This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Jimi: So, um, have you ever heard of Peter Serafinowitz?

[0:02] Tommy: Peter, there was an old man named Peter Serafinowitz had a nickname on his chinowitz.

[0:08] Jimi: Plucked it off, but it grew in a witch borrowed Peter Sarafinowitz beginning what's please tell me that was just a riff.

[0:15] Tommy: No, that's totally a song.

[0:17] Jimi: You've never heard the song Michael Finnegan?

[0:19] Tommy: I guess it's probably a little offensive for people from Scotland.

[0:22] Jimi: Um it's an old rhyme.

[0:24] Tommy: There was an old man named Michael Finnegan.

[0:26] Jimi: Oh, but so you did riff on the Pierce Peter Serafini.

[0:29] Tommy: Yeah, that I did.

[0:30] Jimi: Yeah.

[0:30] Tommy: That was so impressive.

[0:31] Jimi: Thank you.

[0:32] Tommy: Have you been to improv class?

[0:33] Jimi: Uh I try mm friends don't let friends do improv.

[0:36] Tommy: You should know this.

[0:37] Jimi: Fair.

[0:38] Tommy: We have a we have a service for if do you have friends who are interested to improv, they say to you, hey, you want to come see my improv show?

[0:45] Jimi: It's at 10 a.m.

[0:46] Tommy: We're the fifth act to go on.

[0:48] Jimi: It's $7 to get in, but your first drink is free.

[0:52] Tommy: You should call our phone number.

[0:53] Jimi: It's 1-800 no but.

[0:56] Tommy: Friends don't let friends do improv.

[0:58] Jimi: That's funny.

[1:02] Tommy: Welcome to Jim and Tomic's Musical Theatre Happy Hour, your weekly podcast with shots and shanties.

[1:09] Jimi: Do you think there are listeners out there who develop drinking games to our podcast and do shots?

[1:16] Tommy: What do whatever we say?

[1:18] Jimi: Like whenever I say, let's ride there on my segue.

[1:22] Tommy: Um I don't know.

[1:24] Jimi: Or where if I say um Whenever you see.

[1:27] Tommy: Do you know what?

[1:27] Jimi: Every time every time I edit these podcasts, I was like, God, I say that so much.

[1:30] Tommy: And then when it comes to actually thinking about what do I say, I can never remember.

[1:35] Jimi: Whenever you make up an obscure UK word to fool me into thinking it's real.

[1:40] Tommy: Precisely.

[1:41] Jimi: Um also a question. Are there any shanties other than sea shanties?

[1:46] Tommy: Yes.

[1:47] Jimi: Um I only learned this recently because I found a new subreddit.

[1:50] Tommy: I think it's called R Shanties.

[1:53] Jimi: This is an actual save of Reddit.

[1:56] Tommy: This is an actual thing that happened to me recently.

[2:00] Jimi: Oh, it's not called Shanties.

[2:01] Tommy: I'm looking for sea shanties.

[2:03] Jimi: Thanks, R shanties.

[2:04] Tommy: It's RC shanties.

[2:06] Jimi: There are also, Jimmy, did you know this?

[2:08] Tommy: Space shanties.

[2:10] Jimi: Of course.

[2:10] Tommy: Santies in space.

[2:12] Jimi: Including uh one of my favorites, which we should absolutely remember to put in the show notes called Carmen Miranda's Ghost.

[2:21] Tommy: Okay.

[2:21] Jimi: Which I never thought I would have a chance to include in this podcast.

[2:25] Tommy: Yeah, it's like Carmen Miranda's ghost is haunting space pod number nine.

[2:30] Jimi: Um it's really weird, but the free fruit is awesome, is the thesis of the song.

[2:36] Tommy: Okay.

[2:38] Jimi: Well, so not only just space, but ghosts in space.

[2:41] Tommy: Ghosts in space, yeah.

[2:43] Jimi: And the idea, the idea of a space shanty is like there's a sci-fi future where we sail around in spaceships the same way we sailed around in boats in seaships.

[2:56] Tommy: And so, of course, space shanties obviously would develop.

[3:01] Jimi: Um, so long story short, yes, I think there are other kinds of shanties.

[3:05] Tommy: Excellent.

[3:06] Jimi: Well, maybe one day we'll do the space shanty musical.

[3:10] Tommy: Um also, just as a note, we teased it last week.

[3:14] Jimi: We're gonna do it this week.

[3:15] Tommy: Hey, hey, hey.

[3:16] Jimi: Um, so stay tuned till the end of the podcast, which you all do anyway, um, for our Reddit rundown.

[3:23] Tommy: Yeah, we're gonna talk about some of your comments from Heather's last week.

[3:26] Jimi: Exactly.

[3:27] Tommy: Look at us go.

[3:29] Jimi: Let's get into it.

[3:30] Tommy: What uh what are you drinking today, Jimmy?

[3:32] Jimi: I am drinking some seawater.

[3:35] Tommy: Mmm.

[3:36] Jimi: Errrr.

[3:38] Tommy: What are you drinking?

[3:39] Jimi: Uh, this right here?

[3:40] Tommy: Why, this is the very bottle of a Perrier that's mineral.

[3:44] Jimi: Beautiful.

[3:46] Tommy: Well done.

[3:46] Jimi: How how long?

[3:47] Tommy: How long were you were you working that one out?

[3:49] Jimi: Years.

[3:50] Tommy: Years and years and years.

[3:51] Jimi: It's been years in the making.

[3:53] Tommy: And I don't think it's even original.

[3:54] Jimi: I think I heard it somewhere else.

[3:56] Tommy: Well, I liked it.

[3:57] Jimi: I hadn't heard it before.

[3:59] Tommy: Um why are we waffling on about this, sir?

[4:02] Jimi: It has to do with our quiz question last week.

[4:04] Tommy: One of the most popular songs from this quote unquote musical has been parodied in every context.

[4:10] Jimi: It will help you learn about the chemical elements, nations of the world, and even college majors.

[4:15] Tommy: What is the musical?

[4:23] Jimi: With cat like a brain we seal.

[4:31] Tommy: No sound at all.

[4:32] Jimi: We never speak a word of lies football with me.

[4:40] Tommy: So tell the me, the pirate creeps while all the households soundly speaks.

[5:17] Jimi: The Pirates of Penzance.

[5:20] Tommy: The Pirates of Penzance.

[5:21] Jimi: Specifically, which I'm sure we'll talk about in more detail later, but the Major General song, which even if you haven't heard it, you've absolutely heard it.

[5:29] Tommy: Yeah, exactly.

[5:30] Jimi: You know it.

[5:30] Tommy: You pretty much know it off by heart.

[5:32] Jimi: Yeah, it's you know the Daniel Radcliffe sings the Elements song set to the melody of Modern Major General at parties as a parlor trick.

[5:42] Tommy: Um so that's the reason why that's the reason because you're all Daniel Radcliffe fans.

[5:47] Jimi: No, it's in Animaniacs, it's like I am the very model of a cartoon individual.

[5:50] Tommy: There was very popular viral video maybe a couple years ago about Barack Obama.

[5:55] Jimi: Um something president.

[5:59] Tommy: Um it's everywhere.

[6:02] Jimi: You've you've absolutely heard it before.

[6:05] Tommy: And it came from our first Gilbert and Sullivan musical that we are talking about.

[6:12] Jimi: I think we we are treading dangerous waters here, Jimmy.

[6:15] Tommy: I know, I know.

[6:16] Jimi: We're we're going out to the the deadlands.

[6:18] Tommy: Well, there there are there are people who like talking about Arthur Sullivan and William Gilbert are like their life's work.

[6:27] Jimi: Exactly.

[6:28] Tommy: We're never gonna be as smart as them.

[6:30] Jimi: No, absolutely not.

[6:31] Tommy: Caveat right at the start.

