When you think of musicals, you can’t help but think of Andrew Lloyd Webber. He has achieved the greatest success in musical theater and runs one of the largest theater companies in London. He can be credited with creating the longest-running and highest-grossing music production in history. The Phantom of the Opera celebrated its 10,000th Broadway performance on February 11, 2012, which is the first musical to do so and is still going strong today. His talent in producing musicals is legendary and may continue for a long time.
Les Miserables is another musical that has been around for more than 20 years. More than 60 million people around the world have seen musical theater in more than 40 countries. She recently hit the big screen with starring roles for Hugh Jackman, Russell Crowe and Anne Hathaway. If you want to cry well, go to your cinema and watch it. It’s easy to see why it won a Golden Globe for Best Picture and why it garnered 8 Oscar nominations and 9 Bafta nominations.
The history of musicals goes back a long way. I once visited the Amphitheater near Taormina in Sicily and you can bet he saw a good number of musicals in his day. The Romans are believed to have copied Greek theaters and performed in closed wooden structures. They put metal chips in the shows to enhance the sound of the dance. I guess these would be classified as the first tap shoes.
There is something great about musicals when they are done well. When I was a child, the most recorded and watched movies on television for me were all musicals. “The Wizard of Oz”, “Mary Poppins” and “Greece” were my favorites; even today I could sing all the songs and fully follow the spoken dialogue. I even remember spending hours perfecting the exact jump Dorothy makes down the yellow brick road! Then there were “Annie,” “Dirty Dancing,” “Fame,” and “Flashdance,” the list goes on. The more I think about it, the more I realize that I was educated in musicals.
But what is it about musicals that makes them so popular even today? I think it’s simply because they use song and dance to enhance a story. But I think it takes a special director and choreographer to make a musical work. Having seen many productions of the same musical, it seems that the success is really due to how well it is produced. A couple of years ago I took my mother to see “We Will Rock you” and it was just amazing. It really gives you the feel good factor.
I can’t wait for the next great musical to hit the stage. I’ve always wanted to start singing and whistling by doing my weekly shopping at Tesco’s! Maybe I need to fix this, get a group of friends, prepare a dance, and have some music ready. I bet it would make every shopper stop to look and give them the sense of well-being that the best musicals offer.