Musicals

I recently had an argument on Facebook over one of those status games that tell you to Explain A Movie Plot Badly. It was about Grease and the caption was something about a girl dropping all of her standards to win back a greasy, horny, teenage boy... or something like that; I forgot the words. And it's dead on accurate - Sandy caves to peer pressure to try and get Danny's attention. What bothered me was how everyone in the comments section couldn't wait to start ripping on men in general, as is the unfortunate trend. So I pointed out that Danny compromised too and other things. But my main concern was that so many people had been taught to hate a nice movie like this out of some desire to feel socially superior.

It just made me start thinking of musicals in general. I grew up watching musicals as well as other very old movies. I guess they might be why my romantic sensibilities could be considered kind of screwed up, but I think they could be so much deeper than just the silly fluff of the songs and dance routines. Even in something like Grease. I've loved them for a lot of years. All different kinds.

I looked up the categories that they're separated into. They're divided into several categories like Book musicals which integrates all the singing and dancing in with the stories and dialogue. I have my own categories though, and I'd categorize these as Fantasy musicals because the music isn't separate from the script. All emotions and thoughts are sung as well as some of the conversations between characters. Most of my favorites fall into this category and a lot of people recognize these right away as what is clearly defined as a musical.

Another category is Jukebox musicals which is a musical created using preexisting songs. That was the definition of it anyway and what comes to my mind are the Elvis Presley movies where his songs are featured. I haven't seen most of them, so I don't know if they're incorporated as part of the script as well, but I think these movies as well as the movies that the Beatles made (Help, Yellow Submarine, etc.) are what are primarily being referred to here. I also think you could throw in a movie like Dirty Dancing into this category too even though it isn't classified as a musical because it centered around dance routines. In my own category I separate the Fantasy musicals from that of Performance musicals. Most would still readily identify them as musicals, but in my mind they're separate because the songs in the movie are being performed as acknowledge songs or entertainment, not as conversations or "thinking out loud." Movies like White Christmas and The Glenn Miller Story are a good example of this. Most of them combine these two categories as well.

Another category I found was Concept musicals which strive to make a social commentary part of the production. Things like Hair and Cats fall into this one although they still fall into the Fantasy category to me, social commentary or not.

Revue musicals are mostly for the stage and one of them includes several vignettes, sketches, songs, and dance routines. They're usually all related, but they don't have to be. It's a throwback to Vaudville when a variety of acts made up a single stage show. The Zigfield Follies fall under this category. I don't know of many others that do, but I'm not current with what's going on on Broadway nowadays.

Another category is the Rock Opera and that's a category that I can't bring myself to count since it's just hard to think of modern rock music as something that can be considered a musical. I know - Grease is filled with Rock and Roll music, but it's different than Pink Floyd's The Wall, The Who's Tommy, and things like that just seem like albums to me. It's probably because I think of musicals as movies and not elaborate rock concert productions.

 I also have a hard time thinking of Rock Biographies like The Buddy Holly Story and La Bamba as musicals, but I guess I have to count them since I do count other biopics like The Glenn Miller Story, The Five Pennies, and The Jolson Story. I guess I can just categorize them as Performance musicals even though they're modern.

Then there are movies that are mislabeled as musicals. I think a lot of Doris Day movies are thought of as musicals since she was a recording artist as well. And some movies genuinely were musicals like Calamity Jane, but in her "sexless sex comedies" of the late fifties and early sixties, she would always get a song in somewhere in the movie since she was also known as a singer. It would be as a performance, not as part of the conversation. Or it would be background music while she was preparing for her meeting with the leading man.
I don't know if Pink Panther has ever been mislabeled as a musical, but those who don't care for musicals would probably lump it in if it contains a scene like this where someone sings It Better Be Tonight at a party scene near the beginning.

As I said, I haven't kept current with what's on Broadway. Most of the musicals I know and love are the ones that have been made into movies. I haven't included the animated ones that are on the Wikipedia list because I grew up with Disney and it seems natural that cartoons should be musicals. But they count too in the the main categories. It's probably not any easier to make an outlandish production in animation than it is with a large cast of dancers and singers. I just love them all so much! It's one of my passions. One of my fandoms! I'll have to make a list of favorites sometime.