Musical Lyrical Lingo
We're Musical Lyrical Lingo!
Join Tim and Lj who delve deep into the wonderful world of musical theatre and more importantly the lessons they have learned from different musicals.
Join them as they explore some of the greatest musicals ever created, from the classics to the new and exciting shows that continue to teach us something new.
So whether you're a seasoned fan of the stage or a newcomer, this podcast is for you.
So sit back, relax and get ready to immerse yourself in the world of musical theatre.
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Musical Lyrical Lingo
On the Town
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This week we unpack how Jerome Robbins, Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden and Adolph Green expanded a 1944 ballet into a full-throttle Broadway musical that felt like champagne after years of rationing. George Abbott’s decision to cut overt war talk gave the story longevity; the subtext stayed, the escapism sang. We spotlight Hildy’s agency as a cab driver who pursues what she wants, the show’s brave integrated casting—including Sono Osato as Ivy—and the way songs like New York, New York map the city into memory. We also tackle the dream ballet debate with honesty: when does dance deepen storytelling, and when does it test patience? That tension became the bridge to West Side Story’s breakthroughs.
The film’s legacy gets a clear-eyed look too—MGM removing most of Bernstein’s score yet pioneering on-location shooting in New York—and we revisit the numbers that still land: Come Up to My Place, I Can Cook Too, and the aching quartet Some Other Time. At heart, this is a story about time pressure, fleeting joy, and the courage of women who steer the scene rather than sit in it. If you love musical theatre history, New York nostalgia, or big ideas about how form evolves, you’ll feel right at home.
Enjoy the episode? Follow, share with a theatre-loving friend, and leave us a quick review—what’s your favourite number from On the Town, and do dream ballets win you over or lose you?
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Back in the Studio & Panto Memories
TimHello and welcome to Musical Lyrical Lingo. We're your hosts, Tim.
LjAnd LJ. Today and every week we will be discussing musicals, but specifically what they taught us.
TimWe're back.
LjWe're back.
TimWe're ready to go again.
LjWe're back. What do we do? What is this?
TimWhat do we do? What's my name? What is my name?
LjWhere are we?
TimI don't know my name. What's my name?
LjSay my name. Say my name.
TimNo one is around you, T. I also think full disclosure. I think I'm gonna sneeze at some point. Do you know when you oh I really feel it in my nostrils?
LjYou've got a wee fizz, you've got a wee fizz.
Speaker 02My eyes are what I need to say, mate. I'm just getting overly emotional because I'm back with my chum. Talking musicals. It's like therapy. This week I need therapy. It's getting it's all getting a lot. Highlight of my life. Absolutely, Lauren. That's your. That's your love, shine a light. Katrina and the waves. Do you remember? Do you remember when we had that panto one year? Did you not do that panto? You did? That was us, wasn't it?
Speaker 00Well, I remember anyway. We used to rehearse all the old numbers.
Speaker 02That's the first time I ever came across Katrina and the Waves, you know, I think.
Speaker 00Oh, when we did Panto. Yeah.
Speaker 02And I remember loving it and go and I love this song. And then it was like, that's your vision, Tim. And I'm like, Your vision? What's your vision? And now I'm up like a fan.
Speaker 00Um used to be some strange song choices for the numbers and pantos, whether it was the summer panto or the Christmas panto. Yeah. Remember, we had Billy's.
Speaker 02I know, but you don't get that anymore. It's normally just last year's big hit. Do you know what I mean? Like gone are those days of like of really niche choices. I think.
Speaker 00Yeah, I suppose.
Speaker 02You miss it a bit. Do you know what I mean? You're like, oh, that was like last year's like top 10 hit for like 72 weeks. Do you know what I mean? But like back in our day in our day. Um, we're because we're ancient. I feel ancient sometimes between my back and my neck and my ankle and my knee.
Speaker 00Like it's funny because there are some songs, as you've said that now, there's some songs which I only associate with Panther.
Speaker 02Yeah.
Speaker 00And like get on your feet.
Speaker 02Yeah, exactly. And like hello, like that was a very big hit. Yeah. And then another one I remember is we are family.
Speaker 00But that wasn't Panther, that was.
Speaker 02It was. I definitely did it in Panther. I'm almost sure we did it in Panther.
Speaker 00We did that for a big we didn't. That's that's what's on TV. That's us cultural on TV.
Speaker 02Oh no.
Speaker 00That's what that song is.
Speaker 02And you have the video footage of it, and no one's ever gonna see light of day. Don't tell the listeners too much information, or we'll all be going having a look. Um never to be seen ever again. That footage, let me tell you. Oh good times.
Speaker 00I remember, which was always always baffled my mother, the very last song. I'm also doing Beauty and the Beast was um Roy Williams, Let Me Entertain You, but it was the last song. My mum was like, the show's over. Why is that the last song, Let Me Entertain You? That's a entertainment's over.
Speaker 02That's a very weird choice, isn't it?
Speaker 00Anyway.
Speaker 02Good, good times.
Speaker 00We had the best times.
Speaker 02We did indeed. Um boy were we busy back in the day.
Speaker 00I don't know how we did it.
Speaker 02I don't know how we did it either. Although maybe my bodies, our bodies are just feeling it gnawing. Yeah.
Speaker 00So in saying that we're probably not any quieter than we were. Like you're a super busy person, and I'm busy.
Speaker 02Yeah. I was looking at my diary. I'm getting busy again. I'm starting off, starting that again, like around, you know, here we go again.
Speaker 00Here we go again.
Speaker 02Buckle in.
Speaker 00But then when you don't have things on, your body feels weird. I think it's from all the years of burst and shows and stuff.
Speaker 01Yeah.