[6:33] Jimi: Yeah, so I um when I was in Edinburgh, I was a member of the Edinburgh University Savoy Opera Group, uh, which was our Gilbert and Sullivan Society.

[6:42] Tommy: Um they also did musicals as well, but uh that was the principally we did that, and um at the the 50th anniversary gala um that we had, uh it was amazing.

[6:56] Jimi: We got all these speakers, and it was basically just a room full of of GNS heads, and it's so amazing.

[7:03] Tommy: Because like I feel like the passion that we have for musical theater purely equates to the passion that they have for for these for these operas.

[7:12] Jimi: Um, like the fan following, like you know, we talk about Heathers and we talk about Cornets, yeah.

[7:17] Tommy: Um like the fan following for Gilbert and Sullivan is just something else.

[7:22] Jimi: It's everywhere, and it's oh yeah, huge and extremely loyal.

[7:28] Tommy: My my first encounter with the Gilbert and Sullivan fan following was um back in my days of heading up Wiki Project Musical Theatre, um tasked with editing Wikipedia pages about musical theater.

[7:40] Jimi: Um, and we got into quite an internet scuffle with Wiki Project Gilbert and Sullivan about who had purview over which articles, and um there's some passionate internet people out there so interesting.

[7:55] Tommy: That's so because like honestly, because um uh Usac, as we call it, um, started to when they started to do music, they haven't always done musicals, obviously, because we've been going for 50 years.

[8:06] Jimi: Um, when they started to do musical theater, um, and obviously with the current climate of people just knowing musical theater more preferring musical theater, um there's kind of been a shift in what's the priority, um, and like over the past kind of like four or five years, it's a heavy debate about you know what it is, which which is the true thing, which is the thing that's important, you know, what do we call ourselves, blah blah blah.

[8:35] Tommy: Um it's fascinating the the kind of dichotomy's a word.

[8:40] Jimi: And take a shot, we'll probably talk about it later.

[8:43] Tommy: Absolutely.

[8:44] Jimi: But so Pirates of Penzance premiered in 1879.

[8:50] Tommy: I think this is now the earliest show we've talked about.

[8:53] Jimi: It is indeed.

[8:54] Tommy: It is indeed.

[8:55] Jimi: I don't is this will probably be unless we cover another Gilbert and Sullivan, but I can't imagine we'll cover Pinafore or something.

[9:01] Tommy: Um who knows, maybe Jim and Twitter.

[9:02] Jimi: Well, hey, we could be here exactly when we're on episode 56.

[9:06] Tommy: Like we'll need to.

[9:07] Jimi: But like we're we're so far at the Genesis.

[9:09] Tommy: But it premiered just at the end of 1879 in New York, and it had like a triple premiere.

[9:16] Jimi: Um yeah, exactly.

[9:18] Tommy: It it kind of it's it the start of the start of of Gina, and we'll get into this in in a little minute.

[9:26] Jimi: There we go already.

[9:27] Tommy: Um, but the start of Pirates Penzance was so kind of fraught.

[9:32] Jimi: Mm-hmm.

[9:32] Tommy: Um there's lots that went with it.

[9:34] Jimi: So yeah, we were the UK, we were in the US, um, different versions, like it's it was a mad opening.

[9:41] Tommy: And Gilbert Gilbert and Sullivan were I would say known, you know, like this like it was we're going to see the next Gilbert and Sullivan operetta, but this one, you know, reviews very much said like this is they made severe leaps and bounds in their own stylistic choices in creating Pirates of Penzance.

[10:00] Jimi: Mm-hmm.

[10:00] Tommy: Totally.

[10:01] Jimi: Um and this was the first of the operas to be premiered stateside, and there are reasons for that, which again we won't get into.

[10:09] Tommy: Um but kind of after its initial success, I think it ran certainly in the UK it ran for like 400 odd performances.

[10:17] Jimi: Which is huge at that time.

[10:18] Tommy: Exactly.

[10:19] Jimi: At that time that is massive.

[10:21] Tommy: Um and then it was only a couple of years later then it got revived.

[10:25] Jimi: Um in the the Savoy Theatre.

[10:28] Tommy: Um where and I think I think through D'Oyly Carte, um the Gilbert and Sullivan, the main kind of Gilbert and Sullivan production company, um it was it was never off their their touring um books until they closed.

[10:44] Jimi: It immediately started like I think three tours stateside.

[10:48] Tommy: Um that's at this time, turn of the last century, that's one of the fastest moving ways to get a piece of art out there.

[10:59] Jimi: Totally.

[10:59] Tommy: You know, we're we're what?

[11:01] Jimi: We're we're probably we're pre-radio, certainly pre-television, and yeah, you know, we're definitely in silent movie land.

[11:08] Tommy: Um this is Victorian era, like crazy for something to become so wildly popular, um across continents, do you know I mean, not even just within the UK, it's across the continents.

[11:22] Jimi: Yeah, like take take that Andrew Lloyd Weber.

[11:24] Tommy: Yeah, exactly.

[11:25] Jimi: You think you're the machine we're doing.

[11:27] Tommy: Yeah, exactly.

[11:30] Jimi: Please.

[11:31] Tommy: Um let's talk a little bit about what pirates actually is.

[11:36] Jimi: What's going on in this Mary Little Far.

[11:39] Tommy: What ain't going on, right?

[11:41] Jimi: Right.

[11:42] Tommy: Um this is a ridiculous show.

[11:46] Jimi: By contemporary standards, the plot of this show is ridiculous.

[11:49] Tommy: Absolutely.

[11:50] Jimi: And it's do you know what that's kinda interesting in itself because like where do you where do we talk about it from?

[11:56] Tommy: Right.

[11:57] Jimi: Do you know what I mean?

[11:58] Tommy: It is it is ostensibly contemporaneous, right?

[12:03] Jimi: Yes.

[12:03] Tommy: The the idea is that it is written about the late 1870s, early eighteen eighties in that time.

[12:10] Jimi: Yes.

[12:11] Tommy: We're not talking about, you know, the eighteen tens or the seventeen hundreds.

[12:15] Jimi: Exactly.

[12:15] Tommy: Um, but a lot of the plot revolves around how ridiculous it would be if there were a contemporary, still living band of pirates in the eighteen eighties.

[12:29] Jimi: Yes.

[12:30] Tommy: And so it's like self-dating itself through parody, kind of.

[12:36] Jimi: Totally, totally.

[12:37] Tommy: And that, you know, that kind of calls into some of the genius of these guys, is that they really knew how to kind of subvert genre.

[12:47] Jimi: Yeah.

[12:47] Tommy: Um, like really, really well.

[12:50] Jimi: Um so we're we're in Penzance.

[12:55] Tommy: Which is Which is in England, I recently learned.

[12:59] Jimi: Where did you think it was?

[13:01] Tommy: I think it was Africa.

[13:02] Jimi: I thought it was in Australia for several years, which is because it's got a Z in it.

[13:07] Tommy: We don't need to dwell on my stupidity.

[13:09] Jimi: Um it's cause it's because I thought Englishmen were more intelligent than the people portrayed in this musical.

[13:19] Tommy: I see.

[13:20] Jimi: Australia was later in development.

[13:22] Tommy: Sorry, Australian listeners.

[13:24] Jimi: Um, I don't know.

[13:25] Tommy: Something seemed more something seemed more like Australian frontier than it seemed like developed England countryside.

[13:34] Jimi: Okay, that's I mean, I can totally accept that.

[13:43] Tommy: Right, there you go. So we're in, but we're in the South. I mean, you know, South England.

[13:45] Jimi: That's well be Australia.

[13:49] Tommy: Yeah, that's like what 24 degrees Celsius.

[13:52] Jimi: Whoo man. Uh I don't know where that is in Fahrenheit, but who cares?

[13:56] Tommy: You can Google the conversion.

[13:58] Jimi: Yeah. Um, so here we have a band of merry pirates um who are led by the Pirate King.

