1,582 posts
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Post by anita on Mar 13, 2017 11:17:17 GMT
I liked "Our House".
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2017 11:35:00 GMT
I also enjoyed Thriller. But it isn't a Musical. It's Entertainment and Family.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2017 11:42:03 GMT
I'm all for jukebox musicals! I'm the only person in the world that really enjoyed Thriller! What's wrong with going to see great songs performed great(ly)?! Better than the puke GB finds on the floor to eat and then regurgitate init I have no idea what GB stands for here but I concur. If anyone should know about finding puke on the floor and regurgitating it...take a bow Mrs Lovett! Gary Barlow I'm not sure if that's an attack or ur just being cute...... |
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1,320 posts
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Post by londonmzfitz on Mar 13, 2017 11:47:01 GMT
Bob Carlton's Return To The Forbidden Planet, and lesser known From A Jack To A King were my introduction to what's now called the Jukebox Musical. Return To The Forbidden Planet won the Olivier Award for the Best New Musical in 1989 and 1990. I adored From A Jack To A King and saw it loads of times. Classy stuff of it's age. The Bob Carlton shows had a cast that could play a wide variety of instruments. Not singing like the Dreamboats and Petticoats I saw some years ago. roller skating, trumpet playing, etc talented cast. |
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2,702 posts
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Post by viserys on Mar 13, 2017 11:58:56 GMT
Return to the Forbidden Planet had a sad claim to fame over here... when producer Friedrich Kurz, who had brought the big mega musical to Germany (Cats, Phantom, Starlight Express...), was booted out of his own empire, he got the rights to it and produced it in Berlin as "Shakespeare & Rock'n'Roll" - Heaven knows what he was thinking. It couldn't hold a candle to the mega musicals people expected of him, nobody here even knows Twelfth Night and of course it was first translated and then presented by a cast consisting mostly of foreigners who couldn't pronounce Shakespearean German if their lives depended on it. Needless to say the hot mess didn't last long and the poor man disappeared from the scene not long after. Though I guess he was sitting in some cellar somewhere cackling madly when his former empire went bust a few years later...
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341 posts
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Post by adrianics on Mar 13, 2017 12:08:17 GMT
The only jukebox musical I've ever genuinely enjoyed as a piece of storytelling is Our House. Priscilla, Queen of the Desert is another good example of a jukebox musical having a decent story, ditto Beautiful and All Shook Up/Love Me Tender. Jersey Boys is a great show but is pretty poor from a storytelling perspective. WWRY is unmitigated garbage on every level and is a sad indictment of how far we've fallen as a society.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2017 12:28:21 GMT
If you go back a tiny bit further to the late 70's, early 80's, you had a rush of shows like Bubbling Brown Sugar, Ain't Misbehavin', Sophisticated Ladies, One Mo' Time and the previously mentioned Blues In The Night. These though tended to be based on a style or a genre and sometimes a composer. They were all pretty successful and I would guess some bright spark thought that using modern 'pop' music was a money spinner and could bring a whole new audience in, one who maybe wasn't currently spending cash at the theatre!
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Post by profquatermass on Mar 13, 2017 13:39:07 GMT
Forty Second Street is a jukebox musical. As is Side by Side by Sondheim (and a million other Sondheim review shows) and Tomfoolery (Tom Lehrer) and Cowardy Custard (which I see was 1972)
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Post by oxfordsimon on Mar 13, 2017 13:59:12 GMT
There is a strong case for saying that the Jukebox concept predates any of the titles mentioned so far.
1728 saw the first performances of The Beggar's Opera - which took folk tunes and popular songs/arias and wove them into the narrative of Macheath and his misdeeds.
Some might say that a ballad opera is not a musical - but given the theatrical styles of the day, it very much was the first jukebox piece that I can find.