Speaker 00Strange whenever we sit and go, oh, it's not about it.
Speaker 02So what you're saying is you're better to just keep busy or else you fall apart. Do you know who else is busy? Who? Amber Davies. Oh my goodness! Do you know what? I ha you have to take your hat off to her. So literally, it had she had just announced, or they had just announced uh Amber Davies as the new Elle Woods in the 2026-27 UK tour of Legally Blonde.
Casting News, Strictly Drama, and MT Representation
Speaker 02Perfect choice for legal for Elle. Like she will be brilliant. And then literally, I think it was the next day, she was um pulled into Strictly because Danny Dyer has uh broken her or fractured her ankle or something like that. She had 48 hours to prepare for her first dance, and there she is in Strictly, and everybody's given off buckets because people just like to be not very nice online these days. But do you know what? I say go for it. It's nice to see musical theatre being represented.
Speaker 00It is, and also as everyone, as every um musical theatre person has to say whenever they are on Strictly, it's a completely different medium. Yeah, it's like going and training an opera and being a musical theatre singer, it's like being a pop star and singing musical theater. It's a diff it it's different, yes, you've got background, but the problem is how long has Strictly been going for and how long has Dancing with the Stars been going for? Yeah. Same show, obviously, just across the water. Um there haven't like talent is obviously progressed. Like if you try to do what season one, you have been.
Speaker 02Yeah, but it's night and day, no, yeah.
Speaker 00So I know even because there's a couple of people that I really like, celebrities-wise, um, are in dancing with the stars, so I'm watching that.
Speaker 02Oh, yeah, okay.
Speaker 00Um, but the level is um mean, yeah. No. So actually having people who have a little bit of dance background is needed now because the dances are harder and the audiences are more it's the same whenever you watch season one of Bake Off, didn't all?
Speaker 02Yeah, true. That's very true.
Speaker 00Completely different. So uh shove it up yeah. Oh excuse you, oh awful rude, but I think also that came off the week where Carrie Hook Fisher or Carrie Hook Fisher had just been announced as waitress, and the back like last she was getting was ridiculous. Yeah. Amber had to go on and say, I don't want to have to go and tr and speak to my friend and say, Are you okay after a cast announcement? Like what? I know it's ridiculous.
Speaker 02It is ridiculous what people are saying. Also, another musical theatre, Wendy, who's going to be uh popping up on Strictly this year, is Cynthia Arrivo. Have you heard this? Now, this all sounds a wee bit bizarre and a bit different. Well, different, not bizarre, just different. Apparently, this has never been done before. So she so Cynthia Arrivo, long before Wicked Days, she stepped in on the judging panel for like two weeks, like one week for Craig and then another week for Shirley. And she was br like she was brain. So this year, when it comes to movie week, she is going to be a mentor.
Speaker 01Love it.
Speaker 02And she is going to be working with every dance couple in the rehearsal room on their character.
Speaker 00Love it.
Speaker 02For whatever they're portraying for movie week, and then apparently she will sit alongside the judges for that that week's live show.
Speaker 00That's great because that's beautiful, something different. That yeah, that works.
Speaker 02And I just thought that was lovely, and that same week, I think the big like pro dance number is going to be Wicked themed. And surely by the time we get to movie week, like Wicked the movie will like just be around the corner.
Speaker 00It's 50 days until it's out.
Speaker 02I need oxygen.
Speaker 00And that's what I was gonna ask you. Which uh um trailer have you seen? Have you extended or just seen I can't recall.
Speaker 02I maybe extended, but I also didn't finish watching it because I was like, it's giving me too much.
Speaker 00Did you feel like it was it's giving me too much?
Speaker 02I hate that about trailers. Don't show
Cynthia Erivo’s Movie Week Mentorship & Wicked Hype
Speaker 02me.
Speaker 00But musical theatre people are going, you're showing too much. Non-musical theatre people haven't.
Speaker 02Yeah, no, that's true. That is true. And yeah, I think because we know what happens, but I I I but even for myself, I kind of stopped myself from watching the end of it because I was like, already I'm seeing too much. I don't want to see as much of this as this, you know. I want to be surprised. So what you must be super excited though.
Speaker 00Oh my gosh, I'm over the moment. Because I cannot wait. Hurry up, May 2026.
Speaker 02Yeah, so excited for that. Also excited because Smigadoon is getting its run in Broadway in May 26th. April? The 4th of April.
Speaker 00Oh, April, okay.
Speaker 02Beginning in the Netherlander theatre, I think, unless I've got my dates wrong.
Speaker 00It's all happening. I'm gonna have to go to Broadway first. Literally, and then I'm gonna have to you know start off at London.
Speaker 02Yeah, go to London because Beatler Juice is to open in the West End. Finally, we have said its name slightly more than three times, but it's now officially arrived.
Speaker 00It's and it's about time.
Speaker 02A thousand percent, yeah.
Speaker 00I'm so excited.
Speaker 02So, based on Tim Burton's macabre 1988 film, Betelgeuse will open, Good Theatre 2, Prince Ev Prince Edward Theatre, uh, following the closure of MJ. Never really it never kind of like intrigued me. I liked Thriller back in Thriller's days. Um I don't think we needed another Michael Jackson musical. Thriller was I liked it. Um it's limited London, so not thriller, but Beetlejuice. It's a limited London season and it will be on the heels of its third Broadway spell, which commences this month.
Speaker 00I know. I think it'll be extended.
Speaker 02Maybe, yeah. Performances in the West End will begin in May 2026 and tickets go on general seal. Are you ready? The 30th of October.
Speaker 00I'm so excited. Also, did you see any exciting um well you wouldn't have because you're not a big social media person.
Speaker 01No.
