Customer Reviews

The Broadway Musical Quiz Book

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is not for someone who is only a passive fan of musicals. I consider myself very learned on the subject and I find myself getting half the questions wrong!! But still it's a very fun trip and I find I'm learning a lot. Just beware that you have to be a BIG fan to even begin to do well on these things:)

I wholeheartedly agree with the other reviewer: This musical trivia book is not for the casual lover of musicals. I received this book for Christmas and we're barely scratching the surface, but I can already tell we'll have hours and hours of fun testing what we know and how we can find out the answers to the (many many) things we don't know at all. It's best if you're willing to work with open websites like the ibdb, the guide to musical theatre, and musical lyric sites (such as allmusicals), just to name a few. You'll really feel like you've earned your answers, especially when you know one or two right off the cuff. But you'll definitely learn loads about the history of the art form - not just lyrics and libretti but productions, composers, performers, and all sorts of hidden gems on every aspect of musicals and musical theatre. One of the best parts of the book are the details that the author provides in both the questions... and the answers!

There is a lot about this 'quiz' book that is great -- lots of categories, lot's of variety: classics, contemporary -- not just "hip" over-rated shows. I'm a huge Bway buff, and this keeps me on my toes!

I didn't know a single answer... but the person I gave it to as a gift loved it. He knew many answers and was thrilled to learn about the ones he didn't.

I am a huge musical theatre fan who collects cast albums, reads books on the subject, watches the Tonys every year, and tries to catch every Broadway tour that comes my way. I've seen shows in NY, London, and even seen shows in foreign languages in other countries. (The German production of Wicked was truly spectacular.) I merely state this to establish some credibility before I give my reasons for disliking this book:

The questions are too difficult to make these quizzes fun. The author writes in the beginning that she tried to make it interesting for hardcore fans like myself as well as casual fans. If this is true, I'm surprised she didn't categorize the quizzes by difficulty level and gives us quizzes ranging from very easy to very hard rather than a whole book of quizzes that only fit in the latter category. As it stands, I could only answer about one in every seven questions. Thus, I can't imagine a casual musical theatre fan getting much enjoyment from this book. Of course, not knowing a question prompts you to look up the answer and learn something new, which is exciting, but not all the information is correct. I reached the "Typically English" quiz covering British shows, only the fourth quiz in the book, and I already ran across a mistake* and a pretty obvious one at that. This leads me to question the validity of other information contained in this book.

Overall, I love the idea of this book. I just think it could have been a touch easier and researched better while still being fun and interesting to ALL those who appreciate musical theatre.

*In the answers section for the "Typically English" quiz (under #10, pg. 199), the author states that Lauri Peters (and the children) from The Sound of Music lost the Best Featured Actress Tony to Sandra Church from Gypsy. She/they actually lost to their costar in The Sound of Music, Patricia Neway.

Every Monday I post a musical theatre quiz on my website.... and everyone just adores them. And they're not easy quizzes -- very smart questions that really make you think. Great for those "theatre geeks" in your life.

In thia book Laura Frankos gives you a delightful and painless Masters Degree in the musical. When she asks multiple choice questions, the answer is never simply "A" or "C"...but the -reason- that the answer is "A" or

"C", told in a thorough but lighthearted style -- and this lady knows her stuff. I hope Ms. Frankos plans more books on the musical theater, because her love and fascination with it is contageous.

"The Broaedway Musical Quiz Book" is by no means for the layman. I've worked in musical theatre for thirty years and huge chunks of this book left my forehead crinkled and my mind saying, "What the-" The only sequence in which I got them all correct was on Stephen Sondheim, but then there is no one alive other than Sondheim himself who could tell you more.(Maybe not even him; we rarely follow our own lives with the same scruntiny as others do.)

However this book is a lot of fun. I picture a dorm room full of theatre majors playing with the book; I picture teachers looking for extra credit questions. I also can see how this book is useful in looking at the history of Aerican Musical Theatre. I can see the book spending a summer on the porch or a winter in the bathroom.

If you're a fan who lovedf "Cats" and "Phantom" but can't say who wrote the lyrics and book for those two shows, save your money and buy a Sarah Brightman DVD. If you're smarter than that and have a sincere interest in American Musical Theatre, you could do a lot worse.

I do wonder, however, how the author would have done on this before her hunt for information.