Among B’way cognoscente & critics of the time, the general consensus was that the Best Musical of the 1991 - 1992 season wasn’t one of the four Tony-nominated shows that year (CRAZY FOR YOU; FALSETTOS; FIVE GUYS NAMED JOE; JELLY’S LAST JAM), but BEAUTY AND THE BEAST, the animated film playing on the silver screen down the block. And while a revisit shows the film holding up quite nicely, thank you, it also reveals B&B as less a standard, old-fashioned 1940s-style musical (like THE LITTLE MERMAID/’89, the previous Alan Menken/Howard Ashman animated project for Disney), but something even more unfashionable in current Pop culture: operetta. Yet the film was both blockbuster and cultural landmark, making animated features not just respectable (Oscar, Oscar®), but suddenly something adults could see on a date without the kids. How’d that happen? Our vote goes to composer Alan Menken, a musical magpie of borrowed genius, he seemed to know exactly what musical genre was needed to match any property. 1960s Brill Building pastiche for LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS/’86; bubbly ‘50s ballads a la Frank Loesser or Richard Adler for LITTLE MERMAID; and here, 1920s operetta stylings fellow musical magpies Rudolph Friml & Sigmund Romberg might have composed. Especially easy to hear in big group numbers. So, by the time Angela Lansbury lands the title track, we’re all goners.
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY/LINK: Co-directors Gary Trousdale & Kirk Wise never made another feature after ATLANTIS/’01 tanked. Hollywood an unforgiving place, even with B&B in your background. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2016/08/atlantis-lost-empire-2001.html
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