Zero Patience

"Tell the story. Clear my name.
Why do they need someone to blame?"
~ Zero Patience

Gaétan Dugas, a French-Canadian flight attendant, was falsely accused of spreading the AIDS virus across America. He was dubbed "Patient Zero." Evidence was found to clear his name but the myth persisted for years after. John Grayson's musical sends Zero's ghost on a journey to prove his innocence, debunking other myths about the virus along the way. The film is angry, funny, sexy and bittersweet. It's strange to watch now as it came at a time when people were still in crisis and much about the virus was still unknown. The film is hard to track down but clips are floating around. You can read a spoiler filled recap here.

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.

Teen Beach Movie

Disney's Beach Party movies were a hit in the 1960's. Disney's High School Musical was a hit in 2006. Would these two great tastes go together in 2013? Critical reviews were mixed but ratings were high enough to merit a sequel. Afterwards co-stars Garrett Clayton and Ross Lynch would graduate to racier projects, which would renew interest in their musical theater beginnings.

High School Musical

How did a low budget TV movie launch a franchise and a film career? Today's high school themed musicals are loaded with snark and angst. High School Musical has a mean girl and with a coded-gay brother but the overarching tone is earnest.

Quick. What's the hit song from High School Musical? I'm not sure either... but it has four compelling lead players who Disney was able to contractually secure for two sequels.

Oh and my favorite song? I like "Bet On It", Efron's campy nervous breakdown in part 2.

Were the World Mine

This film started off with a great idea. A modern gay remake of A Midsummer Night's Dream with a bullied gay teen, Timothy, serving as a combination of magical Puck and lovelorn Helena. The opening scenes won me to his side and the unleashing of the love potion felt cathartic.

Things fall apart soon after. The film can't agree on tone or internal logic. If the potion makes you fall for the first person you see, it makes sense the all boys school would fill with same sex couples. But why do all couples remain same sex when it spreads to the town? Why does the homophobic coach become a broad gay stereotype? Why do people have selective memories of what occurs during the course of the film? If Tim's point was to make the jocks understand bullying, why leave no straight people left to bully them? Why are the songs so forgettable?

Timothy's primary love interest is a mystery. We aren't supposed to know his true feelings till the end of the film. But we need to learn something about him to invest in the relationship. As is Tim's melancholy is never salved, leaving a streak of pain through the film. A lot of missed opportunities here. It frustrated me as the premise was fantastic.

Royal Wedding

I've seen this movie but I can't remember the love interests at all. They don't get much to do. The Astaire/Powell duets are delightful but the fact that they are playing siblings is... distracting. What exactly happens every night at seven?

The movie's not great, but Astaire gets to dance on the ceiling. Bosley Crowther of the New York Times put it best when he said "Mr. Astaire has fared better in his lifetime-and he has also fared much worse."

Easter Parade

"Someday, we’re going to write a treatise on the crazy hats women wear in musicals. We propose that because there was so much sexual repression in these films, the outrageous hats are supposed to represent vaginas on top of their heads. It’s why so many of the men had walking sticks too.
Think about it." ~ Tom and Lorenzo

This one's not about the plot. It's about the showcase numbers. Here are some highlights:

Steppin' Out with My Baby - Fred Astaire and chorus
Shakin' The Blues Away - Ann Miller
A Couple of Swells - Fred Astaire and Judy Garland

Love, Simon

Love, Simon is a 2018 film based on Becky Albertalli novel Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda. Simon is a closeted gay teen juggling family, friendships, a blackmailer and an online romance. Indie cinema has explored the angst of the closet for decades but Love, Simon aims for the tone of a big studio romcom. Less Beautiful Thing, more 10 Things I Hate About You.

Director Greg Berlanti understands the loneliness, rage and narcissism that can accompany the coming out process. His film doesn’t shy from Simon’s cruel side as he desperately protects his secret and searches for his anonymous paramour. The audience plays detective alongside Simon as he grasps at any odd phrase or lingering glace from his male class mates. We're allowed to share that desperate desire to find someone… anyone… who understands what we're going through.

There are quibbles. Simon is ridiculously privileged. The female characters are treated poorly. The “comic relief” roles are cringey. Still Berlanti and his team have clearly put their hearts into this project. Love, Simon would have made my high school experience a little brighter and I’m glad the current generation of students gets to see it.

… Okay, it’s not a musical. Though there are two musical numbers. If they adapt it to the stage it will fit comfortably alongside Dear Evan Hansen and Be More Chill.

Santa and the Ice Cream Bunny

RifTrax gave this laughably bad low budget children's film a new life and brought attention to the creepiness of the sweaty Santa Claus and the creepy animal costumes. A comic really can't do it justice. Check out this clip.