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2,041 posts
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Post by 49thand8th on Mar 13, 2017 13:59:36 GMT
Forty Second Street is a jukebox musical. As is Side by Side by Sondheim (and a million other Sondheim review shows) and Tomfoolery (Tom Lehrer) and Cowardy Custard (which I see was 1972) And LoveMusik! |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2017 15:48:53 GMT
Beatlemania was also at the Astoria late 70s, as was Elvis before that...
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7,183 posts
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Post by Jon on Mar 13, 2017 18:18:49 GMT
It was a very slow seller at first, and was going to close, then they changed the performance times. It caught the imagination and took off. Hard to believe Mamma Mia! was a slow seller, what was the original performance times? I read that they were after The Prince of Wales or the Piccadilly but when they went to Cameron Mackintosh, he offered them the Prince Edward instead of the Prince of Wales which wasn't available |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2017 19:03:43 GMT
Just remembered Are You Lonesome Tonight? at the Phoenix, mid 80s, featuring Elvis songs. I suppose what we've worked out is that jukebox shows seem like a modern phenomenon but they've actually been around for a while, sometimes going over and over the same material. To me it's the audiences attending these sorts of shows that have changed...
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5,060 posts
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Post by Phantom of London on Mar 13, 2017 19:41:50 GMT
Not true. Mark Shenton says it's a guilty pleasure!!! What bit isn't true? I'm confused... Whoops, sorry. Quoted the wrong thread, meant to have quoted the one, where someone says they the only one to like Thriller. |
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1,320 posts
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Post by londonmzfitz on Mar 13, 2017 20:59:15 GMT
Yakkety Yak at The Astoria in early 1983 with Darts and the McGann brothers. I've still got the programme somewhere. That was a lot of fun.
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4,029 posts
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Post by Dawnstar on Mar 13, 2017 22:39:01 GMT
Bob Carlton's Return To The Forbidden Planet, and lesser known From A Jack To A King were my introduction to what's now called the Jukebox Musical. Return To The Forbidden Planet won the Olivier Award for the Best New Musical in 1989 and 1990. I adored From A Jack To A King and saw it loads of times. Classy stuff of it's age. I love Return To The Forbidden Planet. It was the first West End show I ever saw, some time in the early 90s and I subsequently saw a couple of tours (being a child/early teenager at the time I couldn't do repeat visits like I do for shows I love nowadays). I wish it would get a revival; the only production I have seen in recent years was an amateur one. As I was under 10 when I first saw it I do the Shakespeare quotes the wrong way round, i.e. I heard them first in RTTFP then recognise them in the plays! Was Jack To A King based on Macbeth? I vaguely remember its existance, though I never saw it. I haven't seen many other jukebox musicals, apart from Mamma Mia which is one of my guilty pleasure shows. Not being keen on most pop music means I'm not interested in seeing most of them. I did give Dreamboats & Petticoats a go & was a) the younguest in the audience by 30+ years & b) the only one not singing along. I am slightly interested in Bat Out Of Hell but suspect I would find it too loud. I do actually own a Meatloaf CD: my dad's contribution to my sex education was to give me the CD & tell me to listen to Paradise By A Dashboard Light! |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2017 22:57:55 GMT
I get really annoyed at the snobbery of people who don't like shows such as WWRY. Fair enough if you don't like it, that's your prerogative, but to say things like it's a "damning indictment of how far society has fallen" is a bit offensive to those who happen to have a different opinion to you about something as utterly harmless as a cheesy musical. Likes and dislikes are always subjective and nothing gives you the right to be judgemental about other people just because you prefer theatre you consider to be more refined or intellectually challenging. People like theatre for different reasons and some people would do well to remember and respect that. Rant over. I loved Mamma Mia, WWRY and Sunny Afternoon - all a fun evening's entertainment as far as I'm concerned and nothing more, but sometimes that's all that is necessary.  |
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1,320 posts
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Post by londonmzfitz on Mar 13, 2017 23:19:53 GMT
Yes, From A Jack To A King was based on Macbeth, the cast wore a lot of tartan. I think there were copyright issues, so it's not been redone. I've seen some great Forbidden Planets. I think I did a New Years Eve at The Savoy theatre the last time. God I'm old.
