The FAB-ULOUS Broadway Thread

[Zeeba Neighba]

49) Grease (Original Broadway Cast) - (1972)

Perhaps because of the 1978 film or because I remember frequent commercials on TV in the NYC region when I was younger (ran initially on Broadway from 1972-1980 with 3388 shows - at that time the longest Broadway musical), I always forget that Grease opened in the early 1970s. It was a much rauchier show when it debuted in a Chicago nightclub in 1971. Later productions would also integrate songs from the film (Frankie Valli's "Grease", "Hopelessly Devoted to You"). A fun musical with nice retro-50s style melodies

 

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50) Pippin (Original Broadway Cast) - 1972

A favorite - in my top 10 (in the 6-10 range). Love the original Bob Fosse-directed show soundtrack with Ben Vereen as the Leading Player, and saw the recent revival from 2013 (2013?! What 11 yrs ago already!). Strange, funny, dark, and wonderful play within a play production with great fourth-wall audience interaction.

1970s musicals are just the best
And after a lot of stopping and starting, here we are halfway through my list

 

[axolotl]

And after a lot of stopping and starting, here we are halfway through my list

You should see a specialist about that.

 

[Zeeba Neighba]

51) A Little Night Music (Original Broadway Cast) (1973)



More Sondheim! Based on Bergman’s film “Smiles of a Summer Night” with all its romantic entanglements. Len Cariou, got a Tony nod for Applause with Lauren Bacall, and went onto this musical and another nom (he would later do the film version with Elizabeth Taylor). Glynis John, who recently passed away this year, also is here introducing the song “Send in the Clowns”
Revived in 2009 with Angela Lansbury and Catherine Zeta-Jones (who would win a Tony)

 

[Zeeba Neighba]

52) The Wiz (1975)

Formally "The Wiz. The Super Soul Musical 'Wonderful Wizard of Oz'" - at 1672 performances, remember this being advertised constantly in NYC in my youth. Good to see it back on Broadway now (I'm sure the success over the past 20+ years of Wicked) probably delayed revivals as producers didn't feel need for two Oz-based musicals simultaneously. "Ease On Down the Road" clearly the big number here, but, though the other numbers don't get attention, the funky music (some great basslines) grabs one's attention. The original cast recording (Stephanie Mills, Ted Ross, etc) oddly (despite being in the Library of Congress registry as "culturally, historically or aesthetically significant) is not available on Spotify, but the new version is.
Trivia: Luther Vandross contributed to the music writing of The Wiz

 

[Zeeba Neighba]

53) A Chorus Line (1975)

No brainer - a top 5 musical for me (perhaps even a top 3) - a lot of nostalgia for this one (was the first birthday present my then girlfriend/now wife bought for me). Ran from 1975 to 1990 for 6137 performances, then the longest running musical until Cats surpassed it (I believe it surpassed Grease). One of the few musicals also to win the Pulitzer for Drama. Yes, it has "One" and "What I Did For Love" but the whole soundtrack sizzles and has fantastic humor, and the spartan production - which often is a line on an empty stage except for an upstage mirror is so effective (even more than gargantuan productions that would populate late 1980s/1990s Broadway productions). Have seen several times since

 

[Zeeba Neighba]

54) Chicago (Original Broadway Cast) (1975)

Another obvious choice - a case could be made to listen to the 1996 revival cast (show still going strong as the longest Broadway revival) with Ann Reinking, Bebe Neuwirth, Joel Gray), but went with the original Fosse production. Can't go wrong with Chita Rivera, Gwen Verdon and Jerry Orbach (plus Jerry Seinfeld's TV dad Barney Martin).

Quite the year 1975: Chicago, A Chorus Line, The Wiz
On the other hand: Man on the Moon - a musical written by John Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas and produced by Andy Warhol - it closed in two days
From Wiki:

Setting: The Earth, the Moon, and Canis Minor

The story revolves around the evil scientist Dr. Bomb, head of the United States space program, who plans to blow up the Moon. He is aided by the diminutive Leroy, a "part-man and part big-red box" human bomb.

