The 2016 Broadway season: from Alexander Hamilton through Everlasting.
The 2016 Broadway season was a show that broke some boundaries for the Broadway stage, and it was filled of both highs and lows. I know that it is only July, but I wanted to write this up now because I had some feelings that I needed to get out. I want to talk about four shows in this post, two shows that are doing very well aka a high and two shows that didn’t do so well aka a low. As you might be able to tell from the title here, two of them are Hamilton and Tuck Everlasting the other two are Waitress and Bright Star. I have not seen any of these shows, I picked them based on really loving the cast recordings and in two cases thinking that they deserved a longer life. I felt the need to add that in here so you know that is mostly judged by the music, the performances on tv, what I know about the show, and the grosses for each of these shows.
I will start with the shows that were the lows, as I feel that ending this post on a high is the way to go about it. Tuck Everlasting was a show that didn’t last long at all, and I feel it is because people wrote the show off as a “kid’s show” or a family show and not a show that told a story, and a timeless story at that. People I feel didn’t see the show because they didn’t take the time to read what it was about fully, they just wrote it off as a children’s show, or a show that would be filled with kids and they didn’t want to see that. There was nothing really ground breaking about this show, and that might be one of the reasons that people didn’t go to see the show. They couldn’t get tickets to Hamilton, and so they went back to an older show or a show that has been around for a while rather than seeing something new and exciting. Tuck Everlasting seems like it was a fun show, maybe not a show that people would say had music that you remembered or music that you would walk out of the theatre singing but it seemed like it was fun. My favorite song from the show is Everlasting, and if you listen to this song and you like it you can still buy the Original Cast Recording on CD or digitally on Itunes.
Bright Star was a show that lasted a little longer than Tuck Everlasting did, but I still feel like the time of this show on Broadway was cut short, due to people not seeing the show and not selling tickets they couldn’t keep it open. Edie Brickwell, and Steve Martin who wrote the music and the lyrics of the show invested their own money into the show because they believed in the show, and they wanted to see the show get to the Tonys. I don’t blame Hamilton for the shows closing, but I am saying that if the show had opened any other year maybe it could have done better and maybe it would still be opened today. A show doesn’t get Tony nominations in multiple categories everything from the music of the show, to the female lead of the show for nothing. I feel that this is a beautiful show, and this is just from the music as they’re careful about not saying much about the plot on the cast recording. I thought this from the moment I listened to the Original Broadway Cast Recording for the first time, and to this day I firmly believe this. I would love to see this show go on tour, so that more people can experience this brilliant show live. This show didn’t have that many things that were that ground breaking in it, but the story of the show that was based on true events, and the music of the show is bluegrass and a more classic sound than modern shows these days, and I feel that this was a ground breaking thing. The thing about this shows music is that I can’t pick a favorite song from this show, as the answer would be most of the songs from this show. If you want to hear some music from this show I would start with The Sun Is Going to Shine Again, or for a more light hearted number I would recommend Another Round if you like these the Cast Recording is available.
Waitress is a show that is doing very well right now, and this I feel is a good thing for this show because I want to see this show do well. The thing about this show I feel is the journey, I get this from just listening to the Original Broadway Cast Recording over and over for the past few months. This is show that is filled with fun numbers, and some very serious numbers just like Bright Star was and I love that about this show the variety. With music and lyrics by Sara Barellies It like Hamilton brought people to the theatre to see the show, or it got them to support the show by buying the Original Broadway Cast Recording. Once again this show had a lot of Tony nominations this year, and you don’t get that many Tony nominations for nothing. My favorite song from this show is She Used To Be Mine, this is one of the more serious songs in the show that comes in towards the end of the show.
Hamilton is the show that everyone is talking about, and the show that everyone wants to see this year with presales booked into next year this show is a phenomenon. I feel that this show is so popular because it is something that hasn’t been done before it combines history and rap, and it is teaching kids about the history of our country. This show has a lot of things about it that are ground breaking, but the thing that I feel is the most ground breaking is the fact that it is a show that is largely people of color, because that is the way that Lin wanted it. I also feel that this show is so popular is because it is a show by Lin Manuel Miranda, who had a following from his smash hit musical In the Heights. Hamilton won a lot of Tonys this year, and to the credit of the cast and the creative team they deserved every single award they’ve received, and they deserve all of the success I just wish that the awards could have been spread around more. My favorite song is a lot of them, but I do have a soft spot for the song Burn in the second act of the show as I love the character of Eliza. There are many ways to get involved with the Hamilton experience: getting the Cast Recording, and getting the book Hamilton: The Revolution.