Broadway Babies Say Goodnight: Musicals Then and Now (Hardcover)

by Mark Steyn (Author) "William Wheatley, the manager of Niblo's Garden, has a problem..." (more)
Key Phrases: theatre song, musical theatre, show boat, Lloyd Webber, New York, West End (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Is Broadway musical theater in terminal decline, fed intravenously from London, in headlong retreat to operetta certainties, emotional platitudes and vapidly luxuriant tunes? Almost, but not quite, suggests Steyn in this delightful, irreverent romp through seven decades of American musical theater from Show Boat to Miss Saigon. Taking the pulse of the Great White Way as a theater critic, he finds that Broadway shows have become amorphous creatures, products of the shifting interests of agglomerations of co-producers, fund-raisers, theater owners and provincial tour bookers. His breezy yet substantial surveya spontaneous mix of vibrant history, juicy gossip, plot and song analysis and pungent criticismloses its fizz about halfway through, yet it is filled with gimlet insights into the craft and business of musicals and valuable close-ups of old-timers (Cole Porter, Jerome Kern, Rodgers and Hart and Hammerstein, novelist/lyricist P.G. Wodehouse, the Gershwins, Damn Yankees creator George Abbott, etc.) as well as more recent figures (such as producer David Merrick and choreographer/directors Bob Fosse and Michael Bennett). Separate in-depth chapters cover the massive creative contributions of Jews and gays to the Broadway musical; other chapters offer a scathing look at British musicals and skewer rock musicals from Hair to Rent. Along the way, Steyn memorably tweaks Andrew Lloyd Weber (a classic example of imperial overstretch), Stephen Sondheim and others. With encyclopedic knowledge and unabashed passion for the best of Broadway, Steyn explains how an art form has embedded itself into our cultural vocabulary.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
Steyn, theater critic for the Wall Street Journal, has written a loosely focused set of chapters on various aspects of the musicalAmusic, lyrics, book, proceduresAand on the influence Jews, gays, and the British have had on the form. The best musicals (of which Gypsy, 1959, is his pick for all-time greatest) are like three-piece suits, in which book, lyrics, and music blend as an ensemble. The "invasion" of the British shows of Andrew Lloyd-Webber (Cats, etc.), the "age of the technomusical spectacle," and the increasingly self-referential nature of many recent shows have led to the "death of theatrical culture and its metaphorical power." Although his thesis is too simplistic and his argument poorly constructed, Steyn's extensive knowledge of the musical's history and his provocative commentary will be enjoyed by many musical theater buffs. Recommended for public and graduate-level academic libraries with strong performing arts collections.ARobert W. Melton, Univ. of Kansas Libs., Lawrence
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Routledge; 1 edition (March 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0415922860
• ISBN-13: 978-0415922869
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (25 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,116,815 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

54 of 60 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Breath Of Fresh Air!, April 30, 2001

By	Eric Paddon (Morristown, NJ) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Broadway Babies Say Goodnight : Musicals Then and Now (Paperback)

It's usually quite lonely being a political conservative as I am, and also a devotee of Broadway musicals since for such a long time even in its now seemingly more "conservative" days of the tradtional book musical, Broadway was always the domain of men who possessed very poltically left wing points of view. But during the heyday of Broadway's golden age, liberals like Lerner and Loewe, Rodgers And Hammerstein etc. knew that their audiences were comprised of diverse viewpoints and hence strove first to just entertain with a minimum of social commentary (when Lerner in his advancing years succumbed to the desire to be pretentious, the results, "1600 Pennsylvania Avenue" and "Dance A Little Closer" ended up disappearing in a week and are now deservedly forgotten). Such is not the case with today's Broadway where not only are all new musicals and plays usually loaded with radical left wing social commentary but even the musical revivals are subject to PC rewrites to satisfy today's narrow audience of those on the far left (case in point, the tamperings in "Damn Yankees" which this book comments on, concerning the tacky aside about J. Edgar Hoover which doesn't work in the musical's book and is the biggest exercise of self-indulgence so typical of the arrogant left wing mindset that dominates today's theater).

