Suzuki for having "a brassy voice and the assurance of a younger Ethel Merman " and termed the production "an excellent Broadway show" though "[p]erhaps it doesn't belong in the same world ... as The King and I and Carousel ." Critic Kenneth Tynan , in The New Yorker magazine, alluded to the show The World of Suzie Wong in dismissing Flower Drum Song with
43618-603: The theatre is located, was decorated with Chinese lanterns , and a marching band of "Chinese girl musicians" played outside. The tour continued to be successful, spending 21 weeks in Chicago alone. It closed on October 14, 1961, in Cleveland, a month before the film of the musical opened. Lewis calls the 1961 film version of Flower Drum Song , starring Umeki, Soo, Hall and Suzie Wong star Nancy Kwan , "a bizarre pastiche of limping mediocrity". He comments that since
43844-532: The three producers accompanied the show on the road. After three weeks in Detroit, the show moved to Los Angeles, where the premiere attracted a star-studded audience, including three Scandinavian princesses. San Francisco gave the show a rapturous reception when it opened at the Curran Theatre on August 1. Lee and Fields, both present for the local premiere, were given ovations. Geary Street , on which
44070-679: The traditions of comic opera and used elements of burlesque and of the Harrigan and Hart pieces. He replaced the bawdy women of burlesque with his "respectable" corps of Gaiety Girls to complete the musical and visual fun. The success of the first of these, In Town (1892) and A Gaiety Girl (1893) set the style for the next three decades. The plots were generally light, romantic "poor maiden loves aristocrat and wins him against all odds" shows, with music by Ivan Caryll , Sidney Jones and Lionel Monckton . These shows were immediately widely copied in America, and Edwardian musical comedy swept away
44296-419: The understanding that if the proposed marriage falls through, Fong will still be bound to marry Mei Li. Ta's blind date proves to be the thoroughly Americanized Linda Low, who we will learn is Sammy Fong's girlfriend and a stripper at his club. On the date with Ta (" I Enjoy Being a Girl "), Linda lies to Ta about her career and family. Ta, knowing that Chinese-Americans with college degrees find it hard to get
44522-449: The villain in Oklahoma! is a suspected murderer and psychopath; Carousel deals with spousal abuse, thievery, suicide and the afterlife; South Pacific explores miscegenation even more thoroughly than Show Boat ; the hero of The King and I dies onstage; and the backdrop of The Sound of Music is the annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany in 1938 . The show's creativity stimulated Rodgers and Hammerstein's contemporaries and ushered in
44748-464: The work's musical or dramatic content in defining into which art form the piece falls. Sondheim said, "I really think that when something plays Broadway it's a musical, and when it plays in an opera house it's opera. That's it. It's the terrain, the countryside, the expectations of the audience that make it one thing or another." There remains an overlap in form between lighter operatic forms and more musically complex or ambitious musicals. In practice, it
44974-420: Was A Chinese Honeymoon (1901), which ran for a record-setting 1,074 performances in London and 376 in New York. After the turn of the 20th century, Seymour Hicks joined forces with Edwardes and American producer Charles Frohman to create another decade of popular shows. Other enduring Edwardian musical comedy hits included The Arcadians (1909) and The Quaker Girl (1910). Virtually eliminated from
45200-407: Was No. 1 on the 1956 album charts. After their initial success with Oklahoma! , the pair took a break from working together and Hammerstein concentrated on the musical Carmen Jones , a stage version of Bizet 's Carmen with the characters changed to African Americans in the contemporary South, for which he wrote the book and lyrics. The musical was adapted to the screen in 1954, and scored
45426-420: Was a "show, that, like Show Boat , became a milestone, so that later historians writing about important moments in twentieth-century theatre would begin to identify eras according to their relationship to Oklahoma! ". "After Oklahoma! , Rodgers and Hammerstein were the most important contributors to the musical-play form... The examples they set in creating vital plays, often rich with social thought, provided
45652-712: Was a hit. Their 1927 musical Show Boat is considered to be one of the masterpieces of the American musical theater. Other Hammerstein/Kern collaborations include Sweet Adeline (1929) and Very Warm for May (1939). Although the last of these was panned by critics, it contains one of Kern and Hammerstein's best-loved songs, " All the Things You Are ". By the early 1940s, Hart had sunk deeper into alcoholism and emotional turmoil, and he became unreliable, prompting Rodgers to approach Hammerstein to ask if he would consider working with him. Independently of each other, Rodgers and Hammerstein had been attracted to making
45878-599: Was adapted for film in 1956 with Brynner re-creating his role opposite Deborah Kerr (whose singing was largely dubbed by Marni Nixon ). Brynner won an Oscar as Best Actor for his portrayal, and Kerr was nominated as Best Actress . Brynner reprised the role twice on Broadway in 1977 and 1985 and in a short-lived TV sitcom in 1972, Anna and the King . Based on the fairytale character and story of Cinderella , Rodgers and Hammerstein created their only collaborative effort written for television. Cinderella aired on March 31, 1957, on CBS . More than 107 million viewers saw