[14:06] Tommy: He is the Pirate King.

[14:08] Jimi: Yep. Uh I'm gonna I'm just gonna say I've I've been in this and I played the Pirate King.

[14:12] Tommy: No F and way.

[14:14] Jimi: Absolutely. That is. Isn't the best role I've ever played on a stage?

[14:17] Tommy: Yeah, potentially. That's pretty awesome.

[14:20] Jimi: Exactly. I would never, I would never take no offense, I would never have typecast you as the Pirate King, but I would have really much enjoyed seeing you as the Pirate King.

[14:29] Tommy: Well, maybe if everyone's lucky, I'll upload some video footage of that.

[14:33] Jimi: Including one of the best theatrical blunders, um and most successful theatrical blunders ever to have existed.

[14:43] Tommy: And I'm saying by that.

[14:44] Jimi: Better than breaking Milky White's leg off in that infamous have you seen Oh, it's amazing.

[14:50] Tommy: She'll be fine. Um it's so good. Um, yes, better than that, because it's musical.

[14:54] Jimi: I do it musically. I communicate with an orchestra with my eyes. I'm very excited. Thank you. Um, but no, it was really good fun. So I feel like I know this quite well in terms of the plot. I should do it. The Pirate King leads a merry band of buccaneers.

[15:08] Tommy: Yep. Um, including Frederick.

[15:11] Jimi: Young Frederick. Our protagonist. Um so it must be said as well, these guys are all orphans. Very important. Um basically Frederick was kind of taken in by these pirates uh as an apprentice.

[15:30] Tommy: As a mistake.

[15:31] Jimi: As a complete mistake, oh my goodness, because he wanted to be apprenticed to a pilot.

[15:37] Tommy: And his his nanny, Angela Lansbury in my mind forever and ever and ever.

[15:42] Jimi: Yeah. Um was hard of hearing.

[15:45] Tommy: And instead of hearing pilot, heard pirate, and they have to be really keen on the pronunciation there.

[15:51] Jimi: And you know, the rest of his history.

[15:53] Tommy: But it's his what? It's his 18th birthday.

[15:56] Jimi: Um, yes.

[15:58] Tommy: And he's free of his indentured servitude.

[16:01] Jimi: Um, which is caused for some dismay because he's leaving the pirate call and is called to a duty to exterminating his very kin in the future.

[16:14] Tommy: Exactly. And he's very caught up about it, and as he would be. This is where I think it's worth pausing for a second to talk about genre, because again, by contemporary musical theater terms, like two songs in, we're already in ridiculous territory.

[16:32] Jimi: Absolutely.

[16:34] Tommy: And that's part of that's part of the existence of this, is that it's supposed to be like a happy, clean jaunt. Um, you know, this this show is an escape. There's a little bit of parody and a little bit of satire that might be construed as political or sociopolitical commentary, but for the most part, this is a ridiculous, almost absurdist escape.

[16:57] Jimi: Completely, completely. Um to the point where it's kind of like pantomime.

[17:03] Tommy: Do you know? I mean, we talked about pantomime back in Christmas of last year, and uh yeah, I think I feel like this is a great example of what pantomime could be.

[17:13] Jimi: It's not pantomime, it's not pantomime.

[17:15] Tommy: But it has elements of pantomime.

[17:16] Jimi: You can see the and I'm not well versed on the interplay of the history between the two, but you can see whatever influences pantomime in this.

[17:28] Tommy: Yes, you know, yes, uh-huh, I see what you mean.

[17:28] Jimi: Yes.

[17:28] Tommy: Uh-huh.

[17:32] Jimi: Um.

[17:33] Tommy: So, yeah, Frederick's in a state, um, and then all of a sudden, here comes some lovely young girls.

[17:43] Jimi: Hooray.

[17:44] Tommy: Um, so a big bunch of sisters uh come over the hills um to enjoy the sights of Penzans.

[17:52] Jimi: Which is always my favorite when you look up amateur and high school productions of this when it's like a chorus of like a hundred girls.

[17:59] Tommy: Absolutely.

[18:00] Jimi: Who might as well be sisters.

[18:01] Tommy: Yeah, Major General Stanley got bizay.

[18:05] Jimi: Um Frederick meets them and they're terrified because he's a man and they've got their ankles out.

[18:12] Tommy: Man!

[18:12] Jimi: I know but of course Frisky Young Mabel among them, uh, is kind of enchanted by Frederick.

[18:22] Tommy: Um but wait, the pirates land.

[18:26] Jimi: And they endeavor to wed all the women against their will.

[18:35] Tommy: But what well, but like, hold on. Pirates pirates pillage, rape, and kill.

[18:42] Jimi: Pirates, you know, are mean, awful human beings, not these pirates.

[18:46] Tommy: Not the pirates of Penzans.

[18:48] Jimi: No, they intend to wed against their will.

[18:50] Tommy: Um I always exactly it's it's all like this is probably as close as to like deep hashtag trademark gym and tomic talk we can ever get with this kind of show.

[19:02] Jimi: But like w the the rampant kissing fest that sometimes happens in productions of these things where the pirates intend to wed these women against their will for all of ten seconds.

[19:15] Tommy: Yep. Whoo! Heavy stuff.

[19:19] Jimi: Talk about thin thin lines. There'll be a helpline in the in the show notes if any of these issues.

[19:26] Tommy: If you have ever been a major general's daughter who has been inadvertently kissed by a pirate, there is help there.

[19:26] Jimi: There is.

[19:47] Tommy: For the same entrance as the Pirate King.

[19:49] Jimi: That's the same song as the Pirate King song.

[19:53] Tommy: He is a major general.

[19:54] Jimi: He is he is a major general.

[19:57] Tommy: Reprise, if you will.

[19:59] Jimi: Yes. You know?

[20:00] Tommy: He sings probably the most popular song in the show.

[20:03] Jimi: He does indeed, the one that we've already talked about.

[20:06] Tommy: Um then he finds out that they're all orphans.

[20:13] Jimi: And then a little bit of Abbott and Costello wordplay happens.

[20:16] Tommy: Orphan, orphan, orphan, orphan, orphan.

[20:21] Jimi: And then it's the end of the act.

[20:24] Tommy: Right.

[20:25] Jimi: And then to be entirely honest with you, Jimmy, that is where generally I stop watching or listening to this show.

[20:33] Tommy: That's a shame because you're missing some hits.

[20:35] Jimi: I'm missing some hits.

[20:37] Tommy: I'm missing some hits, but I don't think I'm missing a lot of plot.

[20:42] Jimi: Um well, no, to be honest, that's where most of the plot happens, is in act two.

[20:49] Tommy: Really, act one is just a big bunch of introductions, but act two is where the twists and turns occur.

[21:01] Jimi: Yeah.

[21:02] Tommy: I'll let you defend them twists and turns?

[21:03] Jimi: I absolutely can.

[21:04] Tommy: Okay.

[21:05] Jimi: So basically, um, now that uh Frederick has obviously fallen from Mabel and they're gonna get married, um, he feels this sense of duty, very important uh to Major General Stanley.

[21:19] Tommy: Um, who again wants to fight against the pirates.

[21:28] Jimi: But is is very distraught at how much he lied about being an orphan to escape from them because he is not dun.

[21:40] Tommy: Exactly. Oh my gosh.

[21:42] Jimi: But then to complicate the plot further, uh the Pirate King and Mabel, Ruth, Ruth, the Pirate King and Ruth, who in the Angela Hansbury version version is inexplicably in a much more flattering costume, arrive to tell Frederick of a most inconvenient paradox, I would say.

[22:12] Tommy: I need to tell you, I described to my boyfriend that this musical quote unquote has sung laughs in it, like harmonized sung laughs in it.

[22:23] Jimi: Right, okay.

[22:24] Tommy: And he did not understand, and it took several minutes of explaining that, like ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha docks is like a thing in this show.

