Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance which combines elements of song, spoken word, acting and dancing. The story and emotions in a musical such as anger, joy, sadness and love to say a few are expressed through the words, music and movement. It took many years for American musical theatre to obtain its own identity. The first musical production in the colonies, in South Carolina, was “Flora” in 1735.
The Book musical has been defined as a musical play where songs and dance are fully integrated into a well made story with serious dramatic scenes that can stir up emotions other than laughter. The three main section of a Book musical is the music, lyrics and the book.
It is normally built around from four to six themes tunes, these tunes are usually replayed again at the end of the musical. Each song in a Book musical is individual, they are crafted to suit the character and also the situation they are in.
A genre that is closely related to musical theatre in a theatrical form is opera, but the two are distinguished by a number of factors, musicals generally have a focus on spoken dialogue, dancing and use of various genres of popular music. Whereas an opera singer is first and foremost a singer and secondarily an actor, while a musical theatre performer are firstly an actor and then a singer and dancer.
During the early 1900s, musicals “The Merry Widow” by Franz Lehar had a huge influence on the Broadway musical, but composers George M. Cohan and Victor Herbert gave the American musical comedy an individual sound and style. But then the composers Jeroma Kern and Guy Boulton developed this further and created the Princess Theatre show. This was putting believable people and believable situations on the stage. In the 1920s musical comedy gained worlwide attention. Composers such as Cole Porter, Rodgers and Hart, Gershwin and others began to make a name for themselves on Broadway
During the early 20th century musical theatre gores needed the entertainment to escape the reality of World War I. In 1919 the musical “Irene” had the longest running streak on Broadway until 1938, running for 670 performances. From here the musicals of the roaring twenties emphasize big dance routines which hadn’t been done before. This decade was full of light hearted musicals such as “No No Nanette”, “Lady Be Good” and “Funny Face” and had stars such as Marilyn Miller and Fred Astaire performing in them and also had popular songs by Rodger and Hart, Cole Porter and many others.
These popular songs dominated musical theatre, such as “Tea for Two” and “Someone’s Watching over Me”. This is because during the dark days during the war people needed something upbeat and happy and musicals provided it.
Show Boat in 1927 represented a more complete combination of book and scored than the Princess musical theatres, with dramatic themes, dialogue, setting and themes, this was created by using lyrics and libretto by Kern’s and Oscar Hammerstein.
After the post Broadway national tour of Show Boat, the Great Depression had begun and the public began to stop attending musicals and people did not have money to spend on entertainment. Although the Great Depression did not stop Broadway, in 1930 the light hearted musical “Of Thee I Sing” by Gershwin reached its creative peek and became the first musical to win a Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
The 1940’s to 1960’s were the Golden Age for musical theatre. In the 1940’s Rodger and Hart, Weill and Gershwin and others would produce more hit musicals. “Oklahoma!” By Rodgers and Hammerstein completed the revolution of musical theatre begun by Show Boat by firmly integrating all aspects of musical theatre. With a solid plot, songs that furthered the actions of the story and used dream ballets, along with dances that advanced the plot and developed characters.
In the 1950’s Broadway music was the popular music of the western world and popular Hollywood films were made from musicals. One of the longest running show at this time was “The Three penny Opera”, it ran for 2707 shows becoming the longest running off Broadway musical.
Since the 19th century directors and choreographers have had an influence on musical theatre, until George Abbott. Abbott introduced ballet as a story telling tool in the production of “On Your Toes”
During the Golden Age of musical theatre large corporations and other companies began to employ starts of Broadway to write corporate musical, this is a musical performed only by the employees and shareholders of the business. This was to create a sense of being a part of the team. The last hit of the 1950’s musicals was Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “The Sound of Music”; it was a huge success and ran for 1443 performances along with winning a Tony Award for Best Musical. In 1965 a film version of “The Sound of Music” was made and with this it has become one of the most popular musicals in history.
The first musical produced in the 1960’s off Broadway was “The Fantasticks”; it was soon to become the longest running musical in history running for over 40 years. The same producer of this show had two other musical hits “I Do! I Do!” and “Celebration” which were both the first two character Broadway musicals.
A number of musical hits were produced in the 1960’s such as “Fiddle on the Roof”, “Hello, Dolly”, “Funny Girl” and “Cabaret”. Two men who had a major impact on the musical theatre of 1960’s were Stephen Sondheim and Jerry Herman.