A Star Is Born

The 1954 remake of A Star is Born features one fantastic song: Gershwin and Arlen's "The Man That Got Away." I assumed it would be the grand finale but it turns out to be Judy Garland's first number. She sings it in a bar when James Mason stumbles in. It's the moment that draws him to her and establishes their unhealthy dynamic.

That song is the only thing I really enjoy about the film. The other music is forgettable and the story is dour. Streisand and Gaga's remakes somehow feel even bleaker. The story is interested in the leading man's fall but the audience wants to see the leading lady shine. She does, in moments, and those moments are what people take away from each remake. I don't need to watch the 2018 film again but I'm sure I'll see the scene where Gaga performs "Shallow" many times to come.

Porgy and Bess

When Porgy and Bess returned to Broadway in 2011 it caused controversy. Director/adapter Diane Paulus had overseen multiple revisions to the libretto. Stephen Sondheim wrote the New York Times to express his disapproval.

"She fails to recognize that Porgy, Bess, Crown, Sportin’ Life and the rest are archetypes and intended to be larger than life and that filling in “realistic” details is likely to reduce them to line drawings.... let it not be called “The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess,” nor even “The Gershwin-Heyward Porgy and Bess.” Advertise it honestly as “Diane Paulus’s Porgy and Bess.” And the hell with the real one."

In Paulus's defense the work had already undergone major revisions within the Gershwin's lifetime. Any producer seeing the "real one" has many versions to choose from. The three act opera from 1935, the two act musical from 1942, the two act opera from 1952, and various attempts to dial up or down the characters dialects. None of these versions diminish the power or importance of the work... though I wouldn't recommend doing it with an all white cast like they tried in Switzerland.

Here's Audra McDonald and Norm Lewis performing a medley at the 2012 Tony Awards.

Gershwin series part four: Political Musicals

Life has gotten busy and blog posts have fallen behind.
The election season has reminded us all that "Nobody's Got No Class."

So here is a quick sketch of the political satires of George and Ira Gershwin. I've covered politically themed musicals in the past but there are many more.

Strike Up the Band deals with a war motivated by corporate greed.

Of Thee I Sing deals with a Presidential candidate drawing international outrage when he mistreats a beauty pageant contestant.

In an earlier post I looked at the sequel, Let Them Eat Cake, in which that same candidate, now President, has his fascist proposals undermined by women voters.

Make of this what you will.

Gershwin series part three

.
Girl Crazy. Music by George Gershwin. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Book by Guy Bolton and John McGowan. 1930 Broadway

Includes the songs Embraceable You, I Got Rhythm and But Not for Me.

A typical Ginger Rogers role does not believe in love at first sight. Whether you're Allen Kearns or Fred Astaire you have to earn her affection. Girl Crazy would launch the careers of Rogers and a brassy young singer named Ethel Merman. It also proved a delightful movie for a young Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney.

I have to make a confession. I'm not a fan of the song "I Got Rhythm." I was in a highschool production of Crazy for You. "I Got Rhythm" is the act one finale and the dancey arrangement lasts about 9 minutes. It felt like 90. It's a different experience with Ethel Merman singing it. She made headlines for effortlessly sustaining the big note as the crowds went wild.

Merman's role had two other songs that I find more interesting. The menacing "Sam and Delilah" and the snarky torch song "Boy! What Love Has Done To Me!" Both were sadly cut from Crazy for You though the supporting woman in that show gets the delightful "Naughty Baby."

Pardon My English. Music by George Gershwin. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Book by Herbert Fields and Morrie Ryskind. 1933 Broadway

Pardon My English is less fondly remembered. It provided a showcase for vaudeville comic Jack Buchanan in dual roles. The songs "Isn't It a Pity?" and "The Lorelei" have had some legs and the rest of the score was heard again in a 2004 Encores Concert starring Brian d'Arcy James.

Gershwin series part two

Oh, Kay! Music by George Gershwin. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Book by Guy Bolton and P. G. Wodehouse. 1926 Broadway. 1927 West End.

The musical starred Gertrude Lawrence, the "first British performer to star in an American musical on Broadway." The score introduced Clap 'Yo Hands, Fidgety Feet and the evergreen Someone to Watch Over Me. The bootlegger-in-disguise premise was used in the 2012 Gershwin jukebox musical Nice Work If You Can Get It.

Funny Face. Music by George Gershwin. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin, Book by Paul Gerard Smith and Fred Thompson. 1927. Broadway.

The Gershwin's would feature the Astaire's again in Funny Face. Adele Astaire and her love interest introduced the song S'Wonderful. The title song would be re-purposed for Fred Astaire to sing in the unrelated 1957 film Funny Face. 

Gershwin series part one

Lady be Good, Music by George Gershwin. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Book by Guy Bolton and Fred Thompson. 1924 Broadway. 1926 West End.

Tip Toes, Music by George Gershwin. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Book by Guy Bolton and Fred Thompson. 1925 Broadway.

George Gershwin passed away at the age of 38 from a malignant brain tumor. By that point he had composed an incredible body of music that survives till this day. His brother Ira found new collaborators but devoted his late life to compiling George's music and correspondence for the Library of Congress. He lived to the age of 86.

I was introduced to the Gershwin's through a high school production of Crazy for You (1992). The show took the premise of Girl Crazy (1930) and cherry picked from their song catalog for the score. Tommy Tune and Twiggy had starred in 1983's My One and Only which was a similar hybrid of old and new. Nice Work If You Can Get It (2012) and the stage adaptation of American in Paris (2014) would follow suit. I lined up the song list for these shows and saw they share many of the same songs. "Nice Work If You Can Get It," "But Not For Me," and "S'Wonderful," appear in three out of four.

There's a reason new books are written for the Gershwin catalog. The brother's original shows have extremely creaky librettos relying on thin romantic farces to showcase the stars. When their first shared Broadway show, Lady Be Good, was revived at Encores in 2015 the New York Times called it "a featherweight farrago of romantic contrivances that wears out its daffy appeal long before the curtain falls."

But oh those songs.

Lady Be Good included "Fascinating Rhythm" and "'The Half of It, Dearie' Blues." The song "The Man I Love" was cut. It would be cut from two more shows before becoming a standard on its own.

Tip Toes introduced "Looking for a Boy" and "Sweet and Low Down."

Tony Awards 2015: The nominees

The 2014 Tony nominees for best musical included two jukebox musicals, a Disney cartoon adaptation, and the well deserved winner A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder. I'm pleased to see that three of 2015 Tony nominees possess original scores and the fourth, An American In Paris, is primarily a ballet making it more ambitious than most screen to stage adaptations.

You can take a look at this season's non-nominated musicals here. I've devoted longer posts to Fun Home and The Visit in the past during their pre-Broadway incarnations. Thanks again to Tickle-Brain's Three Panel Shakespeare who's style I pay homage to today (and who is now doing musical recaps of their own).

The Tony Awards will be broadcast this Sunday, June 7, on CBS at 8pm ET / 7pm CT.

Let 'Em Eat Cake

In 1931 the Gershwin's wrote Of Thee I Sing, a musical about about the fictional Wintergreen's run for president. It was a hit. Two years later they wrote a musical about Wintergreen becoming a fascist dictator. It didn't go over so well.

Learn more about the show here!

Lady in the Dark

My first comic in the printed template. I caused quite a debate among my theater friends on Facebook when I snubbed this show for dated sexual politics. One of them rightly commented "the first show to use analysis as anything but a punchline, the first even remotely sympathetic gay character and the whole story is analogous (if coded) to Moss Hart's life."

Lady in the Dark is licensed by the Rodgers and Hammerstein Co. Learn more here.