Speaker 00Guess who started to follow Death Becomes her and who followed them back? Hannah
Broadway Buzz: Schmigadoon, Beetlejuice, Death Becomes Her
Speaker 00Waddingham.
Speaker 02Oh, she'd be brilliant. Although like in me, I really want like the two the two Broadway girls to come over and open in London. Yeah. But yeah, but listen, if that can't happen and Hannah has to do it, like I'd be okay with that too.
Speaker 00Also, another thing you said now, um, remember you were like we were talking about our wonderful friend Sarah, yeah. No, two days later. I know they're their contract.
Speaker 02Their contract isn't yeah, but who knows?
Speaker 00Who knows? Fingers crossed. If you want a musical, guys, write in, let us know about it, we'll talk about it, and then producers will we'll talk about it in the podcast.
Speaker 02The producers will listen and go, those two know their stuff. We must do what they tell us. Anyway, on to this week's musical.
Speaker 00Yes, yes, you're okay.
Speaker 02Interesting.
Speaker 00As in, well, okay, I know why you're making that.
Speaker 02Do you?
Speaker 00Yes.
Speaker 02Do you can read my mind? What do you think my thoughts are on this musical?
Speaker 00Well, I think it's everything that you don't like about Ogloma. There's too much ballet.
Speaker 02Okay, interesting.
Speaker 00This is a ballet with music.
Speaker 02Yeah. A ballet with musical music.
Speaker 00Yeah.
Speaker 02Okay. What are we talking about?
Speaker 00On the time.
Speaker 02Yeah, so we're talking about on the time. Um, it do you know what? For many, many, many, many years, it's been one of those musicals that I've just avoided.
Speaker 00Oh, okay.
Speaker 02Yeah, I've just avoided. Um, even like listening to the cast recording, I think I've got so far and then gone on board. I'm bored. Yeah. Uh, but you will be delighted to know that the the things I do for the pod. I have now listened to the cast recording from start to finish. Uh it hasn't made me want to go and see it anymore. Yeah. But listen, it's up there with one of the biggies and quite significant in musical theatre history. So we've got to give it its place.
Speaker 00And I think it's the film has a has a place as um it was definitely
Why On the Town? First Impressions and Resistance
Speaker 00a number of those. I've talked about it before, where mum would have had it all in the background cotton, some sort of costume. So we kind of associate it with yeah, your childhood and growing up. It's always on.
Speaker 02Yeah.
Speaker 00Um, but plot-wise and things like that, I'm always like, oh, that's it. That's it.
Speaker 02I mean, yeah, as as plot goes, it's relatively straightforward. However, I think there's probably of the time when it was created and it was out there for the public to digest, it probably it had more. I'm being very handsy today, aren't I, for the people on the video. Um it probably had a more deeper meaning or significance than just the the general plot.
Speaker 00Yeah.
Speaker 02So it was a musical by Leonard Bernstein, another biggie for him, uh, book and lyrics by Betty uh Comden and Adolph Green. I love those names. Uh based on Jerome Robbins' idea for his 1944 ballet Fancy Free, which he had set to Bernstein's music. Now, December 1944, as American forces fought the biggest battles of World War II, back home a new kind of musical opened on Broadway, brimming with life on the town, was sophisticated, daring, and ready to reflect a changing world. It seems a simple plot, as we've just said, three sailors, Gabby, Chip, and Aussie. They're on 24 hour shore leave, determined to make the most of New York City. Uh Gaby uh holds a picture of Miss Termstyle, a girl of his dreams, and he is desperate to find her. Chip and Ozzy help Gaby search the city, and each of them enjoys a romantic encounter with Ivy, who is Miss Turnstyle's, Hilde and Claire, before they return to their ship. The show permeated wit and humanity of uh Betty Comden and Adolph Green, who actually played Claire and Aussie, uh, the rich orchestrations of Leonard Bernstein and the ambitious choreography of classically trained Jerome Robbins.
Speaker 00That's it. Um, whenever you listen, well, I think the music is beautiful because I think he does a great job and he's always a composer. And a person film, my sister and brother-in-law um really love Bernstein, and they've watched it and said it was great. I had to turn it off.
Context, Creators, and WWII Timing
Speaker 00Okay.
Speaker 02I think a bit like the show.
Speaker 01Okay.
Speaker 02Too slow. Too slow. Or not enough. Do you know what I mean? It was just a bit now. I haven't watched it. Maybe I wasn't in the right frame of mind for it. Maybe I was looking for something a bit more. I will give it another go because I do think he he holds such a a role in history of of musical theatre, just in theatre in general, I suppose, that I probably need to give him more time. Do you know what I mean? But when I was watching it, I was like not staying awake and there was very little going on, and so I stopped. But yes, I've heard it's good to know.
Speaker 00I think some people are are really rave about it and really read him and think that he's wonderful. And to me, this is another one. There's you know, do you know why you can like pigeonhole a couple of musicals? So I would, um whether this is this is just my opinion, this West Side story, American and Paris, Lemon Valley number and Oklahoma and Carousel, they all kind of go together, they've all got that similar feel, but then they're all of uh sort of around the same. I know West Side's a wee bit later, but yeah, obviously it's got Leonard Burns thing, but it's just I'm like they can kind of all go together. Yeah, like to compartmentalize things, so I'm like, they're all similar and they're all that.
Speaker 02So but it was because one fed into the other. Yeah, do you know what I mean? So like Robbins had already used this idea of three sailors on leave in a short ballet fancy-free in April 1944, with the music of a 26-year-old Bernstein, fresh from his success as a conductor with the New York Symphony Orchestra. Robbins also in his 20s, um, as were Bernstein's close friends, Comden and Green, so they were all really young. Together they expanded this fancy-free ballet into a full-length Broadway musical with a blend of character, lyrics and music, and dance that had already proved so successful the year before with Rogers and Hammerstein's musical Oklahoma. Oklahoma had brought that idea of this dream ballet into musicals.