[22:34] Jimi: Yeah.

[22:35] Tommy: It's good, it's hard.

[22:36] Jimi: It's real, I'm sure. Someone who's sung it.

[22:38] Tommy: Um so let's see if I can remember the whole recit.

[22:41] Jimi: Okay.

[22:42] Tommy: So this is where this is the twist.

[22:44] Jimi: This is a twist in the tail, guys.

[22:45] Tommy: Um, um so for some ridiculous reason to which, however, I have no desire to be disloyal, um, some person in authority, I have no idea who, very likely the astronomer Royal, has decided that for such a beastly month as February, 28 days as a rule are plenty.

[23:08] Jimi: And through some singular coincidence, I wouldn't be surprised if it were owing to the agency of an ill-natured fairy.

[23:13] Tommy: You are a victim of this clumsy arrangement, having been born in Leap Year on the 29th of February, and through some simple arithmetical process, you will easily discover that though you've been alive twenty one years, you were only five and a little bit over.

[23:37] Jimi: I think I missed a line there.

[23:39] Tommy: It sounds pretty close to my own. Something about agency of an ill-natured fairy, which is I will say, despite how accurate or inaccurate they that may have been, yeah, that is what I enjoy about predictable rhyme that I think Gilbert and Sullivan pioneered, and I see Rearitz ugly head now and again.

[23:59] Jimi: Like I will be the first to critique predictable rhyme sometimes, but in context in a show like this, um it helps with understanding.

[24:15] Tommy: Um, and like the plot's so ridiculous you need to understand it a little bit to get the comedy and the humor of it.

[24:21] Jimi: Otherwise, it's just a it's like a gentle absurdity that washes over you and doesn't affect you in any particular way.

[24:29] Tommy: Yeah.

[24:29] Jimi: Um and so, like, um, what rhymes with twenty?

[24:32] Tommy: Um Plenty.

[24:34] Jimi: His day shall be reckoned.

[24:35] Tommy: Oh uh yeah, uh yeah.

[24:37] Jimi: Twenty-eight days as a rule are plenty.

[24:39] Tommy: One year and every four, his days shall be reckoned with nine and twenty.

[24:41] Jimi: Right.

[24:42] Tommy: And so, like, you're that I in my mind hear twenty before twenty is sung.

[24:49] Jimi: And I I listened to this too early in my musical analysis days to know if that happened the first time.

[24:56] Tommy: Right it's one that I can consider gener, you know, there's a good chance you figured it out.

[25:02] Jimi: And like the rest of the rhymes in this one too.

[25:04] Tommy: Um, and also I think kind of throughout this musical in some pretty key areas.

[25:10] Jimi: Because of context, I don't, you know, I won't get my much lauded City of Angels hat out.

[25:18] Tommy: Um and I don't know, much critiqued City of Angels hat out.

[25:21] Jimi: Um like it's appropriate in this context.

[25:24] Tommy: Yeah.

[25:24] Jimi: Well, I just also feel that these guys birthed witty reigns.

[25:29] Tommy: Right.

[25:29] Jimi: Yeah.

[25:30] Tommy: So you can't question them.

[25:32] Jimi: It seem it seems witty over lazy.

[25:34] Tommy: Um, even though it's even though it's predictable.

[25:38] Jimi: Like they set you up, it's always I'm gonna go on a tangent here, and who knows if this will make the edit.

[25:43] Tommy: Um but have I talked about 45 minutes already.

[25:46] Jimi: Right? Exactly. My my philosophy of murder mystery television shows.

[25:51] Tommy: Um there's like two kinds of murder mystery television shows.

[25:55] Jimi: There's the ones where you know who did it and you follow the investigator trying to figure it out.

[25:59] Tommy: Uh-huh.

[26:00] Jimi: Um, like Columbo.

[26:01] Tommy: And there's the ones where you don't know who did it and you follow the investigator actually figuring it out.

[26:06] Tommy: Um murder she wrote in context with the investigator.

[26:11] Jimi: And or take a more contemporary example, Sherlock.

[26:15] Tommy: Um the best murder mysteries let you figure it out just before the character on screen figures it out.

[26:26] Jimi: Uh-huh.

[26:27] Tommy: Um, like we're talking seconds here, but it lets you feel smart and it lets you feel accomplished and clever because you're picking up on the same clues that they're letting them pick up on just a little bit faster.

[26:41] Jimi: Um and so you get that satisfaction of like, oh, I figured it out.

[26:45] Tommy: You don't figure it out so early that like half of the plot is really irrev uh irrelevant because you're yelling at the screen like it was the maid.

[26:52] Jimi: Um, but instead you figure it out just before them. It's the same way I feel with these predictable rhymes. Like you get the rhyme in your mind a split second before the person says it, and it lets you feel the same cleverness that the author does in creating the rhyme, and sometimes the characters do in creating the rhyme because like these sort of characters take pleasure in their wittiness.

[27:17] Tommy: Yes.

[27:19] Jimi: Yes. Is Sonti does it a lot, and I've yet to find other examples um where he plays on that and then right at the last minute smacks you across the face with a non-right.

[27:36] Tommy: Yeah.

[27:37] Jimi: No, so the one that the one that I always go to is an um and per baby. And it's um there's no one where in his life Robert ought to have a woman. Yeah, and not right. Do you know what I mean? And you're just like, oh, this totally should make it because Gilbert and Sullivan did it first.

[27:58] Tommy: Absolutely.

[27:59] Jimi: And this is why they're it's so important, and they call attention to it, and it's because they have this meta. It's funny because they talk about like, you know, they wanted to be very realistic in their direction, and by contemporary standards, they're absolutely not. But Modern Major General plays on that conceit of whenever he's searching for a rhyme.

[28:18] Tommy: And like it's the biggest, most overt punchline of the song. You'll say a better major general has never saty, which like, you know, he's trying to find a rhyme for strategy, finds a really obscure one. Um, and then in some contemporary retellings, when they go back and like capitalize on the fantastical feat that is singing that Patter song, yeah.

[28:43] Jimi: The Major General he sings instead. You'll say a better major general has never rode a horse, and it doesn't rhyme.

[28:50] Tommy: Yeah, and it's even funnier.

[28:53] Jimi: Exactly, exactly. And it's like so buried in context, like just on its own, it's not funny. Us talking about this is not funny, but in context, it's right, like describe like of course describing a joke takes the humor out of it, but this one even more, yeah, because the context is so important, exactly, exactly.

[29:13] Tommy: And I see that with paradox. Um, I see that I know it's not originally written for this, but um the whole conceit of the oh, what's the song? It really doesn't matter. Um the matter song, the matter song, yeah, yeah. And then and then like stupid jokes where they end, you know, in the contemporary writings where it's like and then they go, What's the matter? It's really funny because the last song was the matter song.

[29:38] Jimi: Exactly.

[29:40] Tommy: The plot, right?

[29:41] Jimi: Yeah, yeah, uh-huh. So that translating is the crux of the whole show. Basically, um, the Pirate King and Ruth have discovered that Frederick was born an elite peer, so actually he's only five years old, um, and not twenty.

[29:57] Tommy: And is he a pirate or isn't he?

[29:59] Jimi: Exactly. Is he still in the nobody knows anymore? It's a paradox. Ha ha ha ha ha. Um, and so um Frederick is like, oh well, I'm I'm kind of tied between the two now. What am I to do? This is where I lose the plot.

[30:15] Tommy: Yeah.

[30:16] Jimi: So it well, it all gets a bit crazy. Um, the policeman come.

[30:23] Tommy: Exactly.

[30:23] Jimi: So the meanwhile, meanwhile, Madison is something. Um the major general is called the police in order to arrest the pirates and sort them out. But ugh, unfortunately, the British police force are idiots.

[30:39] Tommy: This is do you know? I don't know if this is an American trope or an international trope, but do you know the Keystone Cops?

