There is atleast one time every week that someone says something that makes me want to give the State of Broadway Speech, but I always refrain. I finally decided that it was time to write it down, in my blog, so I can always link to it or reference it. I know I have covered various small aspects of this in my other posts, but here is the centralized version. So here we go.
Broadway today is in a serious decline, no thanks to any of the people who claim to like it. Despite it's glorious history, the current shell of the past is circling the drain of irrelevance. In general, I blame three musicals. Phantom of the Opera, Wicked, and Rent. Now at this point, people just think that I'm 'hating' on the popular musicals. However, none of these musicals are exceptionally good and the reason that Broadway is in serious decline is BECAUSE these are popular. I mean, if they were popular, but didn't affect anything, that would be a completely different matter.
Phantom of the Opera doesn't necessarily belong on here as much as the other offenders, because it isn't Andrew Lloyd Webber's fault. When we went to New York on a choir trip, we saw POTA and I even tossed aside some of my former resentment of it. However, the problem with Phantom is it's extremely long run. It's developed a sort of self fulfilling prophecy. People who don't know what Broadway show to go to in New York hear the Phantom of the Opera, longest running show, and immediately assume that it means it is one of the best musicals ever written. Since people keep assuming this, the play keeps getting performed, therefore having an even longer running, etc. This leads to new shows on Broadway having larger financial troubles, since they don't draw in audiences due to no fault of their own besides being unknown. Imagine if people always watched the same movies. Would there be any reason for anyone to produce new movies? In today's society, it simply costs too much money to produce a new play with no history behind it, because all of the revivals and plays like Phantom. Sure, some revivals are good, but having half of the plays on Broadway be there for years just hurts new authors/composers.
Wicked is a continuation of this trend. While it is nowhere near the first musical to be based off non-original source material, it was certainly one of the first ones to make the transition that quickly. There was an eight year turn around, which isn't even counting the amount of transitional time it took to actually write it, which makes the turnaround even less. It featured the semi-mediocre styling of Steven Schwartz. I'll just put this in perspective. Schwartz has never won a Tony despite being eligible in multiple categories. This is in an industry where most plays are guaranteed to win one or two Tony's merely due to lack of competition. But people ate up Wicked, which pushed Broadway producers to embrace the new ability to take preexisting movies and books and mercilessly push them on the public, complete with subpar music and adaptation decay. It became more beneficial for up and coming authors to just right derivative works. But certainly it takes work to still orchestrate a hit musical, right?
I know that Rent came out before Wicked, but the constructive order works better this way. Rent proved to America that you don't need to worry about orchestration. Simply by combining a lot of poppy songs together with a limited pit, you could get financial success. I always held the unpopular belief that Jonathan Larson's body tried to get rid of him before it was too late. And this isnt' merely a matter of classical snobbery or sunk costs. The limited pit had limited musical range, but it didn't matter to producers. Now less musicians had to be hired. It also lacked any musical complexity. I've played piano for 10 years, and I could play the piano parts of Rent on BROADWAY without any trouble. I am not a concert pianist. I am not even a piano major. So now we have musical quality decay, bad enough on it's own, but the real floodgates had only just been opened. Jukebox musicals, disappeared for 70 or so years, now had the popularity to come back. A musical could be made out of the hits of Styx, Abba, an album by Green Day. And where does it end? These all have prior proved audiences, so no one needed to worry about filling seats. It didn't matter that these were loosely structured plots with the amount of arranging that I could do in an afternoon where I was actually physically forced to sit down.
All of the keys are in place to have a commercially profitable musical without taking any risks whatsoever. So as an audience who attends plays, are you going to help contribute to the problem and make musical writing an even less work stable job, or will you support original efforts, fully devoted to music and plot? Will you be the audience that helps bring fame to people like me or are you going to be the audience I have to fight against to get plays published.
Think about it.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
How to Write a Plot Outline
Lots of people scoff at the idea of plot outlines. That's because lots of people aren't getting their plays produced on Broadway. I'm not either, it's just taking the advice of most people isn't usually a recommendation. Now, as I'm pretty sure I've stated before, sometimes when you are writing, you just completely run out of steam about where the plot was going or what was happening between point A and B which makes you end up with a whole lot of nothing. When I'm writing a musical, I try to stick to the Corbin Plot Outline and deviate from there. Two acts of six scenes each roughly eight pages a piece. This is far more than you will probably need, but it's a nice rule of thumb to follow. You can have more scenes (that are shorter) or less scenes (don't have less scenes). Usually if you can get the first act long enough, the expected shortening of the second act is forgivable. I'll give you an example from my canceled play, how I set these up.
Act 1:
Scene 1:
Arthur and Roger's home as children. Introduction to family and the Ebony violin. Arthur's dad goes into the throngs of death. Roger tricks Arthur so that he can inherit the violin instead. (Age 15) Arthur gets Ivory violin instead.
Scene 2:
20 years later, Arthur as a professional violinist after a rehearsel one day gets kicked out by the concertmaster. He complains and stuff. Bow is broken by concertmaster.
Scene 3:
Arthur goes to a bar nearby where he meets up and coming vocalist,______ who seduces him and convinces him that he must get back into the orchestra so she can get a singing job.
Scene 4:
Arthur goes to Roger's house and tries to convince him to part with the Ebony. It ends up failing.
Scene 5:
Arthur goes back to the bar. _____ goads him into stealing it at whatever cost.
Scene 6:
Arthur tries to take the violin in the night from Roger. When Roger discovers this, Arthur kills him. He then uses it to take control of _______.
Act 2:
Scene 1:
Arthur has been using the violin to control _______. She threatens to turn him in. Arthur's mother comes and tells him that he must come to the funeral.
Scene 2:
Funeral scene. Arthur is arrested at the funeral.
Scene 3:
Prison. After meeting some of the inmates, Arthur tries to convince his mother to bring him a piece of the bow. He finds out he has been sentenced to death by hanging.
Scene 4:
Arthur cheats death by using the tightened rope as a string and the piece of ebony bow to play the haunting melody.
Scene 5:
Arthur returns to the orchestra with a violin that will fit the tone of the ensemble.
Scene 6:
Arthur finds ______ and he shows her how he has destroyed the ebony violin and combined it with the ivory, giving up all his control just for her.
Now you couldn't write a full play off of this, but it gives you the pacing so that you know how far each scene should move the plot. There is the climax right before Act 2 as necessary. Now all that you need to do is add side plots and flesh out your side characters. While this was only a rough sketch, when you're writing, it's a joy to have. All of the locations are kind of planned out and the length should be enough for a full length musical. This is the importance of having an outline.
I apologize for the overall lameness of this post.
Act 1:
Scene 1:
Arthur and Roger's home as children. Introduction to family and the Ebony violin. Arthur's dad goes into the throngs of death. Roger tricks Arthur so that he can inherit the violin instead. (Age 15) Arthur gets Ivory violin instead.
Scene 2:
20 years later, Arthur as a professional violinist after a rehearsel one day gets kicked out by the concertmaster. He complains and stuff. Bow is broken by concertmaster.
Scene 3:
Arthur goes to a bar nearby where he meets up and coming vocalist,______ who seduces him and convinces him that he must get back into the orchestra so she can get a singing job.
Scene 4:
Arthur goes to Roger's house and tries to convince him to part with the Ebony. It ends up failing.
Scene 5:
Arthur goes back to the bar. _____ goads him into stealing it at whatever cost.
Scene 6:
Arthur tries to take the violin in the night from Roger. When Roger discovers this, Arthur kills him. He then uses it to take control of _______.
Act 2:
Scene 1:
Arthur has been using the violin to control _______. She threatens to turn him in. Arthur's mother comes and tells him that he must come to the funeral.
Scene 2:
Funeral scene. Arthur is arrested at the funeral.
Scene 3:
Prison. After meeting some of the inmates, Arthur tries to convince his mother to bring him a piece of the bow. He finds out he has been sentenced to death by hanging.
Scene 4:
Arthur cheats death by using the tightened rope as a string and the piece of ebony bow to play the haunting melody.
Scene 5:
Arthur returns to the orchestra with a violin that will fit the tone of the ensemble.
Scene 6:
Arthur finds ______ and he shows her how he has destroyed the ebony violin and combined it with the ivory, giving up all his control just for her.
Now you couldn't write a full play off of this, but it gives you the pacing so that you know how far each scene should move the plot. There is the climax right before Act 2 as necessary. Now all that you need to do is add side plots and flesh out your side characters. While this was only a rough sketch, when you're writing, it's a joy to have. All of the locations are kind of planned out and the length should be enough for a full length musical. This is the importance of having an outline.
I apologize for the overall lameness of this post.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Word Choice in Lyrics
Wow, I really need to get back into the swing of article writing. Just a small preview of what's coming up:
Villains, Pt 2
Writing a Plot Outline
Musical Review: Avenue Q (But you'll have to wait after I see it in December)
If there is anything that you guys want to see, you should inform me, because then I can give relevant information, as opposed to topics that come up off the top of my head.
Now, word choice is a very important thing when dealing with writing music and lyrics for your musical. If I've noticed anything in real life, it's that most people lack any semblance of rhythm and flow. Just look anytime someone makes parody lyrics to something off the top of their head. And some people are just downright terrible at TRYING to rhyme as well. As a writer, there are a few things you need to avoid when writing lyrics.
1. The rhymes that people see from a mile away. Be and me and see, etc. They aren't always bad, but when they are the basis behind your melody, that's a no-no. Not completely bad by itself, but if the rest of your lyrics are mediocre at best, this does nothing to stem the tide.
2. Extremely cliche topics and things. People will say love is cliche and it might be, but it's a different kind of cliche. It's such an acceptable concept for a song, that people will just look the other way. But talking about your dreams as reaching HIGH into the SKY and things of that nature is terrible writing. This holds especially true for lines thrown into songs that don't totally have to do with the song. Yes, there is filler in lyrics too.
"Like a comet pulled from orbit
As it passes a sun
Like a stream that meets a boulder
Halfway through the wood"
Shame on you if you recognized those lyrics. They aren't bad, because filler isn't bad. But it's also unique lyrics and imagery. I mean, I don't even think about comets on a daily basis. But if your filler, where you can talk about whatever and use whatever words you want is bad, then how can your song be any good.
3. Choosing words that don't really sound the way you think they do. I have this problem since I pronounce a bunch of words wrong, like projectile (Pruh-jek-tic-el). It sort of rhymes with bicycle the way I say it, and it isn't regional, so it sounds dumb. If I ever rhymed bicycle with projectile as a lyric, no one would understand it. Or rhyming out with rout in TSMGO.
There are some ways to fix your lyrics to make them thousands of times better.
1. Pick rhymes made up of multiple words or multisyllabic words. Since I'm fairly conceited, I'll post examples from my plays.
"He taught me dictation. He taught me many languages
To be the perfect secretary has its share of anguishes." (Ballad of Theylus Mignon)
"Here I sit, patiently
In hopes of admiralty" (The musical I'm working on now)
2. Pick similes and metaphors in your filler that you are unique. My example earlier from...that play is a good example. How about instead of talking about the frolic in the spring, pick the frolic at a carnival. I don't know, I even found it hard to think of cliche metaphors off the top of my head since they make me cringe.
3.Pick words that are unique to the lexicon of the character who is singing them. Mechanical people use mechanical terms, etc. This is also a good form of characterization.
4. Generally being clever in your word choice. Unless you are already clever, pick the tenth word that comes to your mind instead of the first.
I know someone is sitting out there right now saying "Why is this all about rhyming? What about those of us who are too good to rhyme?" Firstly, you are never too good to rhyme, and the words that take the most choosing are the ones that fall into the important positions, aka the rhyming spots. Haven't you ever noticed that if your rhyme is bad you rewrite the whole sentence, not just the last word. The choice of those other words doesn't matter as much.
Hopefully this helps you in your attempt to fill in those lines to your melody. Now I need to go write lyrics myself.
Villains, Pt 2
Writing a Plot Outline
Musical Review: Avenue Q (But you'll have to wait after I see it in December)
If there is anything that you guys want to see, you should inform me, because then I can give relevant information, as opposed to topics that come up off the top of my head.
Now, word choice is a very important thing when dealing with writing music and lyrics for your musical. If I've noticed anything in real life, it's that most people lack any semblance of rhythm and flow. Just look anytime someone makes parody lyrics to something off the top of their head. And some people are just downright terrible at TRYING to rhyme as well. As a writer, there are a few things you need to avoid when writing lyrics.