Speaker 01Yeah.
Speaker 02So they took that and they ran with it. Uh, for the first time, uh so like Robbins followed suit with not one. Now, this is where I think he maybe pushed the boat out a wee bit too far. He didn't just have one dream ballet, he had two. Yeah. One at the end of Act One, which was the Times Square ballet, and then uh in Act Two, the subway ride and imaginary Coney Island ballet. He didn't need to.
Speaker 01Yeah.
Speaker 02And then Robbins and Bernstein would then take this integral fusion of dance and music even further in 1957 with West Side Story, as you've said. Do you know what I mean? So I think you can say all you want about Oklahoma, but it started a trend. Do you know what I mean? And you know, I think Bernstein and Robbins kind of jumped on that bandwagon and went, okay, let's see where we can go. And as you've then said, you have your carousels as well. Like you're right,
Dream Ballets Debate and Genre Evolution
Speaker 02it was a it was a time for that. And I suppose people coming to the theatre to musicals probably were expecting that kind of dream ballet moment in the show. Yeah. But as we've agreed, it's not for you or me.
Speaker 00No, it's not. Though, in saying that, as I was gonna say, I like American and Paris, and I do feel like the ballet within American Paris is interwoven, is that really?
Speaker 02Yeah, because she is a ballet dancer, isn't she? I think the character is a ballet dancer, so therefore the world of ballet is already within the plot.
Speaker 00Yes, and I think that that works much better rather than it's the same as we know how much I hate the mother coming back to life and Billy. Yeah. Do you know it's like oh it's very jarring? Yeah.
Speaker 02So you're not a big fan of dream. No, I'm you're not a dreamer.
Speaker 00Maybe because I don't dream, like I can never dream.
Speaker 02Yeah.
Speaker 00So maybe I'm doing it. What is this?
Speaker 02But you're not a dreamer, you very much live your life in reality. So when you go to a film or when you go to a show, you're wanting reality, you're not wanting this make-believe, like I can't have visions in one foot.
Speaker 00So it either needs to be completely sci-fi, completely fantasy, or completely realistic. You can't do the mix, the mix of see.
Speaker 02I know you so well.
Speaker 00Yeah, I didn't think I ever uh put that together.
Speaker 02I came in tonight and Lauren went, um, we always have a quick chat before we get going about non-musical related things. And you went, thank you, that's that's like my therapy session. I was like, Well, glad I could help.
Speaker 00Thank you, Lauren.
Speaker 02Not at all. It was a young team though, wasn't it? These guys, and I think they had all the necessary enthusiasm and talent that they needed, or but they needed like an older, more experienced kind of soul and hand to guide them. And that's where George Abbott, a man twice their age and a seasoned writer, producer, and director, was brought in to direct. Now, what I thought was interesting about him, one of the first things he did was remove any overt references to the ongoing war that was going on at the time.
Speaker 01Yes.
Speaker 02Uh the characters try to escape the grim reality of war to enjoy themselves and let go, if only for a day. And I thought that was quite interesting that
War-Era Escapism, Women’s Roles, and Integration
Speaker 02in order for this to sell, remove the the obvious references to what these three main characters are experiencing.
Speaker 00Yes, but I also think that he by doing that he created the longevity of the musical.
Speaker 02Yeah, I think you're probably right.
Speaker 00Because at the then it's just three sailors who it's timeless, yeah. So then you can't, even though it's obviously set around it, it can just be, you know, three things getting off for for turning. Also, as we know, arts is used as a form of escapism. So by subtly having it there but not in your face, yeah, it allowed theatre goers of the of the town to go and relax into it rather than being reminded of what and it did have a really important role to play for the audiences of the time.
Speaker 02And what I also like about On the Town is it did highlight the difference the war made to American women. Yes. And more, you know, more than two million of them joined the workforce, often doing jobs that men had to do before because they had all gone off to fight in the war. And I love that one of the main females, one of the female characters, Hilde, is a cab driver. Yeah, previously a male job and pursues, and she pursues her sailor, Chip. Do you know what I mean? Not normally the other way around. And I actually do like that song where he's like, Can we go take me to see this? And she's like, No, take me back to your place. It's you know, I love that, but but it you know, that assertiveness would have shocked audiences at the time. Um, you know, and at the time, many Americans were forced to reassess their prejudices as well. Um On the Town was one of the first musicals brave enough to have a racially integrated cast. I couldn't believe it, I thought this was amazing. So the part of Ivy, who was Miss Turnstyle, this this pinup, this, you know, this woman that Gaby was like, I have to find her. She's perfect. She's my girl, was originally played in the original production by a Japanese-American dancer, Sono Osat Osato, whose father had been held in a US internment camp in 1941.
Speaker 00Because obviously that was, you know, it was the war, it was um Japan in invading America with the whole Pearl Harbor, is why Americans enjoyed the war.
Speaker 02So this is But like how brave, like how brave, and like, yeah, we're doing this, we are going to address these issues. There were six black artists in the cast of 46 who mingled with their white colleagues on stage, something that was unheard of at the time. That in itself, I just you know, you can say a lot about what is happening to the world we live in at the moment, but to have lived then I can't imagine. I can't imagine. Now I know that there are there are, and we're not going political because we never go political, although many of the sh shows we talk about are political, we don't go political, but you just you do worry that some of the things that are happening now are going back that way, and it's like I can't imagine having a non-integrated do you know what I mean? It's but anyway, that's us that's me off my soapbox.
