With “American Idiot”, a musical based on Green Day’s CD, opening soon, Broadway hopes to have a hit with success like that of other musicals based on the works of rock/pop artists.
Just off the top of my head:
Movin’ Out (Billy Joel) Mamma Mia (ABBA)
The Who’s Tommy Jersey Boys (Four Seasons)
There are probably others. My question is, what musical acts and/or albums should Broadway next adapt?
My candidate is The Lamb lies Down On Broadway by Genesis. It wouldn’t need much changing, except updating (specifically Broadway Melody of 1974, and less graffitti by Rael).
Their songs are very story-oriented; they tell a tale. They’re also very suitable to the stage and to Broadway audiences… as opposed to say, Operation Mindcrime by Queensryche…
I don’t know that Mindcrime would be unsuitable. Broadway likes edgy now, and since Mindcrime is over 20 years old, those who listened to it when it first came out are now 35-50 years old, an age group that definitely goes to Boradway shows.
Harry Chapin was a master of the story song. His songs featured all kinds of richly-developed characters, and would probably lend themselves well to a musical, if anybody could string together something out of Harry and Sue (“Taxi” and “Sequel”); Mr. Tanner, the cleaner from Ohio; and the midnight watchman down at Miller’s Tool and Die, the waitress, and the girl who left the six-word letter (“A Better Place to Be”). Plenty of situations and events too, from songs like “Thirty Thousand Pounds of Bananas,” “Flowers are Red,” and “She is Always Seventeen.”
But it seems like it was written specifically as a musical. I was thinking more along the lines of Mamma Mia, where the story is crafted out of characters and songs that weren’t necessarily written to be taken together.
Still, that’s interesting and I’ll have to look more into that. Thanks!
That was my suggestion. The first musical I ever got to play for was Tommy, and my high school drama director introduced The Lamb to me and talked about how it was a dream of his to do that show. I fell in love with the album, and since then, putting up a Broadway version of it has always been floating around in my head.
Actually, I’d like to see Billy Joel actually write an original musical. He’s got the chops to do it. (And I have seen Moving Out – it had the worst choreography I’ve even seen in a professional performance, and since it was all choreography, it was a waste. I found watching the backup band more interesting).
My wife has wanted for ten or fifteen years to make one out of the songs of The Rascals and Spanky and My Gang. Boomer-mellow stuff that could fill seats. She was pissed as similar shows made piles of money by “stealing” (her word, though she never told anybody about but me) her idea while hers languished because she didn’t know anybody in show biz.
A couple years back I met Tony Powers, who wrote one of Spanky’s hits and is buds with The Rascals’ Felix Cavaliere. After a few email exchanges I broached the possibility that such a show might be a success like Ellie Greenwich’s show or the others in the OP.
I wonder if there could be a musical featuring the music of the Kinks. Lola vs. Powerman and the Moneygoround even has a plot behind it, and Preservation, Act I might also be a possibility.
I don’t have anything to contribute to this thread, because I think we’ve had enough jukebox musicals for one lifetime, :p, but I did just want to point out that Tommy doesn’t fit into that category. It was an original musical by The Who, not a collection of their old songs.
I’m aware of that, but the thread seemed to be going in the direction of “jukebox musical”, and I just wanted to clarify that Tommy was not one. And, similar to what Spoons mentioned about the Harry Chapin musical, The Who wrote it with the intention of being “theatrical”, complete with characters and storylines.
I’m not trying to nitpick, I just wanted to clarify for anyone who wasn’t familiar with Tommy and might have thought it was a jukebox musical of Who tunes.