OK, I love musical theater. But I hate, hate, hate with a passion, musical theater which is merely sing-song dialogue set to music. I do like, musical theater which actually has SONGS which, even out of context, could be enjoyable, and even, WITHOUT VOCALS, the music could be enjoyable.
Case in point: RHPS vs REPO:TGO
RHPS - Every song, even out of context, could be enjoyed as a hit single.
REPO: not so much - the dialogue is more like Marshall Ericksen on How I Met Your Mother randomly deciding to sing-song whatever he happens to be doing along to musical accompaniment. Which is fine for random cookie downloads, but nowhere near the level of musical interestingness to sustain a full blown musical film.
Musical : RHPS, Jesus Christ Superstar (Indigo Girls version; original version not as much).
If you’re saying “sing-song dialog set to music,” you mean Stephen Sondheim (and his followers). The issue with Sondheim is that, though a good lyricist (from a technical standpoint; his lyrics in other respects is all surface and no depth), he is a mediocre composer. Thus his songs concentrate on his strength and end up being dialog set to music. This is, unfortunately, considered more sophisticated. It isn’t.
When this sort of thing happens, its for the same reason: weak composing skills (not to mention the urge to follow Sondheim’s formula).
I don’t agree that every song needs to be enjoyable out of context. Even a good musical needs occasional songs that are needed for plot or characterization and may not work alone. But your real issue here is between talented composers and hacks.
I like that the musical Rent has a mixture of the two. Some of the songs, like ‘Out Tonight’, ‘I’ll Cover You’, ‘Seasons Of Love’, ‘Today 4 U’ etc. could conceivably be given to a pop artist and made into chart hits with no connection to the musical, but then there are other songs in the show that are more talk-singing (I know the stage musical is all-singing all-the-time but I’m going by what I saw in the film).
But yes, the standalone strength of the songs has always been one of my favourite things about Rocky Horror.
I don’t even know what REPO is, but it sounds like you’re describing something like “Caroline, or Change.” The opening scene has the maid, Caroline, in the basement doing the laundry, and the stepmom comes downstairs to ask her if she wants to take some of the leftover brisket home to her family. Only stepmom SINGS it.
Would you like some brisket? I made a lot of brisket, so you can have some brisket. etc., etc.
I don’t remember the exact words, but that’s pretty much it. So they don’t talk in the play at all, just sing. And EVERYONE sings: the maid, the mom, the washing machine, the BUS…
You’re talking about recitative. When done properly it can be awesome, but yeah, too much (and with lousy lyrics) makes it sound labored and forced.
By the way, I work in musical theatre and I don’t know what REPO is supposed to stand for. If you are talking about The Genetic Opera, as suggested upthread, and you’re using that, along with Rocky Horror Picture Show, as your examples, then I need to respectfully suggest you broaden your musical theatre horizons.
I can see advantages both ways. A show like Les Miz has basically zero plain dialog, just about everything is sung. This does mean that there are some fairly boring musical bits (much as I like Les Miz). On the other hand, a show like West Side Story has talking, then a song, then talking, then a song, etc. The potentialy drawback here is that it hurts the suspension of disbelief when it keeps switching back and forth.
Basically, there are great musicals written both ways. The problem with Repo: The Genetic Opera isn’t that it has recitative, it’s that it just isn’t good.
He is far from the inventor of recitative (as DooWahDiddy correctly describes it). Might as well complain about those hacks Gilbert and Sullivan and their followers.
LOL I didn’t pick them as key examples of their type. I picked them because 1) people were already discussing them and comparing them on another thread so they were fresh in my mind and 2) I never pass up an excuse to complain about Repo:TGO and 3) RTGO is getting a lot of “It’s the new Rocky” so they are an obvious pair of musicals which are similar (or supposed to be) in a lot of respects but for the one aspect of reciting.
Although it’s true, while I can think of lots of regular musicals, I had trouble coming up with many examples of sing-songy ones because in general, I avoid them, and if I happen to stumble into one, I try my best to forget the experience.