Speaker 00Yeah, no, and I
Film Adaptation: MGM Changes and Legacy
Speaker 00love the fact that it was a racial reverse cast, and then the um conductor who took over, yeah. Um so it was like the first black conductor, so amazing, amazing. So, yes, this was all happening in 1944, and then we had the film, which most people will probably be familiar with, um, was 1949. Yeah, though the film did replace all but four the original numbers.
Speaker 02Yes, I was yes, Bernstein. Now, the bits I did watch of the film, he was a hothead. Bernstein was a fiery, fairy individual. I can't imagine how that went down when uh who who was it?
Speaker 00Yeah, was it he Gene Cally co-directed it?
Speaker 02Okay, and was it him that that pulled the MGM Studios? Yes. I was I couldn't remember the studio. So uh Louis B. Mayor, the head of MGM Studios, found the music too demanding and considered the stage version to be vulgar in places. So they ripped most of the the songs out. He had Comden and Green rewrite the story and replace all but four of Bernstein's songs, like crazy, crazily brave of the studios because uh Bernstein was hothead like.
Speaker 00Yeah, yeah. So the film did star Jean Kelly, as I mentioned, Frank's an actor Jules Munchin, and Miller Fair Ellen and Betty Agart. Yeah. Um, it did then have a West End production in 1963, there was a Broadway revival in 71 and in 1998. The English National Opera did one in 2007, and then the Broadway revived it in 2014. And I've seen a number of clips of that one because I think there was like a Tony Award um uh performances, um, and then a 2017 London revival.
Speaker 02So and that was that 2017 that was Regent Park with Drew McConey, who is up there with one of the the best choreographers that we have at the moment. Yeah, so I would probably have gone to see that just to see his choreographer.
Speaker 00Even though most people will have heard of On the Town or people of a certain generation, it hasn't had very many revivals or haven't had very many productions.
Speaker 02It's best known because it introduced several of those popular classic songs, yeah, isn't it?
Speaker 00That's it, and also the time that it came out, um, what
Songs, City Lessons, and New York References
Speaker 00it was about, and then obviously that the film really sort of cemented um its sort of place in movie musical history. Yeah.
Speaker 02Do you know one of the funnest movie facts I I learned when I was researching was that the film censors got involved and insisted on changing the word hell of a town that comes at the end of one of those classic songs. We were talking about New York, New York, it's a hell of a town. They didn't like hell of a and they made them change it to New York, New York, it's a wonderful town. How sad.
Speaker 00Hell of a hell of a town, literally such a bad word. Yeah, so strange, but I suppose like things are different, you know. But yeah, hell of a doesn't really seem like that bad a word, anyway. No, it did, but on the town is an example of perfect time. So it as we've sort of briefly touched about when the musical opened, the Battle of the Bulge, Germany's last major offensive um on the Western Front was defeated, and Germany then spent the rest of World War II in retreat. Okay, were feeling hopeful. People knew that the end of World War II was in sight, and audiences were happy then to go and watch three American sailors have a night of adventure and like so.
Speaker 02Lovely.
Speaker 00And things that we've mentioned before about the fact that it the the war wasn't really mentioned. This is another reason why people people did go and the 1949 film it premiered in Reader City Music Hall, and the line to get in was the largest in the theatre's history. Oh, nice, it's not really at the time. Um the film was the second largest grossing MGM film. And do you know what number one was at the time? No, beat me in St. Louis.
Speaker 02Oh, that is what and we need to do that next is it's an Easter one, is it?
Speaker 00No Christmas.
Speaker 02Christmas. Oh, you might see that this Christmas time.
Speaker 00Um the profit for that film was 474,000, which would be 5.6 million today.
Speaker 02That's insane.
Speaker 00And it was the very first musical to be shot on location.
Speaker 02Oh, I didn't know that. That's cool. Yeah, oh, in New York. New York, it's a hell of a town.
Speaker 00That is a great song.
Speaker 02It is great.
Speaker 00It is there's some really, really good songs.
Speaker 02Yeah, no, that's true. And I um again, give it having given it as fair go this time and listening through, I agree, like I definitely enjoy it. What did you learn from it then?
Speaker 00Well, he's the lyrical angle. It always taught me that the Bronx is up and the batteries down.
Speaker 02Bronx is up and the batteries down, me too. I didn't well, I knew what the Bronx was, and it's situated in the north, which is up. I didn't know what the battery was. And I was referring to Battery Park.
Speaker 00Battery Park, sorry. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 02Uh and it's the southernmost of Manhattan, you see, which is down. You see, I haven't done a America enough. Like I've done New York a couple of times, but I haven't like ventured that far out past Times Square. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 01Okay.
Speaker 02So really hotel room. Yeah. That's my hotel room or a Broadway theatre. That is my experiences of New York.
Food, Lyrics, and “I Can Cook Too”
Speaker 02Or the big ball falling on New uh New Year's Eve.
Speaker 00And the Christmas tree. And the Rockefeller Christmas tree.
Speaker 02Yeah.
Speaker 00Where you stood and watched ice skating because you were like, I'm not getting on that.
Speaker 02Absolutely not. That's right. We were in New York, New York at the same time. Yeah, I know. Good times. Good times. Not together, but it was lovely to meet up. I know.
Speaker 00It was lovely.
Speaker 02It was lovely.
Speaker 00Yeah, so that's what I learned in New York, New York. And then carried away, it says, um, I'm a sucker for a bargain sale. If something is marked down upon a shelf, my sense of what is practical begins to feel. I buy one, then another, another, then another. I buy the whole store out and I'm business for myself.
Speaker 02Lauren, that's you. It's like you wrote that song.
Speaker 00I learned that I must have been around in 1944.
