A Century of Musicals in Black and White: An Encyclopedia of Musical Stage Works By, About, or Invol

raphies and discographies of music, rep- ertory, related . Musical. Stage Works by, about, or Involving. African Americans. . and "White-oriented musicals with blacks in minor roles." cluded because it involved at least one ma- jor theatrical .
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Guitar Exercises for Beginners: I've got a solution for You. The Blackest of All Magick. He or she who would call himself or herself an American Patriot while being ignorant of Truth is neither an American nor a Patriot. From Booklist This volume describes more than 1, musical shows in which African Americans were involved, either as creators or subjects, from the s to the s. Greenwood October 25, Language: Related Video Shorts 0 Upload your video. Share your thoughts with other customers.

Write a customer review. There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later. No previous book has gone into such detail on the hundreds of musicals that utilized black talent in the 20th century. One person found this helpful. There's a problem loading this menu right now. Get fast, free shipping with Amazon Prime.

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A , The Greatest Showman P. Spain has a history and tradition of musical films that were made independent of Hollywood influence. The first films arise during the Second Spanish Republic of the s and the advent of sound films. A few zarzuelas Spanish operetta were even adapted as screenplays during the silent era.


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The beginnings of the Spanish musical were focused on romantic Spanish archetypes: Andalusian villages and landscapes, gypsys, "bandoleros", and copla and other popular folk songs included in story development. These films had even more box-office success than Hollywood premieres in Spain. The first Spanish film stars came from the musical genre: The Spanish musical started to expand and grow. Juvenile stars appear and top the box-office. Due to Spanish transition to democracy and rise of " Movida culture ", the musical genre felt into a decadence of production and box-office, only saved by Carlos Saura and his flamenco musical films.


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An exception to the decline of the musical film is Indian cinema , especially the Bollywood film industry based in Mumbai formerly Bombay , where the majority of films have been and still are musicals. The majority of films produced in the Tamil industry based in Chennai formerly Madras , Sandalwood based in Bangalore , Telugu industry based in Hyderabad , and Malayalam industry are also musicals.

In the s, Bollywood musicals played an instrumental role in the revival of the musical film genre in the Western world. Unlike the musical films of Hollywood and Bollywood, popularly identified with escapism, the Soviet musical was first and foremost a form of propaganda. Vladimir Lenin said that cinema was "the most important of the arts. Films were widely popular in the s, but it was foreign cinema that dominated the Soviet filmgoing market. Films from Germany and the U. A struggle between laughter for laughter's sake and entertainment with a clear ideological message would define the golden age of the Soviet musical of the s and s.

Then-head of the film industry Boris Shumyatsky sought to emulate Hollywood's conveyor belt method of production, going so far as to suggest the establishment of a Soviet Hollywood. In , the esteemed Soviet film director Sergei Eisenstein went to the United States with fellow director Grigori Aleksandrov to study Hollywood's filmmaking process. The American films greatly impacted Aleksandrov, particularly the musicals. The film was light on plot and focused more on the comedy and musical numbers. Party officials at first met the film with great hostility.

Aleksandrov defended his work by arguing the notion of laughter for laughter's sake. Messages like the importance of collective labor and rags-to-riches stories would become the plots of most Soviet musicals. The success of The Jolly Fellows ensured a place in Soviet cinema for the musical format, but immediately Shumyatsky set strict guidelines to make sure the films promoted Communist values.

Shumyatsky's decree "Movies for the Millions" demanded conventional plots, characters, and montage to successfully portray Socialist Realism the glorification of industry and the working class on film. The first successful blend of a social message and entertainment was Aleksandrov's Circus Amidst the backdrop of lavish musical productions, she finally finds love and acceptance in the USSR, providing the message that racial tolerance can only be found in the Soviet Union.

The influence of Busby Berkeley 's choreography on Aleksandrov's directing can be seen in the musical number leading up to the climax. Another, more obvious reference to Hollywood is the Charlie Chaplin impersonator who provides comic relief throughout the film. Four million people in Moscow and Leningrad went to see Circus during its first month in theaters. Another of Aleksandrov's more-popular films was The Bright Path This was a reworking of the fairytale Cinderella set in the contemporary Soviet Union.