[30:46] Jimi: Um, it's absolutely I'm I experienced the idea of the Keystone Cops before I ever knew what Pirates of Penzance were. And I'm positive the Keystone Cops are taken from Tarentorah, the constables and Pirates of Penzance. But for American audiences, you know the Keystone Cops, they're parodied in a bunch of Looney Tunes cartoons where it's a you know an amorphous blob of officers of the law who are chasing a criminal in a very bumbling way.

[31:18] Tommy: Uh-huh.

[31:18] Jimi: And like waving their sticks and like they round the corner, and as they round the corner, they have to hop on one foot so they can like make up the momentum to go in one direction. Um, it's like it's a it's a physical comedy staple of like a hundred police officers, you know, and you see it it it it is core to the society. I mean, you see Keystone Cops the trope in the Blues Brothers movie um with like all the Chicago police trying to bumblingly chase the blues brothers through you know a mall in their like that's Keystone Cops, and it starts in Pirates of Penzance.

[31:56] Tommy: This is this is where that joke starts. We're seeing the genesis of a meme.

[32:00] Jimi: Um so yeah, so the police are a bit ridiculous, um, and are a bit scared of the old pirates, but again, feel their own sense of duty, um, and uh decide to to help. And they take a whole song to exit stage.

[32:18] Tommy: Exactly, away away.

[32:20] Jimi: Um as we go, uh Tarantara. So good. Um then um Frederick uh kind of says goodbye to Mabel and kind of tells tells her that oh I've got to do this, um, because of my sense of duty, which is such such a shame. Um so he joins up with Pirate King and Ruth uh and the rest of the pirates, and they sneak into the major's house very loudly. Um there's uh there's a fight scene, some brief altercation, exactly brief altercation, absolutely not.

[33:06] Tommy: Hey, the actual fight lasts about three bars, yeah, and then in every reenactment, it takes up like a half of the second act.

[33:16] Jimi: What do you mean?

[33:17] Tommy: Have you not watched a contemporary recreation of Pirates of Penzance?

[33:21] Jimi: I've been in one, yeah.

[33:23] Tommy: There's like both in the pirate movie, infamously featured uh music theatre mash dot youtube dot whatever um or the Angela Lansbury adaptation. It's like this is where the swash the swashbuckling happens.

[33:37] Jimi: Are you talking about cat like tread?

[33:39] Tommy: Oh, you're talking about cat like tread. Sorry, I'm getting ahead of myself.

[33:42] Jimi: No, I'm not. I'm talking about with base deceit. This is see, this is this is my difficulty with contemporary recreations of this. The end of Act 2 is so altar case, the actual fight is literally just bum bum bum bum bum. With base deceit, you with the bonar dealings. With vengeance read and then they fight some more in some recreation. And then they fight some more, and then they fight some more, and then it's like stop, we've lost Queen Victoria, and then we Deus is mocking now our way out of the plot.

[34:21] Tommy: Well, actually, what happens is Ruth remembers that they're not all pirates. Actually, they're all noblemen, they're all members of the peerage, um, and they've just gone gone a bit wrong.

[34:34] Jimi: This is where I start losing my patience with this.

[34:36] Tommy: There you go.

[34:36] Jimi: Your patience? Put that away. DNS Pons. Um Basic, uh, yeah, and then we're then we're at the end. Like, like, don't look for a happy fun resolution here. I mean, it but it is a happy fun resolution. It's just not it's not a good solid resolution.

[34:53] Tommy: It's not like it's not like one that they foreshadowed or set up, or like that makes any sense.

[34:59] Jimi: Um I am the vetted model of a model major general, legend of mission, vegetable and mineral. I know the kings of England and I quote the Fights Histonical from Matalphon to Waterloo in order to categorical. I'm very well acquainted to with Matter's Mathematical. I understand equations both for simple and quadratical. Lots of news, lap and pinomial. Who with the many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse?

[35:31] Tommy: So here's the thing. I'm sure we're at the end of uh of Jimmy and I rambled on for the plot about far too long, and I'm sure there was a wonderfully cohesive trimmed down version of that in the final edition of the podcast. But I think the thing to note is like because this plot like this plot is lauded in its existence for being so cohesive.

[35:56] Jimi: But by contemporary standards, it's absolutely not.

[36:00] Tommy: Yeah.

[36:01] Jimi: Which is why we've talked about it for so long.

[36:03] Tommy: Yeah.

[36:03] Jimi: Like there's loads, like you said, Deus Ex Machina there at the end.

[36:07] Tommy: Um exactly.

[36:09] Jimi: Exactly. It's kind of like, or tight spot, dear sex machinery.

[36:12] Tommy: Yeah.

[36:13] Jimi: But that's, you know, that's fine. Do you know it's like it's part of the form, you know.

[36:18] Tommy: Absolutely, absolutely.

[36:20] Jimi: Um, you know, writing a musical um back in those days was not a simple thing to do that you could just slot in a couple of songs.

[36:32] Tommy: Right.

[36:33] Jimi: Um, and it's its existence as an operetta, which we'll talk about maybe if we don't run out of time.

[36:39] Tommy: Yeah.

[36:39] Jimi: Um, was like supposed to be light and fluffy and non committal and non dramatic and non-tragic and non-offensive. And so the alternative in those days was to make something that like is so ridiculous it doesn't matter.

[36:54] Tommy: Uh-huh.

[36:55] Jimi: Yeah, precisely. Plus he's more. Um okay, well, let's have our first natural seg. We're now in, that's fine. Um, let's have our first natural segue to where does GNS sit in our lovely musical theater history. This is something I felt we've should have talked about for a long time because it's important and it's not, it's hard to piece this timeline together in your mind because it only exists as far as these pieces of arts, these pieces of the art.

[37:24] Tommy: And also there's like it's like the Legend of Zelda, there's like three timelines to, you know, what happens and what perspective you take it from.

[37:33] Jimi: Uh but yes, let's look at it from the the GNS timeline. Let's let's say that GNS has a part in the history of musical theater. That's the timeline.

[37:41] Tommy: I think, and I would I would argue this even on a greater scale. I think the conception of musical theatre as we know it starts with Gilbert and Sullivan.

[37:52] Jimi: Um see, I would say it goes further back.

[37:55] Tommy: Okay.

[37:56] Jimi: I could see that.

[37:57] Tommy: Yeah.

[37:59] Jimi: But like I would say it goes right back.

[38:01] Tommy: Yeah, to the very beginning.

[38:03] Jimi: Yeah, this is the contentious part. But if you start with Gilbert and Sullivan, so they're we're talking they collaborated 1871 kind of to 1896.

[38:12] Tommy: Yeah.

[38:12] Jimi: Um on operettas, I would say.

[38:16] Tommy: Yes.

[38:16] Jimi: Yes. Um, they'd worked uh particularly um WS Gilbert, he had worked um on some other like sort of Victorian burlesques um in those days, and they were both kind of sick of it because these were quite inane things.

[38:36] Tommy: Yeah.

[38:36] Jimi: I mean, it's not we're not talking Gypsy Rose Lee style burlesque here, it's much more like showing your ankles. Um things like silly can can and you know, the beginning big dresses and kick lines.

[38:49] Tommy: Exactly.

[38:49] Jimi: And you know, seeing lots of um gender bending and and yeah, the commentary was there, but it was very broad. And it's still the the appeal is like sexy ladies in sexy dress of the era, but like we're not, you know, it it feels like low art.

[39:08] Tommy: Yeah, exactly.

[39:09] Jimi: And that's that's the thing, is they were there, it was pure entertainment, yeah.

[39:13] Tommy: Um it's weird, these things kind of come in waves, you know. I mean, because they were created in a response to the ballad operas, which were uh really kind of early musicals where it's like you're mixing like songspiel stuff where you're mixing in music and text together.

