Movie Musicals: A Snapshot into American History

Transcription

1 Movie Musicals: A Snapshot into American History Two years ago one of my good friends sat me down and insisted I watch My Fair Lady. She said, You have to see Audrey Hepburn in this. You need to see how good she was. It really didn t take that much convincing. I do love old musicals after all. I was enamored. Right from Rex Harrison s performance of Why Can t the English (Speak Proper English) (which touches on class systems in England) to Hepburn's graceful I Could Have Danced all Night, I was completely in awe of the grace and the beauty that was this film. And then there was the final number, I ve Grown Accustomed to her Face performed with the cantankerous likability that only Harrison and maybe a few other actors could actually portray. I ve Grown Accustomed to her Face is an admittance-to-love song, without the declaration. Harrison s professor Henry Higgins is not fond of the L word, and yet, and yet, what he says is enough. The audience and the character, we understand each other. We know what he means. We ignored the bit about Freddie living in a flat above a shop, and we know what he is saying. As the film closes, we understand that they will probably grow older together. We are confident in our hope. For ages, musicals have brought joy to their audiences and movie musicals are no different. Growing in popularity in the 30s, at the height of the Great Depression, it's no difficult to imagine why movie musicals, which almost always ended in hope, drew large crowds, even when people couldn't truly afford it. In fact, if there was one industry unmoved by the stock market crash of 1929, it was Hollywood. From the Warner Brothers first foray into sound, with 1927 s The Jazz Singer to the technology race that followed, with other studios tearing down old stages to make way for incoming sound equipment, Hollywood continued to grow and make more money than ever before. The ones who made the films remained painfully unaware of the realities the rest of the country was facing, and maybe that helped. Audiences paid to escape to the theater, even for a few hours. Movie musicals began as escapism art, a way to remove one s self from the realities of poverty, job loss and uncertainty and escape into the world of glitz, grandeur and synchronized dance steps. While over time the style and music has changed and is currently in the midst of a re-visitation, the core of what makes a musical great lies not with any story or actor, but with the promise of hope no matter the tragedy at hand a key ingredient. By the end of the 1930s, the world was at war, and while America stayed out of the battles for much of the early conflict, the rush, and anxiety of what would become the inevitable brought economic boom and the fear of invasion. Again, people fled to the movies. Whether it was Dorothy

2 clicking her heels twice or Judy Garland falling in love in Meet Me in St. Louis, musicals continued to end in hope while critical darlings, like Citizen Kane explored harsher, more serious topics. Dance was also an important part of the evolution of the movie musical. By the 1950 s when the country experienced anxiety over the threat of communism during the cold war, they watched Gene Kelly, Donald O Connor and Fred Astaire (who had already enjoyed around 20 years of success in the industry) glide, leap and tap their way through their films numbers. Astaire was known for his ease of step. In an article announcing his passing in the 1980s, New York Times Writer Richard F Shepard noted: Mr. Astaire blithely danced his way into the heart of an America tormented by the Depression and edging toward World War II. His deceptively easy-looking light-footedness, warm smile, top hat, cane, charm, and talent helped people forget the real world that nagged at them outside the movie house. Gene Kelly, both his contemporary and his successor, mirrored Astaire s ease and added fun to the mixture. Kelly seemed like a kid when he danced, and watching him tap was a bit like watching your fun uncle play hopscotch with you in the neighborhood park. In his 1951 film An American in Paris, there s a scene where Kelly s character Jerry Mulligan is surrounded by children and he sings the now infamous I Got Rhythm in an effort to teach them English. As he taps within his circle of wide-eyed pupils his steps grow more and more manic and his physicality more silly. Kelly s sense of fun was echoed and amplified by his contemporary and co-star, Donald O Connor. While Kelly was more elegant, O Connor was athletic. He was known for using his whole body in a way that sometimes walked the line slapstick comedy. In Singin in the Rain, O Connor has a number called Make em Laugh that features flips and twists. O Connor goes through a wall, flips over a couch and has a fake slap fight with a headless dummy. By the end of the 50 s cinema was battling TV as the new, cheaper mode of entertainment. Because of the TV, people grew decidedly more aware of world events, and there was a real shift from the desire to escape through art. People wanted stories that touched on real issues. This was especially true for such hits as West Side Story and The Sound of Music. U of T film professor Benjamin Wright mentioned in an interview with him that, West Side Story brought a contemporary (at least for 1961) flair to music, dance, and its spotlight on clashing urban cultures. The Sound of Music has had a lasting impact because of its large-scale (widescreen, stereo sound, etc.) treatment of a family drama set against World War II.