1. The rhymes that people see from a mile away. Be and me and see, etc. They aren't always bad, but when they are the basis behind your melody, that's a no-no. Not completely bad by itself, but if the rest of your lyrics are mediocre at best, this does nothing to stem the tide.
2. Extremely cliche topics and things. People will say love is cliche and it might be, but it's a different kind of cliche. It's such an acceptable concept for a song, that people will just look the other way. But talking about your dreams as reaching HIGH into the SKY and things of that nature is terrible writing. This holds especially true for lines thrown into songs that don't totally have to do with the song. Yes, there is filler in lyrics too.
"Like a comet pulled from orbit
As it passes a sun
Like a stream that meets a boulder
Halfway through the wood"
Shame on you if you recognized those lyrics. They aren't bad, because filler isn't bad. But it's also unique lyrics and imagery. I mean, I don't even think about comets on a daily basis. But if your filler, where you can talk about whatever and use whatever words you want is bad, then how can your song be any good.
3. Choosing words that don't really sound the way you think they do. I have this problem since I pronounce a bunch of words wrong, like projectile (Pruh-jek-tic-el). It sort of rhymes with bicycle the way I say it, and it isn't regional, so it sounds dumb. If I ever rhymed bicycle with projectile as a lyric, no one would understand it. Or rhyming out with rout in TSMGO.
There are some ways to fix your lyrics to make them thousands of times better.
1. Pick rhymes made up of multiple words or multisyllabic words. Since I'm fairly conceited, I'll post examples from my plays.
"He taught me dictation. He taught me many languages
To be the perfect secretary has its share of anguishes." (Ballad of Theylus Mignon)
"Here I sit, patiently
In hopes of admiralty" (The musical I'm working on now)
2. Pick similes and metaphors in your filler that you are unique. My example earlier from...that play is a good example. How about instead of talking about the frolic in the spring, pick the frolic at a carnival. I don't know, I even found it hard to think of cliche metaphors off the top of my head since they make me cringe.
3.Pick words that are unique to the lexicon of the character who is singing them. Mechanical people use mechanical terms, etc. This is also a good form of characterization.
4. Generally being clever in your word choice. Unless you are already clever, pick the tenth word that comes to your mind instead of the first.
I know someone is sitting out there right now saying "Why is this all about rhyming? What about those of us who are too good to rhyme?" Firstly, you are never too good to rhyme, and the words that take the most choosing are the ones that fall into the important positions, aka the rhyming spots. Haven't you ever noticed that if your rhyme is bad you rewrite the whole sentence, not just the last word. The choice of those other words doesn't matter as much.
Hopefully this helps you in your attempt to fill in those lines to your melody. Now I need to go write lyrics myself.
Monday, September 21, 2009
A List of Musicals I've Seen, Been In, Etc.
Last updated, March 28th, 2010.
Here just for future reference to myself and anyone reading this, I'm going to list the musicals I have seen and in what capacities.
Broadway/Off-Broadway:
Wicked
Phantom of the Opera
Mary Poppins
Avenue Q (At the Lied)
South Pacific (At the Lied)
Chanhassen (It's a dinner theatre in Minnesota):
My Fair Lady
State Fair
Brigadoon
Beauty and the Beast
Camelot
Cats
Performed In:
Kilroy Was Here
Music Man
Gone With the Breeze
Fiddler on the Roof
Beauty and the Beast
Other Live Shows:
Sound of Music (MHS Production)
Bernice Bobs Her Hair (UNL Production)
Movies:
The Producers
Fiddler on the Roof
Camelot
Hairspray
(Moulin Rouge)
Sound of Music
Music Man
Bye Bye Birdie
Sweeney Todd
Jesus Christ Superstar
Unsinkable Molly Brown
West Side Story
Company
I think this list is fairly accurate. Some of the older movies and Chanhassen plays I can barely remember, hence why I don't use them as examples very often.
Here just for future reference to myself and anyone reading this, I'm going to list the musicals I have seen and in what capacities.
Broadway/Off-Broadway:
Wicked
Phantom of the Opera
Mary Poppins
Avenue Q (At the Lied)
South Pacific (At the Lied)
Chanhassen (It's a dinner theatre in Minnesota):
My Fair Lady
State Fair
Brigadoon
Beauty and the Beast
Camelot
Cats
Performed In:
Kilroy Was Here
Music Man
Gone With the Breeze
Fiddler on the Roof
Beauty and the Beast
Other Live Shows:
Sound of Music (MHS Production)
Bernice Bobs Her Hair (UNL Production)
Movies:
The Producers
Fiddler on the Roof
Camelot
Hairspray
(Moulin Rouge)
Sound of Music
Music Man
Bye Bye Birdie
Sweeney Todd
Jesus Christ Superstar
Unsinkable Molly Brown
West Side Story
Company
I think this list is fairly accurate. Some of the older movies and Chanhassen plays I can barely remember, hence why I don't use them as examples very often.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
How To Make A Villain Part 1: Types of Villains
Now, you don't always need a villain in a musical. The Producers doesn't have a villain. Still, most people enjoy either playing or watching villains and they are the most concrete form of conflict for your protagonist. I mean, face it, look at any movie where weather was the enemy. How seriously boring and unmotivated was it to you? Self-conflict is cool in movies, but have you ever watched someone on stage do it? It seriously sucks. In my opinion at least. There are three types of villains.
Type I Villains:
You don't want a Type I Villain. Type I's are the people who are only villains because our main characters are deviates from society. Look at Benjamin from Rent. He's the villain, because he wants to make the people who live in his building pay rent like normal members of society. We're supposed to feel bad that he's kicking the main characters out, but if this situation ever happened in real life, who would we really side with? I don't care that they weren't supposed to be paying rent out of Benny's kindness, but get over it. Actually, it isn't even the Rent. It's just that he isn't as poor as they are. Whenever I think of Type I Villains, I also think of this comic:
. Basically, the reason you don't want a TI is because reasonable people sometimes side with them over the protagonists. And if you're going to have a villain, you want people to side with the protagonist.
Type II Villains:
These are the middle ground. These are the villains who aren't necessarily malicious, but misguided or just wrong. Anything based around a war, the enemy general will fall into this category (minus battles with Hitler). Or anyone who is doing something for the greater good, science, or anything like that, and you as the audience can legitimately feel like they're not too far off. This isn't always the case, as you see with about anyone who does things for the sake of nature. These villains are usually well received by audiences and actors alike, since they can sort of empathize, while still being a strong character.
Type III Villains:
This is where all of the villains from the musicals I've written fall into place. Any character who is either completely insane or is so immoral and self serving that they will do anything despite the social acceptability. Rutherford Wilson? A bully who tries to get revenge on one of his former victims after the victim retaliates. In doing so, he attempts to pit two crime lords against each other in order to oversee their downfall as well as Theylus's death. And don't even get me started on Triptuk and Barnesly from Jamoddysey. Anyone seen the Dark Knight? The Joker well falls into this category. These are the funnest characters to act, due to their melodramatic attitudes. The audience loves to hate them. No one will ever remember them as remarkably deep characters, but that doesn't matter.
Before you really get into making your villain, you need to decide what category of villain you want. In the next part of the series, I'll tell you how to build the necessary backstory and personality of your villain.
Type I Villains:
You don't want a Type I Villain. Type I's are the people who are only villains because our main characters are deviates from society. Look at Benjamin from Rent. He's the villain, because he wants to make the people who live in his building pay rent like normal members of society. We're supposed to feel bad that he's kicking the main characters out, but if this situation ever happened in real life, who would we really side with? I don't care that they weren't supposed to be paying rent out of Benny's kindness, but get over it. Actually, it isn't even the Rent. It's just that he isn't as poor as they are. Whenever I think of Type I Villains, I also think of this comic:
. Basically, the reason you don't want a TI is because reasonable people sometimes side with them over the protagonists. And if you're going to have a villain, you want people to side with the protagonist.Type II Villains:
These are the middle ground. These are the villains who aren't necessarily malicious, but misguided or just wrong. Anything based around a war, the enemy general will fall into this category (minus battles with Hitler). Or anyone who is doing something for the greater good, science, or anything like that, and you as the audience can legitimately feel like they're not too far off. This isn't always the case, as you see with about anyone who does things for the sake of nature. These villains are usually well received by audiences and actors alike, since they can sort of empathize, while still being a strong character.
Type III Villains:
This is where all of the villains from the musicals I've written fall into place. Any character who is either completely insane or is so immoral and self serving that they will do anything despite the social acceptability. Rutherford Wilson? A bully who tries to get revenge on one of his former victims after the victim retaliates. In doing so, he attempts to pit two crime lords against each other in order to oversee their downfall as well as Theylus's death. And don't even get me started on Triptuk and Barnesly from Jamoddysey. Anyone seen the Dark Knight? The Joker well falls into this category. These are the funnest characters to act, due to their melodramatic attitudes. The audience loves to hate them. No one will ever remember them as remarkably deep characters, but that doesn't matter.
Before you really get into making your villain, you need to decide what category of villain you want. In the next part of the series, I'll tell you how to build the necessary backstory and personality of your villain.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
When Salvaging A Scrapped Musical
Ever since my last musical I wrote, I have been starting and failing to finish musicals. There are a few things that should make you drop a musical sooner than later.
1. It's Scene 2 and you are already sick of your characters. Sometimes I've made brilliant plots and characters, but after a while, they just start to rag on you. If you get sick of your characters, you can be almost positive that your audience will.
2. You realize that you didn't craft the plot carefully and you don't have enough stuff to happen between the beginning and end. Sometimes filler can fix this, but most of the time you want to AVOID filler, so when you have half a play without filler, you would be better off starting over, do some serious replot structuring, or just dropping it.
3. Whatever was motivating you to write this specific musical stops being an influence.
Regardless, a lot of the time when you scrap a musical, there are lots of beautiful parts that you just can't chuck in the trash. This article goes through each category and what you should and shouldn't keep.
(By the way this is assuming you are starting a new play. I put mine on infinite hiatus, which is different. Infinite hiatus is like "Oh, hey. I like the plot, I just don't like it right now..." I'll explain the difference in some of these categories)
PLOT:
It's really hard to salvage a plot by starting a new musical. In fact, it doesn't really make any sense. I put mine on infinite hiatus, which is different. Infinite hiatus is like "Oh, hey. I like the plot, I just don't like it right now..." Usually this is when you rewrite a plot later on. You can salvage some scenes and situations, but those probably were pretty loosely held by your original plot anyway. There isn't a lot you can do here besides take the same story and try again.
CHARACTERS:
Characters are so easy to salvage it isn't even funny. I had the first female admiral in the British Navy, Oliver Brown (not real) in three of my failed plays. Anything during that time period could conceivably involve her and it usually did. Names are something nice to salvage. I don't know about you, but I don't like to reuse names, so any name that I can use I will. Also some archetypes (Magician, pirate, etc.) can be reused if you had some great ideas for some sideplots involving them.
I know that if I ever scrap The Show Must Not Go On, I'm combing it for lines to use first. "Even gold has standards"? I got shivers up my spine when I wrote that. Maybe because I was sick, but still! Usually dialogue is like plot ("So Theylus, are you glad that you didn’t off yourself?") are contextually stuck in their original work. But you would be well advised to take your most golden lines. But you know what they say about gold...
MUSIC:
Much like dialogue and plot, lyrics are not salvageable. But melody lines totally are. And even some songs are too. I'm definitely including "Pennsylvania, It's The Best State" in one of my shows. The setting will just...have to be in Pennsylvania.
THEME:
You can always salvage your themes. Themes are universal and don't apply to one work alone. I mean, most of the time the subconscious theme is what's going to make you STOP writing a musical, but whatever. Oops. I didn't say that? Think for a minute about whatever work you just scrapped. Were you getting too involved with your own theme? Nod your head yes, because it's probably true. I mean, the above three reasons also happen sometimes, but the theme is the make it or break it. You most likely got too worried over if it presented gender plights or racial acceptance to bother to continue writing what flows in your mind.
As you can see, scrapping a musical isn't the end of the world or the end of your work. Every musical you write, failed or not, helps contribute to your overall writing ability.
1. It's Scene 2 and you are already sick of your characters. Sometimes I've made brilliant plots and characters, but after a while, they just start to rag on you. If you get sick of your characters, you can be almost positive that your audience will.
