| West Side Story, Annie Get Your Gun, My Fair Lady: Blasts from today's MARQUEE Substack | |
| Posted by: TheBroadwayMaven (DavidBenkof@gmail.com) 08:39 am EST 01/24/25 | |
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| Excerpted from this week's MARQUEE Substack: BROADWAY BLAST: In “Gee, Officer Krupke” from West Side Story, after A-Rab, playing a social worker, declares that “Juvenile delinquency is merely a social disease,” his mock patient Action declares, “Hey, I got a social disease!” Action is rather proud of the diagnosis, with its implication of venereal disease and thus evidence to his friends that he’s had sex. This humorous moment of bravado not only encapsulates the gang's dismissive attitude towards societal norms but also offers a poignant reflection of their misguided understanding of adulthood and masculinity within the turbulent social fabric of 1950s America. BROADWAY BLAST: One of the most ingenious—and fun—songs in Annie Get Your Gun is "Anything You Can Do," a comic challenge song between Annie Oakley and Frank Butler. But as a revolutionary 1946 musical that came just three years after Oklahoma!, Annie Get Your Gun may also have been saying to musicals of the past that the art form had evolved into a new phase of a tight book, two-couple structure, and songs (tons of them!) that advance the plot. Anything old Broadway could do, Irving Berlin was saying, he could do better. This shift toward integrated musicals allowed characters' internal motivations to drive the songs, creating richer storytelling that left behind the revue-style formats of earlier Broadway. LAST BLAST: In a clever twist of irony, My Fair Lady portrays Henry Higgins—a phonetics professor obsessed with diction—as he misstates that Eliza should be "taken out and hung." The proper term is "hanged" when referring to execution. This slip not only undermines his linguistic authority but also hints at a deeper subconscious perception of Eliza. By using "hung," Higgins may be viewing her as an object to be displayed—something to be "hung" like artwork—rather than acknowledging her as a person with feelings. This moment serves as a subtle critique of his pedantry and objectification, reminding the audience that even experts are fallible, and that true respect requires seeing others as equals. |
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