Hello, Goodbye

Hi everyone.

I've officially moved on from this blog.

I realized it never quite got to where I wanted it to go. If you want to see more of what I'm doing check out my new blog:

The Fangirl's Dilemma

It's more focused, I update (almost) daily, and I'm really happy about it.

Thanks everyone over here!

No One Loves Dick Whitman...except I love Mad Men

Mad Men is back.

Now that I've had some time to process the premier, I'm ready to say that I liked it. I didn't know how I felt about it at first, but let's face it, ambiguity is kind of the point with Mad Men, so I've decided that I liked it.

I loved the way things lined up. I love Megan and Don's marriage. I love that she knows about Dick Whitman and vehemently doesn't give a shit. I love that Peggy is still pissed about Megan. I love that Joan loves being a mother to her and Roger's son Kevin, but she still wants to get back to work, and doesn't feel guilty or torn about it at all. (This is why Joan kicks ass, by the way.) I love that Roger and Jane's marriage continues to deteriorate. Because that's what happens Roger, when you leave awesome Mona for someone who isn't Joan! I love that Don hated the stupid surprise party Megan threw him as much as the stupid dinner parties that Betty would throw.

I really love that just about everyone's situation has changed except Pete. Because Pete is just a douchebag. Also, I love that we saw Trudy and not Betty. A lot of people didn't like that. But I thought it was awesome. Because Betty is terrible. I don't just mean that she's a bitch (she is) or that she's crazy (also, yes) I mean that she's a terribly boring character. Now that she's not married to Don, really, who cares? I don't care about her life with Henry except Sally's there. And Sally Draper is my favorite kid on TV (Sorry Luke Dunphy and Arya Stark, you guys are good too, just not Sally good.)

Anyway, I'm psyched Mad Men is back, and I've spend the past few night staring at 60's dresses on eBay for that reason.

It's the Beat of Her Heart: The Promise of Smash and The Failure of Glee

It started out small. A breath, a tiny little line that struck a chord with a few hundred people in this world:

"Being a part of something special makes you special, right?"

When nearly four years ago, Rachel Berry earnestly said those words to Will Schuester, we all exhaled. It was here. It had been threatening for so long, the re-mainstreaming of musicals. We'd been hoping since Chicago, living through Camp, and High School Musical, and Dreamgirls and You're the One That I Want, and a dozen other misfires. But this, this little show, about a glee club in Ohio, this was the one we were waiting for.

How quickly we were proved wrong. Yes, Glee was plenty mainstream. And yes, some of it's elements do musicals proud, but it lost focus somewhere along the line and became instead of telling a coherent story aided by song and dance (and sometimes told through them) a convoluted mess of unresolved plots, inconsistent characters and uninspired pop covers.

Three seasons later I'm still watching, but I don't know why. I rarely enjoy it anymore, and end each Tuesday night at 9, frustrated that this promising baby, born of two genres I love, musicals and teen dramadey never delivered on it's promises.

Glee was a false savior. But I think it did a more important job, which was to provide television a platform for Smash.

If you haven't been watching, Smash is a brilliant new show on NBC about putting on a Broadway musical, starring among others, Debra Messing, Angelica Houston, the guy that played the Commodore in The Pirates of The Caribbean, and a stable of Broadway actors (Will Chase & Christian Borle to name two of them.)

But that's not the main event. The main event is the two female leads, played by American Idol runner up Katherine McPhee and Broadway vet Megan Hilty. They play two girls vying for the coveted role of Marilyn Monroe in Marilyn: The Musical. The two couldn't be more different. Hilty is a veteran chorus girl named Ivy Lynne, who has been working Broadway for ten years, and McPhee plays Karen Cartright, a fresh face new comer from Iowa who is seriously talented. You probably saw the endless promos featuring her singing Christina Aguilera's "Beautiful." That was a great moment but there have been endless amazing musical moments since then. I even don't hate Nick Jonas anymore because he was totally endearing singing "I Just Haven't Met You Yet" in episode 3.