Speaker 02Like that is literally you.
Speaker 00I love a bargain. I love a bargain. I see a yellow sticker to go, oh my gosh, yes, Marzipan, I need that.
Speaker 02And then walk up Marzipan's good, though. And then you walk out the the shop and you've spent an absolute bloom of fortune.
unknownYeah.
Speaker 00Yeah. That is.
Speaker 02Oh, but at least you know, at least you know.
Speaker 00But I was like, I need to get that tattooed.
Speaker 02That's for my that that is so as you were as you were reading that out, I was like, oh my goodness, it's Lauren. It's literally her.
Speaker 00Like I have um on many occasions, as I'm sure you are well aware, like I've gone to like IKEA and gone, oh I I I needed that light that shines, you know, images in the front of my house. And I am married 15 years this October, and I have not used it once.
Speaker 02Oh, but you'll use it this year because you're in your lovely new house, and like that, you've got a lovely big, tall front there.
Speaker 00She can imagine Aaron really wanting me to like display images on our front wall.
Speaker 02Like we we we you could do it like so it looks like it's snowing or something. That'd be lovely.
Speaker 00I could, yeah.
Speaker 02Well, I will move on quickly from your like spending spree habits. I love that. That is so you. Oh, bless you. Um come up to my place, which we were talking about earlier. That's a song about who is it again? Um the girl. Yes, me too.
Speaker 00Um is it Hilda? Hilda Hildi.
Speaker 02Hilde. Yeah, who's the cab driver? Isn't that right? Yeah, so she this is the number where she isn't it, Aussie. I think she's got in in the back of the corner. He's like, he keeps saying, take me to. So this is a like where's where in New York. So uh he's saying, if she should ever hit New York, be sure to see the Hippodrome. Yeah. So the Hippodrome Theatre was once the largest theater in the world. Uh the pride of New York City. Yeah. Uh seating and capacity
Architecture, Vocabulary, and Deep Cuts
Speaker 02was 5,200 and a stage 10 times the size of an average Broadway stage. Like, how massive is that? It was uh large enough to accommodate a thousand performers. Sometimes sounds like an amateur production.
Speaker 00I don't know, it's got the same.
Speaker 02Or a full or a full circus with elephants and horses. I've worked with horses, not elephants. Uh it was the site of one of Harry Houdini's most famous performances, The Vanishing Elephant, in 1918. Yeah. But in 1939 the Hippodrome was torn down. Do you know what it is now? This like site of such theatrical significance and such elegance and history. Do you know what it is now?
Speaker 00Yeah.
Speaker 02Office buildings.
Speaker 00Oh, of course it is.
Speaker 02That makes me sick.
Speaker 00Of course it could be worse, could be in a car park.
Speaker 02That's true. He also sings about Forest Theatre, which was the Eugene O'Neill Theatre that we've talked about on the podcast many times before. He then also sings about some tickets tickets for Tobacco Road. I thought Tobacco Road was uh just another road. It was actually the longest-running play in history at the time. Tobacco Road, created by Jack Kirkland, centred around a poverty-stricken family in rural Georgia during the Great Depression.
Speaker 01Very good.
Speaker 02And the first performance was in 1933 and it ran on Broadway for a total of You Ready for This? 3,182 performances.
Speaker 01Gosh.
Speaker 02It ended in May 1941, and uh on the town's character, Chip would have just missed its closing.
“Some Other Time” and Wartime Longing
Speaker 02Oh, good at night. Yeah. Yeah. He sings about let's go to Cleopatra's Needle. One of the three similarly named Egyptian, is it obliques? Oh B E L I S K S Obliques. Yeah. Uh Cleopatra's Needle stands in Central Park. There are two others. Do you know where the other two Cleopatra needles are in the world? Go on.
Speaker 00No, I haven't cleared.
Speaker 02Go on.
Speaker 00Scotland.
Speaker 02Laura. Honestly. Paris in London. And you would know them. There's definitely, I think the one in London is along the embankment, along the river. Oh, okay. I'm almost sure. Okay. So there you go. I I love that we come up to my place. I just love that she was so forceful. Or go back to your place or come up to my place.
Speaker 00Because she's about to get fired, or she is fired, I think. So she's she's like one more ride, and she sort of says to the people, um, not you, not you, definitely not you. And then he walks along, she goes, I'll have you.
Speaker 02Yeah, love it.
Speaker 00Um, and I can cook too. I can cook too.
Speaker 02I didn't really know this song. Oh, right. Although it was one of those ones that is is a takeaway from the show. But yeah, I love it now. I had to listen to it three times.
Speaker 00I'm a man's ideal of a perfect meal, right down to the demitas. Is that how you say it?
Speaker 02Demi-tass, yes. Demi-tass. Yeah.
Speaker 00Um, which is a small cup of black coffee, about 60 to 90 milliliters.
Speaker 02Yeah.
Speaker 00So is that like less than an espresso then?
Speaker 02Uh yeah, it's like an espresso or espresso. Uh it's like a common way to finish a meal. My dad would have been like that back in the day.
Speaker 00But I think it's all also has to be in those wee small sauce.
Speaker 02Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 00It has to be in the cup and saucer.
Speaker 02That's right, yeah. We small cup.
Speaker 00So yeah, there you go. Um, it's important. It's very important.
Speaker 02Is that what you said? Is that what she learned?
Speaker 00No, that's what I said.
Speaker 02What did you learn from this this number? Cooking. It's very important.
Speaker 00It is important. It's a really important skill to have. See, for somebody me who does all the meals in the house, breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks. Because my husband cannot cook.
Speaker 02He's not here to defend himself.
Speaker 00He won't cook. Learning how to cook.