2. You realize that you didn't craft the plot carefully and you don't have enough stuff to happen between the beginning and end. Sometimes filler can fix this, but most of the time you want to AVOID filler, so when you have half a play without filler, you would be better off starting over, do some serious replot structuring, or just dropping it.
3. Whatever was motivating you to write this specific musical stops being an influence.
Regardless, a lot of the time when you scrap a musical, there are lots of beautiful parts that you just can't chuck in the trash. This article goes through each category and what you should and shouldn't keep.
(By the way this is assuming you are starting a new play. I put mine on infinite hiatus, which is different. Infinite hiatus is like "Oh, hey. I like the plot, I just don't like it right now..." I'll explain the difference in some of these categories)
PLOT:
It's really hard to salvage a plot by starting a new musical. In fact, it doesn't really make any sense. I put mine on infinite hiatus, which is different. Infinite hiatus is like "Oh, hey. I like the plot, I just don't like it right now..." Usually this is when you rewrite a plot later on. You can salvage some scenes and situations, but those probably were pretty loosely held by your original plot anyway. There isn't a lot you can do here besides take the same story and try again.
CHARACTERS:
Characters are so easy to salvage it isn't even funny. I had the first female admiral in the British Navy, Oliver Brown (not real) in three of my failed plays. Anything during that time period could conceivably involve her and it usually did. Names are something nice to salvage. I don't know about you, but I don't like to reuse names, so any name that I can use I will. Also some archetypes (Magician, pirate, etc.) can be reused if you had some great ideas for some sideplots involving them.
I know that if I ever scrap The Show Must Not Go On, I'm combing it for lines to use first. "Even gold has standards"? I got shivers up my spine when I wrote that. Maybe because I was sick, but still! Usually dialogue is like plot ("So Theylus, are you glad that you didn’t off yourself?") are contextually stuck in their original work. But you would be well advised to take your most golden lines. But you know what they say about gold...
MUSIC:
Much like dialogue and plot, lyrics are not salvageable. But melody lines totally are. And even some songs are too. I'm definitely including "Pennsylvania, It's The Best State" in one of my shows. The setting will just...have to be in Pennsylvania.
THEME:
You can always salvage your themes. Themes are universal and don't apply to one work alone. I mean, most of the time the subconscious theme is what's going to make you STOP writing a musical, but whatever. Oops. I didn't say that? Think for a minute about whatever work you just scrapped. Were you getting too involved with your own theme? Nod your head yes, because it's probably true. I mean, the above three reasons also happen sometimes, but the theme is the make it or break it. You most likely got too worried over if it presented gender plights or racial acceptance to bother to continue writing what flows in your mind.
As you can see, scrapping a musical isn't the end of the world or the end of your work. Every musical you write, failed or not, helps contribute to your overall writing ability.
Friday, August 14, 2009
Musical Review: The Producers
So, I could have reviewed American in Paris last week, except it had no validity as a musical. I was hard pressed to find a song that was actually relevant to the events that were going on around. It was an okay movie, but Gene Kelly should have gotten out of his little "Let's just tap dance all the time" phase. Even though I like tap dancing. Now I have a review for you of my favorite musical which I recently rewatched on DVD with my sister. The Producers. Before you shoot down the review because it's my favorite musical, I also recently learned that besides being the 20th longest running show on Broadway (And in the 21st Century no less), it won every single musical Tony that year, besides Best Revival and Best Female Lead (Since there isn't one, only a "featured"). That adds some validity to my rating. So without any more stuff: The review.
Plot: 20/20
I would be hard pressed to find ANYTHING in this musical that is filler. Every scene is essential to the plot. And how original the plot is to. A has-been Producer and his accountant realize that they could make more money by producing a flop than a hit, so they set out to get the worst play, director, cast, and anything else that will ensure their failure. Of course, this isn't as easy as it sounds. Just hearing the plot setup was enough for me to watch this movie. Just a note though, the movie is basically a filmed version of the stage production with better sets. So some stuff will seem to be over the top and hammy. Especially the first scene in the office.
Characters: 15/15
Every character in The Producers is a riot in themselves. And that's saying something considering all of the large parts in this musical. Besides Leo and Max, you have Ulla, Roger, Carmen, Franz as fairly large parts. Even some of the one shot characters seem to have very strong connections to the plot. As a female, I would feel bad about the lack of women roles, but oh well. It's hard to imagine that such unrealistic over-the-top stereotypical exaggerations can simultaneously seem so realistic.
Dialogue: 14/15
The dialogue is filled with dry jokes, clever puns, and references to things. I took off a point for the office scene at the beginning. Maybe it was poor translation from stage to movie, but it's almost unbearable for me to watch between "Opening Night" and "We Can Do It", since "King of Broadway" was a deleted scene, so I won't count that in the chronology.
Music: 20/20
The music is by far the best part of The Producers. I can listen to the whole soundtrack in order and frequently do, due to it's quality melody lines, great lyrics, and strong pit parts. Every song is catchy and good, two elements which aren't always present. There are about 20ish songs in this production, and only the rare repetition of themes. One of the best moments, however, is in the song "Betrayed", where Max Bialystock summarizes the whole musical up to that part in the space of about thirty seconds. Just the shock running down my spine from witnessing this feat was impressive. Not to mention that the songs are very well tied to the musical. You could sing a bunch of the songs standalone, but there would be no mistaking where it came from.
Adaptation: 10/10
This musical is an adaptation of a movie. A rather outdated boring movie. Well, it isn't that bad, but it shouldn't even be a question which one is better. This is the only reason why I don't completely bash adaptations. Retains most of the best lines from the movie and cuts the crap (LSD guy...).
Curtain Call: 5/5
The credit music added three MORE songs of original material. That's pretty intense for the CREDITS.
Theme/Underlying Social Message: 7/7
The only real underlying social message that you can get from this is that Max and Leo pick Springtime for Hitler because it's sure to offend people of all nationalities, religions, and creeds. The Producers itself could almost fall under the same category. A lot of the self referential humor make the musical almost a parody of itself.
Other Opinion Category: 7/8
That first office scene...
Total: 98/100
Well worth a watch. Just don't watch it with someone who will be offended easily.
Plot: 20/20
I would be hard pressed to find ANYTHING in this musical that is filler. Every scene is essential to the plot. And how original the plot is to. A has-been Producer and his accountant realize that they could make more money by producing a flop than a hit, so they set out to get the worst play, director, cast, and anything else that will ensure their failure. Of course, this isn't as easy as it sounds. Just hearing the plot setup was enough for me to watch this movie. Just a note though, the movie is basically a filmed version of the stage production with better sets. So some stuff will seem to be over the top and hammy. Especially the first scene in the office.
Characters: 15/15
Every character in The Producers is a riot in themselves. And that's saying something considering all of the large parts in this musical. Besides Leo and Max, you have Ulla, Roger, Carmen, Franz as fairly large parts. Even some of the one shot characters seem to have very strong connections to the plot. As a female, I would feel bad about the lack of women roles, but oh well. It's hard to imagine that such unrealistic over-the-top stereotypical exaggerations can simultaneously seem so realistic.
Dialogue: 14/15
The dialogue is filled with dry jokes, clever puns, and references to things. I took off a point for the office scene at the beginning. Maybe it was poor translation from stage to movie, but it's almost unbearable for me to watch between "Opening Night" and "We Can Do It", since "King of Broadway" was a deleted scene, so I won't count that in the chronology.
Music: 20/20
The music is by far the best part of The Producers. I can listen to the whole soundtrack in order and frequently do, due to it's quality melody lines, great lyrics, and strong pit parts. Every song is catchy and good, two elements which aren't always present. There are about 20ish songs in this production, and only the rare repetition of themes. One of the best moments, however, is in the song "Betrayed", where Max Bialystock summarizes the whole musical up to that part in the space of about thirty seconds. Just the shock running down my spine from witnessing this feat was impressive. Not to mention that the songs are very well tied to the musical. You could sing a bunch of the songs standalone, but there would be no mistaking where it came from.
Adaptation: 10/10
This musical is an adaptation of a movie. A rather outdated boring movie. Well, it isn't that bad, but it shouldn't even be a question which one is better. This is the only reason why I don't completely bash adaptations. Retains most of the best lines from the movie and cuts the crap (LSD guy...).
Curtain Call: 5/5
The credit music added three MORE songs of original material. That's pretty intense for the CREDITS.
Theme/Underlying Social Message: 7/7
The only real underlying social message that you can get from this is that Max and Leo pick Springtime for Hitler because it's sure to offend people of all nationalities, religions, and creeds. The Producers itself could almost fall under the same category. A lot of the self referential humor make the musical almost a parody of itself.
Other Opinion Category: 7/8
That first office scene...
Total: 98/100
Well worth a watch. Just don't watch it with someone who will be offended easily.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Musical Review: Camelot
Last night, I watched Camelot with my sister on Netflix's "Watch it Now" option online. I had previously seen it live at the Chanhassen, but that was years ago so I only vaguely remembered it. After a lot of technical mishaps, I was finally able to watch it. I decided, why not use the rating system I developed to rate it for people?
Plot: 19/20
The plot of Camelot is superb. I know that there were some differences between the movie and musical though. However, it was three hours long. This is a long time, but the plot wasn't dragging at all. My only complaint about the plot was the erratic time flow. Years pass by at certain points, while at other points you think it is years instead of only a day. I was able to follow these, but your typical audience may not be able to. They should have clarified how much later things were or made it more obvious somehow.
Characters: 13/15
Most of the characters were great in this musical. The only problem was that there weren't a lot of them. You have Arthur, Lancelot, Guinevere, King Pellinore, and Mordred. And those last two were almost a stretch. Sure there are some one shot knights and the boy at the end, but I would hate to be auditioning for something like this. After Lancelot and Guinevere get together, you barely want to be around them either, so it could have used some more line soakers. I know the play had Merlin and Morgan Le Fay, so I didn't take off too many points.
Dialogue: 13/15
While "no one talks like that" now days, the dialogue seemed almost as authentic as it could get. Whether this was director's choice or merely poor writing however, most of the lines lent themselves to being whispered. I had to hook my laptop into my TV's audio so that I could turn it loud enough to hear what they were saying. Also, if someone really acts Lancelot the way play suggests, it gets rattling, since the accent could so easily be done away with. This could be more of a grasp towards authenticity, but maybe a little less thick would have made it more enjoyable.
Music: 18/20
The music in this was great. While there weren't as many songs as I would hope for (They apparently cut four or so for the movie), every one of them was memorable. They were all well written vocal parts, although the pit parts seemed to suffer from a bit underuse, which could just be because of the medieval sound. I also would have liked for other people to sing songs besides the main three. They cut both of Mordred's songs, but there is still only one (Two if you count "The Lusty Month of May") song where the company sings.
Adaptation: 8/10
While this was very well written, anyone who didn't have background on King Arthur wouldn't have understood a lot of it. And it is an adaptation still, so...
Curtain Call: 4/5
The credit music was fine. Nothing phenomenal though.
Theme/Underlying Social Message: 7/7
Some of the themes really hit home to me, like Arthur deciding to let Lance and Gwenny be together, because otherwise he's putting his rights above theirs, and he is a civilized king. This ends up being his tragic downfall however. A lot of the other issues are still comparable today, and despite being set in medieval times, it still seems very "current".
Other Opinion Category: 7/8
I took off a point because of the limited cast and long length, two things most audiences wouldn't appreciate.
Total: 89/100
That's a good score by the way. Camelot is a very good musical and I would recommend it to anyone. It doesn't have a specific niche so I think it could be enjoyed by any audience.
Plot: 19/20
The plot of Camelot is superb. I know that there were some differences between the movie and musical though. However, it was three hours long. This is a long time, but the plot wasn't dragging at all. My only complaint about the plot was the erratic time flow. Years pass by at certain points, while at other points you think it is years instead of only a day. I was able to follow these, but your typical audience may not be able to. They should have clarified how much later things were or made it more obvious somehow.
Characters: 13/15
Most of the characters were great in this musical. The only problem was that there weren't a lot of them. You have Arthur, Lancelot, Guinevere, King Pellinore, and Mordred. And those last two were almost a stretch. Sure there are some one shot knights and the boy at the end, but I would hate to be auditioning for something like this. After Lancelot and Guinevere get together, you barely want to be around them either, so it could have used some more line soakers. I know the play had Merlin and Morgan Le Fay, so I didn't take off too many points.
