Film Music Archives - Page 2 of 3

Sweet Charity’s Sisterly Sourcing and Songs

August 21, 2023February 10, 2022 by debisimons

Actress Giulietta Masina in Nights of Cabiria; licensed under Creative Commons https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/legalcode

The Sourcing

The Broadway musical Sweet Charity opened in 1966 to rave reviews, sweeping up nine Tony nominations and winning one, lasting for a respectable 600+ performances and then being revived many times, both in the US and abroad. Bob Fosse won the Tony for choreography and then ended up directing the film version, his directorial debut in that genre. Everybody could be pretty happy about how this story about “a girl who wanted to be loved” turned out. But where did the idea for the whole thing come from in the first place?

All sources I’ve consulted agree that the precursor to the plot of Sweet Charity was the 1957 film by famous Italian director Federico Fellini called Nights of Cabiria, which concerns an ever-hopeful prostitute who never loses her optimism that someday she’ll find true love and happiness. And where did he get the idea for the plot, you ask? Well, often the source of ideas is completely unknown, even to the artist him/herself. (One of the most irritating questions you can ask an author is, “Where do you get the ideas for your books?” The only legitimate answer is usually a shrug, perhaps accompanied by an eye roll.) But for this story we do have at least somewhat of a source, probably gleaned from Fellini’s letters or other papers. It’s not terribly upbeat: “The film took its inspiration from news reports of a woman’s severed head retrieved in a lake and stories by Wanda, a shantytown prostitute Fellini met” on the set of a previous movie. (Wikipedia) The mystery of creativity, of course, is that lots of other people had read that head-in-the-lake story, and Wanda probably talked to lots of other people on the film set. But only Fellini got the idea of making those disparate elements into a movie. He started the film with his main character ending up in the river, not a lake, and still in possession of her head—but having been pushed in by her cad of a boyfriend who then stole all of her money. The story went on from there with Cabiria going from cad to cad; at the end she was left alone but still hopeful.

Were the Hills Ever Really Alive with the Sound of Music?

June 21, 2022September 27, 2021 by debisimons

The real Maria von Trapp, late in life. Image accessed via https://www.factinate.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Untitled-28-1.jpg

In other words, is there a true story behind the musical? And of course there is, and it’s much more interesting than the plot that could be crammed onto the stage or into a film. (Note the proper use of prepositions.)

We all know that when we see the words “based on a true story” at the beginning of a biopic or a docudrama that we’d better not take the storyline too seriously. Those warnings don’t appear at the beginning of The Sound of Music, but perhaps they should. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed researching the real von Trapp family and would urge you to follow the links below to get a fuller picture than I can give here.

A Song about Singing—“It’s a Grand Night for Singing”

June 21, 2022August 29, 2021 by debisimons

The long road to this song started with a novel, State Fair by Phil Strong, written in 1932. Its unifying event is . . . wait for it . . . the three days of the Iowa State Fair, in which a farm family consisting of a husband, wife, daughter and son have various adventures and romances over that period. And in case you were wondering, yes, the fair is still being held. I just looked it up. Now it lasts 11 days instead of three; the 2021 dates were August 12-22. It’s quite a production these days with all sorts of entertainment and events, some separately ticketed and some included with the general admission charge. There are still the various competitions including livestock, beekeeping and beermaking, and, of course, you can still get food in ample supply—including anything and everything you can eat off a stick. The fair had some COVID advisories in place this year but nothing mandatory; the fair was, however, canceled in 2020, marking the first cancellation of the event since World War II.

The Many Creative Wellsprings for the Musical “Guys and Dolls”

February 9, 2021January 27, 2021 by debisimons

English: Portion of title page of Guys and Dolls, Libretto and Vocal book, printed by Music Theatre International, 1978.

First, let’s define a few terms that will help along the way in outlining the wellsprings mentioned in the title above, particularly “libretto” or “lyrics” vs. “book.” I’ve run into these terms before and never quite gotten them straight. So the “libretto” (literally “little book” in Italian and typically used for opera) is the text of the sung parts, including the individual songs (or arias, again used primarily in opera) and any recitatives (that is, sung exposition). While an opera is usually all sung (but there are certainly exceptions such as The Magic Flute), musical theater typically has spoken parts as well. So the “book” is the compendium of everything the performers say or sing, as well as the stage directions. And thus the stage is set (ahem) for endless combinations, borrowings and re-workings. You’ll hear about someone getting an idea for a musical or an opera from seeing a play or reading a book and then going through the long and sometimes tortured process that will turn one format into another. Unless the creative mind behind it all is capable of doing everything—the words, the music, the staging—various roles have to be farmed out.

What Serious Moral/Social Issue Is Addressed in the Musical “South Pacific”?

February 9, 2021January 22, 2021 by debisimons

Original Broadway poster, 1949, accessed via Wikipedia

And the answer is: racial prejudice. If you don’t know the plot of this musical and think it’s just something lighthearted, you might be surprised by its content. The location is an island in the (where else?) south Pacific during World War II. The central conflict between the two main characters, Nellie the Naval nurse and Emile, the French planter with whom she falls in love, is that Nellie finds it very difficult to accept that Emile has been married before to a “dark-skinned Polynesian” and has two “mixed race” children. It’s only after Emile is almost killed in a secret mission to spy on the Japanese forces that Nellie realizes how much she loves him and his children. Another character, the Naval officer Cable, falls in love with a Polynesian girl, Liat, and that romance is also considered pretty scandalous. He decides that he can’t marry her because of how his family back home would react. He’s killed during the spy mission. But before he goes off to that fate he sings a very famous (and controversial at the time) song about how prejudice develops: “You’ve Got to be Carefully Taught.”