Speaker 02But you're not teaching. He couldn't be bothered. Okay.
Does It Hold Up? Revivals, Favourites, and Takeaways
Speaker 00He sees no interest, he has no joy in eating food or preparing food.
Speaker 02Really? Yeah. You see, whereas and I think it's a thing that's come with age with me. Oh, here we are. It's no longer a musical theatre podcast. It's like cooking with Tim and LJ. Um, here that's the good we side. I don't have time. We don't have time. Um, I love cooking now, as I like like, you know, with like leisure and like escape. And I actually enjoy the process of it.
Speaker 00But I think I have realized over the years, I like, and I I really I don't say things like this often. I'm really good in the kitchen.
Speaker 01Yeah.
Speaker 00And I, to me, because I'm good at it, I'm like, okay, well, most people should be able to do this because I can't go to a cupboard and go, okay, we've got three things here, da, I make something. Well, Aaron just sees ingredients and doesn't can't put it all together. So that part stresses him out.
Speaker 02I don't know if I'm I'm at that stage either, though. So it's I need a wee recipe, like what didn't I'm gonna I'm gonna cook this tonight. What do I need?
Speaker 00Right, okay.
Speaker 02I don't think I I still don't think I could open a cupboard and go, okay, I'll mock up this.
Speaker 00Okay. You see, I'm I'm quite good at that as well because my son has celiac disease. Yeah. So I have to adapt meals all the time. Yeah. So I think I've just got really really good with that over the last couple of years. But um also having one child who doesn't have celiac disease but is the fussiest eater is really hard. So then you're going to do this.
Speaker 02So I just assume it's well, you have to be really good then.
Speaker 00Yeah, I have to just make sure that everybody is satisfied. And then some nights I just throw the head up and go, everybody's eating it. Everybody's just eating what is on the face.
Speaker 02Just right. That's the only way you can do it. Maybe not your son must say next. No, no, no, no. I want to make sure that he's like kids.
Speaker 01Or I'm not going to be able to do that.
Speaker 02They phone, you know, they phone like social services. Um in I Cook too. I there were a few other lines that I thought, oh, I that's interesting. They say he sings I sh it's her Hilda. Uh Hilde? It's Hilda. Hilde, yeah. She sings, I'm a brand new note on a table de hut. Um French phrase that literally means the host's table. Yeah. It's basically a set menu at a fixed price. Yeah. Did you know that? Yeah. Oh, you're so culinary. I love this uh
Patty Dilemma, Roller Skates, and Sign-Off
Speaker 02line. I'd make a wonderful driver even hit a high C. That's very impressive. I make the best taxi driver. The real rhyme here is fantastic. I rate a big Navy E.
Speaker 00Yeah, what is that?
Speaker 02Yeah, so the US Navy awards the battle efficien Oh, this is hard. Effectiveness award. Oh. Or the battle E, formerly known as the Battle Efficiency Award, to ships and other units that win their battle effectiveness competition.
Speaker 01That sounds a bit random.
Speaker 00Yeah.
Speaker 02She sings step up to my sh uh smorgas board.
Speaker 00Yeah, I love a smorgasbord.
Speaker 02I don't know what that is.
Speaker 00You do!
Speaker 02Well, it's uh well I know because I wrote it down, but I didn't know. Uh a range of open sandwiches and delicacies served as hordeaux. Yeah, so or a buffet.
Speaker 00A bit like a shakerie board where everything's just a schmorgish board? Yes, but it's a little so no way sandwiches though. But that's what's going on. So your shakuterie board will have meats and cheeses and like all of those types of things, while your schmorge board will have a more of a range of stuff.
Speaker 02How'd you say that?
Speaker 00Schmorger board. Um it'll have, like I said, sandwiches and maybe have some hot food, cold food. It's just like Picky tea.
Speaker 02Yes, very good, and then the last line in uh that song that I thought, oh, interesting. Oh, I'm a pate, a marion glace. Yep, uh, a dish you wish she had took, and what's more, baby I can cock. It's a great song. Uh a maron glass, candy chestnut.
Speaker 00Candy chestnut? Oh, never had that one.
Speaker 02There you go. Don't know if I'm interested in a candy chestnut. Oh is that are those those chestnuts that are covered in those that like that crunchy, like sweet coat like covered? It's just they're disgusting. And you would see that back in the day, you would have seen them. You know the way now if you go places there might be like a wee bowl of like cheese sweets.
Speaker 00Yeah.
Speaker 02But back in the day there would have been these cover like sweet covered chestnuts.
Speaker 00No, are you thinking of sugared almonds?
Speaker 02That's what I'm thinking of.
Speaker 00Oh, they're gross. Do you remember they're disgusting, right?
Speaker 02That's not a candy, that's not a maroon glass thing. No. Okay.
Speaker 00No.
Speaker 02I'll have to google.
Speaker 00Well, chestnut is like what you get at Christmas, you know, like chestnuts.
Speaker 02Running on the open.
Speaker 00But I don't know what that is. So I'm assuming.
Speaker 02Will it not be just the same? Only it's a different nut. It's not an almond, it's a chestnut.
Speaker 00Like your glass A cherries, which are very sweet, which we put into fifteenths.
Speaker 02You made some fifteen recently.
Speaker 00Um anyway. Anything else? Subway right, it says pilasters, coins, and piers. I probably didn't say that right, and spirandles and columns.
Speaker 02Lauren, I've missed your pronunciation so much.
Speaker 00These are um nobody knows what they are. If my cousin listens to this, he's studying to be an architect. Architectural elements used to add visual interest. So they're literally describing all the things in the subway. Like, oh, there's a pillar, and this is a column, and this is but I I I think there was lots more, and then I got bored. I was like, I'm not really that interested.