Dialogue: 13/15
While "no one talks like that" now days, the dialogue seemed almost as authentic as it could get. Whether this was director's choice or merely poor writing however, most of the lines lent themselves to being whispered. I had to hook my laptop into my TV's audio so that I could turn it loud enough to hear what they were saying. Also, if someone really acts Lancelot the way play suggests, it gets rattling, since the accent could so easily be done away with. This could be more of a grasp towards authenticity, but maybe a little less thick would have made it more enjoyable.
Music: 18/20
The music in this was great. While there weren't as many songs as I would hope for (They apparently cut four or so for the movie), every one of them was memorable. They were all well written vocal parts, although the pit parts seemed to suffer from a bit underuse, which could just be because of the medieval sound. I also would have liked for other people to sing songs besides the main three. They cut both of Mordred's songs, but there is still only one (Two if you count "The Lusty Month of May") song where the company sings.
Adaptation: 8/10
While this was very well written, anyone who didn't have background on King Arthur wouldn't have understood a lot of it. And it is an adaptation still, so...
Curtain Call: 4/5
The credit music was fine. Nothing phenomenal though.
Theme/Underlying Social Message: 7/7
Some of the themes really hit home to me, like Arthur deciding to let Lance and Gwenny be together, because otherwise he's putting his rights above theirs, and he is a civilized king. This ends up being his tragic downfall however. A lot of the other issues are still comparable today, and despite being set in medieval times, it still seems very "current".
Other Opinion Category: 7/8
I took off a point because of the limited cast and long length, two things most audiences wouldn't appreciate.
Total: 89/100
That's a good score by the way. Camelot is a very good musical and I would recommend it to anyone. It doesn't have a specific niche so I think it could be enjoyed by any audience.
Friday, July 24, 2009
New Musical Pt 1. (Introduction and What's in a Title)
So I put the musical I was writing on unrequested postponement. It wasn't going to be used for the purpose which I was writing it for, so I didn't feel the need to finish it. I also had too many melodies and not enough plot content. Unwilling to make another Dreamgirls, I set it aside in order to better use my creative talents. I decided it would be beneficial for my audience if I outlined the steps that I went through, for those of you who are in need of general help in writing.
I can't help you come up with an idea. My idea just came to me. It's the story of a concert violinist, who at a young age was gypped out of his father's prize violin by his treacherous younger brother, in a Jacob and Esau sort of allusion. When he is older, he is thrown out of his orchestra after a while because the violin he uses simply doesn't match up to the tone of the other violinists and it sticks out. Instead of getting a new one, he sets off to reclaim the one owed him by birthright.
Now that's just the basis. The next step for me is to come up with a working title. Which leads to the article
WHAT'S IN A TITLE?
A lot of people underestimate the importance of a good title. A lot of uninformed people only have your title to go off of. If a title sounds interesting, you will get more viewers. Otherwise it just won't stand out in a crowd. It's important to always consider the length of your title. Quickly think of the longest musical title you can. How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying comes to mind for me, but the only reason is because of it's length. It's hard to generate lots of buzz about a longer title, simply because it takes more effort to mention it, and lots of people are lazy. On the flipside, shorter names don't go very well either. You pretty much have to make up a word or use a very uncommon one. Otherwise it just sounds like a brand of perfume.
You'll want to make sure that your title doesn't mislead people about the content of your musical. Most of the time this will scare away people as opposed to drawing them in. If I named my musical The Battle of Redsboro, when it's about two clothing lines trying to draw customers away from each other, I'm going to have a double dip in attendance. People who don't really like war aren't going to look at it and won't go. People who are into war will look into it, find out it's actually about fashion, and won't go. Real musicals that I believe fall in this category? I couldn't find any examples off the top of my head. However, just wait and I will think of one, just like how I just remembered A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum has a longer title.
A lot of the time it will be better to have a title which could also be a title of the song in the work. Camelot, Sound of Music, and The Producers all have songs in them that are titled the same as the work. So when people think of Camelot, instantly they think of the song Camelot too. Which, if you do that you have to make sure the song based off the title is good.
Now let's look at the titles for my previous plays:
1. Ballad of Theylus Mignon- Not altogether descriptive of what happens. There is a song in it with the same title though, so we'll give it props. Vague, but won't scare or attract specific groups of people.
2. Jamodyssey- You know there is going to be an adventure in it. Lots of English professors will be attracted by the possibility of allusions. It doesn't scare anyone away, and generates a lot of buzz as a title, hypothetically.
3. The Show Must Not Go On - The subject matter is vague, but you know some matter of show will be happening. People may be drawn in by the fact that the protagonist clearly doesn't want the show to happen. There is a song with the same title.
Anyway, I have determined that the title of my next work will be The Ebony Violin. This alludes to The Red Violin, a famous named violin.
Next time, I'll tell you how to create a main character. And maybe the plot layout or something.
I can't help you come up with an idea. My idea just came to me. It's the story of a concert violinist, who at a young age was gypped out of his father's prize violin by his treacherous younger brother, in a Jacob and Esau sort of allusion. When he is older, he is thrown out of his orchestra after a while because the violin he uses simply doesn't match up to the tone of the other violinists and it sticks out. Instead of getting a new one, he sets off to reclaim the one owed him by birthright.
Now that's just the basis. The next step for me is to come up with a working title. Which leads to the article
WHAT'S IN A TITLE?
A lot of people underestimate the importance of a good title. A lot of uninformed people only have your title to go off of. If a title sounds interesting, you will get more viewers. Otherwise it just won't stand out in a crowd. It's important to always consider the length of your title. Quickly think of the longest musical title you can. How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying comes to mind for me, but the only reason is because of it's length. It's hard to generate lots of buzz about a longer title, simply because it takes more effort to mention it, and lots of people are lazy. On the flipside, shorter names don't go very well either. You pretty much have to make up a word or use a very uncommon one. Otherwise it just sounds like a brand of perfume.
You'll want to make sure that your title doesn't mislead people about the content of your musical. Most of the time this will scare away people as opposed to drawing them in. If I named my musical The Battle of Redsboro, when it's about two clothing lines trying to draw customers away from each other, I'm going to have a double dip in attendance. People who don't really like war aren't going to look at it and won't go. People who are into war will look into it, find out it's actually about fashion, and won't go. Real musicals that I believe fall in this category? I couldn't find any examples off the top of my head. However, just wait and I will think of one, just like how I just remembered A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum has a longer title.
A lot of the time it will be better to have a title which could also be a title of the song in the work. Camelot, Sound of Music, and The Producers all have songs in them that are titled the same as the work. So when people think of Camelot, instantly they think of the song Camelot too. Which, if you do that you have to make sure the song based off the title is good.
Now let's look at the titles for my previous plays:
1. Ballad of Theylus Mignon- Not altogether descriptive of what happens. There is a song in it with the same title though, so we'll give it props. Vague, but won't scare or attract specific groups of people.
2. Jamodyssey- You know there is going to be an adventure in it. Lots of English professors will be attracted by the possibility of allusions. It doesn't scare anyone away, and generates a lot of buzz as a title, hypothetically.
3. The Show Must Not Go On - The subject matter is vague, but you know some matter of show will be happening. People may be drawn in by the fact that the protagonist clearly doesn't want the show to happen. There is a song with the same title.
Anyway, I have determined that the title of my next work will be The Ebony Violin. This alludes to The Red Violin, a famous named violin.
Next time, I'll tell you how to create a main character. And maybe the plot layout or something.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
Avoiding Oversaturation
A lot of writers think that the trick to a longer musical is a longer script. This may seem like the obvious solution, but there are lots of wrong ways to do it (In fact, some people may find that the stuff you don't write in the script, AKA all of the song and dance parts, take up most of the time). There are lots of proper things you can do to fill out a script, like filling it with more dialogue and actual content. Then there are the things to avoid. Here are some rules to follow to make sure you don't fall into their traps.
1. AVOID UNNECESSARY STAGE DIRECTIONS
The rule of stage directions is that you shouldn't put them in, unless they are important and something that wouldn't naturally be done. Or exits/entrances. Firstly, directors don't necessarily care about following the script. They will work around the set and the physical demands and staging that they feel like. Twenty pages worth of (CHARACTER crosses stage) (CHARACTER walks to his left) is worthless. Secondly, your estimate has been thrown off. Your two hour work is now at a questionable hour and a half.
2.AVOID IN DEPTH CHARACTER DESCRIPTIONS
Guess what the character page is for? Describing your characters. Guess what the PLOT and DIALOGUE is for? Characterizing your characters. If the need for your character to wear a redd dress has no plot significance, symbolism, or anything of that nature, cut it. Don't take half a page the first time the character is mentioned saying what they are like. You are being redundant and your script length to quality ratio will suffer.
3.AVOID UNIMPORTANT SCENE DESCRIPTIONS
You can include diagrams if you want. You don't need to describe every inch of your town scenery, if over half of it is just unnamed vendors and buildings that don't have any significance. Sets are EXPENSIVE and you certainly don't want to limit theatres on a budget by making them think that everything you mention is necessary.
4.DON'T SPLIT YOUR LYRICS INTO MULTIPLE LINES
...while you are writing the paper draft of your musical. Certainly, when you type up your masterpiece, space them out as another reference for phrase breaks and things of that nature. But when you write out your work, you will fool yourself into thinking that you have written more than you have. And it's ten times harder to write more material after you have finished than during the process.
The general rule of thumb is that a musical is about two hours long. That's two hours of dialogue, music, and "action". So anything you write in the body of your musical must be essential. Otherwise you can count your script amongst all those submitted that are too short for consideration.
1. AVOID UNNECESSARY STAGE DIRECTIONS
The rule of stage directions is that you shouldn't put them in, unless they are important and something that wouldn't naturally be done. Or exits/entrances. Firstly, directors don't necessarily care about following the script. They will work around the set and the physical demands and staging that they feel like. Twenty pages worth of (CHARACTER crosses stage) (CHARACTER walks to his left) is worthless. Secondly, your estimate has been thrown off. Your two hour work is now at a questionable hour and a half.
2.AVOID IN DEPTH CHARACTER DESCRIPTIONS
Guess what the character page is for? Describing your characters. Guess what the PLOT and DIALOGUE is for? Characterizing your characters. If the need for your character to wear a redd dress has no plot significance, symbolism, or anything of that nature, cut it. Don't take half a page the first time the character is mentioned saying what they are like. You are being redundant and your script length to quality ratio will suffer.
3.AVOID UNIMPORTANT SCENE DESCRIPTIONS
You can include diagrams if you want. You don't need to describe every inch of your town scenery, if over half of it is just unnamed vendors and buildings that don't have any significance. Sets are EXPENSIVE and you certainly don't want to limit theatres on a budget by making them think that everything you mention is necessary.
4.DON'T SPLIT YOUR LYRICS INTO MULTIPLE LINES
...while you are writing the paper draft of your musical. Certainly, when you type up your masterpiece, space them out as another reference for phrase breaks and things of that nature. But when you write out your work, you will fool yourself into thinking that you have written more than you have. And it's ten times harder to write more material after you have finished than during the process.
The general rule of thumb is that a musical is about two hours long. That's two hours of dialogue, music, and "action". So anything you write in the body of your musical must be essential. Otherwise you can count your script amongst all those submitted that are too short for consideration.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Instrumentation
Instruments play a huge role in how your music sounds. Don't believe me? Find someone who likes MIDI compared to live instruments. If you actually did, send them to the hospital to get their hearing checked. That's not even something that you can have a preference on. Before you electronic lovers get on my back, there is a stark difference between GEN-MIDI and electronica instruments. Now, you have two main choices these days. You can have a classical orchestral sort of pit crew or you can have a more modern "rock" crew like Rent had.
Oh sorry. Did I say you have a choice?
DON'T DO ROCK PIT. DON'T DO ROCK PIT. DON'T DO ROCK PIT. Turn on your radio. Flip through all of the channels. What do most of them have on them? Guitar/Bass/Drums with maybe some keyboard and some junky percussion. Do you want your audience to be comparing your music to Van Halen, Dream Theater, or *shudder* Paramore? The trap set was the stupidest part of seeing Phantom live. Musicals aren't movies (But adapt musicals to movies, please). The music has to be a richer, deeper sound. Which is where your classical orchestra comes in.
Consider the setting of your musical. Or don't if you don't want to. Plenty of composers managed to invoke other countries in their pieces without changing their orchestration.