3 Both West Side Story and The Sound of Music touch on, decidedly, more adult topics. I could argue that money and audience interest were leading factors in this change. Movie musicals were growing up. As television grew in popularity, Hollywood was beginning to lose money. The musicals they were putting out were simply not landing in the way that they used to. Hollywood turned to the stage for new material. The stage, Broadway in particular, had a knack for discussing hard issues, this because New York was a multicultural metropolis and people were exposed to each other. Minority groups, and particularly a large Jewish population who had family that had just experienced the Holocaust and the Second World War in Europe told harsher stories that touched on discrimination and loss. Musicals grew darker and in turn so did the movie equivalent. Simultaneously, the 60s and 70s were a time of political protest. America had entered into the Vietnam War in 1954, and to the dismay of young people across the nation, remained in conflict through the 60s. This was a war America was clearly losing and people were tired of sending relatives into battle. Thousands upon thousands of young people protested against America s involvement in the Asian country. In the south, the civil rights movement was in full force as leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X fought for racial equality. The 60 s was a time of political upheaval and dissatisfaction. Unlike previous generations, who wanted to escape the pain of their realities, people were tired and angry and they gravitated toward art that reflected their pain. West Side Story succeeded because it was a story about wanting what you weren t allowed to have. If audiences couldn t relate to the gang culture of the 1950 s New York, they could at least relate to lost love or lost freedom. Rebellion also exists in the story of the seemingly light Sound of Music. At the end of the film, The Von Trapp family escapes Austria to avoid submitting to Nazi rule. In the 70 s and 80 s the movie musical genre experienced a severe decline, as audiences drift toward grittier storytelling than the genre would allow. Musicals instead remained with Disney, as they experienced what is known today as the Disney Renaissance, a series of films that include the Little Mermaid, Lion King and Beauty and the Beast that are now considered classic animated works of art. In the 2000s, Director Baz Luhrmann took a risk. Musicals in the past two decades had failed to bring in audiences and money, but he wrote, produced and directed Moulin Rouge! in U of T professor Wright said that, Contemporary musicals are very often the product of a postmodern condition where filmmakers aim to pay homage to an earlier era or style of filmmaking. Think about Moulin Rouge and its pastiche of songs and dance styles from different eras. Moulin Rouge ushered in a new era of the movie musical, one that, as Wright notes, plays homage to an era where musical films thrived. Moulin Rouge brought hope back into the adult movie musical. It ends with the death of Satine (played by Nicole Kidman), but the hope that Christian (Ewan McGregor) will love her until his dying day.

4 The following year, Chicago was released, and it ushered in a slightly different musical trend. If Moulin Rouge played homage to the old movie musicals of the 30 s, 40 s and 50 s, Chicago brought back the stage-to-screen musical. Arguably a little more popular, stage-to-screen musicals gave us such hits as, The Producers, Rent and Hairspray. Rent and Hairspray struck a chord with audiences because of the subject matter. Rent explored the lives of gay and poor artists living in a bohemian New York neighborhood. The play explored sexuality and relationships against the backdrop of the aids crisis that plagued predominately the gay communities in the 1980s. The film was released at a time when it was still illegal for gay men and women to marry their partners, and the LGBTQ community was breaking free from decades of marginalization. The success of Rent came from the heart of the characters in the story, the rebellion explored through grittier storytelling and that all too familiar ingredient, hope. Rent ends with the group huddled together, watching a film of their past year, created by the movie s narrator Mark Cohen. There s this hope, in the end, that the characters will survive, at least anyway, one day at a time. Rent was one of the many films released in the decade that gave voice to the gay community. Similarly, Hairspray touched on race relations in America despite its bright visuals and upbeat numbers. Hairspray is set in Baltimore in the 1960s during the civil rights movement. Teenager Tracy Turnblad is an optimistic, overweight girl who dreams of dancing on The Corny Collins show. Despite being rejected by the show's resident stage mom, Velma Von Tussle, played by a frigid Michelle Pfeiffer, young Tracey urges the show toward a more intergraded presence, one that accepts everyone. The film was praised for its handling of race issues and its take on body image in the media. It reached people, because at the time, these two issues were hot button in culture. Movie musicals have always touched on hope. They have acted as a response to political, cultural and economic turmoil, whether it s been to escape it, face it or acknowledge it. Their history has been an unlikely peek at the values held by the public over time. In 2016, Whiplash director Damien Chazelle will release La La Land, a story that follows two young lovebirds (played by Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone) as they navigate life as struggling artists in modern day LA. Toronto International Film festival volunteer Sasha Braganza saw the film at The Orange Screening after it won the festival s People s Choice Award. She said, "In ways, it reminds me of Singin in the Rain but she warns, it did such a good job

5 mesmerizing the audience making them smile, making them fall in love with the environment and the characters [but] when the plot takes a turn, it actually hurts because it s a hard snap to reality. Perhaps La La Land is a new kind of musical, one like Moulin Rouge that delves into homage, but also forces the audience to see a harsh reality. It s certainly touching on something timely, financial instability, but it s unclear whether the film will end in hope. Maybe it will. It is an essential ingredient after all, right? Maybe hopefully.