# Help me choose a musical!

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-choose-a-musical/44469>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [December 7, 2000, 1:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-choose-a-musical/44469 "2000-12-07T13:47:44Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\
**Post date:** [December 9, 2000, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/help-me-choose-a-musical/44469/41 "2000-12-09T18:52:17Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Mauvaise \*  
> \*\*I’d like to toss in a mention for The Fantastiks as well. It was the first musical I ever saw and I still think it’s wonderful. The set (at least in the production I saw) was just a tree, with a person posed against it acting as the Wall.  
> \*\*

I love the Fantasticks, but the problem with a school putting it on is that there’re only six (or seven.\<counts on fingers\>…the narrator, Matt, Luisa, His Dad, Her Dad, and the mute and , the old actor guy, the guy who dies…eight!) parts,only one of which is written for a girl (and none of the parts aren’t unisex…you can’t make the narrator a girl, for instance or the “Round and Round” song becomes…not something that a conservative school would be comfortable with…the Rape Ballet would also have problems if one or more of the actors were women.)

And the charm of the show is it’s intimacy…adding a big chorus ruins the charm (I’ve had the misfortune to see this done:  
Matt: Love, you are Love  
Chorus: **YOU ARE LOVE**  
Matt: Better far than any metaphor could ever, ever be  
Chorus: **EVER BEEEEEEEEEEE!**  
Matt: Love, you are love  
Luias: I am love!  
Chorus: **SHEEEE! SHEEEE IIIIISSS LOOOOOOOVE**  
Matt, whispers:[sub] My mystery[/sub]  
Luisa, whispers:[sub] His mystery[/sub]  
Chorus. NOT whispering: **THE MYYYYYYYYYYYSTEEEEEEEY!**  
Matt; of love.  
Chorus: **OOOOOOOFFF LOOOOOOVVVVE! OOOOOOFF LOOOOOOVE!**

It wasn’t pretty)

Another suggestion: How 'bout a forgotten musical by Kander and Ebb ccalled Flora, The Red Menace: Lots of parts, catchy songs, big chorus, nothing objectionable in the content.

Fenris

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