The typical orchestra consists of a lot of strings, that is, violins, violas, cellos, and basses. Next you have the woodwinds. Instruments that may have been spare in your band in school are more prominent here. Brass are more of fanfare players in musical theatre, besides the French Horn who will have a lot of your melodies. The important percussion is all of the auxiliary and timpani. But please, no snares.
Instrumentation plays a very important part in giving subtle hints to the audience. If you are like me, you will like assigning certain instruments to motifs and characters. Is your cello in hiding? Give a short little hint of the cello character motif in the interlude music. Not everyone will pick up on it, but some people will, and most people will subconsciously. Or in a work that I'm not going to spoil for anyone, after a certain character died, they played the reoccurring theme with the main instrument missing. It really changed the whole sound of the song and showed the audience the loss everyone was going through. Now remember that you can get completely different sounds out of instruments through altered techniques or even just different ranges. A trumpet playing low sounds a lot different than a trombone playing high. Is your character drunk? Let their instrument show it.
A lot of people also forget about instrumentation when trying to establish a certain mood. If your song doesn't sound sad enough, don't scrap it. If you reorchestrate it, you may find that your music is fine when played in the low brass instead of the clarinets, or something similar.
You should consider all of these things when you are writing for orchestra. Because you aren't writing for a rock pit, remember?
Oh sorry. Did I say you have a choice?
DON'T DO ROCK PIT. DON'T DO ROCK PIT. DON'T DO ROCK PIT. Turn on your radio. Flip through all of the channels. What do most of them have on them? Guitar/Bass/Drums with maybe some keyboard and some junky percussion. Do you want your audience to be comparing your music to Van Halen, Dream Theater, or *shudder* Paramore? The trap set was the stupidest part of seeing Phantom live. Musicals aren't movies (But adapt musicals to movies, please). The music has to be a richer, deeper sound. Which is where your classical orchestra comes in.
Consider the setting of your musical. Or don't if you don't want to. Plenty of composers managed to invoke other countries in their pieces without changing their orchestration.
The typical orchestra consists of a lot of strings, that is, violins, violas, cellos, and basses. Next you have the woodwinds. Instruments that may have been spare in your band in school are more prominent here. Brass are more of fanfare players in musical theatre, besides the French Horn who will have a lot of your melodies. The important percussion is all of the auxiliary and timpani. But please, no snares.
Instrumentation plays a very important part in giving subtle hints to the audience. If you are like me, you will like assigning certain instruments to motifs and characters. Is your cello in hiding? Give a short little hint of the cello character motif in the interlude music. Not everyone will pick up on it, but some people will, and most people will subconsciously. Or in a work that I'm not going to spoil for anyone, after a certain character died, they played the reoccurring theme with the main instrument missing. It really changed the whole sound of the song and showed the audience the loss everyone was going through. Now remember that you can get completely different sounds out of instruments through altered techniques or even just different ranges. A trumpet playing low sounds a lot different than a trombone playing high. Is your character drunk? Let their instrument show it.
A lot of people also forget about instrumentation when trying to establish a certain mood. If your song doesn't sound sad enough, don't scrap it. If you reorchestrate it, you may find that your music is fine when played in the low brass instead of the clarinets, or something similar.
You should consider all of these things when you are writing for orchestra. Because you aren't writing for a rock pit, remember?
Side Characters
Oh, side characters. The people who make us laugh and cry. The people who are played by actors who put extra effort in to be remembered by the audience. They may not be as skilled or important as the main characters, but they still help your play get high ratings. Side characters fall into four categories: Comedy relief, plot essential, required, line soakers.
1. Comedy Relief
If you have a serious play, there will be parts in the middle where your audience will be starving for some quick laughs. Usually your main characters are too serious to be funny or are in too serious of situations to be funny. This is where your side characters come in. You can easily throw together someone to filter your jokes through to the audience. Be warned though. Comedy relief side characters are the easiest ones to screw up with. If they are too annoying, the audience will hate every second they are on stage. Unlike the mains, they COULD have been cut. That will reflect poorly on you, the writer.
2.Plot Essential
These are the characters that the plot incorporates, but doesn't show up enough to be a main. An example would be the King Richard at the end of Robin Hood from the Disney movie. He is important to the plot and necessary, but he only shows up at the end. This is true for any character who dies usually too. They would have been mains, but they got killed. Typically, audiences don't gripe about plot essential characters and how they could be cut. Just avoid giving them roles that would realistically be other peoples. A king doesn't have ten messengers for the same exact recipient usually, for example.
3.Required
So maybe you wrote yourself into a little hole. Your characters go to a restaurant for a few scenes of the musical. You need to make a waiter or waitress. There aren't very many ways around this. Your character is an adolescent whose parents should realistically show up at some point even if they don't necessarily affect the plot. These are similar to "Plot Essential", however they are more realistic due to the characters existing in a "real world" instead of because the plot needs them. Audience members should never think these characters should be cut.
4.Line Soakers
This is the hardest category of side characters to justify and the ones that you need to be careful with, or you WILL have problems. Line soakers can be the characters you stick around because you don't want your two mains talking to each other for the entire play. Line soakers can also be groups of characters who collectively have too many lines. If they were all one character, they would be end up being a main character and for some reason you have opposition to this. For example, in The Ballad of Theylus Mignon, Axle, Bolt, and Girder could conceivably have been one character. However, as one character, they would have too many lines. They also have a better group dynamic than if they were one single character. Line soakers can sometimes be hard to justify, but if you do them right you should be fine.
Now, what are some mistakes people make with their side characters? Not only am I saying this next part from the view of a writer, but also an actor and an audience member. Here are some things to keep in mind when creating side characters:
Firstly, make a spider web of all your characters and their hypothetical connections to each other in the plot. If they are going to encounter other characters, connect them. Anything like that. Now look at your spider web. Do you have any characters that only are connected to one or two characters? Ask yourself why these characters aren't connected to anyone else. If they are imaginary, in hiding, any of those things, that's fine. It makes sense. Otherwise, build some more connections or cut them. If your play is running long or boring, these will be the first people your audience will have a problem with.
Secondly, do you have any characters that should show up more? When I was in Mr. Hobb's Vacation, I played whatever the chick's name is boyfriend Sam. Now, I only showed up in the first scene. However, the chick was in every scene, the family was always talking about Sam being around, and there was no real reason for him to be absent. That was poor writing on that playwright's part. People were confused and multiple people asked me what happened to him. Make sure you give all of your characters the stage time they require.
Thirdly, if you are going to have someone show up for one scene, give them a bunch of lines in that scene. There is nothing worse than the person who is not only insignificant enough that they don't show up in the rest of the play, but aren't even prominent in the scene they are in. That's just a glorified chorus member. Don't make some poor sap happy by giving their character a name, without the satisfaction that comes with named parts. This goes for you Beauty and the Beast, who named all of their chorus members, which severely distorted who was actually important and who wasn't.
Go through your play. Decide which category your side character fits in and make sure that they dont' violate any rules. This should bring you closer to a more perfect product.
1. Comedy Relief
If you have a serious play, there will be parts in the middle where your audience will be starving for some quick laughs. Usually your main characters are too serious to be funny or are in too serious of situations to be funny. This is where your side characters come in. You can easily throw together someone to filter your jokes through to the audience. Be warned though. Comedy relief side characters are the easiest ones to screw up with. If they are too annoying, the audience will hate every second they are on stage. Unlike the mains, they COULD have been cut. That will reflect poorly on you, the writer.
2.Plot Essential
These are the characters that the plot incorporates, but doesn't show up enough to be a main. An example would be the King Richard at the end of Robin Hood from the Disney movie. He is important to the plot and necessary, but he only shows up at the end. This is true for any character who dies usually too. They would have been mains, but they got killed. Typically, audiences don't gripe about plot essential characters and how they could be cut. Just avoid giving them roles that would realistically be other peoples. A king doesn't have ten messengers for the same exact recipient usually, for example.
3.Required
So maybe you wrote yourself into a little hole. Your characters go to a restaurant for a few scenes of the musical. You need to make a waiter or waitress. There aren't very many ways around this. Your character is an adolescent whose parents should realistically show up at some point even if they don't necessarily affect the plot. These are similar to "Plot Essential", however they are more realistic due to the characters existing in a "real world" instead of because the plot needs them. Audience members should never think these characters should be cut.
4.Line Soakers
This is the hardest category of side characters to justify and the ones that you need to be careful with, or you WILL have problems. Line soakers can be the characters you stick around because you don't want your two mains talking to each other for the entire play. Line soakers can also be groups of characters who collectively have too many lines. If they were all one character, they would be end up being a main character and for some reason you have opposition to this. For example, in The Ballad of Theylus Mignon, Axle, Bolt, and Girder could conceivably have been one character. However, as one character, they would have too many lines. They also have a better group dynamic than if they were one single character. Line soakers can sometimes be hard to justify, but if you do them right you should be fine.
Now, what are some mistakes people make with their side characters? Not only am I saying this next part from the view of a writer, but also an actor and an audience member. Here are some things to keep in mind when creating side characters:
Firstly, make a spider web of all your characters and their hypothetical connections to each other in the plot. If they are going to encounter other characters, connect them. Anything like that. Now look at your spider web. Do you have any characters that only are connected to one or two characters? Ask yourself why these characters aren't connected to anyone else. If they are imaginary, in hiding, any of those things, that's fine. It makes sense. Otherwise, build some more connections or cut them. If your play is running long or boring, these will be the first people your audience will have a problem with.
Secondly, do you have any characters that should show up more? When I was in Mr. Hobb's Vacation, I played whatever the chick's name is boyfriend Sam. Now, I only showed up in the first scene. However, the chick was in every scene, the family was always talking about Sam being around, and there was no real reason for him to be absent. That was poor writing on that playwright's part. People were confused and multiple people asked me what happened to him. Make sure you give all of your characters the stage time they require.
Thirdly, if you are going to have someone show up for one scene, give them a bunch of lines in that scene. There is nothing worse than the person who is not only insignificant enough that they don't show up in the rest of the play, but aren't even prominent in the scene they are in. That's just a glorified chorus member. Don't make some poor sap happy by giving their character a name, without the satisfaction that comes with named parts. This goes for you Beauty and the Beast, who named all of their chorus members, which severely distorted who was actually important and who wasn't.
Go through your play. Decide which category your side character fits in and make sure that they dont' violate any rules. This should bring you closer to a more perfect product.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
Importance of the Curtain Call
Most people under estimate the power of a good curtain call. The last thing the audience remembers is the curtain call, and if you make it bad, they will remember. When I have assisted in directing musicals, I always take this responsibility to make the best. But how do you even do a curtain call right or wrong?
1. You need to pick a song in duple meter or quadruple meter. Usually audiences like the curtain call clap of "ONE-TWO-ONE-TWO". I always start it when I can, and you should to. You're clapping with the song, with the backup music for the actors. What more connection can you have? Don't be like the fools who put a slow ballade on or something in 3/4? Or the ones who plain don't have music during curtain call? Fools.
2. DON'T HAVE SINGING DURING THE CURTAIN CALL. There is nothing worse than having an idiot director who decides that everyone should stop clapping to hear this last little bit and then resume clapping. It's disorienting. People are already leaving when the actors start coming on anyway. It's just a waste of your actors' energy.
3. Make the curtain call at least medium length. Short curtain calls not only make standing ovations less likely to occur, but you don't give all of the parts their fair response of applause. And you have to really suck to not get a standing ovation professionally, so anything to make that worse is a bad idea.
4. Acknowledge the pit, tech crew, etc. so that people can appreciate their work too.
Now, here's a true "Corbin" curtain call. Acknowledge if you use this, or I will make you suffer.
Have each group of characters come out to their respective music. So a medley of all the memorable music themes you have had. Always make sure that the slow songs get sped up for this. Hopefully you can find the right tempo for songs in 3/4 so that the audience can still clap away if you are forced to use one. They come out from least important to most important. If you aren't doing curtain calls at least THIS way, you are doing them wrong probably. If you have a lot of doubling of parts, have everyone be their best one.
If you do curtain calls wrong, your play will close faster on Broadway. Guaranteed.
1. You need to pick a song in duple meter or quadruple meter. Usually audiences like the curtain call clap of "ONE-TWO-ONE-TWO". I always start it when I can, and you should to. You're clapping with the song, with the backup music for the actors. What more connection can you have? Don't be like the fools who put a slow ballade on or something in 3/4? Or the ones who plain don't have music during curtain call? Fools.