Whereas in Circus , the musical numbers involved dancing and spectacle, the only type of choreography in Bright Path is the movement of factory machines. The music was limited to Orlova's singing. Here, work provided the spectacle. The other director of musical films was Ivan Pyryev. Unlike Aleksandrov, the focus of Pyryev's films was life on the collective farms. Like in Aleksandrov's Bright Path , the only choreography was the work the characters were doing on film.

Even the songs were about the joys of working. Rather than having a specific message for any of his films, Pyryev promoted Stalin's slogan "life has become better, life has become more joyous. During the filming of Cossacks of the Kuban , the Soviet Union was going through a postwar famine. In reality, the actors who were singing about a time of prosperity were hungry and malnourished. The most popular film of the brief era of Stalinist musicals was Alexandrov's film Volga-Volga. The star, again, was Lyubov Orlova and the film featured singing and dancing, having nothing to do with work.

It is the most unusual of its type. The plot surrounds a love story between two individuals who want to play music. They are unrepresentative of Soviet values in that their focus is more on their music than their jobs. The gags poke fun at the local authorities and bureaucracy. There is no glorification of industry since it takes place in a small rural village. Work is not glorified either, since the plot revolves around a group of villagers using their vacation time to go on a trip up the Volga to perform in Moscow. Volga-Volga followed the aesthetic principles of Socialist Realism rather than the ideological tenets.

It is another example of one of the films that claimed life is better. Despite the growing number of large-scale musicals in the s and s, a number of lower-budget, smaller-scale musicals managed to find critical and financial success, such as Falsettoland and Little Shop of Horrors , Bat Boy: The Musical and Blood Brothers. The topics of these pieces vary widely, and the music ranges from rock to pop, but they often are produced off-Broadway, or for smaller London theatres, and some of these stagings have been regarded as imaginative and innovative.

In the new century, familiarity has been embraced by producers and investors anxious to guarantee that they recoup their considerable investments. Hamilton , transformed "under-dramatized American history" into an unusual hip-hop inflected hit. However, most major-market 21st-century productions have taken a safe route, with revivals of familiar fare, such as Fiddler on the Roof , A Chorus Line , South Pacific , Gypsy , Hair , West Side Story and Grease , or with adaptations of other proven material, such as literature The Scarlet Pimpernel , Wicked and Fun Home , hoping that the shows would have a built-in audience as a result.

Today, it is less likely that a sole producer, such as David Merrick or Cameron Mackintosh , backs a production. In , the credits for Thoroughly Modern Millie listed ten producers, and among those names were entities composed of several individuals. Several musicals returned to the spectacle format that was so successful in the s, recalling extravaganzas that have been presented at times, throughout theatre history, since the ancient Romans staged mock sea battles.

Turn Off the Dark These musicals involved songwriters with little theatrical experience, and the expensive productions generally lost money. Conversely, The Drowsy Chaperone , Avenue Q , The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee , Xanadu and Fun Home , among others, have been presented in smaller-scale productions, mostly uninterrupted by an intermission, with short running times, and enjoyed financial success.

In , Cyndi Lauper was the "first female composer to win the [Tony for] Best Score without a male collaborator" for writing the music and lyrics for Kinky Boots. Another trend has been to create a minimal plot to fit a collection of songs that have already been hits. This style is often referred to as the " jukebox musical ".

Seuss 's How the Grinch Stole Christmas! After the immense success of Disney and other houses with animated film musicals beginning with The Little Mermaid in and running throughout the s including some more adult-themed films, like South Park: In Asia, India continues to produce numerous "Bollywood" film musicals, and Japan produces "Anime" and "Manga" film musicals.

Made for TV musical films were popular in the s, such as Gypsy , Cinderella and Annie Several made for TV musicals in the first decade of the 21st century were adaptations of the stage version, such as South Pacific , The Music Man and Once Upon a Mattress , and a televised version of the stage musical Legally Blonde in Additionally, several musicals were filmed on stage and broadcast on Public Television, for example Contact in and Kiss Me, Kate and Oklahoma!