All of the characters are compelling, the plot lines a wonderful and soapy, and apparently the logistics are absurdly realistic (if slightly heightened for dramatic effect.) Smash is doing amazing things, and I can't wait to see where it goes. Of course, six episodes in, there was still a lot of hope for Glee too.

But Glee didn't open their sixth episode with Bernadette Peters singing "Everything's Coming Up Roses." So point, Smash.

Ain't it a fine life?

If anything was going to get me blogging again, it was going to be this.

Last night I had a singularly fun experience. And fun is absolutely the word I would use.

I went to go see Disney's Newsies, on Broadway.

20 years ago (chilling) Disney released a little (ha!) movie entitled Newsies. It was a full fledged musical, with new songs by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman, who had just received an Oscar for another little movie they wrote some songs for called Beauty and The Beast...maybe you've heard about it. Newsies was directed by a fairly unknown choreographer named Kenny Ortega. It starred Robert Duvall, Anne Margaret, Bill Pullman, and an up and coming Welsh teenager named Christian Bale, as well as a full ensemble of singing, dancing, non threatening hunky teenage boys.

The movie flopped. But Ashman and Menken went on to write Aladdin and Menken several other Disney hits. Ortega later made the High School Musical and Christian Bale...well..

He did OK for himself in the end.

But Newsies never went away. It developed a massive cult following. Seriously, google it. And twenty years later Disney brought it back as a stage musical.

Newsies has lots of flaws. The film has massive horrific flaws. Doesn't make it less wonderful. I love that movie, not despite it's flaws, but because of them. It takes itself far too seriously, there are about seven too many plots, Robert Duvall is absolutely terrible as Joseph Pulitzer. Like, massively awfully terrible. Jack Kelly (Bale) has an awkward, shoehorned in romance with the older sister of his right hand David. Ann-Margaret's entire character, Medda seems to only exist because they wanted Ann-Margaret to be in the movie. Bill Pullman seems unable to stop being Bill Pullman.

They fixed some of these problems for the stage version. Medda becomes Jack's other employer. In addition to being a Newsie, he's an aspiring and very talented artist and he paints back drops for her theater. Sarah (the sister) is excised altogether, as is Brian Denton (Pullman) and both are replaced with Catherine, a plucky Jo March type female reporter who joins forces with the newsies. She's infinitely more compelling and streamlines the plot a little bit.

Now, it's still deeply flawed. A totally unnecessary Act II plot twist complicates Catherine and Jack's relationship, which given that she is clearly meant to be an educated upper class young lady, and he a street kid was probably already complicated enough. David's character is turned into a bit of a wimp, although that may have just been casting, and the supporting newsies, who in the film are colorful and each have distinct and loveable personalities, are pushed to the back to create a more intense interior monologue for Jack. Which translates into about twenty six (hyperbole) reprise's of Jack's character song (musical theatre term!) "Sante Fe."

Spot Conlon, Crutchy and Racetrack still make the cut (though Racetrack's name is shortened to simply "Race") but gone are Kid Blink, Boots, and my favorite Mush. Spot and the Brooklyn newsies do get their own song now though, entitled "Never Fear, Brooklyn's Here!"

There are several new songs, including a duet between Jack and Catherine that is pure beautiful Menken schmaltz. I smiled thinking how good he is at that Act II duet. "Suddenly Seymour," "A Whole New World," and "I See The Light," are perfect examples and "I Believe in You," isn't quite as good as those, but it's perfectly lovely. A new song for Medda is worlds better than her originals, and "The Bottom Line" performed by Pulitzer and is cronies isn't memorable but it does it's job.

The dancing is superb and the energy doesn't stop. And the guys are still totally hunky in that adorable boy bandy way. What impressed me the most is that the musical stands on it's own. Knowing the movie helps, but it's hardly necessary to enjoy the show.

I did wake up this morning and walk to work skipping and humming "Carrying The Banner," and I haven't stopped smiling since the curtain went down. So it definitely did it's job.