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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 01:10 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
| In reply to: Ages and these characters - AC126748 04:00 pm EST 12/28/21 | |
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| I think we discussed this stuff here years ago, and I may have written some of this then. I know that I have posted the general stuff I am posting below in other places in the past. The published script gives Mrs. Paroo's age as 40. As noted in a post below, Pert Kelton was 50 when the original production opened. The script says that Winthrop is 10. Eddie Hodges was 10 when the original production opened. Ron Howard was 7 when the movie was being made, and with Kelton a few years older by that time, it does seem unlikely in the movie that she could be his mother, especially since Kelton reads to us now as being at least her age. But we were supposed to not think about that or suspend disbelief if we did think about it. In the footbridge scene, Harold guesses that Marian is 26. If Marian is 26 or so, and Mrs. Paroo is 40, then it may be that Mrs. Paroo was married at 14. Legal in many states at that time, although if she was pregnant when she got married, perhaps a bit of a scandal to those who knew. But this is thinking more than I think the creators intended us to think. Anyway, they cast a 50-year-old Mrs. Paroo, not too old to have a 10-year-old son and not too young to have been a perfectly respectable age when she had a daughter who is now 26. The theory that Marian is Winthrop's mother, which people have been talking about since at least as long ago as the 1970s and probably back in 1958, seems to me easily dismissed (although someone who sometimes posts here argued with me once about this, insisting that Marian was Winthrop's mother). If this were the case, lots of people in town would know it. You can't hide something like that. You can try, but this is a small town in which everybody knows everyone else's business. If the family takes a trip for six months or nine months or a year, and when they come back, there is Winthrop, and they tell the townspeople he is Mrs. Paroo's son, who would believe it? No one. Can we believe that when Mrs. Shinn and the other ladies try to turn Harold against Marian, telling him she used her womanly wiles with old miser Madison, they would not tell him or at least strongly imply that Winthrop was Marian's out-of-wedlock son? I can't believe that. Again, this is overthinking in ways that the creators probably never expected anyone to do, but that theory is out there and has been for decades. If the roles are cast with performers who look appropriate ages, there should be no problem. If the creators had especially cared or expected us to think about these kinds of questions, they would not have cast 79-year-old Helen Raymond as Eulalie Mackecknie Shinn. The script says Eulalie is 50. Given that she has both a 16-year-old daughter and a younger one, 50 is certainly plausible. 79 is not. Hermione Gingold was 62 or so when the movie was being made. 62 is not very plausible since the yonger daughter, Gracie, is probably 12--14. Yet I never hear anyone wonder if the Shinns employed a surrogate. :) Oh, yes. Jane Houdyshell is 68. And Marie Mullen, as noted by a poster below, is also 68. Not a problem if onstage they look 50ish, even 55, but do they? But it is theatre, and this show is not exactly realism. Still, I bet people are going to wonder if Marian is Winthrop's mother much more than they did in 1957, and not just because we perhaps think that way more now. |
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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Posted by: KingSpeed 03:41 am EST 12/30/21 | |
| In reply to: re: Ages and these characters - AlanScott 01:10 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
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| My mom had her first kid in 1970 and her last kid in 1990. So it happens. | |
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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Posted by: jeffef 01:32 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
| In reply to: re: Ages and these characters - AlanScott 01:10 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
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| When I first saw the movie the Music Man, I was totally confused by Marion being Winthrop‘s sister. But I just went along with it, one of my favorite all-time musicals. It still doesn’t make sense to me when I see any production. So I say, whatever. Can’t wait to see it in May. |
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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 11:12 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
| In reply to: re: Ages and these characters - jeffef 01:32 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