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Post by Mr Snow on Mar 14, 2017 7:37:36 GMT
"John Paul George Ringo And Bert" was at the Phoenix in the 70s, using Beatles songs. If you are old Mz Fitz what does that make me? I remember JPGR&B very well. I thought of it as a very funny play with music sung and played by a band who were not in the narrative. Still my memory may be faulty as Wiki points out this was August 1974 and calls it a musical. Just look at some of the emerging talent it featured. Writer Willy Russell. • John Lennon : Bernard Hill • Paul McCartney : Trevor Eve • Ringo Starr : Anthony Sher • Singer and pianist : Barbara Dickson |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 14, 2017 8:29:43 GMT
I get really annoyed at the snobbery of people who don't like shows such as WWRY. Fair enough if you don't like it, that's your prerogative, but to say things like it's a "damning indictment of how far society has fallen" is a bit offensive to those who happen to have a different opinion to you about something as utterly harmless as a cheesy musical. Likes and dislikes are always subjective and nothing gives you the right to be judgemental about other people just because you prefer theatre you consider to be more refined or intellectually challenging. People like theatre for different reasons and some people would do well to remember and respect that. Rant over. I loved Mamma Mia, WWRY and Sunny Afternoon - all a fun evening's entertainment as far as I'm concerned and nothing more, but sometimes that's all that is necessary. Hope my comment on WWRY was clear that as a particular show it wasn't my thing? I really wanted to love it but just ...didn't. Other jukebox musicals I've loved! I'm all for a serious and educational night at the theatre, and challenging interesting musicals, but we all want to relax and have fun sometimes too 
Another weird quirk is loving the recording, but hating the show...I loved the American Idiot recording but was decidedly 'meh' about the show. Same actually with some WWRY songs. I also love the really different arrangements of 'classic' songs jukebox musicals can give!
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1,351 posts
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Post by CG on the loose on Mar 14, 2017 8:30:20 GMT
Another Forbidden Planet fan here... last seen on tour in Oxford, I want to say a couple of years ago, but given that 'time flies ever faster' thing I havre going on, it was probably 4 or 5!
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3,057 posts
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Post by ali973 on Mar 14, 2017 9:59:59 GMT
I think there's always been a form of a "jukebox musical" one way or another that preceded the actual term. Back in the day, it was called a musical revue.
I really have no idea with a jukebox musical, provided it's not a bio-jukebox musical a la Beautiful, Buddy, etc. I could be intrigued with a quirky musical that cheekily shoehorns obscure numbers and barely have them make sense.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 14, 2017 10:10:41 GMT
If you go way back to the earlier parts of the twentieth century, quite a lot of musicals were created by stringing together a bunch of already popular songs with a story. It's more obvious when they do it nowadays as popular music and musical theatre have diverged from each other in style quite significantly, but it's really not a new thing.
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341 posts
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Post by adrianics on Mar 14, 2017 11:44:01 GMT
I get really annoyed at the snobbery of people who don't like shows such as WWRY. Fair enough if you don't like it, that's your prerogative, but to say things like it's a "damning indictment of how far society has fallen" is a bit offensive to those who happen to have a different opinion to you about something as utterly harmless as a cheesy musical. Likes and dislikes are always subjective and nothing gives you the right to be judgemental about other people just because you prefer theatre you consider to be more refined or intellectually challenging. People like theatre for different reasons and some people would do well to remember and respect that. When did I mention anyone who's a fan of WWRY, or say that they weren't allowed to enjoy it, or be judgmental of them in any way? For someone who's so sensitive about this, you don't seem to see a problem with making huge assumptions about me. |
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341 posts
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Post by adrianics on Mar 14, 2017 14:36:54 GMT
There is no problem, it's just that this works in both directions. Just like people are allowed to enjoy WWRY despite my own opinion that it's terrible, I am entitled to hold that view and do not deserve to be accused of being a "snob" who is "judgmental about other people" when I said absolutely nothing of the sort.
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