[39:33] Jimi: Right.

[39:34] Tommy: And so they kind of came as as a response to that as a much more lighthearted version of that. Um there were like opera comique at the time, which I'm terribly mispronouncing, but like Carmen and things like that, which is not comic opera, but is like human opera, where it's not 100% tragic.

[39:57] Jimi: Um is really, I think Yeah, exactly, exactly. It's it's it's not grand opera, it's not French grand opera.

[40:02] Tommy: Right.

[40:03] Jimi: Um so what Gilbert and Sullivan decided to do was they were like, well, we're too intelligent for this, um, and we want to make much more of a commentary. Um, so started making the light operas um as kind of a form of satire, basically.

[40:19] Jimi: And that's kind of prevalent in all of their works. Um, they each make a commentary on some part of Victorian contemporary society. And "Pirates" is probably one of their most popular.

[40:32] Tommy: Simikado.

[40:37] Jimi: Yeah, I would say "Mikado's" popular. I would say "Pirates" has seen the most longevity because "Mikado" has fallen into a very racist trap. And like, you know, wasn't the intent, but is racist. Um, because everything has r racist subtitled in it in that age.

[40:58] Tommy: Right, exactly, exactly. Um, but I think it's one of their best by far.

[41:03] Jimi: It's absolutely my favorite. Um, so they created the kind of Savoy operas called because they were all premiered by Mr. D'Oyly Carte in the Savoy Opera House. And there was an intent that these Savoy operas were was like this was going to be a more general term. Um, like there was an I a can a concept that there were going to be more of them, but Gilbert and Sullivan kind of defined their own era.

[41:33] Tommy: Yeah, and so nowadays the Savoy operas kind of just refers to Gilbert and Sullivan operettas.

[41:39] Jimi: Yeah, they had the monopoly on that one completely. Um, meanwhile, kind of at the same time, um, you see the musical comedies in New York, we're talking turn of the last century.

[41:50] Tommy: Yeah.

[41:51] Jimi: Um, they're very much a contemporaneous turn on the Victorian burlesques. Um, near the late. Kind of including, I was gonna say kind of including minstrel shows, which we've talked about before.

[42:04] Tommy: Kind of, yeah. It's like we're just pre-dating some vaudeville stuff in the beginning of vaudeville.

[42:11] Jimi: Yeah. Um, and then a lot of like sexy ladies in skimpy dress, but like with a bit of a story, maybe. Um, or a bunch of songs, or you know, people in blackface in the middle. Um, we're the shows from this era you wouldn't recognize. The shows from this era have not escaped the era, but it is a transitionary time that's kind of happening alongside the swell of these operettas. They're a little separate, but they become important together later.

[42:43] Tommy: Yeah.

[42:44] Jimi: Um, and in the sense that because D&S's operettas were so good, so of such high quality, they made it across the pond, and people were totally here for them. Um, and then we start bleeding a bit more into the songspiel kind of idea. Um, talk a bit more about "The Merry Widow" because I don't really understand how it fits in.

[43:07] Tommy: Yeah, it's um because to me it's an opera.

[43:10] Jimi: It's yeah, so "The Merry Widow" premiered in 1905 in Germany and then had its English translation in 1907, um, is kind of on the coattails of this Gilbert and Sullivan trend. And there were plenty of others in America too that didn't that haven't stood the test of time that you don't hear about, but "The Merry Widow" is one that has made it out.

[43:35] Tommy: Um, I think partially because it had its big English premiere in England as opposed to New York. Um, but "The Merry Widow" was a contemporary operetta, more contemporary than Gilbert and Sullivan. Um, in that it is lighter fare, it is not tragic, no one dies, um, but is still sung, and the story is connected to the song.

[44:04] Jimi: I do think in talking about these things, I really think the missing piece for all these things, which I never concluded before was dance, and the thing that really makes the conjoined musical, the um integrated musical theater, which we'll get to later, is the inclusion of dance in all these things. Um, but "The Merry Widow," you know, it's important to point out here because "The Merry Widow" has stood the test of time, it's like a thing you can call back to in your mind, um, and lives on this opera to operetta to musical comedy to musical theater spectrum in 1905-1907.

[44:39] Tommy: Um, after that, we're starting to get into a bit more familiar territory.

[44:44] Jimi: Yeah.

[44:44] Tommy: Um, Broadway starting to be born here, um, where we have the Follies and um, kind of the end of vaudeville.

[44:54] Jimi: Yeah, we do it. Does feel like a if we're like on the I don't know, the smartness scale, like the highbrow lowbrow scale, it feels a little bit like a pendulum swing back.

[45:03] Tommy: Yeah, exactly, exactly. And you know, that's been a good like 40 years that we've traveled on in this time. Um, so that's absolutely fine. Um, then um, the show that kind of changed everything, it'll have its own episode, obviously.

[45:11] Jimi: Um, but "Show Boat" swam in 1927, exactly.

[45:25] Tommy: Uh, and in many ways was our first piece of musical theater.

[45:31] Jimi: Right. As opposed to say musical comedy.

[45:35] Tommy: Exactly.

[45:36] Jimi: Yeah, and it's we'll I'm sure, you know, we'll spend five hours in it on a future episode.

[45:41] Tommy: Yeah.

[45:41] Jimi: But the idea is "Show Boat" took the structure of what was then the musical comedy, but it felt inappropriate to call it a comedy.

[45:50] Tommy: Yeah.

[45:50] Jimi: And so then, you know, it's a revolution in the art form.

[45:55] Tommy: Completely.

[45:55] Jimi: Completely it was. And it really acted as a turning point, yeah, inspiring um eventually "Oklahoma."

[46:06] Tommy: And I think it is important to say here, because our podcast has an international flair, almost divergently, like at the same time, the three penny opera premiered a year later after "Show Boat" in 1928.

[46:19] Jimi: And they don't owe a lot of their genesis to the same ideas, like they're not evolved from the same theater schools, but they happened around the same time.

[46:28] Tommy: Yeah.

[46:29] Jimi: And so it points to a changing society and a changing world landscape there.

[46:34] Tommy: Definitely. Well, I mean, if you know, you just have to look at what's happening at that time in the world, um, to understand why people would be wanting a change, you know.

[46:43] Jimi: I mean, we're about to end of the World War II, so it's you know, like it we've talked about a lot in throughout the opera podcast, but people were on the fringe of thought here.

[46:52] Tommy: Um yeah, so between "Oklahoma" and "Show Boat," we did have um uh quite a lot of big musical comedies and um a lot of light relief was happening again, yeah, to deal to cope with what was going on in the world.

[47:12] Jimi: It really does feel like a pendulum swinging back and forth, but like moving one direction. Is you have the, you know, ridiculously lowbrow, Victorian burlesque sort of things, and then we swing in one direction towards Gilbert and Sullivan.

[47:30] Tommy: Um, you know, where like we're adding a little, you know, it's integrated plot, a little bit, you know, we don't have ladies in skimpy dress, and then we swing back towards the musical comedies in New York, where it's you know, girls, girls, girls, and all these things, and like legs, and then we swing back a little bit in the other direction with operetta like "The Merry Widow" and like you know, adding a little more plot than maybe Gilbert and Sullivan, and then we swing back the other way with the Follies and more girls, girls, girls, but with a little more plot, and then we swing back the other way with "Show Boat" and "The Threepenny Opera," and then we swing back with the Great Depression, and "Anything Goes," and who the heck cares, and then finally we land on "Oklahoma" in 1943, and the rest is history, as they say.

[48:07] Jimi: Yeah, exactly.

[48:09] Tommy: And to be honest, we're still swinging, we're still swinging that pendulum.

[48:12] Jimi: Yeah, but it does it feels like it swings faster now.

[48:15] Tommy: Yeah, and it's much more of a rigorous structure.

