| re: When did we not know this? nm | |
| Posted by: NewtonUK 10:50 am EST 01/03/18 | |
| In reply to: When did we not know this? nm - ryhog 07:50 pm EST 01/02/18 | |
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| Wow. Starting 2018 by snarking at me. Waste not want not. Until not that long ago, Broadway was pretty much 100% for adults and doing just fine. We brought our kids to see the same musicals we saw and they fell in love with Broadway. When I was 8 and 9 and 10 years old I was taken to see productions (usually National Tours as I didnt live in NYC) of Oklahoma, My Fair Lady, Redhead, Merry Widow, The Desert Song, How To Succeed - and fell in love with a world that I have subsequiently spent my entire life in. I didn't have to see a stage version of SNOW WHITE AND THE 7 DWARVES to be able to to, or to love Broadway shows. When I was 11 I saw Broadway on Broadway for the first time. Not a cartoon musical in sight - FIORELLO, CAMELOT, MY FAIR LADY, and THE UNSINKABLE MOLLY BROWN. Did I understand all of these shows totally? No. But when I got home I reserached La Guardia, Molly Brown, and read TH WHite's THE ONCE AND FUTURE KING ... Broadway for adults, serving everyone. But there has been the constant creep of 'family fare' on Broadway, taking up prime real estate with shows produced usually by multibillion $ corporations as marketing wings of their other enterprises. The goal is to get Mom and Dad to shell out $150-250 a ticket and be co-erced by kids into buying a zillion $ of merchandise. Currently 7 of our 41 Broadway theatres are stuffed full of this fare. One show will close soon. Two more - HARRY POTTER and FROZEN - are to open - so 8 of 41 theatres will be filled with jolly family fare. Before 1994 (BEAUTY AND THE BEAST), in the previous 94 Broadway seasons there were virtually no 'family' shows on Broadway, and Broadway did just fine without them. And kids got to see the same shows grown ups saw - which I would say helps the kids grow up more than 3 hours at LION KING does. An inexhaustive search of the 94 seasons prior to BEAUTY AND THE BEAST show perhaps two dozen 'family' titles on Broadway. Several, like YOURE A GOOD MAN CHARLIE BROWN and SEUSSICAL were Broadway flops. BAck in 1903-04 175 shows opened on Broadway. There were 3 'family' shows amongst them - BABES IN TOYLAND, MOTHER GOOSE, and THE WIZARD OF OZ. And of course none of them ran 17 years. |
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