The Fan

Lauren Bacall started a new chapter of her career by starring in the musical Applause. She followed this up with two less successful musical projects. The Fan opened a few months after the opening of Lauren's next musical, Woman of the Year. Unfortunately it also opened after the murder of John Lennon. The grim ending was quickly re-written and re-filmed. A happy ending and an award bait song weren't enough. The film was a box office bomb.

Lauren Bacall's musicals cast her as fairly passive figures. Margo Channing, Tess Harding and Sally Ross start off with thriving careers. The active supporting characters harm that success and leave them reeling. We watch them cope with the loss rather than strive to recover.

A similar plot would have more success in the 1992 film The Bodyguard... which has just been made into another terrible musical.

Victor/ Victoria

Victor/Victoria thrived on film and flopped on stage. Why? Julie was older, yes, but the show didn't work any better with Liza Minnelli, Raquel Welch or Toni Tennille. I think the rewrites did it in. On film the story is a delightful ensemble farce. On stage it's a weak star vehicle. The supporting roles are diminished by bland new songs and a tendency to disappear.

One way the stage show expands upon the film is with Julie's love interest, King Marchand. James Garner determines Julie's a woman before declaring his love while Michael Nouri decided it didn't matter. This feed into the films larger thesis of sexuality as performance. 

The original film trailer

Julie Andrews singing Louis Says on stage.

Rachel York singing Chicago, Illinois on stage.
Raquel Welch singing I Guess It's Time on stage.
Liza Minnelli's press reel.

Julie Andrews Flops

Julie Andrews attempted to shake off her wholesome image with a pair of sex comedies. It didn't work. You'd think these films would be camp classics. Sadly they are simply boring. Blake Edwards blamed Darling Lili's failure on studio interference but his attempts to mock the studio in S.O.B. proved no less tedious.

Darling Lili. Written by William Peter Blatty & Blake Edwards. Music by Henry Mancini. Lyrics by Johnny Mercer. 1970 film.

S.O.B. Written by Blake Edwards. Music by Henry Mancini.

Flapper Julie Andrews

The Boy Friend. Music, Lyrics and Book by Sandy Wilson. 1953 West End. 1954 Broadway

Thoroughly Modern Millie. 1967 screenplay by Richard Morris. Original music by Elmer Bernstein.  2002 book by Richard Morris. Original music by Jeanine Tesori. Original lyrics by Dick Scanlan.

The Broadway transfer of The Boyfriend featured the New York debut of Julie Andrews! She would don her flapper dresses again for Millie and make her directing debut with a production of The Boyfriend in 2003. Both stories focus on flappers who enjoy their independence till their poor boyfriends confess they are secretly rich and propose. It's telling that the sequel to The Boyfriend was titled Divorce Me, Darling!

The Boy Friend is a fairly conventional musical that was turned into a strange film.
Millie was a weird film that got turned into a conventional musical. Carol Channing and Beatrice Lillie are doing... something... bizarre that the raise the film to new camp levels. Channing's character was toned down when the show transferred to Broadway but Harriet Harris made Lillie's villain her own crazy (and Tony winning) creation.

Trailer for The Boy Friend on film.
Trailer for Thoroughly Modern Millie on film.
Performance from Thoroughly Modern Millie at the Tony's.

Joan Crawford Musicals

Stephen Sondheim based the lyrics to the song I'm Still Here around the career of Joan Crawford. 

First you're another

Sloe-eyed vamp,

Then someone's mother,

Then you're camp.

The FX show Feud reminds us that Hollywood treats many of their actresses the same way. While she played dancing flappers in the 1920's I'm going to focus on two works from the 1950's.

Johnny Guitar

Music by Martin Silvestri. Lyrics and Music by Joel Higgins. Book by Nicholas van Hoogstraten. 2004 Off Broadway.

The 1954 film is campy because it took itself so seriously. It wants to be a feminist Western about McCarthyism. It's better remembered for Joan Crawford's outfits, Mercedes McCambridge's scenery munching and the barely repressed lesbian subtext. The 2004 musical flopped because it tried to be a zany Forbidden Broadway style spoof. The subtext became text which misses the point.

Torch Song

Screenplay by John Michael Hayes and 

Jan Lustig (de). 

Music by Adolph Deutsch. 1953 film.

Here's another film that didn't need a parody. (Though Carol Burnett made a go of it). Joan Crawford dancing in blackface while lip synching to India Adams is camp enough. 

The Harvey Girls

“In this day and age girls don’t leave home. But if you get a hankering you wanna roam.”

