I confess I am not a big fan of Broadway Musicals. I don’t have any specific reason why. Maybe it’s because I’m not moved much by visual performance of song, maybe it’s the boundaries of the stage, maybe the changing scenes in the same space. I’m not sure. I’ve seen maybe three “Broadway” performances. My first real Broadway performance was “Godspell,” in 1983, in New York City. That performance was a school field trip.
I was in our own high school musical “Godspell” in 1983. After much controversy, our school cancelled its performance of “Oklahoma,” the large cast was dismissed, and a quickly-assembled cast was to perform “Godspell.” My sister was part of the new cast, and I happened to be “drafted” onto the cast when I went to pick her up from rehearsals the first evening. The music teacher, Mr. David DeAngelis, thought that if my sister could sing then so could I. So I sang. I was not Pavarotti, but I got the job done.
We took the field trip to give ourselves a jump-start, showing us what the musical “should” look like, when performed by professionals. We only had a few weeks to learn and get ready, so this quick immersion helped. That was my first introduction to live musical performance. We performed “Godspell” in my high school for a week, if I remember right. The house was full each day. I did decide, however, that performance art was really not my thing…I was more of a visual media artist. Further, I didn’t like the “drama” of all the needy performer personalities.
As I mentioned, I’ve seen very few Broadway performances. Recently I’ve seen “Spamalot” and “The Book of Mormon.” I went to those performances because I’m a big fan of Monty Python and Southpark.
I’ve seen several other iconic musicals as movies – “Oklahoma,” “West Side Story,” “Oliver,” “The Music Man,” and others, I’m sure. I enjoyed the movie versions of those musicals. Thinking back, it was probably because they weren’t confined to a stage.
After reading several articles on the Stage Door web site, I was really struck by the PASSION Angel de Quinta had for the stage and all of the performances he wrote about. He also writes with such vibrant color. I enjoyed his writing style. I can’t say I share his unbridled enthusiasm for the stage, but I appreciate the effort he put in to each article I read. I also appreciate the contributions to the genre he has made.