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| There ia 20-years age difference between Jones and Howard. Certainly not too much for them to have the same parents, but I think something so much less common by the early 1960s than it was perhaps in earlier times. Especially if the Paroos are Catholic, we can easily imagine a backstory of Mrs. Paroo having had upwards of ten children. We may imagine a tragic history of stillborns and children who died before reaching adulthood in that time of high childhood and teeenage mortality. Of course, that is making the show much more serious, but we know that Willson started with something more serious in mind. Now I start to wonder if there was more backstory in the early drafts. One days perhaps I will read the McHugh book. If we saw or heard references to other children of Mrs. Paroo between Marian and Winthrop, it would perhaps have lessened all this talk of Winthrop being Marian's son. :) It need not all have been as tragic as what I suggested above. Most of them might simply have moved away from intolerant River City. The gay twin brothers, for example, realized they would be happier in a bigger city. Joking, but only sort of. In any case, simply a mention of other siblings who had moved away would help it make more sense to us nowadays. And perhaps in 1957, it was more easily understood that such families were not uncommon, especially in earlier decades but certainly still even in the 1950s and in New York City, with lots of huge Irish Catholic families with children who were 20 years apart in age or even more. I see a new Spielberg film version of The Music Man with a Tony Kushner screenplay providing backstory, including the gay twin brothers who moved to New York. |
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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Last Edit: Ann 08:08 am EST 12/30/21 | |
| Posted by: Ann 08:06 am EST 12/30/21 | |
| In reply to: re: Ages and these characters - AlanScott 11:12 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
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| It's also possible they had one child and thought that would be it, then have a surprise when Mrs. Paroo was in her forties (not late fifties, but...) I had a friend who was the older sister in a similar situation, but they were only twelve years apart (twin surprises in that situation). To me, it's possible, but I think it's odd he decided to write it that way. There could be other ways to have a young boy in the house (orphaned nephew or cousin, etc.) I hope there is some explanation on the thinking. |
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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 01:55 pm EST 01/06/22 | |
| In reply to: re: Ages and these characters - Ann 08:06 am EST 12/30/21 | |
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| Sorry it has taken me a few days to reply, Ann. This does happen to me a lot nowadays, when I manage to reply at all. Of course, a number of years between siblings (with no others in between) happens, but it does seem as if one reason why people see something suspicious in the Paroo family is because of the 16-20 (or more) years difference in age, depending on the production, that there appears to be between Winthrop and Marian. After I posted a few days ago, I remembered something in the dialogue that could be cited as evidence by those wanting to make the case that Marian is Winthrop's mother but perhaps I shouldn't mention it, especially since it tears down one point I cited in making the case that she is not. :) I feel like Perry Mason. Anyway, it certainly would not have been odd in that time for there to have been children between Marian and Winthrop, children who have either died or moved away, or some of both. There is a much bigger improbability in the script that no one ever mentions, perhaps because it was changed in the movie: the library being open till what seems to be around midnight on the Fourth of July. |
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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Posted by: Ann 02:50 pm EST 01/06/22 | |
| In reply to: re: Ages and these characters - AlanScott 01:55 pm EST 01/06/22 | |
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| There is a much bigger improbability in the script that no one ever mentions, perhaps because it was changed in the movie: the library being open till what seems to be around midnight on the Fourth of July. What else is there to do when they don't want you to play pool? :) Thanks as always, Alan, for adding facts and invaluable insight. Seems that something could have been included in the book to prevent viewers from thinking about the age difference between Marian and Winthrop, but maybe they didn't think about it. Hope you get to check the McHugh book. |
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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Last Edit: BroadwayTonyJ 01:36 pm EST 12/30/21 | |
| Posted by: BroadwayTonyJ 01:25 pm EST 12/30/21 | |
| In reply to: re: Ages and these characters - Ann 08:06 am EST 12/30/21 | |
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| From the Mexican-American wing of my family, my niece's husband Roberto is 42 and his biological sister Jeanette is 20. Their father emigrated to Texas from Mexico in the early 80's as a migrant farm worker. Their mother wasn't able to gain entrance to the U.S. until the late 1990's. My entire family is Catholic. I knew an older couple (now deceased) who were also migrant workers in the 80's and friends of Roberto's parents. When they were in their late 40's, they adopted the baby of another migrant worker, who was unmarried, a close friend, and died in childbirth. The baby was named Santos, who today is 44. His older siblings are in their late 60's and early 70's. Winthrop could easily have been the child of a close friend or relative of Mrs. Paroo. She could have disclosed the child's origin to the denizens of River City or she could have chosen not to. I think that would have been quite possible at the turn of the century. |
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| re: Ages and these characters | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 11:36 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
| In reply to: re: Ages and these characters - AlanScott 11:12 pm EST 12/29/21 | |
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| The gay twin brothers, for example, realized they would be happier in a bigger city. I normally wouldn't go here, but could Winthrop have inherited their lithpths? :-) |
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