2. DON'T HAVE SINGING DURING THE CURTAIN CALL. There is nothing worse than having an idiot director who decides that everyone should stop clapping to hear this last little bit and then resume clapping. It's disorienting. People are already leaving when the actors start coming on anyway. It's just a waste of your actors' energy.
3. Make the curtain call at least medium length. Short curtain calls not only make standing ovations less likely to occur, but you don't give all of the parts their fair response of applause. And you have to really suck to not get a standing ovation professionally, so anything to make that worse is a bad idea.
4. Acknowledge the pit, tech crew, etc. so that people can appreciate their work too.
Now, here's a true "Corbin" curtain call. Acknowledge if you use this, or I will make you suffer.
Have each group of characters come out to their respective music. So a medley of all the memorable music themes you have had. Always make sure that the slow songs get sped up for this. Hopefully you can find the right tempo for songs in 3/4 so that the audience can still clap away if you are forced to use one. They come out from least important to most important. If you aren't doing curtain calls at least THIS way, you are doing them wrong probably. If you have a lot of doubling of parts, have everyone be their best one.
If you do curtain calls wrong, your play will close faster on Broadway. Guaranteed.
The Musical Writer's Guide to Rating Musicals.
When I rate musicals on here, I will be using the "Corbin" 100-point rating system. I know that it may seem to you like a lot of things are named after me in this blog. Tough it out. Besides explaining to you so that you know how I get my ratings, you can also see what sort of things I consider when giving a value in each category.
First thing to consider though before we start is objectivity vs subjectivity. You may notice that nowhere do I rank actors, setting, or music performance. We're rating these as metaformances. A metaformance is a hypothetical performance with the best actors, the best musicians, the best set, etc. My opinion shouldn't conflict with yours just because I saw it performed in a local theatre and you saw it on Broadway, except in the case where the directors actually change the Book/Score.
Plot: X/20
1. Consider whether the plot was hard or easy to follow. Keep in mind that if the plot was intended to be hard to follow that you don't punish the author for that.
2. How much was plot versus filler? If there was a lot of filler, was the filler enjoyable? Filler is anything that doesn't really do a job of characterization or advancing the plot or anything. I can't think of a good example. Maybe when Raoul gets the people to try to shoot the Phantom and they fail. They could have cut that without much loss. Most of Music Man is filler, but it's enjoyable filler.
3.How original the plot was is important. You can forgive fairly unoriginal plots if they were still very good, but a plot score can suffer if it's the same romance story you have heard fifty times.
Characters: x/15
1. Are the characters who are supposed to be interesting interesting? You have to look past actors' performances for this one. If you have any strong feelings, good or bad, towards characters, they are probably interesting.
2. Don't punish musicals for having superfluous characters. Sometimes you need to add in a few more male or female roles just so that it doesn't get rejected because most high school productions try to include many people. Broadway people will have people double up, don't worry about it. The only time this gets to be a problem is when you have forty characters who are named and have few lines.
3. Are the characters strongly connected to the plot? This mostly applies to main characters, but if they don't seem to fit with the plot and the plot is pretty good, then the problem is with the characters.
Dialogue: x/15
1. People really overuse the phrase "People don't talk like that" when referring to works by their peers. I'm guilty of saying it to. However, when it comes to musicals for example, I always write out most contractions. That makes the actor/director aware that they are there. They can recontract them later if it sounds choppy. The good actors can figure out which contractions are necessary.
Also, just because you don't know people that talk that way doesn't mean no one does.
2. Are there a lot of pointless lines?
3. Take points off for unnecessary accents on the parts of characters. Making your work hard to understand because of dialect is just stupid. I'm looking at you Brian Jacques with your stupid Redwall dialects. I can figure out that the moles are supposed to sound like rednecks or whatever. I don't need "Ow geroff muh' . She seys dat nuhbudy gunna get tru har"
Music: x/20
1. Are the pit crew parts good? Remember that the pit is more important in creating the mood of a song than the singer. If you don't like the music, that's usually where you can look.
2. Are the songs memorable? You don't have to punish Musicals for not having memorable songs, but reward them for it for sure. Sometimes things just don't click with individuals.
3. Is there too much singing and too much repetition of themes? Phantom...!
Adaptation: x/10
1. If it's not an adaptation, give 10 points, unless it's really bad and you are looking for more places to take off points.
2. If it's a good adaptation of the source, give it a higher score out of /10. I mean, have you ever said, "I liked that better than the movie."? That would be a good adaptation regardless of how "faithful" it is to the source material.
3. If it was a terrible adaptation, did it atleast stick to the source material?
Curtain Call: x/5
1. Did you enjoy the hypothetical curtain call? Did it have the right music for the curtain call? If you watch a movie, credit music takes the place. If there is absolutely no indication of you what the curtain call would be like, just use this as free reward/punishment.
Theme/Underlying Social Message: x/7
1. Was it a strong theme? Stronger themes get more points unless it becomes obnoxiously in your face.
2. Could you find a theme? If you couldn't and it seems like it was trying to have one, punish them. If it just legitimately doesn't have one, use this category for whatever.
3. Does it violate my Underlying Social Message thing?
Other Opinion Category: x/8
1. Poor use of plot twist or anything like that?
2. Just didn't like the historical setting?
3. Just don't like certain musical writers?
Hopefully this guide will help you. Either judge each category, or give a score out of 100, and then divide the points up into how you see them. Like, I would give Dream Girls a 40/100 probably. If I went down category by category I would probably end up with a higher score than 40, simply because it's hard to determine whether I'm being too harsh or not.
Use this to your advantage in rating musicals with an objective point of view.
First thing to consider though before we start is objectivity vs subjectivity. You may notice that nowhere do I rank actors, setting, or music performance. We're rating these as metaformances. A metaformance is a hypothetical performance with the best actors, the best musicians, the best set, etc. My opinion shouldn't conflict with yours just because I saw it performed in a local theatre and you saw it on Broadway, except in the case where the directors actually change the Book/Score.
Plot: X/20
1. Consider whether the plot was hard or easy to follow. Keep in mind that if the plot was intended to be hard to follow that you don't punish the author for that.
2. How much was plot versus filler? If there was a lot of filler, was the filler enjoyable? Filler is anything that doesn't really do a job of characterization or advancing the plot or anything. I can't think of a good example. Maybe when Raoul gets the people to try to shoot the Phantom and they fail. They could have cut that without much loss. Most of Music Man is filler, but it's enjoyable filler.
3.How original the plot was is important. You can forgive fairly unoriginal plots if they were still very good, but a plot score can suffer if it's the same romance story you have heard fifty times.
Characters: x/15
1. Are the characters who are supposed to be interesting interesting? You have to look past actors' performances for this one. If you have any strong feelings, good or bad, towards characters, they are probably interesting.
2. Don't punish musicals for having superfluous characters. Sometimes you need to add in a few more male or female roles just so that it doesn't get rejected because most high school productions try to include many people. Broadway people will have people double up, don't worry about it. The only time this gets to be a problem is when you have forty characters who are named and have few lines.
3. Are the characters strongly connected to the plot? This mostly applies to main characters, but if they don't seem to fit with the plot and the plot is pretty good, then the problem is with the characters.
Dialogue: x/15
1. People really overuse the phrase "People don't talk like that" when referring to works by their peers. I'm guilty of saying it to. However, when it comes to musicals for example, I always write out most contractions. That makes the actor/director aware that they are there. They can recontract them later if it sounds choppy. The good actors can figure out which contractions are necessary.
Also, just because you don't know people that talk that way doesn't mean no one does.
2. Are there a lot of pointless lines?
3. Take points off for unnecessary accents on the parts of characters. Making your work hard to understand because of dialect is just stupid. I'm looking at you Brian Jacques with your stupid Redwall dialects. I can figure out that the moles are supposed to sound like rednecks or whatever. I don't need "Ow geroff muh' . She seys dat nuhbudy gunna get tru har"
Music: x/20
1. Are the pit crew parts good? Remember that the pit is more important in creating the mood of a song than the singer. If you don't like the music, that's usually where you can look.
2. Are the songs memorable? You don't have to punish Musicals for not having memorable songs, but reward them for it for sure. Sometimes things just don't click with individuals.
3. Is there too much singing and too much repetition of themes? Phantom...!
Adaptation: x/10
1. If it's not an adaptation, give 10 points, unless it's really bad and you are looking for more places to take off points.
2. If it's a good adaptation of the source, give it a higher score out of /10. I mean, have you ever said, "I liked that better than the movie."? That would be a good adaptation regardless of how "faithful" it is to the source material.
3. If it was a terrible adaptation, did it atleast stick to the source material?
Curtain Call: x/5
1. Did you enjoy the hypothetical curtain call? Did it have the right music for the curtain call? If you watch a movie, credit music takes the place. If there is absolutely no indication of you what the curtain call would be like, just use this as free reward/punishment.
Theme/Underlying Social Message: x/7
1. Was it a strong theme? Stronger themes get more points unless it becomes obnoxiously in your face.
2. Could you find a theme? If you couldn't and it seems like it was trying to have one, punish them. If it just legitimately doesn't have one, use this category for whatever.
3. Does it violate my Underlying Social Message thing?
Other Opinion Category: x/8
1. Poor use of plot twist or anything like that?
2. Just didn't like the historical setting?
3. Just don't like certain musical writers?
Hopefully this guide will help you. Either judge each category, or give a score out of 100, and then divide the points up into how you see them. Like, I would give Dream Girls a 40/100 probably. If I went down category by category I would probably end up with a higher score than 40, simply because it's hard to determine whether I'm being too harsh or not.
Use this to your advantage in rating musicals with an objective point of view.
Plot Twists
As we explored in Plot vs Underlying Social Message, fledgling writers are always tempted by quick ways to get to the top. One of these ways is through the use of plot twists. You know that one shirt where it lists all sorts of plot twists? A lot of those works are only so widely known because of their plot twists. However, you shouldn't just assume that plot twists make good works because of that. But what is a plot twist?
The "Corbin" definition of a plot twist is a story item with the following criteria:
1. It cannot happen before roughly halfway through the work. The plants being the culprit in the Happening is not a plot twist. Multiple characters expressed that "suspicion" very early on. If it had been because of that lady at the end, that would have been a plot twist.
2. It must be unmentioned on the cover, advertisement, whatever (depending on the media format). I haven't read Twilight, but I know Edward is a vampire. I don't know if that was supposed to be a plot twist, but if it was, the author did a terrible job of disguising it in the back synopsis.
3.It has to be something unexpected. In a murder mystery, finding out who did it usually isn't a Corbin defined plot twist. Technically, it's a twist in the plot, but the identity of the killer shouldn't shock you, even if it's the little kid. Want to see a plot twist in a murder mystery? The Westing Game.
4. It has to affect the plot significantly. Discovering that the butler randomly has shovels for hands is not necessarily a plot twist. Even if he uses them to dig his way out of jail, it isn't. Why? Because the important thing is that he escaped from jail, not how he did.
I may be sort of a hypocrite in this regard. My first two works contained major plot twists as well as the one I'm writing right now. However, the first two musicals I wrote were very absurdist. There were plenty of strange things that happened in them. These were just very large strange things. Especially The Ballad of Theylus Mignon. It isn't even a matter of the audience not thinking "the event" was going to happen, "the event" is something that no one would have ever fathomed happening. When I put it up with my commentary, you will just have to see.
So should you not use plot twists? That isn't what I am saying. First of all, I encourage making plots that don't follow the audience's anticipations. But you can do that without the use of plot twists. You should be asking yourself, do I need to use a plot twist? Do I want my work to be remembered as "the one with the plot twist"? It's nearly impossible to watch some older movies now days, because everyone knows there is a plot twist coming. Like Usual Suspects. I loved the movie, and I didn't know there was supposed to be a major plot twist at the end before hand. That one was so good that my jaw almost hit the floor. Unfortunately this has transitioned our society to one that expects plot twists in every movie.
Look at your story mock-up. Are any of your plot items merely trying to mess with your audience minds to an extreme. Perhaps consider removing these, unless you are sure it is going to work. If you have a deep unique plot already, do you want to risk your audience disliking it in the hopes of gaining more fame?
On the other hand, some things are just begging for plot twists. My newest musical begins with a maid moving in to work for a rich eccentric. Ooh, can't you just see the class struggles after they fall in love? You've heard this story before. This is where a plot twist is needed. Now I'm not going to spoil it for any of you, even if you want it. The point is, there is the difference between playing with the audience's preconceptions and forcing things taken for granted down your audience's throat. Playing with preconceptions is the right way to do it.
