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| re: When a musical is revived, should it be influenced by its film version? | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 04:21 pm EDT 08/30/18 | |
| In reply to: re: When a musical is revived, should it be influenced by its film version? - Chromolume 03:18 pm EDT 08/30/18 | |
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| Well, "Cabaret," in the original staging, started in the real cabaret, and then the real cabaret disappeared, as Sally stepped off the stage and the tinsel curtain came down, and she walked through it while singing into the downstage area in front of the curtain. This was the metaphorical cabaret area where "Two Ladies," "The Money Song," and "If You Could See Her" were also performed. Sally's move occurred after the Elsie section, when the pizzicato accompaniment started. By this point she had moved off the cabaret stage but was still in the literal cabaret set, singing at the bar in front of the stage. "Don't Tell Mama" was performed within the set that represented the literal Kit Kat Klub, which included a literal stage. "Tomorrow Belongs to Me" and the kickline were also performed downstage but in front of the famous row of lights, while "Wilkommen" and the finale utilized the entire stage with the mirror. The rest of the show, apart from these sections, was performed in representational or semi-represenational sets. |
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| re: When a musical is revived, should it be influenced by its film version? | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 04:30 pm EDT 08/30/18 | |
| In reply to: re: When a musical is revived, should it be influenced by its film version? - AlanScott 04:21 pm EDT 08/30/18 | |
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| I wonder, though, how clear a distinction -- if any --there was meant to be between the numbers performed in the real cabaret and in the metaphorical cabaret. Is this made clear in the stage directions in the script? As for the staging, perhaps certain numbers were performed downstage not necessarily to indicate a metaphorical cabaret area, but to leave the upstage area free for set-changing purposes? | |
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| re: When a musical is revived, should it be influenced by its film version? | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 04:46 pm EDT 08/30/18 | |
| In reply to: re: When a musical is revived, should it be influenced by its film version? - Michael_Portantiere 04:30 pm EDT 08/30/18 | |
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| It's not indicated in the published script, but it was most definitely intentional on the part of Hal Prince and it was worked out with Boris Aronson, Jean Rosenthal and Ron Field. He believed that when Sally crossed from the "real world" into the "limbo area" (Prince's terms) during the title song, the audience understood. I'm not sure they did, but he felt they did. He wrote about this in Contradictions and I think it's all in Sense of Occasion, and it's been written about in other books. | |
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| what no one has mentioned | |
| Posted by: StageDoorJohnny 07:51 pm EDT 08/31/18 | |
| In reply to: re: When a musical is revived, should it be influenced by its film version? - AlanScott 04:46 pm EDT 08/30/18 | |
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| when the original show opened the best known performers were Lenya and Gilford. Grey was Mr Understudy, Haworth was best known from film and TV, not stage, and Convy from Fiddler. The show was not around star. The film was. Stars and featured performers don't get the same kind of material. The Money song in the film is for two stars, Money Makes the world go 'Round, is for a supporting player with backup. | |
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| re: what no one has mentioned | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 05:08 pm EDT 09/01/18 | |
| In reply to: what no one has mentioned - StageDoorJohnny 07:51 pm EDT 08/31/18 | |
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| I think you got the titles mixed up, which is easy to do because they do get confusing, especially since they have been known by different titles in different productions. "Money Song" was the original title for the stage version, and "Money, Money" was the title listed on the soundtrack LP for the film, but the Broadway playbills for the Mendes-Marshall production listed it as "Money," while many call it "Money Makes the World Go Round." People sometimes call the original stage version "Sitting Pretty," perhaps because "Money Song" might refer to either version, while "Sitting Pretty" makes it clear which they mean. Anyway, I don't necessarily agree that the original stage version is for a supporting player with backup. The movie song is for two stars, but mostly because they were two stars. If it would have made sense for Sally to do it in the stage version, it could have been done by Haworth and Grey (although she probably would have needed easy choreography). Grey had replaced Warren Berlinger in Come Blow Your Horn and did it for eight or nine months, and he took over in Stop the World for the last three months of the Broadway run. This was after he had toured the latter, paired with Julie Newmar, for around six months all over the country. So I think he was thought of as a replacement guy more than an understudy. He spelled Tommy Steele when Steele took a week's vacation from Sixpence, but I'm not sure he was ever the standby. He may have been an unlisted standby for a while. Of course, he'd also done The Littlest Revue for the Phoenix, various Yiddish or Yiddish-flavored revues with his dad (all over the place), and he'd done stuff around the country, including Og in Finian's Rainbow more than once. |
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| re: what no one has mentioned | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 05:21 pm EDT 09/01/18 | |
| In reply to: re: what no one has mentioned - AlanScott 05:08 pm EDT 09/01/18 | |
