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.

New Season Awards

OK, so now that I've gotten most of the new seasony stuff whittled down, here are some of the things that I have to say about it, a few "awards" if you will. Not all of them are positive

Best Pilot:

New Girl. Hands down, this show gets the award for best from moment one. I was a little skeptical, because it seemed a little too similar to a certain ignored TBS sitcom with the EXACT SAME PREMISE. (RIP My Boys...I will continue to sing your praises for all time.) But Zooey Deschanel is adorable, the guys are hilarious and really, can any of us really deny that we've been running around for the past two weeks singing, "Who's that girl? It's Jess!"

Best Comeback:

Glee. Let's face the facts, last season Glee was, umm, let's say it was distracted. Distracted is a good word. But it seems to be on it's way back. Who knew that all it would take was a breath of fresh air from Blaine, the return of Shelby Corcoran, and a new villain in the form of a tone deaf Vanessa Lengies, her character is named Sugar, but I'm just gonna call her Roxanne. Also, shifting the musical focus from top 40 regurgitation to interesting renditions of showtunes, classic pop/rock and standards. There have only been two episodes and we've already gotten six Broadway belts (Ding dong the witch is Dead, Hey Big Spender, Anything Goes/Anything You Can Do I can do Better, Somewhere and Something's Coming.)

Biggest Surprise
Ringer. I thought that Ringer was going to be awful. It isn't it's kind of wonderful in that guilty pleasure CW kind of way. Plus it's Buffy and Richard Alpert (Buffy and Lost related CSD is one crazy combo, and guarantees all kind of out there plot twists.)

Biggest Pilot Let Down
Free Agents. I wanted to love Free Agents. I really did. It has a phenomenal cast. I don't love Free Agents. I don't know how I feel about it. That kind of fits in really well with the spirit of that show though.

Biggest Post Pilot Let Down
Pan Am. I loved the pilot for Pan Am...I loved the concept. Mad Men, on a plane, with spies. But episode 2 was a mess. And Christina Ricci needs more attention. Her character is awesome. She's like, Joan Hollaway...but on a plane.

Best Comeback (Showrunner Edition)
Josh Schwartz. OK, so Chuck had a little bit to do with restoring my faith in Josh, but Hart of Dixie pushed it right on over the edge. If the adorable Rachel Bilson vehicle, and the spy comedy of all spy comedies have been where his focus have been, it explains so much of why Gossip Girl has been so sloppy and awful the past few seasons. And so Josh, I forgive you for Blair/Dan and Jenny/Chuck, so long as Zoe Hart sticks around.

So, that's what's happening in my head right now. What about some other thoughts on the new season?

West Side Stor-Glee

OK, so I spent a good chunk of my life and I don't mean recently, I mean in my entire 23 years, analyzing, over thinking and casting and recasting West Side Story. So now that Glee is embracing this, the greatest of all musicals. (Seriously, it's THE BEST MUSICAL EVER)

So, here's my New Directions Casting of West Side Story (regardless of whatever maimed version Murphy, Falchuck and the other guy decided)

Tony: Blaine (the ONLY choice
Maria: Rachel (again)
Riff: Puck
Bernardo: Mike Chang (did you know that in the show Bernardo doesn't sing, but he has to dance like a Mofo?)
Anita: Santana
Action: Artie (I know he's directing the show, but really? Could it be anyone else in that club singing Officer Krupke?)
Rosalia: Mercedes
Anybodys: Tina
Baby John: Kurt
A-Rab: Finn
Graziella: Brittney
Chino: Ok, look there is no clear choice for Chino in New Directions and we're out of boys.
Velma: Quinn
The Shark Girls: The Cheerios
The Jet Boys: The Warblers

So yeah, that's how it should happen.

It probably won't.

Edit By Big Bro Mike: Finn as Riff and a random warbler as A-Rab solves a few problems. It allows Puck to play Bernardo and them you can shift Mike Chang to Chino. There DONE!

What I'm loving so far

So, the new TV season is off and running, even if all the racers aren't in yet. Here's some of the stuff I like so far...

1. The new Sheriff on Sons of Anarchy and his no nonsense dealings with the club, and that dick US Attorney.
   
2. The return of Lea Michelle's bangs.
3. Two Broke Girls. Everything about Two Broke Girls. (Yes, even the horse and the bad puns.)
   
4. The cast of Up All Night, even if the pilot didn't totally rock.
5. That Dharma and Greg toured Charlie Harper's house on the Two and A Half Men premier.
6. Quinn Fabray's Gwen Stefani hair.
7. The impending domination of Fox and then the planet by the Deschanel sisters.
8. The impending domination of all of TV and then the less quirky parts of the planet by the cast of Buffy.
9. Speaking of Buffy, Ringer doesn't suck. So that's kind of cool.
10. Terry O'Quinn's character on Hawaii Five-0 is basically John Locke.
11. This season Robin is going to be chasing Barney, not the other way around.
12. Oh and Victoria is back on How I Met Your Mother. VICTORIA people! This going to be classic Mosby.
13. Finding out that Juice is half black and that the reason why he lied about it is the Sons don't accept black members. (Also, Juice gets a storyline, this almost makes up for the loss of Half-Sack...almost)
    
14. New Directions is putting on West Side Story.
15. Beercules.
16. Vanessa Lengies on Glee. (She can dance to one of Quinn's Donna Summer songs)

So, that's the beginning. After the rest of the week (through Sunday) I'll make another list. Excluding the shows I listed here.