Three Lovely but Bittersweet Autumn-Themed Songs

August 26, 2025August 26, 2019 by debisimons

Introduction to the Medley

Ah, autumn! On the one hand it’s the start of crisp, invigorating fall weather and the new school year; on the other it’s the end of summer and the inevitable slide towards winter. I’ve always loved fall, but as a gardener I also mourn the end of the growing season, trying to comfort myself with the refrain, “Next year!”

Three pieces of film/stage music capture this two-sided aspect of autumn: “The Summer Knows” from Summer of ’42 (1971), “Les Feuilles Mortes”/”The Autumn Leaves” from the post-WWII French film Les Portes de la Nuit (The Gates of the Night), and “September Song,” originally written for the 1936 Broadway musical Knickerbocker Holiday and later used in the 1950 film September Affair.

I could write an entire post about each of these beautiful pieces, but since I originally sang them as a medley I’m combining them into one. (See info at the bottom of this post about the medley and its performance.)

Was the Song “Singin’ in the Rain” Written for the Movie “Singin’ in the Rain,” or Vice Versa?

October 11, 2023April 2, 2019 by debisimons

Singing in the rain poster.jpg — Image accessed via Wikipedia

I had watched the entire movie Singin’ in the Rain at some point many years ago, and my memory of it was spotty. I remembered Gene Kelly’s description of his childhood and early career: “Dignity. Always dignity,” and of course the title song, and that the whole plot centered around the advent of talkies and the demise of silent movies. I also had this vague notion that the song had something to do with smiling in the face of adversity, sort of along the same lines as “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on my Head.” (Rabbit trail alert: Of course I had to look up “Raindrops” and watch the clip of its occurrence in the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. It doesn’t make a whole lot of sense for Sundance to take the time for this little romantic bike-riding interlude with Etta Place, his schoolteacher girlfriend, since he and Butch are on the run from the law, but there it is. Maybe someone decided that the story had been going on too long without any fun stuff. The song itself doesn’t advance the plot directly, but the director wanted something to go with the scene, and Burt Bacharach, who was writing the score, apparently had the first line in his head and wanted to use it. You can shoehorn the lyrics into the plot of the story somewhat, but it takes effort. I will point out, by the way, that this scene includes no rain. Sheesh.) But back to “Singin’,” which isn’t about adversity at all. Gene Kelly’s character is simply in love. He’s just said goodnight to his new girlfriend Kathy, and he’s so happy that he’s perfectly willing to dance through the storm. No angst at all is involved.

Has Disney Lightened and Brightened Its Source Material?

August 19, 2022October 8, 2018 by debisimons

Yes, it has. But that’s what always happens. If successive generations couldn’t put their own stamp on sources, we’d be pretty limited in what we could read, see and hear. There’s a theory that there are only around seven plots that show up in every piece of fiction ever written. I’m not sure that I quite buy that, but it’s certainly true that the same themes show up over and over again. We never tire of true love’s triumph, for instance. And I am especially fond of fairy tales, having devoured so many of them when I was in grade school. How exciting it always was to go to the bookmobile with my mom and see what new choices were there. If a book had the word “fairy” in the title, I was game.

Is There Any Actual African Folklore behind Disney’s “The Lion King”?

December 15, 2020September 25, 2018 by debisimons

I assumed that the answer to the above question was “yes.” (And I have to admit here that I’ve never seen this movie or its live musical version. Our family has never been great fans of the Disney animated features, with the exception of Beauty and the Beast. But maybe now I’ll watch it, because I’ve gotten very intrigued by its creation.) So anyway, The Lion King has the distinction of being a Disney animated film based on an original story rather than a known source.

Just How Sappy and Goopy Can I Get about “When She Loved Me”?

September 18, 2023September 25, 2018 by debisimons

Jessie (Toy Story).png

Image accessed via Wikipedia

And the answer is: Very. Like, a lot.

The funny thing is, when we first got our music in fall 2018, as part of a concert I sang with my own choir, the Cherry Creek Chorale in the Denver area, I didn’t recognize this song, just noting that it was by Randy Newman (“Mr. Mucus,” as far as I’m concerned—sorry, fans!). Then something our conductor said about Toy Story jogged my memory and I looked it up. How could I have forgotten this lovely rendition by Jessie the cowgirl doll? She’s explaining to Woody how she ended up in a toy warehouse: she was Emily’s favorite toy until Emily grew up. The song ends with Jessie being left in a donations box by the side of the road. She’s bought by a toy collector and ends up in storage.

That memory released a flood of nostalgia about my son’s childhood and his interactions with the TS franchise. There he is, running around the house with his Batman cape on, shouting his version of Buzz Lightyear’s motto: “To definity and beyond!” (It was a sad day when he got the word right.) And there we are after attending a showing of TS2 with Gideon saying, “I don’t like Stinky Pete!” To which I kept saying, “But honey, you’re not supposed to like him. He’s the bad guy.” To which he’d reply, “I don’t like Stinky Pete!”