Speaker 02In architecture, an architecture. Don't tell your cousin.
Speaker 00Um hyper aesthesis.
Speaker 01Uh-huh.
Speaker 00Okay, which is an abnormal and extreme heightened sensitivity to sensory stimuli, mostly commonly affecting pain, touch, or temperature.
Speaker 02And was that in the same number there? Oh, interesting. Very good.
Speaker 00That is all my thing.
Speaker 02Yeah, the only last thing that I thought, and I went a bit deep, uh, was some other time is a beautiful, beautiful song. And you know, we were talking about you know, when they brought on um Abbott, yes, you know, to direct how he had kind of removed the overt references to the ongoing war. But this quartet quartet takes place late in the musical when Claire and Hildeck have fallen in love with their sailors. Don't don't don't they all fall in love with their sailors? Uh with the men Sure Leave about to expire, they all face the prospect of not knowing when they'll see their love, uh loved one again. And the song captures what many wartime Americans, not just wartime Americans, anybody that experienced war were experiencing that pain of separation and the need to grasp every fleeting moment of happiness.
Speaker 00Yeah, and I suppose as well anybody who's in um a career of a service like that, you know, the pressure of time, urgent and genuine connection is felt through this musical. Um, and also you may find love when you least expect it. Yeah and hidden lies don't I know it and glamorous people, um, such as the Miss Turnstyle, yeah, um Ivy Smith, though they have complicated realities, yeah. Um, and then overall there's a massive power of confidence, like confidence is power, um, like Hilde does sort of show the fact that it's okay to take the leap.
Speaker 02I love that. It's so good, and especially when you think of when this when this musical was was produced, like it it's amazing that that's what they you know the message they were putting out there. What were your standing nose?
Speaker 00I can cook.
Speaker 02Yeah, I can cook too was mine. Uh also you said it before. New York, New York, it's just such a it's a classic, isn't it? It's a classic, isn't it? And I do love the beginning of it musically. You know, there was like trombos, dum, dum, dum, dum, dum, dum, dum, dum, dum, dum. Like I love that bit. I also, it was a surprise to me. I didn't know it before. I love the come up to my place. It just made me laugh. Like I actually laughed.
Speaker 00Comedian.
Speaker 02Yeah, it's a great number. Yeah.
Speaker 00Very good. Yeah, that was.
Speaker 02I mean, for a musical that I'm a bit meh over, it it it's I think the history of it's interesting. It it intrigued me more than the musical itself. Do you know what I mean?
Speaker 00I think that's why you can kind of see why it still has its place. Yeah. You know, it's not one that has kind of just fallen away.
Speaker 02Would I choose to go and see it?
Speaker 00That's what I was gonna say. Probably not. Would it maybe make a good um, you know, say you had to put on something within teenagers or whatever on a shortened version or a couple of numbers here and there? Might be quite good to do.
Speaker 02No, it's got dream ballets, that's my idea of how you don't have to put the dream ballets in. You can't not do on the time without the dream. Most of the shows are bloody dream ballets. There's two.
Speaker 00Can you reimagine it without the ballets?
Speaker 02Right, interesting.
Speaker 00Don't you reimagine Oklahoma without the ballet? See, it can be done.
Speaker 02Well, yeah, well.
Speaker 00See it can be done.
Speaker 02I did do the ballet, I just shortened it to really cut the the tripe out of it.
Speaker 00There, then shorten the ballets by non-existing them.
Speaker 02You're a gay. Anyway.
Speaker 00Anyway, what would Patty do this being?
Speaker 02Oh, okay. I don't know.
Speaker 00Would Patty um be Frankie Valley in Jersey Boys or the lead in Starlight Express?
Speaker 02That's a really easy one for me this week, but I also it it causes great problems.
Speaker 00Yeah.
Speaker 02It would definitely be the lead for Starlight Express because I can't stand the Jersey Boys. However, I can't roller skate, nor do I think I'd be very good. As you as you referred to it, you minch, you know what you're doing. Um when I did go to New York, I stood on on the edge of Rockefeller's ice rink and just pointed and laughed at everybody who couldn't skate because I knew I wouldn't be able to skate, so I certainly wouldn't be able to roller skate.
Speaker 00Yeah, well, that's what I thought. But also, maybe in fairness, also Frankie Valley's like numbers might be a wee bit too high for you.
unknownYeah, me.
Speaker 00Strangled cat. But you know, I do feel sorry for those meeting videos.
Speaker 02We won't you come home to I'll be the one. Come why don't you come off? Come on.
Speaker 00I think you've you've done your edition.
Speaker 02In fact, I could be all four of the seasons.
Speaker 00Like for Grease 2. I'll be your girl. Four of seasons.
Speaker 02I love Have we done Grease 2 yet? We have to. I know it hasn't really made it. We've got Co-Rider, but that's not really being made into a music.
Speaker 00We can kind of get away with it because it kind of does have co-rider.
Speaker 02Stuff that I want to talk about, Grease 2. It's so much fun. Let's do it. Um yeah, no, I might go and start practicing a skate. Could you imagine?
Speaker 00I mean, people do take up things when they're 40th year, so maybe this is skating.
Speaker 02I think somehow roller skating's not going to be one. Like I put my neck out by drying my back. Can you imagine? Could you imagine what I would do to my body if I took up roller skating?
Speaker 01Oh.
Speaker 02You totally threw me under a bus with that one this week. You may watch yourself. I'm coming for you.
Speaker 01Okay.
Speaker 02I'll maybe see you next week. Lauren might not be so lucky. Tune in. See if she's see if she's still here or if I replaced her. Uh until next week. Bye. Bye.
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