The day Broadway took over.

Today, Broadway is becoming more and more prominent in the lives of all.

With the introduction of hit shows such as Glee and Smash, and the rising popularity of the annual Tony award ceremony, musical entertainment is showing its "mainstream" side. Here, I am going to give you some  details of "the day (or new era) that Broadway took over".

1) Smash
(first season aired: 2012)

First, my personal favorite.

Smash is a television drama about what goes on behind the curtains of a *fictional* big Broadway musical.

The show is named "Bombshell" and follows the beautiful/tragic life of Marilyn Monroe.
From casting to pre-production to opening night, the characters of Smash duel for roles, sabotage competitors, and sing out their emotion. But that's not the only singing they do. Of course, since it is a musical they are making, numbers are introduced throughout the season, bringing in a nice mix of covers and original compositions. The best part for me is envisioning how a producer could pick up this idea, and turn the fantasy production into a real-life showstopper. And damn, could it be good.

2) Glee

(first season aired: 2009)

Yes...Glee.

As much as any of us would hate to admit it (meaning I. I hate to admit it), Glee has played a huge role in getting musical-type entertainment into the headlines. For anyone who's not in the loop, I'll explain.

Glee is a television comedy/drama/whatever you want to call it, about a High School Spanish teacher who takes over the dying glee club and renews it. In this show, you have all the basic teenage hormonal drama- packed with love interests, sexuality conflicts, and other issues. But they sing! So what...it may be heavily lip-synced and auto-tuned, and yeah, there's no original compositions, but they are singing. My generation (sigh) has made them so popular, that despite the previously mentioned facts, there's no way anyone could ignore that Glee has brought music and stage performance to a new level of recognition.



3) The Tonys!
(first...tony award given: 1947)

Yes! The Tony award ceremonies! Every Broadway writers/singers/actors/producers/directors dream!

Think of the breast....*ahhem!* I MEAN prestige!

For those of you who live under a rock (also...why are you reading this all-about-theatre blog?) who don't know what the Tony awards are:

The Tony's (named after the Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre) is an annual award ceremony -like the Academy awards, Oscars, etc..- designated to recognize the best and brightest of Broadway that year.

And despite being run by a panel of about 700 like-minded judges, they usually make the right decisions.

Most major Broadway shows have either been popular and won a Tony, or won a Tony then became popular.

How about a list inside of a list!? Listception (had to be done)

1)Guys & Dolls                   6)Fiddler on the Roof  11)Evita           16)The Producers

2)My Fair Lady                   7)The Wiz                   12)Cats           17)Hairspray

3)The Music Man        8)A Chorus Line     13)Les Miserables 18)Spring Awakening

4)The Sound of Music         9)Annie                       14)Rent             19)Billy Elliot

5)How to Succeed 10)Sweeney Todd  15)The Lion King  20)The Book of Mormon

                                         
                                                 And this years...21) Once

All of those titles should be recognizable to the reader.

All of those shows won "Best" in their category.

But...anyone notice something? They're all musicals. (durr) And these are some of the winners since 1947. If you're doing the math right now, that's 38 years worth of winners that I did not list.

So, what do we have so far? Well, the list contains about a third of all the winners for Best Musical.

But wait! there's more. You forgot the runners-up for Best Musical! In that category, there are over 182 musicals that placed below the winner. These include (but are not limited to) 

1)West Side Story  6)Grease            11)Into the Woods          16)Wicked

2)Gypsy                  7)Pippin             12)Beauty and the Beast  17)Rock of Ages

3)Oliver!                 8)Chicago          13)Smokey Joe's Cafe     18)American Idiot

4)Hair                     9)Dreamgirls      14)Ragtime                19)Catch Me If You Can

5)Follies                10)Joseph & the ATD  15)Mamma Mia!               20)Sister Act

                             
                          And this years (popular) runner-up...21)Newsies

Holy Balls, did I get off topic.

Well, the main point of this whole article is to prove that musical entertainment is becoming more pronounced in our lives, right?

So tell me- how many of those titles did you recognize?

Maybe more then you'd expect, huh? Well there ya go. That has to be some kind of proof that the Tony's is worming it's way into your brain..like a parasite! Right? Right!?

Well okay, you get what I mean.

The essence of this article: Musical entertainment is all around you! Seek it out! There is a large group of fun, accepting people inching into daily society that are waiting for you to join them (not a cult).

But.. if you are really bent on not getting into our scene- persistently steering away whenever you hear those kids in the Black Box shout out a showtune, and changing channels as soon as you see Neil Patrick Harris doing his opening number- well...we'll probably just find you and force you to drink our fahbulous kool-aid. Whether you want it or not!

At which point you'll be whisked away to this heaven!
 (see you on the other side, Robin)

Phone Rings, Door Chimes, In Comes... Hello? Anybody?

Hey, remember back when there was more than one-and-a-half/two people running this blog? Remember back when people posted stuff here? Ah, memories. But then we get one or six little threatening notes from some dick called Chad about "taking us all out one by one," and all the little sissies run off. I'm sure that was just a joke, you wussies! But fine, I didn't need them, I can run this just fine by myself, and I've still got the Hipster for eye candy. Right, Hipster? ....Hello?

No one wants to work with the self proclaimed "Bitch," and I can't imagine why.