So be careful with your plot twists and don't ruin other people's well written plot twists by making people expect them in every musical.
The "Corbin" definition of a plot twist is a story item with the following criteria:
1. It cannot happen before roughly halfway through the work. The plants being the culprit in the Happening is not a plot twist. Multiple characters expressed that "suspicion" very early on. If it had been because of that lady at the end, that would have been a plot twist.
2. It must be unmentioned on the cover, advertisement, whatever (depending on the media format). I haven't read Twilight, but I know Edward is a vampire. I don't know if that was supposed to be a plot twist, but if it was, the author did a terrible job of disguising it in the back synopsis.
3.It has to be something unexpected. In a murder mystery, finding out who did it usually isn't a Corbin defined plot twist. Technically, it's a twist in the plot, but the identity of the killer shouldn't shock you, even if it's the little kid. Want to see a plot twist in a murder mystery? The Westing Game.
4. It has to affect the plot significantly. Discovering that the butler randomly has shovels for hands is not necessarily a plot twist. Even if he uses them to dig his way out of jail, it isn't. Why? Because the important thing is that he escaped from jail, not how he did.
I may be sort of a hypocrite in this regard. My first two works contained major plot twists as well as the one I'm writing right now. However, the first two musicals I wrote were very absurdist. There were plenty of strange things that happened in them. These were just very large strange things. Especially The Ballad of Theylus Mignon. It isn't even a matter of the audience not thinking "the event" was going to happen, "the event" is something that no one would have ever fathomed happening. When I put it up with my commentary, you will just have to see.
So should you not use plot twists? That isn't what I am saying. First of all, I encourage making plots that don't follow the audience's anticipations. But you can do that without the use of plot twists. You should be asking yourself, do I need to use a plot twist? Do I want my work to be remembered as "the one with the plot twist"? It's nearly impossible to watch some older movies now days, because everyone knows there is a plot twist coming. Like Usual Suspects. I loved the movie, and I didn't know there was supposed to be a major plot twist at the end before hand. That one was so good that my jaw almost hit the floor. Unfortunately this has transitioned our society to one that expects plot twists in every movie.
Look at your story mock-up. Are any of your plot items merely trying to mess with your audience minds to an extreme. Perhaps consider removing these, unless you are sure it is going to work. If you have a deep unique plot already, do you want to risk your audience disliking it in the hopes of gaining more fame?
On the other hand, some things are just begging for plot twists. My newest musical begins with a maid moving in to work for a rich eccentric. Ooh, can't you just see the class struggles after they fall in love? You've heard this story before. This is where a plot twist is needed. Now I'm not going to spoil it for any of you, even if you want it. The point is, there is the difference between playing with the audience's preconceptions and forcing things taken for granted down your audience's throat. Playing with preconceptions is the right way to do it.
So be careful with your plot twists and don't ruin other people's well written plot twists by making people expect them in every musical.
Don't Make Adaptations
If I have one complaint about Broadway these days, it is this. Over 3/4 of new Broadway shows are adaptations of movies, books, and other things. Let's look at what is on Broadway right now:
Avenue Q (Not new)
Billy Elliot (Based off a Film)
Burn the Floor (Not new)
Chicago (Not new)
Hair (Not new)
In the Heights (Actually new original)
Jersey Boys (Based off a bunch of old 60s to 70s songs)
The Lion King (Based off movie)
The Little Mermaid (Based off movie)
Mamma Mia (Based off the hits of ABBA)
Mary Poppins (Based off the movie and books)
Memphis: A New Musical (Got to take Broadway's word that this is "new" I guess)
Next to Normal (Actually new original)
9 to 5: The Musical (Based off a movie)
Phantom of the Opera (Not new)
Rock of Ages (Based off popular rock songs from 1980s)
Shrek the Musical (Based off a movie)
South Pacific (Not new)
West Side Story (Not new)
Wicked (Based off a book)
As you can see, most producers don't want to bother with new musicals now days that don't have already have proven music or story content. This isn't the way it should be, but it won't get any better if this generation of musical writers don't change things. Put down that Cher's Greatest Hits that you want to structure something around. Put down the copy of Ender's Game that you want to add music to.
Firstly, you have to go through lots of legal paperwork for all of this stuff. Most of the time they already want to have a finished work to consider whether they give their blessing or not. You know what that means? You spent six months writing Cher's Game and now you can't do anything with it. You can't even publish it. Seems like a waste of time, doesn't it. Oh wait, it isn't because you only put HALF THE WORK into it.
Secondly, alluded to above, is the fact that you in no way put as much work into your work as someone who wrote an original. No one cares how much time Winnie Holzman put into adapting. Everyone who cares remembers the person who wrote the original that the work was based off of. Oh wait. You don't who Winnie Holzman is? Ever heard of Wicked? See. No one will remember the time you put into doing the orchestral arrangements of Styx, various artists. They aren't even NAMED on Wikipedia.
Thirdly, if you had put in a little more effort, you could have a completely original work. This may seem trivial to you, since you have a "less chance" of getting the right people to produce your musical. The satisfaction that comes out of it so much greater though. Meridith Wilson just wrote the Music Man and Unsinkable Molly Brown. He's still umpteenth times more well known than Steven Schwarz, the guy who wrote the music for Godspell and Wicked, two adaptations. And Pippin, which was original, but he just wrote the music for that anyway.
Lastly, do you care about money? You don't get all the money for royalties or anything like that. You share them with the person whose work you are using. And you can kiss movie deals good bye. ABBA made so much more money than the person who wrote Mamma Mia off of the movie version, after already making a large chunk of money off of Mamma Mia itself in drama theatres.
Musical to movie adaptations on the other hand, are not only fine, but encouraged. You aren't being a sell out, you are merely allowing more people who don't live in New York City to see your work.
So don't make adaptations.
Avenue Q (Not new)
Billy Elliot (Based off a Film)
Burn the Floor (Not new)
Chicago (Not new)
Hair (Not new)
In the Heights (Actually new original)
Jersey Boys (Based off a bunch of old 60s to 70s songs)
The Lion King (Based off movie)
The Little Mermaid (Based off movie)
Mamma Mia (Based off the hits of ABBA)
Mary Poppins (Based off the movie and books)
Memphis: A New Musical (Got to take Broadway's word that this is "new" I guess)
Next to Normal (Actually new original)
9 to 5: The Musical (Based off a movie)
Phantom of the Opera (Not new)
Rock of Ages (Based off popular rock songs from 1980s)
Shrek the Musical (Based off a movie)
South Pacific (Not new)
West Side Story (Not new)
Wicked (Based off a book)
As you can see, most producers don't want to bother with new musicals now days that don't have already have proven music or story content. This isn't the way it should be, but it won't get any better if this generation of musical writers don't change things. Put down that Cher's Greatest Hits that you want to structure something around. Put down the copy of Ender's Game that you want to add music to.
Firstly, you have to go through lots of legal paperwork for all of this stuff. Most of the time they already want to have a finished work to consider whether they give their blessing or not. You know what that means? You spent six months writing Cher's Game and now you can't do anything with it. You can't even publish it. Seems like a waste of time, doesn't it. Oh wait, it isn't because you only put HALF THE WORK into it.
Secondly, alluded to above, is the fact that you in no way put as much work into your work as someone who wrote an original. No one cares how much time Winnie Holzman put into adapting. Everyone who cares remembers the person who wrote the original that the work was based off of. Oh wait. You don't who Winnie Holzman is? Ever heard of Wicked? See. No one will remember the time you put into doing the orchestral arrangements of Styx, various artists. They aren't even NAMED on Wikipedia.
Thirdly, if you had put in a little more effort, you could have a completely original work. This may seem trivial to you, since you have a "less chance" of getting the right people to produce your musical. The satisfaction that comes out of it so much greater though. Meridith Wilson just wrote the Music Man and Unsinkable Molly Brown. He's still umpteenth times more well known than Steven Schwarz, the guy who wrote the music for Godspell and Wicked, two adaptations. And Pippin, which was original, but he just wrote the music for that anyway.
Lastly, do you care about money? You don't get all the money for royalties or anything like that. You share them with the person whose work you are using. And you can kiss movie deals good bye. ABBA made so much more money than the person who wrote Mamma Mia off of the movie version, after already making a large chunk of money off of Mamma Mia itself in drama theatres.
Musical to movie adaptations on the other hand, are not only fine, but encouraged. You aren't being a sell out, you are merely allowing more people who don't live in New York City to see your work.
So don't make adaptations.
Writing Memorable Tunes Pt. 1
I decided that the title of this article was too broad, and in the case that I ever need to write another "Writing Memorable Tunes", I have thought ahead and added a Pt. 1.
I don't know about any of you, but one thing that I value in musicals is memorable songs. I'll give an example and a counter example. I watched Hairspray when it came out to theatres. I thought it was a fine musical, not that great, but there was nothing abhorring about it. About a month afterwards, I couldn't remember a single song from it except the opening "Good Morning Baltimore" and "You Can't Stop the Beat", simply because we sang the latter in choir class four years before it. Now compare that to The Unsinkable Molly Brown. I know a lot of people don't like it that saw it with me, but I thought it was pretty good from a theory standpoint. I still remember most of the songs from that movie even though I only saw it once. Memorable tunes don't make or break a musical, but they are still important.
Now you may initially say "Okay, Corbin. Memorable tunes. Those would be the popular ones. I should look at Pop Artists today. Everyone remembers their songs." However, their memorability is mostly because of the lyrics. As a musical writer, you don't want to depreciate your art by throwing in catchy lyrics. Instead, focus on a catchy tune. And where to look for that besides classical music?
I will warn you. Not all classical music is catchy. Just because you have heard some songs all your life and recognize them does not make them catchy either. I have gone to the orchestra before, and after listening to an entire Symphony by Mahler, for example, and thoroughly enjoyed it. However, I could not recall a single memorable line in it even minutes after leaving the hall. For "catchy" classical music, you need to look towards Gershwin, Tchaikofsky, and Rimsky-Korsakov. Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikofsky were both described as very melodic composers, with their works always having memorable themes. When I sit down and listen to a Rimsky-Korsakov or Tchaikofsky that I haven't heard before, I still can recall pieces of it later on. And Gershwin was described by many as an American Tchaikofsky, so there is his qualification.
"Corbin. I have troubles coming up with and remembering melody lines. How can I help that?"
Writing Melody Lines:
1. Sit down at a piano with a recorder and improvise over simple chord progressions. Afterwards, listen to it and see if anything sticks out.
2. If you aren't as improvisationally skilled or the above method doesn't work for you, you could also try another method of mine. Take a book. Or the back of a cereal box. Now sing the words that there are with sentences. Don't let yourself cheat and fall back on already created melodies.
3. You could try some manner of chance related creation, such as rolling a twelve sided die and writing down the results.
Remembering Melody Lines:
1. Tape Record it.
2. Write it down. I have a very good memory, but even I forget music if I don't write it down. If you aren't in a circumstance to write it down or tape record it:
3. Make sure to associate where you were and what you were doing when you came up with the melody. This works better if you weren't sitting at the piano or other instrument. Even remembering what you were listening to or thinking of can help bring it back.
4. Assign words to it. They don't have to be related to your musical at all. Just a sentence in the tune. You can usually remember words more than tunes unless you hear it enough.
I'll explore more concepts in the Writing Memorable Tunes Pt. 2, but this should get you off to a start.
I don't know about any of you, but one thing that I value in musicals is memorable songs. I'll give an example and a counter example. I watched Hairspray when it came out to theatres. I thought it was a fine musical, not that great, but there was nothing abhorring about it. About a month afterwards, I couldn't remember a single song from it except the opening "Good Morning Baltimore" and "You Can't Stop the Beat", simply because we sang the latter in choir class four years before it. Now compare that to The Unsinkable Molly Brown. I know a lot of people don't like it that saw it with me, but I thought it was pretty good from a theory standpoint. I still remember most of the songs from that movie even though I only saw it once. Memorable tunes don't make or break a musical, but they are still important.
Now you may initially say "Okay, Corbin. Memorable tunes. Those would be the popular ones. I should look at Pop Artists today. Everyone remembers their songs." However, their memorability is mostly because of the lyrics. As a musical writer, you don't want to depreciate your art by throwing in catchy lyrics. Instead, focus on a catchy tune. And where to look for that besides classical music?