[48:18] Jimi: Yeah. Do you know what I mean? Um, so yeah, so that's the brief timeline of one of the interpretations of where musical theaters are from. It's the justification of why we're talking about Gilbert and Sullivan's "Pirates of Penzance," very clearly an operetta on our podcast, Jim and Tomic's Musical Theatre Happy Hour.

[48:38] Tommy: Exactly, exactly. It's important to know where you have been.

[48:44] Jimi: Yes, yes, with just my pick us to a green the ways of paradox and comments since she gayly mocked though counting in the usual way.

[48:58] Tommy: Yes, twenty-one, I've been alive.

[49:01] Jimi: Yep, reckoning by my natal day.

[49:04] Tommy: Yep, reckoning by my mantle day.

[49:07] Jimi: I am a little boy of five.

[49:36] Tommy: Would you like to know a little bit about how "Pirates" came to be?

[49:40] Jimi: I'm very excited to hear about this.

[49:42] Tommy: Excellent. Okie dokie. So let me tell you a tale of how pirates fought off pirating.

[49:53] Jimi: Yeah.

[49:54] Tommy: Yeah. So back in the 1800s, as you'll remember, as you recall.

[50:00] Jimi: When I was alive.

[50:01] Tommy: Yeah. Copyright laws pretty much didn't exist. Particularly international copyright laws. You know, for example, the work, you know, I wrote I write a musical here and I get it copyrighted here. That's makes it safe that no one can across the pond can pinch it and make it their own.

[50:22] Jimi: Right.

[50:23] Tommy: Do you know what I mean? That's it's safe for me there. That didn't really exist in 1800. So a lot of Gilbert and Sullivan stuff, like we said, it was very high quality. Um, was getting pirated all over the place, particularly "HMS Pinafore," um, which is one of the first really, really big ones. Um, to even the point where when Gilbert and Sullivan themselves brought "HMS Pinafore" over to the States, um, it didn't do well because the US were already just sick of it.

[50:49] Jimi: They were like, You're like, what's this? Another "Pinafore"? These people think they are.

[50:54] Tommy: Yeah, we've seen this.

[50:56] Jimi: Um, you don't know any better.

[50:59] Tommy: And so what they decided to do is to bring their next show over to the States first to ensure its copyright there, which is why it had its premiere in the States. So the working title at the time was "The Robbers."

[51:14] Jimi: And I don't doubt for a second that was William Gilbert having some fun.

[51:25] Tommy: And that's where the kind of inspiration for the show came from. But at that time, um, pirates were very in.

[51:38] Jimi: Pirates.

[51:39] Tommy: Pirates is a literary character, not pirates as like actual pirates.

[51:42] Jimi: Yeah, exactly, exactly. But them as like a fun, you know, trope. Uh, it was very exciting. Um, and critics, you know, critics would say, like, oh, it's just "HMS Pinafore," but on dry land. It was very different, actually. It's pirates, not sailors, hugely different.

[51:59] Jimi: Um, so that's how it kind of arrived at the States, but its actual creation um was an equal farce. Uh, because so um, they'd written some of it over by um in the UK, uh, but Sullivan who apparently was a serial procrastinator, um, didn't bring over his act one.

[52:28] Tommy: Um, he just had to try and rewrite it from memory.

[52:32] Jimi: Um, and so that's why like um, climbing over Rocky Mountains has uh similar music to um one of the songs in "Thespis," uh huh. The first thing that they did.

[52:45] Tommy: I think similar sells it very kindly, yeah.

[52:49] Jimi: But it's the same. Um, yeah, just I mean, I can only imagine.

[52:59] Tommy: So it was a bit rollicking. Um, and then at 7am, I don't know how specifically they knew that, but at 7am on the 28th of December, let us remember that it premiered on the 31st of December.

[53:12] Jimi: Um, it was finished, and they took it straight into rehearsal.

[53:17] Tommy: It's quite interesting. So they were quite passionate about using um non-professionals in their shows, um, because uh Gilbert was very controlling, basically, a man after my own heart, um, and like to take uh these these people kind of from day one and do it his way.

[53:39] Jimi: Um, so here they had a bunch of non-actors, um, or you know, amateurs uh basically rehearsing for the show that was premiering in a day.

[53:50] Jimi: Um meanwhile, all the while this was going on, uh people are like listening at the door of the rehearsal space.

[53:58] Tommy: All of the scripts and librettoes uh are literally kept under lock and key because they don't want this to be pirated, they want this one to stay safe.

[54:07] Jimi: Like the cast are being offered bribes, the band were being offered bribes um at all costs.

[54:13] Tommy: Uh and uh even though they had all these things in the safe, it was still pirating, which I think is just hilarious that pirates was finally pir pirated.

[54:27] Jimi: Um, and apparently it's because they had loads of basically copyists in the theater watching it night after night after night and just writing everything down from memory when they got home.

[54:36] Tommy: Um and so uh one of the first thing to get published in the States was I think it was called like recollections of the Pirates of Penzance, um before the actual thing was published itself.

[54:49] Jimi: But I think because they had had the performance there, um and they'd set up the tour so quickly as well, um, they kind of kept it alive in the It gives the it gives them the stronger not even like legal backing, but like because they're also on the ground with anyone who's trying to pirate their material and perform it immediately, it lets them do it better faster because they did it first.

[55:14] Tommy: Yeah, exactly.

[55:15] Jimi: But it's just I just can't imagine what that must have been like.

[55:19] Tommy: Like there's no you couldn't obviously you could never have that happen today because you know, of laws, but it's so it's so wild, you know.

[55:28] Jimi: I mean, it's so wild to me.

[55:29] Tommy: It's it's very crazy.

[55:31] Jimi: It gives me s you know, when I run into problems with licensing companies or like when I see hear the stories about like MTI or Sam French or whatever author being kind of, you know, shitty to some particular production.

[55:47] Tommy: It's reassuring to know that by no means are we in like the knockdown drag out warring ages of Gilbert and Sullivan producing their their new musical at the same time across the continent to like make sure they can solidify their copyright.

[56:01] Jimi: Exactly, exactly.

[56:03] Tommy: Um, so well done to the guys.

[56:05] Jimi: Also, the musicians tried to mutiny halfway through, just keeping the pirate theme.

[56:10] Tommy: Um, because they decided that the score was just too big.

[56:14] Jimi: Uh so they were like, This is actually a grand opera, this isn't an operetta, we're not getting paid enough.

[56:19] Tommy: Um, and uh I love it though.

[56:22] Jimi: Sullivan was really canny and was just like, well, that's fine if you feel like that, but I've got another orchestra just waiting on standby, I'll just call them and we can get them shipped over.

[56:30] Tommy: Um he told that story to the press and just obviously completely made it all up, right?

[56:36] Jimi: Um they backed down and they were like, okay, cool, fair.

[56:40] Tommy: I do think as much as Gilbert and Sullivan absolutely were fantastic authors, their businessmanship also has a very strong standing in their enduring popularity.

[56:54] Jimi: Yeah, I think they were just extremely intelligent men.

[56:58] Tommy: Yeah.

[56:59] Jimi: Do you know what I mean?

[56:59] Tommy: They had a they're really they had their finger on all of the pulses.

[57:03] Jimi: They had it figured out because like they they directed and music directed.

[57:06] Tommy: It wasn't like they wrote this thing and passed it off to a bunch of people like the contemporary Broadway system, like they saw it through.

[57:13] Jimi: Um, my confusion gets me, but whichever one conducted the opening performance of every Sully conducted the opening performance of every single American tour.

[57:24] Tommy: Um, and like the you know, they were they were with this piece of art in every detail, completely they're fascinating men.

[57:33] Jimi: It's they're like their whole story, their whole lives are completely fascinating.

[57:37] Tommy: I think it's a good point.

[57:39] Jimi: Um, to wedge into the show notes, um, the movie Topsy Turvy, um, which is just a great film at the end of the day, but it's just it's a really great way to kind of see their relationship.

