Customer Reviews

Runaways (Original Broadway Cast)

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

 

 

RUNAWAYS is composed by Elizabeth Swados and premiered at the Public Theather NYC, 1978. This excellent show which spans multiple musical styles featured such performers as Diane Lane, Trini Alverado, Jossie de Guzman, and Karen Evans. RUNAWAYS is great for anyone who likes shows in the style of HAIR, THE ME NOBODY KNOWS and INNER CITY (another AMAZING AMAZING musical avaliable on LP from Footlights Records NYC) For people who like urban musicals and rock music (RUNAWAYS even has a full rap, preety advanced for 1978, this is an album to have. The script is avaliable from Samuel French, NYC

A phenomenal soundtrack - listen for young Josie Guzman, later to become a star in the "Guys and Dolls" revival. I was involved with a community theater production of this musical at age 15, and I've been listening to a bad tape of a warped record for more than a decade. I couldn't be more thrilled to finally own it on CD!!

This is not an easy soundtrack to sit through, just as the show is not easy to watch. But the music is often entrancing, if the sentiments/situations expressed are disturbing.

The musical was developed using interviews with children who were living on the streets in New York City in the 70s, much as A Chorus Line was developed by talking with dancers/gypsies. Reportedly, some of the cast were runaways themselves.

The music is more situational than integrated into the story. Some of it does not seem to match the sentiments presented in the lyrics. Other times -- especially in "Song Of A Child Prostitute" -- it is disconcertingly appropriate.

There is no plot line through the show/album. The musical itself was an integration of poetry, choreography, music, and costume to try to express the plight of children living on the street. Anyone who saw the deaf cast member furiously signing lyrics or pre-teen children wishing they could have had a childhood could be unmoved. (I highly recommend checking out the cast's performance at the Tony Awards on YouTube.)

This will stay with you, though none of the tunes are particularly "hummable." Especially is "Enterprise", which arguably can be called a rap song with it's rhymic patter -- a full year before the Sugar Hill Gang recorded "Rappers Delight."

There is no "moral" to this story, other than "Let me be young before I grow old. Let me be a kid." But this WILL stay with you.

Both CD's arrived in good time, in good condition and exactly as I had expected.

I SAW THIS SHOW YEARS AGO AND THOUGHT IT WAS QUITE STRIKING. I STILL FIND THIS UNUSUAL MUSICAL STRIKING, POINGANT AND POWERFUL. I AM SO GLAD IT HAS BEEN PRESERVED

Liz Swados unique (and Tony nominated) musical managed a fairly successful 274 performance run in 1978. The cast album was made by Columbia in their last flurry of activity before abandoning the field the label had dominated for 30 years. As an album it never gave you a sense of what the show was about. Perhaps they needed to record some of the monologues and speeches. The youthful cast has energy to spare but the diction in the chorus numbers is often mushy. Still the score is unique in melding several different styles, and almost two decades ahead of RENT in addressing urban social woes. Some of the material is disturbing, some heartbreaking: listen to "Lullaby from Baby To Baby."

The lyrics are stream-of-consciousness style and some of the lines seem forced. The show has had a number of regional and community theatre stagings, but remains one of the least-known Tony nominated shows of all time.

The problem of teen runaways is still a major one, and no musical is ever going to solve that.