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| re: MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG -- Can the Original 1981 Version Ever Be Shown Again? | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 08:04 pm EDT 08/24/22 | |
| In reply to: re: MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG -- Can the Original 1981 Version Ever Be Shown Again? - comedywest 07:53 pm EDT 08/24/22 | |
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| I think he felt that a lot of the changes he made were made under duress. Which was why I would have hoped that some stuff would have been restored when they revised it, but little if anything was restored, except "The Blob," which was not the book. And to me "The Blob" makes little sense with the mix-and-not-really-match Gussie of the revision. It seems that both Furth and Sondheim felt that the problem was casting young people. The script and score had been written for young people to perform. A lot of the playfulness of the original book disappeared. I think one problem with the revision is that if the book was going to be changed that much, the score needed to be changed a lot more to fit the book. Sondheim wrote his score to fit that book. The book pretty much preceded the score. But since most everyone liked the score a lot, relatively little of the score changed, at least compared to how much the book changed. I don't think they fit together all that well now. And who are those people singing to us at the beginning and why are they singing to us? Productions keep trying to solve this via staging and projections, but there is a limit to what can be done without bringing back the frame. |
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| re: MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG -- Can the Original 1981 Version Ever Be Shown Again? | |
| Posted by: Chromolume 10:33 pm EDT 08/24/22 | |
| In reply to: re: MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG -- Can the Original 1981 Version Ever Be Shown Again? - AlanScott 08:04 pm EDT 08/24/22 | |
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| And who are those people singing to us at the beginning and why are they singing to us? Productions keep trying to solve this via staging and projections, but there is a limit to what can be done without bringing back the frame. And why, in one of the last "Merrily Transitions" (if not the last), is Frank Jr - labelled as such - singing to us, before he was born? :-) |
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| re: MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG -- Can the Original 1981 Version Ever Be Shown Again? | |
| Posted by: Chazwaza 08:33 pm EDT 08/24/22 | |
| In reply to: re: MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG -- Can the Original 1981 Version Ever Be Shown Again? - AlanScott 08:04 pm EDT 08/24/22 | |
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| 100%. And what's even more infuriating is that the framework of the graduation is SO good and works SO well, and it is a perfectly good motivation for the opening title song to be sung. In the current version it is awkward and meaningless... not to mention how awkwardly stunted the song feels in so many places now with the revisions/cuts he made in it. If they were going to revise it to cut the high school graduation, you'd think they'd have at least subbed it out for some kind of lifetime achievement film award, or People's Choice award or something where he's thanking people and comes to Mary and Charley... and the people in the audience or at the gala are the ones who sing back to him for him to reflect. |
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