The railroad allowed Fred Harvey’s chain of restaurants and hotels brought civility to the Wild West and independence to single women in the 1870’s. His waitresses, the “Harvey Girls,” are the subject of one of Judy Garland’s most interesting films.

The show had one breakout song, “The Atchison Topeka and the Santa Fe.” This fantastic number introduces the townsfolk, the Harvey girls, the supporting cast and the plot. Then Garland enters and brings it to a big finish. She’s come to town to get married but the groom is a bust. She joins the Harvey Girls and never looks back.

The disposable love interest doesn’t appear till later. His duet with Garland was cut as the film’s not about him. Instead she shares a trio with Cyd Charisse (dubbed by Betty Russell) Virginia O’Brien’s fellow Harvey Girls as they struggle with the social roles they’ve been assigned. They learned their trades to attract husbands. When none appeared they used the skills to support themselves. The number feels like a template for Sweet Charities “There’s Gotta Be Something Better Than This.” Their boss, Marjorie Main, and their rival, Angela Lansbury, will get solos as well. Main wants to class up the town. Lansbury… does not.

Lansbury’s “showgirl” is a hoot. Her solos were dubbed but her body language says more about her character than the lyrics. She looks fabulous but she’s bored. Garland’s rivalry brings a spark into Lansbury’s life and helps her find her priorities. At the end she’s happy to hand her boyfriend off to Garland and focus on her career. 

La La Land

Is La La Land a forgettable romcom with pretty costumes and miscast stars?
A gorgeous love letter to the musicals of Vincent Minnelli and Jacques Demy?
A sharp dissection of American narcissism?

Critics have argued for all of these and more in the lead up to Oscar night. My guess is that the film will be forgotten after Oscar night and the musical theater fans will move on to debating the merits of the Disney's Beauty and the Beast remake.

Chazelle draws a line in the sand midway through when Ryan Gosling's musician joins John Legend's jazz fusion band. Emma Stone's actress attends the concert and shakes in horror at the high energy performance and the cheering crowds. She seems to be saying "Ugh. Pop music. How tacky. Wouldn't you rather be listening to my breathy head voice or watching Gosling's timid dance steps?" I was team John Legend from that scene on.

Grease 2

"There's gotta be more to life than making out... I'm tired of being someone's chick." ~ Grease 2

The little Chicago musical about teen class war became a record breaking film in 1978. Three sequels and a TV series were proposed. A script was hastily written, the film tanked, and the franchise was scrapped. Grease 2 is no gem but Michelle Pfeiffer's solo, “Cool Rider,” is a camp classic. By the end of the film she learns, unlike Danny Zuko, to appreciate her partner’s nerdy side as well as the sexy persona.  

The Nightmare Before Christmas

I didn't appreciate The Nightmare Before Christmas in the theaters in 1993. The trailer had spoiled the film's best gag and Danny Elfman's moody ballads didn't appeal. Ten years later I saw the film again and was amazed by what I'd missed. The film is gorgeous with an bold design and a clever score.

The stop motion field was revitalized and continues today with the crazy geniuses at Studio Laika. However Laika, for all their artistry, has been criticized for their inability to sustain a narrative. Nightmare's story remains clever, subversive and well told. Haven't seen it in a while? It's worth another look.

It's Always Fair Weather

Why hello pen and ink! It's been a while. Yes I still love you. No you aren't as easy to correct as digital art.

Betty Comden described this cynical follow up to On The Town as a study of "the corrosive nature of time on friendship." This forgotten musical flopped in 1955 but fascinates in 2016. Several of the creatives hate each other off screen as well as on and the tension is palpable.

Dolores Gray plays Madeline Bradville, the self-absorbed host of a reality television show. She's introduced with a bland ballad titled "Music is Better than Words," than vanishes. The story isn't about her. It's about the three unhappy soldiers and Gene Kelly's romance with Cyd Charisse. Then, at the last minute Dolores Gray re-appears to sing the bizarre and fascinating 11 o'clock number "Thanks a Lot but No Thanks." Any fan of musical theatre and/or camp should click the link and watch it right now. Gray complained that the role was "an ageless, sexless caricature" but she scorches the screen in this song.

Pete's Dragon

"It's not easy to find someone who cares.
It's not easy to find magic in pairs."

Okay so I stretched the truth a little on this one.

Pete's Dragon was no masterpiece. It stopped Disney from making live musicals for many years but it had some catchy songs. The 2016 remake cuts the songs and apparently improves upon everything else. Disney tends to base their heroes journey around dead parents. In the original film Pete is fleeing from an abusive family bringing things closer to a Roald Dahl narrative.

Today's artwork is loosely inspired by the game Undertale.