46104-552: Was attended by veterans of the film and 1958 production. Though it received warm applause from the audience, the critics mostly panned it. Attendance was near-capacity during the first month of the run, but then dropped off precipitously. The producers hoped the show could hold out long enough to get a boost from the Tony Awards (though nominated for three, including best book, it won none), but in February, they announced that
46330-711: Was broadcast in color, and the major networks all had the new (B&W) videotape recorders from Ampex, a black and white kinescope is all that remains. It featured songs still treasured today, "In My Own Little Corner", "Ten Minutes Ago" and "Impossible: It's Possible." After the success of the 1957 production, another version was presented in 1965 and shown annually on CBS, starring Lesley Ann Warren , Stuart Damon , Celeste Holm and Walter Pidgeon . Yet another television version first aired in 1997 on ABC , produced by Walt Disney Television , starring Brandy , Whitney Houston , Bernadette Peters , and Whoopi Goldberg . Stage versions were also presented in London and elsewhere, and
46556-576: Was busy starring in The Sound and the Fury , and they could not negotiate his release from Twentieth-Century Fox . Instead, they hired actor and dancer Gene Kelly , who had never directed on stage before. Kelly felt that the work would not be one of Rodgers and Hammerstein's best, but "as long as I crammed the show brim-full of every joke and gimmick in the book, I could get it to work". The three producers sought Chinese, or at least Asian, actors to fill
46782-439: Was cast as Frankie Wing, comedian at Sammy Fong's Celestial Bar. The role of Fong proved difficult to cast. Initially, it was given to Larry Storch , a nightclub comic, but during the Boston tryouts, it was given to another Caucasian, Larry Blyden , who was married to Carol Haney, the show's choreographer. The role of Madam Liang, Master Wang's sister-in-law, fell to Juanita Hall , a light-skinned African American who had played
47008-401: Was decided to close the show, and the last Broadway performance was given on May 7, 1960. In his autobiography, Rodgers wrote of the effect the success of Flower Drum Song had on his state of mind: The entire experience of working on Flower Drum Song was rewarding in many ways, not the least of which was that it convinced me that I had overcome all traces of my depression. My only thought
47234-482: Was deleted, as was Master Wang's line that all white men look alike (based on a line in C. Y. Lee's novel, in which Wang states that all foreigners look alike). The author gave a rare public interview to defend his novel and the musical adaptation. The production, which had been scheduled for a three-week run, closed early. A well-attended production in Oakland in 1993 adhered strictly to the 1958 script, though part of
47460-480: Was directed by James Hammerstein , supervised by Richard Rodgers and choreographed by Tommy Tune. State Fair finally arrived on Broadway on March 27, 1996, with Donna McKechnie and Andrea McArdle , produced by David Merrick , and received five Tony Award nominations. South Pacific opened on Broadway on April 7, 1949, and ran for over five years. Its songs " Bali Ha'i ", " Younger Than Springtime ", and " Some Enchanted Evening " have become standards. The play
47686-468: Was dominated by musical theatre standards, such as " Fascinating Rhythm ", " Tea for Two " and " Someone to Watch Over Me ". Many shows were revues , series of sketches and songs with little or no connection between them. The best-known of these were the annual Ziegfeld Follies , spectacular song-and-dance revues on Broadway featuring extravagant sets, elaborate costumes and beautiful chorus girls. These spectacles also raised production values, and mounting
47912-586: Was fresher. Tolerance as an important theme in musicals has continued in recent decades. The final expression of West Side Story left a message of racial tolerance. By the end of the 1960s, musicals became racially integrated, with black and white cast members even covering each other's roles, as they did in Hair . Homosexuality has also been explored in musicals, starting with Hair , and even more overtly in La Cage aux Folles , Falsettos , Rent , Hedwig and
48138-405: Was ineffective as a director, and began attending rehearsals. A number of changes were made to the songs. "My Best Love", a song for Master Wang, was at first thought better suited to his sister-in-law, but when Juanita Hall could not make it work, the song was cut entirely. Rodgers and Hammerstein transformed a song entitled "She Is Beautiful" into "You Are Beautiful". The team decided to include
48364-469: Was nevertheless a success and broke new ground by using a mostly Asian cast. The 1961 film adaptation was a lavish, but much criticized, Ross Hunter production released by Universal Studios . A Broadway revival in 2002 starring Lea Salonga had a rewritten plot by playwright David Henry Hwang but retained the inter-generational and immigrant themes as well as most of the original songs. The Sound of Music , Rodgers and Hammerstein's last work together,
