Bloomer Girl and South Pacific

Bloomer Girl. Music by Harold Arlen. Lyrics by E.Y. Harburg. Book by Sig Herzig and Fred Saidy. 1944 Broadway.

South Pacific. Music by Richard Rodgers. Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein. Book by Oscar Hammerstein and Joshua Logan. 1949 Broadway.

One of these shows is better known than the other but both concern race relations in war time. Both were considered progressive for the 1940's and both feature artists from the original production of Oklahoma!

Finian's Rainbow

Earlier this summer I wrote about Were The World Mine, a musical in which the homophobic jocks are magically transformed from straight to gay. In Finian's Rainbow a spell transforms the racist Senator from white to black. The Senator tries to undo his cruel policies but as a black man his staff will no longer listen to him. The leprechaun has to restore him to white to save the Sharecroppers. Pretty cutting social commentary for 1947.

A white actor put on blackface makeup on Broadway in 1947 and on film in 1968. When the show was revived in 2009 the switch was made with two actors. Critics praised the production but it only ran 15 weeks. 40's satire wasn't commercial in the 00's.