Newsday critic Allan Wallack said "Man on the Moon is the kind of show that ought to be reviewed on the obit page.

 

[Zeeba Neighba]

55) Annie (1977 Original Broadway Cast Recording)
56) Evita (1979 Original Broadway Cast Recording)

Well, if the Tony's happen, you can probably guess, I'm gonna say "Hey I haven't listened to musicals in awhile". So another post now 10 months later. Two key musicals for me as these were (aside from one of Yul's last King and I) my first musicals seen live on Broadway fostering my love of the genre. I believe I was in 3rd grade and 5th grade respectively, both with original casts. Recently saw Annie again last year on tour in NOLA and despite it's more family-friendly content, man, the music still was wonderful. Actually met Andrea McArdle (the original Annie) oddly at an NHL Hall of Fame dinner where I oddly as a Boy Scout was serving as ushers (who knows how that happened).
Can't believe the last revival of Evita was 2012 (then with Ricky Martin as Che) but the original cast of Patty LuPone (under fire lately for some comments definitely diva-ish with racist undertones in an interview) and Mandy Patinkin reign supreme

Both won the Tony for Best Musical (1977 and 1980). Evita's here chronologically a bit early because its debut in the West End was 1978

 

[Zeeba Neighba]

57) Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (Original Broadway Cast)

As many think of the Dolly-Burt Reynolds film, this seems like an odd choice among so many classics and Tony Winners (though this was nominated too for Best Musical in 1979 - (deservingly) losing out to the next selection Sweeney Todd) but this story of the La Grange Chicken Ranch (which operated from 1905-1973 until shut down) really remains a rousing good time of a music, energetic, quite funny. The two leads both won Tony's -interestingly both were nominated and won for Best FEATURED artists, and I wonder if that was to avoid competition with Sweeney's Len Cariou and Angela Lansbury.

 

[Zeeba Neighba]

58) Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1979)

An obvious choice and arguably Sondheim's best (IMO between this and Company - if you don't count his lyrical work on Gypsy and West Side Story). Great, dark plot and original cast of Cariou and Lansbury is aces.

 

[Ojai Sam]

Bette Davis with the Original Broadway Cast - Two's Company (1952, Sepia expanded reissue 2005)

Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen, right? It was. Even music by Vernon Duke and lyrics by Ogden Nash couldn't make Bette into either a singer or a dancer. After 90 performances, Bette was declared to be "sick" and the curtain mercifully rang down.

The Sepia release adds Vernon Duke's extremely rare Atlantic 10" LP along with two songs from other stage successes of his.

 

[Ojai Sam]

Original Broadway Cast - Shuffle Along (rec. 1921, 1950 - Harbinger 2016)

Noble Sissle and Eubie Blake's Shuffle Along wasn't the first Black musical to reach Broadway, but it was the first all-Black show to succeed with white audiences. “I’m Just Wild About Harry” and “Love Will Find A Way” became standards, and the show itself resulted in the integration of theaters all over the country.

The Art Music Lounge explains further:

Singer and lyricist Sissle was originally a drum major and vocalist for Lieutenant Jim Europe’s “Hellfighters” 369th Infantry Band in World War I...not even the Original Dixieland Jazz Band had yet made an appearance in New York. To them, jazz was what we now call “hot ragtime.”

Nevertheless, Shuffle Along remains a vitally important historical moment in the history of black entertainment. First gaining attention at the Howard Theatre in Washington for two weeks, it then moved to the 63rd Street Theater in New York City in May before racking up 504 performances(!) at the Cort Theater on 48th Street. The cast included several names that would become famous over the next few years such as Adelaide Hall, Florence Mills (who replaced Gertrude Saunders after the first year), Fredi Washington and Paul Robeson—none of whom recorded anything from the show!—and a very young Josephine Baker in the chorus line.

Harbinger Records did an amazing job to recreate the original music by presenting the songs in opening night performance order. They did this by utilizing period recordings by cast members, augmented by rare demos for a never-realized revival of the show in 1950.