For someone who listens to a lot of podcasts, I have never been a diehard fan of musicals. I have never even watched a musical on the stage. That said, I have been a fan of listening to them for a long time and have finally leaped to go to a few live performances. Surprisingly, while I have some reservations about going to live musicals, they have been some of the most life-changing experiences of my life.
The stage musical is one of the most common forms of entertainment in today’s society, but what do you think about it? Musicals are one of the most popular forms of entertainment in the world today, and you can find them in almost any form of entertainment that can be watched, listened to, or read about. The format of musicals varies from musical to musical, but they can be broken down into three main types: plays, musicals, and musicals based on plays.
A brief history of the Stage Musical
In the early days of the theatre, plays were mostly performed on a bare stage, with actors performing more or less wordlessly on the spot. Strange as this might seem, these were the first “stage musicals” and the first “rock stars” of their day.
The idea of a stage musical has been around for centuries, and there have been numerous attempts to adapt it to the stage. The first published stage musical to be based on a book was “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby” in 1838, and it wasn’t until 1845 that a stage adaptation of Charles Dickens’s “Great Expectations” was performed. It was another 5 years before another successful stage adaptation, “The Pickwick Papers,” was performed.
Somewhere in the world, there is a musical written by someone named Andrew Lloyd Webber. The musical was called “Cats.” It features many things that make musicals great: a big cast of characters, a complex plot (which is also told in a flashback), and a ton of catchy songs. “Cats” was a hit with audiences and critics alike, and it opened on Broadway in 1981. Since then, it has been performed all over the world, and versions of the musical have been produced in several languages.
What makes a Stage Musical great?
The simple fact is that the script is a vital part of the design when it comes to staging a musical. But what makes a script great? For starters, it has to be well written. But the thing is, so many people overlook their writing skills. They think because writing is something they never did or did poorly in school, they’re not good enough to write a script for their favorite musical. They’re wrong.
Script Writing: There are three main areas to focus on when writing a script for a musical.
1.) The story
2.) The dialogue
3.) The lyrics
The first and most important thing is the story. A stage musical should be able to stand on its own and not require previous knowledge of the story it’s telling. The second thing is the music and the lyrics. Both elements must be strong and well written. If anything, you should be able to tell the story without listening to the music and/or lyrics, which seems to be the case for many stage musicals these days.
Why it is important to learn about the Stage Musical
It’s no secret that there’s a great deal of wisdom to gain from studying the classics, but you must learn about the stage musical. Broadway is the genetic source of just about everything that exists in modern culture, and it will be used as a model to explain the basics of movie, TV, and video game production. Not all shows are created equal, however, so it’s important to be knowledgeable about the classics so that you can understand the context for these new forms of entertainment.
So, the stage musical is a wonderful art form that is joyful, meaningful, and enriching but imperfect. There are flaws in the stage musicals of today, but there are also reasons to be optimistic about the future of the art form, and for fans of the stage musicals of today, there are also reasons to be optimistic.
