threeara's review
5.0
This series is absolutely invaluable -- this one preserves a script (As Thousands Cheer) that has never been published before! Still, there's a conflict for me with the authors presenting only the merits of these texts when they do include period-typical sexism and racism. I don't know how I expect that to be acknowledged, exactly, but some acknowledgement would be appropriate.
melias6's review
4.0
Ranking by Book/Libretto
1. South Pacific
2. Oklahoma!
3. Kiss Me, Kate
4. On the Town
5. Show Boat
6. Finian’s Rainbow
7. Pal Joey
8. As Thousands Cheer
Ranking by Score
1. South Pacific
2. Oklahoma!
3. Show Boat
4. Kiss Me, Kate
5. On the Town
6. Pal Joey
7. Finian’s Rainbow
8. As Thousands Cheer
Hot Takes:
South Pacific: Is there another musical with as many recognizable and superb songs as this one? Coupled with one of the smoothest and most "readable" books in the collection, it's the best of this bunch on both fronts.
Oklahoma!: Ditto the above, but in the #2 slot. (I've never considered myself a big Rodgers and Hammerstein fan -- the only score of theirs I love top-to-bottom is Carousel -- yet here we are.) Introduced one of my least favorite musical tropes, the dream ballet, but it goes down more easily in book form.
Kiss Me, Kate: The concept and construction are so smart (marrying the backstage musical with one of the Bard's prickliest -- and problematic -- comedies) that it would succeed even without Porter's music and lyrics. Yet despite a handful of inspired songs ("I Hate Men"; "Too Darn Hot"; "Brush Up Your Shakespeare") there are others that are merely pleasant.
On the Town: Feel similarly about this as I do Kiss Me, Kate. Book-wise, it's amusing and pleasant (if slight). Musically, there are some terrific songs and character work that stand on their own, but others suffer from the lack of visual context.
Show Boat: The biggest surprise for me musically -- I don't think I'd ever heard this in full before? Grand and stirring across the board, with a book that, for all its ambition and complexity, struggles to iron out the decades-spanning timeline of Act II.
Finian's Rainbow: Brand new to this one, and found the book a slog (if well-constructed and narratively satisfying). Musically it didn't do much for me; at least Pal Joey has "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered."
Pal Joey: Stories about cons long and short rarely pique my interest, and I much prefer Rodgers w/ Hammerstein vs Hart (and I'm not even huge fans of the former). The bigger problem is that these characters suffer on the page without the benefit of charismatic performers.
As Thousands Cheer: Automatically gets the bottom spot musically, since half of these Irving Berlin tunes are impossible to track down. (Of those available, only "Suppertime" evokes genuine pathos.) The book holds special interest for being available, for the first time, in its entirety here, but it's incredibly dated and just not very amusingly satiric.
1. South Pacific
2. Oklahoma!
3. Kiss Me, Kate
4. On the Town
5. Show Boat
6. Finian’s Rainbow
7. Pal Joey
8. As Thousands Cheer
Ranking by Score
1. South Pacific
2. Oklahoma!
3. Show Boat
4. Kiss Me, Kate
5. On the Town
6. Pal Joey
7. Finian’s Rainbow
8. As Thousands Cheer
Hot Takes:
South Pacific: Is there another musical with as many recognizable and superb songs as this one? Coupled with one of the smoothest and most "readable" books in the collection, it's the best of this bunch on both fronts.
Oklahoma!: Ditto the above, but in the #2 slot. (I've never considered myself a big Rodgers and Hammerstein fan -- the only score of theirs I love top-to-bottom is Carousel -- yet here we are.) Introduced one of my least favorite musical tropes, the dream ballet, but it goes down more easily in book form.
Kiss Me, Kate: The concept and construction are so smart (marrying the backstage musical with one of the Bard's prickliest -- and problematic -- comedies) that it would succeed even without Porter's music and lyrics. Yet despite a handful of inspired songs ("I Hate Men"; "Too Darn Hot"; "Brush Up Your Shakespeare") there are others that are merely pleasant.
On the Town: Feel similarly about this as I do Kiss Me, Kate. Book-wise, it's amusing and pleasant (if slight). Musically, there are some terrific songs and character work that stand on their own, but others suffer from the lack of visual context.
Show Boat: The biggest surprise for me musically -- I don't think I'd ever heard this in full before? Grand and stirring across the board, with a book that, for all its ambition and complexity, struggles to iron out the decades-spanning timeline of Act II.
Finian's Rainbow: Brand new to this one, and found the book a slog (if well-constructed and narratively satisfying). Musically it didn't do much for me; at least Pal Joey has "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered."
Pal Joey: Stories about cons long and short rarely pique my interest, and I much prefer Rodgers w/ Hammerstein vs Hart (and I'm not even huge fans of the former). The bigger problem is that these characters suffer on the page without the benefit of charismatic performers.
As Thousands Cheer: Automatically gets the bottom spot musically, since half of these Irving Berlin tunes are impossible to track down. (Of those available, only "Suppertime" evokes genuine pathos.) The book holds special interest for being available, for the first time, in its entirety here, but it's incredibly dated and just not very amusingly satiric.
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