I will warn you. Not all classical music is catchy. Just because you have heard some songs all your life and recognize them does not make them catchy either. I have gone to the orchestra before, and after listening to an entire Symphony by Mahler, for example, and thoroughly enjoyed it. However, I could not recall a single memorable line in it even minutes after leaving the hall. For "catchy" classical music, you need to look towards Gershwin, Tchaikofsky, and Rimsky-Korsakov. Rimsky-Korsakov and Tchaikofsky were both described as very melodic composers, with their works always having memorable themes. When I sit down and listen to a Rimsky-Korsakov or Tchaikofsky that I haven't heard before, I still can recall pieces of it later on. And Gershwin was described by many as an American Tchaikofsky, so there is his qualification.
"Corbin. I have troubles coming up with and remembering melody lines. How can I help that?"
Writing Melody Lines:
1. Sit down at a piano with a recorder and improvise over simple chord progressions. Afterwards, listen to it and see if anything sticks out.
2. If you aren't as improvisationally skilled or the above method doesn't work for you, you could also try another method of mine. Take a book. Or the back of a cereal box. Now sing the words that there are with sentences. Don't let yourself cheat and fall back on already created melodies.
3. You could try some manner of chance related creation, such as rolling a twelve sided die and writing down the results.
Remembering Melody Lines:
1. Tape Record it.
2. Write it down. I have a very good memory, but even I forget music if I don't write it down. If you aren't in a circumstance to write it down or tape record it:
3. Make sure to associate where you were and what you were doing when you came up with the melody. This works better if you weren't sitting at the piano or other instrument. Even remembering what you were listening to or thinking of can help bring it back.
4. Assign words to it. They don't have to be related to your musical at all. Just a sentence in the tune. You can usually remember words more than tunes unless you hear it enough.
I'll explore more concepts in the Writing Memorable Tunes Pt. 2, but this should get you off to a start.
Thursday, July 2, 2009
Plot vs Underlying Social Message
There are a lot of "quick" ladders to success. Marry rich and famous. Commit a grand crime. But there is none more tempting to the young writer than being controversial. Society allows it to happen too. Look at some of the literature that you have had to read in your high school careers. If you take the underlying social message out those books, was there enough real substance and reason to read them?
Sure, raising social issues is fine and dandy if you care about the one you are raising, but let me tell you how far a musical about how we are mistreating animals by making them into fur is going to make. Sure, PETA might throw you some money to get it produced. Maybe. That's a big maybe. But barring some really great writing, it's going to flop.
But what if I don't want to make money, Corbin? What if I just want to express myself?
Get out of musical theatre. Or just publish them and leave it to people to decide whether or not they want to perform them. That's what books are for. And self-releasing albums of yourself singing. You don't scramble together 50-100 people to perform your work if it's a load of pretentious garbage, just because YOU want to express yourself. I mean think of the economy. You are sucking all of this money into a vacuum. But I'll get into the economics of producing flops for your own benefit at another time.
The problem that arises with writing for your social message is that the plot usually suffers. The music usually suffers. And that's okay sometimes. Sometimes you have to take a hit if it means you get more viewers or get higher reviews or it just makes you feel better knowing that while you could have made it a masterpiece if the main character died in the end, you loved them enough to have them survive.
But you have to ask yourself this. Do I really care about this issue? In order not to offend anyone and alienate readers, let's pretend cannabalism of dead corpses is legal. And that's the issue at stake here. Now, of course most people have a problem with this. But does it really affect you a lot? Are you going to potentially ruin a musical of yours in order to press for this issue? Are you doubting yourself? Don't worry about it. There will be the people so adamant about writing about the wrongs of cannabalizing dead corpses that they won't even CARE what advice I have for them on the subject. It's simply not your fight. This is there battle to write musicals about.
Usually the suffering of the writing comes merely from the fact that you can't let the social issue be too far beneath the surface. The only people who would catch those are the intellectuals who already have formed their strong opinions on the issues. But the more blatant it gets, the more you have to structure the plot and the characters and the songs around portraying your idea. If you wanted to prove that cannabalism of dead corpses is wrong, you basically have to have a character that we all grow and love be eaten by cannibals. Maybe that character was better off alive. And you would just have to follow it up with some campy song about their death, which has to specifically address the fact that they were eaten by cannibals, just so that people don't take the song out of context.
Do you see how this is creating a problem? Now, I can already seeing myself being blamed for stilling social progress, but hopefully the end result of better written musicals will make up for it. And honestly, if you really care about an issue, it will sort of make it self present in what you write unintentionally anyways. So don't worry about it.
PS. If you didn't catch the references to Stranger than Fiction and The Producers in here, shame shame shame.
Sure, raising social issues is fine and dandy if you care about the one you are raising, but let me tell you how far a musical about how we are mistreating animals by making them into fur is going to make. Sure, PETA might throw you some money to get it produced. Maybe. That's a big maybe. But barring some really great writing, it's going to flop.
But what if I don't want to make money, Corbin? What if I just want to express myself?
Get out of musical theatre. Or just publish them and leave it to people to decide whether or not they want to perform them. That's what books are for. And self-releasing albums of yourself singing. You don't scramble together 50-100 people to perform your work if it's a load of pretentious garbage, just because YOU want to express yourself. I mean think of the economy. You are sucking all of this money into a vacuum. But I'll get into the economics of producing flops for your own benefit at another time.
The problem that arises with writing for your social message is that the plot usually suffers. The music usually suffers. And that's okay sometimes. Sometimes you have to take a hit if it means you get more viewers or get higher reviews or it just makes you feel better knowing that while you could have made it a masterpiece if the main character died in the end, you loved them enough to have them survive.
But you have to ask yourself this. Do I really care about this issue? In order not to offend anyone and alienate readers, let's pretend cannabalism of dead corpses is legal. And that's the issue at stake here. Now, of course most people have a problem with this. But does it really affect you a lot? Are you going to potentially ruin a musical of yours in order to press for this issue? Are you doubting yourself? Don't worry about it. There will be the people so adamant about writing about the wrongs of cannabalizing dead corpses that they won't even CARE what advice I have for them on the subject. It's simply not your fight. This is there battle to write musicals about.
Usually the suffering of the writing comes merely from the fact that you can't let the social issue be too far beneath the surface. The only people who would catch those are the intellectuals who already have formed their strong opinions on the issues. But the more blatant it gets, the more you have to structure the plot and the characters and the songs around portraying your idea. If you wanted to prove that cannabalism of dead corpses is wrong, you basically have to have a character that we all grow and love be eaten by cannibals. Maybe that character was better off alive. And you would just have to follow it up with some campy song about their death, which has to specifically address the fact that they were eaten by cannibals, just so that people don't take the song out of context.
Do you see how this is creating a problem? Now, I can already seeing myself being blamed for stilling social progress, but hopefully the end result of better written musicals will make up for it. And honestly, if you really care about an issue, it will sort of make it self present in what you write unintentionally anyways. So don't worry about it.
PS. If you didn't catch the references to Stranger than Fiction and The Producers in here, shame shame shame.
Introductions
In my searches of the internet, I was never able to find any tips for people who want to write musicals. Sure, there was advice on writing in general. There was advice for writing plays. But a play is very different from a musical. But what is a musical necessarily?
The "Corbin" definition of a musical is a dramatic work with the following criteria:
1. Music that is a part of the plot. Not just characters singing something or background music between scenes. Music is a pivotal part of musicals. My definition, therefore, excludes some older "musicals" which were just a collection of popular songs of the day with a loosely structured plot.
2. There has to be talking. The music has to stop SOMETIMES. This differentiates musicals from operettas and operas.
3. The subject work can be as comedic or serious as the author feels.
4. Must be at least two acts in length. Sorry all of those people out there writing for elementary school kids. You are not writing musicals.
There are some other case by case verdicts, but these are the general ones.
Why would someone take advice from me? I have some limited credentials, but the chances of my advice helping you is going to be the same regardless. I have been raised in a environment with lots of music. I play violin, piano, and French horn and dabble in other instruments. I have taken AP Music Theory and am a State Champion Music Listener (It's a contest sort of thing in Minnesota. Look it up). So on the whole music side of musicals, I have things covered. I have written two unpublished musicals The Ballad of Theylus Mignon and Jamoddysey and three quarters of another one, The Show Must Not Go On (Which was partially an exercise in how fast I could write if I put my mind to it. Three days. However, it had other purposes, which ended with it not getting finished. While I am not working on it now, some day I may end it, and it still has lessons to teach in writing musicals, so it will still be referenced.)
And think about it. On the slim chance that I do become famous, you can say that you read me when I had just finished high school. I did just finish high school by the way. I will be attending the University of Nebraska-Lincoln for the next four years barring extraordinary circumstances. If you happen to have some negative opinions of the place, just keep in mind that I'm getting a full ride, room and board, and extra spending money, just for being me. If you wouldn't take a deal like that...well, I won't insult the reader.
Anyway, whenever I find a topic to rant on related to Musical Theatre, I will make sure to post it here. Not only does that include tips, but reviews of other musicals, commentary on the Tony's, and things like that.
Look forward to the scripts for my musicals online too, with commentary. However, I can not post links to the music for three reasons. One, I don't have a place to host them anyway. Second, I don't have anything better than midi recordings anyway, and being a terrible midi transcriber, you wouldn't hear any dynamics, tempo changes, or anything like that. That would give you a poor impression of my musical composition talents. Thirdly, and most importantly it is harder for me to check copyright infringement for musical works. Am I being full of myself by thinking people would steal it? Maybe. But whereas I can just punch a random part of one my plays into Google and see how many hits I get, I can't do that for music. If it gets performed somewhere or published, I will post the music. But until then, don't even bother.
Unless you are considering one of my plays to be performed. I require money like anyone else and some lead time, since I don't have an electrical copy of everything, but just contact me, and I'll work stuff out.
So, here's to a bright new blog.
-Corbin
The "Corbin" definition of a musical is a dramatic work with the following criteria:
1. Music that is a part of the plot. Not just characters singing something or background music between scenes. Music is a pivotal part of musicals. My definition, therefore, excludes some older "musicals" which were just a collection of popular songs of the day with a loosely structured plot.
2. There has to be talking. The music has to stop SOMETIMES. This differentiates musicals from operettas and operas.
3. The subject work can be as comedic or serious as the author feels.
4. Must be at least two acts in length. Sorry all of those people out there writing for elementary school kids. You are not writing musicals.
There are some other case by case verdicts, but these are the general ones.
Why would someone take advice from me? I have some limited credentials, but the chances of my advice helping you is going to be the same regardless. I have been raised in a environment with lots of music. I play violin, piano, and French horn and dabble in other instruments. I have taken AP Music Theory and am a State Champion Music Listener (It's a contest sort of thing in Minnesota. Look it up). So on the whole music side of musicals, I have things covered. I have written two unpublished musicals The Ballad of Theylus Mignon and Jamoddysey and three quarters of another one, The Show Must Not Go On (Which was partially an exercise in how fast I could write if I put my mind to it. Three days. However, it had other purposes, which ended with it not getting finished. While I am not working on it now, some day I may end it, and it still has lessons to teach in writing musicals, so it will still be referenced.)
And think about it. On the slim chance that I do become famous, you can say that you read me when I had just finished high school. I did just finish high school by the way. I will be attending the University of Nebraska-Lincoln for the next four years barring extraordinary circumstances. If you happen to have some negative opinions of the place, just keep in mind that I'm getting a full ride, room and board, and extra spending money, just for being me. If you wouldn't take a deal like that...well, I won't insult the reader.
Anyway, whenever I find a topic to rant on related to Musical Theatre, I will make sure to post it here. Not only does that include tips, but reviews of other musicals, commentary on the Tony's, and things like that.
Look forward to the scripts for my musicals online too, with commentary. However, I can not post links to the music for three reasons. One, I don't have a place to host them anyway. Second, I don't have anything better than midi recordings anyway, and being a terrible midi transcriber, you wouldn't hear any dynamics, tempo changes, or anything like that. That would give you a poor impression of my musical composition talents. Thirdly, and most importantly it is harder for me to check copyright infringement for musical works. Am I being full of myself by thinking people would steal it? Maybe. But whereas I can just punch a random part of one my plays into Google and see how many hits I get, I can't do that for music. If it gets performed somewhere or published, I will post the music. But until then, don't even bother.
Unless you are considering one of my plays to be performed. I require money like anyone else and some lead time, since I don't have an electrical copy of everything, but just contact me, and I'll work stuff out.
So, here's to a bright new blog.
-Corbin
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