48590-401: Was overshadowed that year by Redhead , which though it received only slightly better reviews than Flower Drum Song and had a considerably shorter run, dominated the Tony Awards in the musical categories. Flower Drum Song ran for 600 performances, a longer run than any of the shows with which it had competed for Asian performers. Midway through the run, Larry Blyden left the show and
48816-421: Was postponed by two weeks. In interviews, however, Hammerstein pointed out that he had, when necessary, written songs for previous shows while in rehearsals for them. The musical retained Lee's "central theme – a theme coursing through much 20th-century American literature: the conflict between Old World immigrants and their New World offspring". Hammerstein and Fields shifted the focus of the story, however, from
49042-510: Was praised by critics for its innovations in music and choreography but was less commercially successful than the same year's The Music Man , written and composed by Meredith Willson , which won the Tony Award for Best Musical that year. West Side Story would get a film adaptation in 1961, which proved successful both critically and commercially. Laurents and Sondheim teamed up again for Gypsy (1959), with Jule Styne providing
49268-496: Was put on the stage, lines and songs that might be offensive were often cut. The piece did not return to Broadway until 2002, when a version with a plot by playwright David Henry Hwang (but retaining most of the original songs) was presented after a successful Los Angeles run. Hwang's story retains the Chinatown setting and the inter-generational and immigrant themes, and emphasizes the romantic relationships. It received mostly poor reviews in New York and closed after six months but had
49494-482: Was replaced in the role of Sammy Fong by Jack Soo, with Larry Leung assuming the role of Frankie Wing. The production returned $ 125,000 profit to its backers on an investment of $ 360,000. Attendance began to decline in December 1959, though it continued to draw at above the 70% of capacity level which a Broadway play then needed to meet expenses. With the summer approaching, generally a bad time for attendance, it
49720-448: Was restored in its place, and "The Next Time It Happens" was imported from Pipe Dream . New orchestrations were by Don Sebesky and music director David Chase. According to The New York Times , Hwang "has reshaped the story to elucidate two of his own abiding thematic interests: the idea of the theater as a prism for society and the generational clashes of diversely assimilated immigrants." In September 2000, after development through
49946-540: Was right, Mei Li is the girl for him. But now, Mei Li wants nothing to do with him, and the Lis leave the Wang home. Sammy Fong and Linda decide to get married ("Sunday"), but when he goes to the Three Family Association (a benevolent association ) to announce Linda as his bride, he finds Mei Li and her father there, and the elders insist that he honor his betrothal to the immigrant girl. Ta brings Mei Li
50172-482: Was the French operetta The Chimes of Normandy in 1878 (705 performances). English comic opera adopted many of the successful ideas of European operetta, none more successfully than the series of more than a dozen long-running Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas, including H.M.S. Pinafore (1878) and The Mikado (1885). These were sensations on both sides of the Atlantic and in Australia and helped to raise
50398-507: Was to keep on doing what I was doing, and I saw nothing in the future that could stop me. The show opened in London's Palace Theatre on March 24, 1960, and ran for 464 performances. Fewer Asian performers were used in London; the West End production starred Yau Shan Tung as Mei Li, Kevin Scott as Ta, George Minami as Wang, Harriet Yamasaki ("Yama Saki") as Linda Low, Tim Herbert as Sammy Fong and Ida Shepley as Madam Liang. The production used Haney's choreography, Bennett's orchestrations and
50624-451: Was usually written around the talents of a specific performer, such as Ethel Merman or Fred Astaire , no stars were used in the production. Ultimately the original cast included Alfred Drake (Curly), Joan Roberts (Laurey), Celeste Holm (Ado Annie), Howard Da Silva (Jud Fry), Betty Garde (Aunt Eller), Lee Dixon (Will Parker) and Joseph Bulloff (Ali Hakim). Marc Platt danced the role of "Dream Curly", and Katharine Sergava danced
50850-420: Was well received in every city except New York. Subsequent productions have favored the Hwang script, although the older version remains available for license and has received occasional revivals, including a 2006 staged concert as part of Ian Marshall Fisher's Lost Musicals series. A review in London's The Times compared this production with "the much grander production of Show Boat currently docked at
51076-453: Was well-received, and none was a critical or commercial flop. Most of their shows have received frequent revivals around the world, both professional and amateur. Among the many accolades their shows (and film versions of them) garnered were 34 Tony Awards , fifteen Academy Awards , two Pulitzer Prizes (for Oklahoma! , 1944, and South Pacific , 1950) and two Grammy Awards . At Columbia University , Rodgers and Hammerstein collaborated on
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