The made-for-TV musical High School Musical , and its several sequels, enjoyed particular success and were adapted for stage musicals and other media. Some television shows have set episodes as a musical. Others have included scenes where characters suddenly begin singing and dancing in a musical-theatre style during an episode, such as in several episodes of The Simpsons , 30 Rock , Hannah Montana , South Park , Bob's Burgers and Family Guy.

Musical film

There have also been musicals made for the internet, including Dr. It was written during the WGA writer's strike. You're the One That I Want!

However, the light musical stage in other countries has become more active in recent decades. Musicals from other English-speaking countries notably Australia and Canada often do well locally and occasionally even reach Broadway or the West End e. South Africa has an active musical theatre scene, with revues like African Footprint and Umoja and book musicals, such as Kat and the Kings and Sarafina! Japan has recently seen the growth of an indigenous form of musical theatre, both animated and live action, mostly based on Anime and Manga , such as Kiki's Delivery Service and Tenimyu.

The popular Sailor Moon metaseries has had twenty-nine Sailor Moon musicals , spanning thirteen years. Beginning in , a series of popular revues have been performed by the all-female Takarazuka Revue , which currently fields five performing troupes. Elsewhere in Asia, the Indian Bollywood musical, mostly in the form of motion pictures, is tremendously successful. Hong Kong 's first modern musical, produced in both Cantonese and Mandarin , is Snow.

Musical film - Wikipedia

After the formation of amateur Gilbert and Sullivan companies licensed to perform the Savoy operas , professionals recognized that the amateur societies "support the culture of music and the drama. They are now accepted as useful training schools for the legitimate stage, and from the volunteer ranks have sprung many present-day favourites. It reported, in , that nearly amateur dramatic societies were producing Gilbert and Sullivan works in Britain that year. This number has grown to an estimated 18, in the US.

The Broadway League announced that in the —08 season, Total attendees in the major commercial and grant-aided theatres in Central London were Stephen Sondheim commented in the year You get your tickets for The Lion King a year in advance, and essentially a family It has nothing to do with theater at all.

It has to do with seeing what is familiar. I don't think the theatre will die per se, but it's never going to be what it was It's a tourist attraction. However, noting the success in recent decades of original material, and creative re-imaginings of film, plays and literature, theatre historian John Kenrick countered:. Is the Musical dead? The musical has been changing ever since Offenbach did his first rewrite in the s. And change is the clearest sign that the musical is still a living, growing genre. Will we ever return to the so-called 'golden age', with musicals at the center of popular culture?

Public taste has undergone fundamental changes, and the commercial arts can only flow where the paying public allows. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Development of musical theatre. General Lists of musicals Long-running musical theatre productions Theatre music Show tune Related forms Cast recording Indian classical dance Industrial musical. The New York Times. Retrieved October 6, The Musical Times , Vol.

Musical theatre

Retrieved on 4 May Gilbert and American Musical Theatre", pp. Readings from the Popular Press by Timothy E. Yip Harburg, Lyricist , pp Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, ; and Bradley , p. Basil Hood , Who's Who in Musicals: Hellzapoppin — History of The Musical Stage s: University of Illinois Press.

Part II" , Musicals New York Times Magazine. Retrieved May 26, Gilbert and his choreographer John D'Auban helped transformed Victorian musical theatre production styles. Retrieved 26 March ; and "Mr. The Times , 17 April , p.

Editorial Reviews

The Richard Rodgers Reader. Oxford University Press US, Interviewed by Frank J. Oteri published May 1, New York Herald Tribune. Archived from the original on December 12, A Chorus Line ". Retrieved March 1, Retrieved February 9, Retrieved June 28, Archived from the original on September 28, Look, I Made a Hat: NBC Musical Draws Retrieved 4 December First Look at Joss Whedon's "Dr. Taking the Stage , Beijing Review , , p.

School groups include the Educational Theater Association, which has 5, member school groups in the US. Gilbert and Sullivan and Their Operas. Archived from the original on February 22, Society of London Theatre. Archived from the original PDF on October 29, New York Times Magazine , March 12, Stage management Technical director production management house management company management.

Musical ensemble Orchestra Pit orchestra. Category Commons Wiktionary WikiProject. Retrieved from " https: Views Read Edit View history.