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| I think you got the titles mixed up, which is easy to do because they do get confusing, especially since they have been known by different titles in different productions. "Money Song" was the original title for the stage version, and "Money, Money" was the title listed on the soundtrack LP for the film, but the Broadway playbills for the Mendes-Marshall production listed it as "Money," while many call it "Money Makes the World Go Round." People sometimes call the original stage version "Sitting Pretty," perhaps because "Money Song" might refer to either version, while "Sitting Pretty" makes it clear which they mean. FYI - the published version of the score (i.e. the original 1966 version of the show), and the Tams script for that version, do contain the title "Sitting Pretty." There is no mention of anything called "The Money Song" even though I know it has also been called that. |
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| re: what no one has mentioned | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 06:19 pm EDT 09/01/18 | |
| In reply to: re: what no one has mentioned - Chromolume 05:21 pm EDT 09/01/18 | |
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| Thanks. I think I had seen at some point that it was called "Sitting Pretty" in the published score and the Tams script, but it certainly has also been called "The Money Song." It was called "The Money Song" in the playbill for the original production, on the cast recording of the original production (LP and CD issues), in the program for the London production, and on the cast recording of that production (LP and CD issues), and in the published script. It's one of those oddities, but certainly most people who saw Cabaret in one of the incarnations of the original production or had the OBCR or the OLCR would have known it as "The Money Song," and even now on the CD issues it's called that. So it seems to me that it's probably more widely known as "The Money Song," for whatever that's worth. | |
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| "The Money Song" in the film version | |
| Posted by: RobertC (robertcollier930@gmail.com) 06:35 pm EDT 09/01/18 | |
| In reply to: re: what no one has mentioned - AlanScott 06:19 pm EDT 09/01/18 | |
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| In one scene, Cliff, Sally and Max dance together on music from a Gramophone. The music they are dancing to is "The Money Song." (No lyrics). On the HIP-O LP release of the film's soundtrack, that track is called "Sitting Pretty." | |
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| re: what no one has mentioned | |
| Posted by: KingSpeed 04:27 am EDT 09/01/18 | |
| In reply to: what no one has mentioned - StageDoorJohnny 07:51 pm EDT 08/31/18 | |
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| Your post made me look up Joel Grey on IBDB because I had never thought about what he had done before Cabaret. Wow. His Broadway career goes back to 1951!! | |
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| re: what no one has mentioned | |
| Posted by: BroadwayTonyJ 09:02 am EDT 09/01/18 | |
| In reply to: re: what no one has mentioned - KingSpeed 04:27 am EDT 09/01/18 | |
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| Joel Grey did regional theatre in the 40's and had small roles in a couple of 50's movie musicals. He did a lot of TV work prior to Cabaret including the title role in a musical version of Jack and the Beanstalk(in '56) with Leora Dana, Cyril Ritchard, Celeste Holm, and Dennis King. He even played Spring Byington's nephew (I think) Jimmy during the '57 season of December Bride. In any case even though his roles were always small, he was instantly recognizable and amazingly talented. He would have been perfect as Wykeham in the '52 film version of Where's Charley? if Warner Bros. had had the foresight to take a chance and cast him (since he was hardly an unknown quantity in the entertainment world). After all they did make Doris Day the lead in her first film based on her prowess as a big band singer. |
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| re: what no one has mentioned | |
| Posted by: Michael_Portantiere 10:23 pm EDT 09/02/18 | |
| In reply to: re: what no one has mentioned - BroadwayTonyJ 09:02 am EDT 09/01/18 | |
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| I think Joel Grey in the title role of WHERE'S CHARLEY? back in the day is an excellent idea in terms of his talent and his suitability for the role, but I think it's beyond the bounds of all reality that it would have ever entered the minds of any Warner Bros. executives to cast him in that role in the film version in 1952. (Really not the same situation as Doris Day, I would say.) | |
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| re: what no one has mentioned | |
| Last Edit: BroadwayTonyJ 07:58 am EDT 09/03/18 | |
| Posted by: BroadwayTonyJ 07:52 am EDT 09/03/18 | |
| In reply to: re: what no one has mentioned - Michael_Portantiere 10:23 pm EDT 09/02/18 | |
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| Oh, I know -- I was just in a fanciful mood (again) when I did that post. I guess being the son of Mickey Katz doesn't open as many doors as being the daughter of Judy Garland. It's too bad Borscht Capades wasn't a big hit on Broadway. Still Grey was cast as Bender, a showy role in the '52 Warners musical About Face -- his performance is the only thing worth mentioning in that awful film. I was watching Where's Charley? this morning. Although he is charming in the "Once in Love with Amy" sequence, the 48-year old Bolger is laughably (actually grotesquely) cast as a college student -- he looks like his roommate's father. He's even 7 years older then Margaretta Scott, who plays his aunt. Maybe if Warners had reconceived the film as a vehicle for Doris Day (as Amy) and Gene Nelson (as Jack), it would have allowed them to cast someone as relatively unknown (but talented and age appropriate) as Joel Grey in the title role. I'm sure that would have made Loesser happy, and most likely the film would be less obscure today. Although Day might have come across a bit like a Mrs. Robinson-type (a role which I believe she would be considered for some years later). |
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