As such, it is a wonderful breath of fresh air to find this book by Mark Steyn, a theater critic who happens to be a political conservative, offering a good deal of telling insights as to why Broadway has largely lost its way the last couple decades, though it is very unfair and typical of the left-wing arrogance of some of the writers below that all of his criticisms are rooted in his ideology. To blast today's musicals on their inability to provide a good integrated score and book, as well as good songs is the kind of criticism that a liberal like Richard Rodgers, who walked out of "Hair" after Act One, would have no problem with. (Indeed, apart from "Memory" when was the last time a Broadway song made into the standard repertoire of American popular music?) Steyn proves to be provacative at times, and also very funny as well on a number of occasions that you have to applaud his brilliance even if you don't end up agreeing with him all the time. His chapter on Stephen Sondheim is priceless, showing the strange contradiction of how the works of Sondheim that are so timeless in their appeal ("West Side Story" and "Gypsy") are the ones that are put down the most by his most die-hard fans in favor of his forgettable flops.

One other note to [e-mail] who likes to use the term "McCarthyism" with the same reckless abandon so typical of the militant left, yet like so many of its members does so in total ignorance of the actual events that spawned the term. One, Senator McCarthy didn't send anyone to jail, and two he had nothing to do with the investigation of Hollywood Communists (all of whom went to jail for the very real crime of contempt of Congress, not their poltical beliefs and the fact that they were leftists or in some cases committed Stalin bootlickers). "McCarthyism" is a term which in its proper context refers to unproved or reckless accusations against someone with the intent to damage or smear merely beacuse of one's political associations. It has nothing to do with sending people to jail for their beliefs. And in its proper context, [e-mail] by smearing Mark Steyn because he is a conservative who writes for the American Spectator on occasion, is the true practitioner of "McCarthyism" in the end.

26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best review of Broadway in years, September 2, 2002

By	Matthew Asnip "bibliophile" (Atlanta, GA United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Broadway Babies Say Goodnight : Musicals Then and Now (Paperback)

The Great White Way is in trouble. It's condition is terminal but not serious, as the Russians say. Whatever you think of the causes for that, you will enjoy this book, if you love theatre. Mr. Steyn provides an excellent, if short history of Broadway, interspersed with lively criticism of the 'state of the stage'. Sondheim, in particular, receives some cutting thrusts. Reading it, I alternatively wanted to shout in Mr. Steyn's face and shake him by the hand. I laughed, I cried, I threw the book across the room at least three times, but I couldn't put it down.

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wit, Wisdom, Opinion, And Tap-Tap-Tapping Feet!, September 25, 2005

By	Dan Fendel (Hollywood, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Broadway Babies Say Goodnight : Musicals Then and Now (Paperback)

Marc Steyn is a Brit transplanted to New Hampshire who writes mostly political commentary for papers in Chicago, London, and Canada plus columns for National Review, but this volume harkens back to his days as a theater critic and historian to give us a complete, though opinionated, picture of the history of the musical theater--first on Broadway and then in London. His writing is full of puns and wit, but more importantly, the stories he tells and the quotes from every major figure ranging from Lerner & Lowe to Andrew Lloyd Webber put the whole mysterious world of how musicals are born, rehearsed, and then live or die into perspective that both the outsider looking in and the theatrical professional can appreciate. He also uses his knowledge of history to put shows and their popularity into the context of their times--for example sharing the fact that literally hundreds of shows in the immediate post-Civil War period dealt with ghosts and spirits because the strong belief in an afterlife gave the nation a spiritual soothing after the horrors of massive death in the war itself. He covers the songwriters, the book writers, the hits, the flops, the stars---even the whole CONCEPT of a "star" and how it has changed over the years--and you will be entertained and enlightened indeed.

This is a book perfect for a gift for anyone you know who loves theater, music, or hopes to be a part of the professional world of it or is already. It isn't exactly a tale with a happy ending--the current state of the musical is pretty grim in many ways Steyn elaborates on--but it does point out the way "home" to real successes in the future, too.

From obscure historical stuff you'd never find anywhere else to major "name" showbiz stars and their gossip, "Broadway Babies Say Goodnight" is a superb read for the theater fan.