Discovering a new show to fall in love with is one of my favorite things about being a musical theater geek. There’s nothing that compares to the excitement of hearing one song, loving it instantly, and then ending up with the entire cast recording of a show on your iPod. Not to mention the newly-found lyrics and lines all over your Twitter feed and Facebook timeline.
I know that for each under-appreciated show, there is a secret group of people who love it more than any other musical you could possibly think of, and that certainly makes me feel better for those musicals and their fate. There are, however, shows that simply deserve more attention – musicals that never made it big, ones that have been forgotten, or have somehow just slipped under the radar of the younger generation of theater fans.
Sometimes, you might feel like discovering something you have never listened to before and that may be hard if you have no idea where to start looking. That’s exactly where a list of under-appreciated musicals could really come in handy. So there we go: without too many plot spoilers, here are five musicals you should know more about, if you don’t love them already!
1. The Pajama Game
Based on a novel, this 1954 musical covers topics such as feminism (women working in the 50s!) and labor troubles (no one’s getting paid enough!) through a story about a pajama factory. While the topics The Pajama Game covers are serious, the show itself is equal amounts hilarious and touching, the songs are catchy, and the characters are all equally lovable in different ways: from the supporting roles of the factory employees, to Sid and Babe – the two main characters whose rocky love story on the two sides of the trade union (and the factory’s hierarchy) becomes the center of the musical.
The romantic plot line, however, is no more important than the workers’ strike, and their struggle to get fair pay for their work at the factory. The perfect balance between those two aspects of the plot, along with the comedy of some of the musical numbers and dialogue make the show interesting and appealing to a very wide audience.
Recommended Songs: “I’m Not At All in Love,” :There Once Was a Man,” “7 ½ Cents”
You’ll love it if you like: Kinky Boots, 9 to 5, any show with a factory/office or an unlikely love story!
2. She Loves Me
Have you ever seen You’ve Got Mail? Late 90s, Meg Ryan, Tom Hanks, and that adorable final scene with the running dog that always makes me cry? The romcom and Harnick and Bock’s She Loves Me (1963) are both adaptations of the same novel! The plot is quite similar and honestly, not too surprising: a man and a woman think they hate each other but end up falling in love without even realizing it. It’s cute, it’s romantic, it gets just sad enough to prompt a few melancholy scenes towards the middle of the second act.
She Loves Me stays much closer to the source material than the Nora Ephron movie. The musical keeps the original setting – the entire plot revolves around the employees of a perfume and cosmetics shop in Budapest, where the main characters – Georg and Amalia, meet and where all of the challenges of their relationship begin.
Like with The Pajama Game, the comedic moments and all of the supporting characters (who are just as interesting as the leads!) make the show perfect for young theater fans. Also Krysta Rodriguez once said she’d like to play Ilona, Amalia’s best friend, and I think that’s the beginning of a revival cast right there!
Recommended songs: “I Don’t Know His Name,” “Try Me,” “Vanilla Ice Cream”
You’ll love it if you like: Newsies, First Date, ice cream, romantic comedies
3. The Threepenny Opera
This musical is old—like, really old. Like, 1920s old. Written by Kurt Weill and Bertold Brecht, it is an adaptation of an eighteenth century English opera. While the production history of the musical is really interesting, and the importance of the show and its creators in the world of theater is undeniable, it’s honestly not the kind of musical a young, 21st century theater kid would immediately be interested in.
Here’s why you should be: it’s all about criminals and horrible people in Victorian London. The main character is all kinds of dark and despicable, and happens to be a serial killer. What’s worse is none of the other characters are all about rainbows and sunshine, either. Even the policemen who are supposed to be “the good guys” are just as corrupt and dangerous as the criminals and degenerates!
I’m sure that, with the upcoming off-Broadway production’s stellar cast, people will be prompted to revisit and rediscover the musical. It would be fascinating to see the way its social criticism is received and interpreted by a whole new generation of theater goers almost an entire century after the musical was first performed!
Recommended songs: “The Ballad of Mack the Knife” (or just watch the opening of the 1930s film!)
You’ll love it if you like: Sweeney Todd, Les Miserables, Victorian England
4. [title of show]
Imagine two guys, Hunter and Jeff, who are writing a musical. And it’s all about writing a musical. And because that’s a great, meta idea, Hunter Bell and Jeff Bowen actually sat down and wrote a musical about Hunter and Jeff… writing a musical. Since every show, even the one-act hilarious and almost absurd ones, needs a title, they called the show [title of show] (2006), and thus a musical that doesn’t get nearly enough love was born.
Once you get past the obvious absurdism of the entire concept, and the fact that all of the characters in the show are named after the original cast, you’re left with what’s simply one act of brilliant comedy that manages, lightheartedly while getting its point across, to bring the audience’s attention to what has to happen in order for a show to become something that exists outside its creators’ minds.
In that sense, [title of show] is really not that different from, for example, Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George – it is a musical about the artists’ craft, and everything that happens throughout the show is centered around the work that goes into finalizing a work of art. What makes [title of show] so lovely is the way it manages to incorporate that topic within a perfectly crafted post-modern comedy that is hilarious and engaging from the moment you hear the mere concept of it, and has you absolutely hooked by the time you reach the Finale.
Recommended songs: “Secondary Characters,” “Nine People’s Favorite Thing”
You’ll love it if you like: Sunday in the Park with George, people making art, hilarious pop culture references
5. Bonnie & Clyde
We all know the story: Bonnie and Clyde’s life is tragically cut short by nearly 130 bullets fired at them—or by, you know, Frank Wildhorn’s show closing after just 69 performances on Broadway.
It hasn’t been that long since that closing night, and I feel like this is the one musical on the list that everyone kind of knows about. I don’t think, however, that it gets nearly as much appreciation as it deserves. Heartbreaking love story, crime and angsty belting aside, there is so much more to Bonnie & Clyde that makes the musical incredibly special.
A dramaturgical masterpiece, it tells the story of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow a lot more truthfully and honestly than most adaptations of their life story, which focus on the crimes they committed and glamorize killing people while ignoring the passion, the love and the struggles that were the reason behind everything Bonnie and Clyde (and their gang!) did.
The show’s dialogue and lyrics, as well as the set and costume design in the original Broadway production are dedicated on portraying Bonnie and Clyde, and everyone else in their lives, as human as possible. The musical makes you understand them and sympathize with them (even if, of course, you don’t condone their crimes!) a lot more than every History Channel documentary on the topic. Maybe sometimes, and definitely in Bonnie & Clyde’s case, just singing about things on a Broadway stage makes them more understandable than ever.
Recommended songs: “This World Will Remember Us,” “Dyin’ Ain’t So Bad”
You’ll love it if you like: The 1930s, history, action… Laura Osnes and Jeremy Jordan
Photo via The New York Times