But this seemingly tragic event is all according to plan, because it gives me a nice little segway into what I was planning to write about. But I've forgotten what that was, so instead I'll talk about the Theatre of the Absurd. I make the rules now.
My first experience with Theatre of the Absurd was in Drama class, where I wrote a scene about a piece of space junk crashing into an out-of-used satellite, and the satellite realizing that it's scientists had stopped sending it signals and it was alone, kind of like how I'm all alone, so alone, just me and the friendly voices in my head telling me never to forgive those bad people.

Why do so many people take pictures of themselves curled up in dark rooms?

The awesomeness of my own work aside, I guess I have a bit of mixed feelings about them. The Absurdist shows, that is. I thought you might have gotten confused, because people tell me I get sidetracked easily and butterflies. But anyway, when I think of Surreal Shows, as I often do on these lonely nights, whilst taking pictures of myself curled up in a dark room, my instinctive response is to say that I love them. I want to be the type of person who likes absurd things. But if someone were to ask my opinion, which they never would- which is why I have a blog instead of friends, I would feel the need to think it over, and note that there are both pros and cons blah blah blah, no one came here to listen to me sound like an essay, so lets make a LIST! 
First off- The PROS!

Here represented by Robert Downey Jr. because it's my blog now and you can't stop me.

1. Surrealism gives you the power to explore things you might not be able to otherwise. The more odd and unreal a play is, or the more cerebral the play is, the easier it seems to be to explore a more cerebral topic. (That sounded far less obvious in my head.) Did you ask for examples? I thought I heard someone ask for examples. Well, I'll put some out anyway, and you can take them if you want. (I'm not saying that the following are examples of Theatre of the Absurd, I'm just saying they have some surreal moments/qualities that help capture their deeper topics/thoughts. Jesus. I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition.)

What were you expecting a picture of?

 Company:  At first, it seems straightforward, but then you realize that this guy has been having a hell of a lot of Birthdays lately, and that it was actually pretty stupid of you to expect straightforward from a Sondheim musical. Man attempts to sort out his feelings on commitment, watching his crazy married friends, his birthday, and his own relationships. At one point there's a tiny parade. And that's fine.
Death of a Salesman: Mostly realistic, but also delves deeply into memory, and has a few parts purely in the characters head. No, I won't tell you what it's about. Go read it. No I don't care if you don't have a copy. Buy one. Borrow one. Get one from the library. Steal one. Hold a friend hostage until their parents buy you a copy, and maybe a car too, since you have their son and all.
Waiting for Godot: Flat out Theatre of The Absurd. What the fuck is going on.
12. I feel like I could make a clever rhyme using the word "Artsy," but it escapes me. I'll admit it, I'm a sucker for the artistic type stuff. I'm one of those dicks that play pixel flash games that are 87% text and thinks abstract art is really deep. And in my defense, some of those can be really good. And it's great to live in a world where you can say, "I am an energetic piece of space junk" in front of a group of people, and they'll simply accept that. There's so many doors that are open to you.
I got it! Artsy Pie-chartsy!
75. Elephants are Awesome.

CONS

Here represented by some stranger I've never seen before.

1. Less accessible.This might end up being my only point in the cons section, but it's a pretty big point. Surreal works are very hard for some people to like, understand, and preform. For example, On of my favorite movies (as I might have mentioned before) is Adaptation, by Charlie and Donald Kaufman. If you aren't familiar with Charlie Kaufman's other works [Being John Malkovich, Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind], he's well known for being, as the professionals put it, weird as hell. Now, I think he's awesome and love it. But I've had friendly dinner conversations with people who thought his movies were just weird, and 'didn't get them.' As I poured hot soup over their heads, I mused that there are some people in the world who will just never be able to get into Absurdist theatre. It's one thing to watch Oklahoma! and like it. (That was a bad example. No one with any taste actually likes Oklahoma!) But even I had some troubles reading Waiting for Godot. Partly because I lost my place halfway through, and when I tried to remember what was happening so I could find where I was, I realized that nothing was happening ever. Adding on to that, you're probably never going to see a high school preform Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. (Although that'd be pretty bitchin'.) Like I said, it's less accessible. A smaller amount of people would be able to preform it, and there's a smaller market audience for it.
2. ... But Is it Art? Remember how earlier, I commented that I play a lot of Artistic type flash games? No, of course you don't, because you're only skimming through and looking at the pictures. But one problem with those games, is that some people just make a point and click game with shitty graphics, make everyone really agnsty, and then kill everyone off at the end. And as many observant people are probably thinking while reading this, there's a fine, fine line between absurdist art, and just being weird in the hopes people will think you're clever. And it can be hard to tell the difference sometimes. This problem pops up in about every form of media: Is abstract art brilliant, or just splotches on a canvas? Are these pictures of a pair of shoes deep and meaningful, or hipster bullshit? Are free verse poems / forms of art/ or just words/ with funny/ line breaks?

Jason Pollock is a question all in of himself.

I'd like to end this post in a parable.
Once apon a time, there was a cat and a turtle, who lived together in an old lady's house. Now, the turtle was a very obedient turtle, kind and easy to get along with. But he was also a very dull turtle, that never did anything but lie around and eat, and he never offered the lady any excitement or joy. The cat, meanwhile, was very hard to get along with, hissing at people who came too close and knocking over vases when no one was looking. But the old lady decided to befriend this cat anyway, and found to her delight that when she worked hard enough, the cat began to cuddle with her at nights and purr in her ear, giving the old lady great joy. The Surreal play is like this cat.
And then one day, a giant dragon flew down from the sky and ate the old lady, and the cat turned out to be a witch and flew away. And the turtle was alone, all alone, alone like me, with no one but the psychopath in the corner to keep me company.

Tomato soup.