Ye gods!
I saw a feature about how it was made (on a DVD, maybe?) in which Shirley Jones said that the only person who knew she was pregnant on the set was the director. Then she was singing “Till There Was You” with Robert Preston, and while they were embracing, baby Patrick kicked, and Preston felt it. He was really startled. Many years later, he met Patrick and said that they’d really “met” before Patrick was born! 
Chenoweth was quite good as Marian (though, I readily acknowledge my pro-KC bias), but I just couldn’t buy Broderick as Prof. Hill – however, I don’t think anyone but Robert Preston could really fill that role in my eyes.
IIRC In the early 1980s when Preston was getting some publicity for “Victor/Victoria”, he said he was ultimately cast as Professor Harold Hill as a last resort. They couldn’t find anyone so someone said wtf, let’s try Preston. The same thing with Rex Harrison in "My Fair Lady’. They tried virtually every English actor before they got someone who defined the role. I would not want to see anyone else in those two roles than I would want to anyone sitting on Dan Patch
I hope, and I pray
For Hester to win just one more A
the sadder but wiser girl is the girl for me.
I love Ron Howard!
(And the anvil salesman dropping his bag still cracks me up).
“So what the heck, you’re welcome. Join us at the picnic. You can eat your fill of all the food you bring yourself.”
Preston has also said the only reason he got the part was because the producers had him sing “Trouble” as part of the audition, rather than anything that would have required any kind of vocal range.
The Music Man went on tour with Robert Preston and appeared in San Jose, Calif. I assume this was before the 1962 movie was made, though I can’t find any old Music Man tour schedule via Google. Those were the days of black-and-white TV’s … and of course even a TechniColor film wouldn’t be as flamboyantly exciting as this great stage play.
The only reason I recall watching Preston on the stage is that my mother often liked to tell a joke about her son when he was (roughly) nine years old: “It’s in color!” I apparently gasped when the curtain opened.
Seriously. Trouble in River City is one of my favorite hip hop songs.
He’s also said he got the part because he was used to performing fast-paced dialogue from his film career, and the singers/stage actors who auditioned kept flubbing their lines.
I watched it again recently and kept wondering when does Grig show up?
My nephews had one of those “Seriously, does this guy know everything?” moments when they were first reading Harry Potter and asked if anyone knew how to say the girl’s name. Sister 1: Who? Sister 2: No idea. Uncle epb: Her-My-o-knee." 'Course, telling them I knew it because of a musical would have ruined the mystique…
Especially if you’re a guy.
I hope you’re kidding with this. I see every reason not to think that.
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Marian and her mother have two separate discussions about her edging towards spinsterhood. Mrs. Paroo’s advice is for Marian to let go of her fantasy of Mr. Right and give a real guy a chance. I would think that if she’d already succumbed and had the Mr. Wrong’s baby, that would at least be alluded to.
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When Marian confronts Harold about his befriending Winthrop, she tells him, “My brother…can’t understand why his father was taken away.” I think that’s enough of a backstory, and a sad enough one without Winthrop having two dead dads.
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Marian is still reeling from the anvil salesman’s revelation when she tells Harold about “Mr. Madison, my father’s best friend…” It seems pretty clear to me in that scene that Marian is telling the truth and there never was anything inappropriate between them. And because Harold believes her, she gives him the benefit of the doubt, that the anvil salesman might have been lying, the same way the Pick-A-Littles lie about her.
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And it’s because those biddies believe so strongly that Winthrop has Madison DNA that I’m inclined not to believe it. They are presented as hypocritical at best and vindictive at worst. If you believe them, you undermine Marian’s character.
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Overall, it would make the story so much darker than I would think it’s meant to be. Did anyone ever ask Meredith Willson about this?
Trivia for those who might not have noticed on first viewing:
The song, “76 Trombones” is the exact same melody as “Good Night, My Someone”…just with a much slower tempo.
As the script was finally written, no, there isn’t. But there’s good reason to think Willson started the story that way, and made only the small changes the producers thought he should in order to avoid ruffling 1950’s sensibilities. The characters and their interactions do make more sense to me that way - Marian is really sadder but wiser, with the townsladies having more reason to shun her as a fallen angel, Miser Madison has a better reason to see that she and her family are taken care of when he’s gone, the age difference between Marian and Winthrop becomes plausible, etc. It could even be that Marian and Mama tell him a lie about Marian being his sister instead of his mother, and get the townspeople to go along with it so he doesn’t have an even rougher childhood ..
Or they’re in a very good position to know.
“Oh yes, that woman made brazen overtures, with a gilt-edged guarantee. She had a golden glint in her eye and a silver voice with a counterfeit ring. Just melt her down and you’ll reveal a lump of lead as cold as steel, here, where a woman’s *heart *should be! He left River City the library building but he left all the books to her…”
Wow! And, I thought a movie was just a movie. 
Miser Madison… Madison Picnic Park? Madison Gymnasium? Madison Hospital? Madison Public Library? That Miser Madison? Yeah, sounds like that old grinch, knocking up a young girl and leaving her virtually penniless. You sound as bad as the townies.
That and the song with the women and the chickens are my two favorite numbers from any musical ever.
Mostly, hence the 
But it’s an old joke in productions, where Mrs. Paroo- a great role for older “graduated divas”- is often played by a woman too old to have a child Winthrop’s age. (Shirley Jones played the role in her 70s, when she was almost too old to have a child Marian’s age.)
Of course in the movie Hermione Gingold was 65 and the mother of a high schooler and a younger daughter.