[57:50] Tommy: Like um, they're they're su they they're almost opposite characters in many ways.

[57:55] Jimi: Um, and naturally the relationship was really tumultuous.

[58:00] Tommy: Um this was a pirates was a particularly rosy period for the most part, but you know, they did have their their issues, yeah.

[58:10] Jimi: Um, and that's like that's a really really great film.

[58:13] Tommy: Um that that one and all should watch to experience the GNS track.

[58:18] Jimi: Well help you it'll help you stop getting them confused with Rogers and Hammerstein.

[58:22] Tommy: Exactly.

[58:23] Jimi: I mean, if you get them confused, that's bad.

[58:25] Tommy: Um but yeah, I think I don't know, I feel like you can start to get a sense of why they are as popular as they are.

[58:34] Jimi: Do you know what I mean?

[58:35] Tommy: Because it's the they've come from such a stock of strength, yeah.

[58:39] Jimi: Do you know what I mean?

[58:40] Tommy: There's there's not really make many mistakes, not certainly till the end where they started to make flops.

[58:45] Jimi: Um, but I feel like that's just because the times were changing.

[58:48] Tommy: Um whereas you know, in their heyday, they were doing some magical things, and and like you say, to to triumph across continents, yeah.

[58:58] Jimi: That's huge.

[58:59] Tommy: Like we'd have you haven't really seen that until Adrod Weber.

[59:02] Jimi: Do you know what I mean?

[59:02] Tommy: Like he he picked that up the second time.

[59:05] Jimi: Um it's it's really yeah, really impressive, yeah.

[59:10] Tommy: And and their stuff is very high quality.

[59:12] Jimi: Their lyrics and their music is extremely high quality.

[59:15] Tommy: It lasts, it stands up.

[59:17] Jimi: Um, you know, I mean, I you know, I I performed Pirates in 2011 or whenever it was, yeah.

[59:23] Tommy: Like there are hundreds of thousands of shows between Pirates of Penzance and Oklahoma that no one will ever hear again because they're so poor in quality, yeah.

[59:34] Jimi: But like exactly, you know, Pirates of Penzance, as we've said, everyone knows.

[59:38] Tommy: Everyone knows, even if you don't know it, you know it.

[59:40] Jimi: Absolutely, and it is getting performed across the world at any given moment.

[59:45] Tommy: Um I mean, more so it's been a hundred years, so there's now no longer any copyright on it, so you can just do it.

[59:52] Jimi: But um but even I mean, have you seen the contemporary trend of performing Pirates of Penzance with a Pirates of the Caribbean twist and making the Pirate King look like Captain Jack Spire?

[1:00:04] Tommy: Yeah, which like makes me vomit a little bit in my mouth, but like it it stays.

[1:00:10] Jimi: People go see it, people are excited to see it.

[1:00:12] Tommy: Like people exactly people who couldn't possibly have been Pirates of Penzance fans from the beginning because it's so freaking old.

[1:00:22] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:00:23] Tommy: Go see it.

[1:00:24] Jimi: Exactly.

[1:00:24] Tommy: And like it's it's almost a safe bet, right?

[1:00:29] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:00:30] Tommy: It's almost a safe theatrical bet.

[1:00:32] Jimi: Like if I know a company is doing a GNS, I will be s I would be fine going to see it because I'm you can't really mess up, like unless you've got a bunch of tone deaths people.

[1:00:47] Tommy: But even then it's it's reached it's reached the point of like almost being godly that Shakespeare has.

[1:00:54] Jimi: Um where like even a really poor production still has this like deep feeling of tradition and literature to it that like keeps you from faulting it entirely.

[1:01:07] Tommy: Um totally, and like uh because I've seen I've seen Pirates uh on a professional stage directed by uh you know, Mike Lee, who's directed Topsy Turvy, but is one of my favourite directors.

[1:01:20] Jimi: Um, consequently, it wasn't actually very good.

[1:01:23] Tommy: Um but then I've seen it, you know, in the fringe where there's like a cast of twelve.

[1:01:29] Jimi: Right in in some ways that was better.

[1:01:32] Tommy: Do you know what I mean?

[1:01:32] Jimi: Like, yeah, and there's just so there's so much you can do with it.

[1:01:36] Tommy: Like it's again, it's one of these shows.

[1:01:37] Jimi: If you're a director, um you can have so much fun because you just it is so ridiculous that you can just play around and uh it does, it does feel like it's become bigger than it is, you know?

[1:01:52] Tommy: Like uh I don't know the best way to put this thought.

[1:01:56] Jimi: Like its popularity is it's not a revolutionary plot.

[1:02:04] Tommy: There's there are better songs today than in this show, but because it's Pirates of Penzance, because it was so popular when it existed and then continued to remain so popular, yeah.

[1:02:17] Jimi: Totally.

[1:02:18] Tommy: Like its reputation precedes it.

[1:02:20] Jimi: Yeah, exactly.

[1:02:21] Tommy: Exactly.

[1:02:23] Jimi: Um by the way, I've worked out through the video of this podcast.

[1:02:26] Tommy: Exactly.

[1:02:26] Jimi: That's one of the things I say all the time.

[1:02:28] Tommy: Uh exactly.

[1:02:29] Jimi: I'm really sorry.

[1:02:30] Tommy: I'm really sorry, but it's not it's not gonna stop.

[1:02:32] Jimi: If you've been taking a shot every time Jimmy says exactly, we're so sorry.

[1:02:35] Tommy: Yeah, the liver damage is real.

[1:02:37] Jimi: Um yeah, it's it's it's really it's just really enjoyable.

[1:02:44] Tommy: Like I learned so much doing it.

[1:02:46] Jimi: I learned so much.

[1:02:47] Tommy: Like, see, just musically, because it is because it's near opera, yeah, you learn a lot about technical singing, and you learn a lot about consonants and the importance of consonants and uh held notes.

[1:03:03] Jimi: Yep.

[1:03:04] Tommy: Do you know like just these simple things that uh you know a lot of contemporary musical theater doesn't necessarily require, yeah, do you know what I mean?

[1:03:14] Jimi: I don't know, if you're doing like Dear Evan Hans, you don't really need to worry about your consonants too much because there ain't no patter song and dear and handson like exactly um whereas if you don't watch a consonants and Paris Penzans, then you're not gonna understand anything.

[1:03:30] Tommy: Well, and it's I wonder it's so it's interesting to me because we've seen it.

[1:03:34] Jimi: You can you can draw the descent of this sort of impressiveness of this sort of thing, but like even the idea of a patter song, yeah.

[1:03:42] Tommy: You know, you look at something like Modern Major General, where like it, you know, before it hits its first immediate reprise could demand a standing ovation.

[1:03:52] Jimi: And not because it's a like it's a funny song, but like in a difficult convoluted sort of way.

[1:03:58] Tommy: Yeah, it's not a terribly moving song, it's not a terribly like knee slapping kind of funny song.

[1:04:03] Jimi: Um, but it the technical prowess required to execute the song is impressive.

[1:04:09] Tommy: It's like watching someone run a marathon.

[1:04:11] Jimi: Um and like that, you know, drives you to stand up.

[1:04:14] Tommy: And you see those things sort of happen on a descending scale through things like the music man, or like, you know, you see them pop up now and again as like homages, like direct homages in like the early modern millie.

[1:04:29] Jimi: Yeah, exactly.

[1:04:30] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:04:30] Jimi: But even like Son, like Sandy Love is a patter song.

[1:04:33] Tommy: Exactly.

[1:04:34] Jimi: But how many how many songs on Broadway right now are like about how technically difficult they are to execute in a live context?

[1:04:44] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:04:45] Jimi: I'd wager probably zero.

[1:04:47] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:04:48] Jimi: Um, like there are beautiful songs and pretty songs, and where like you clap for the performer and their wonderful interpretation of it, but like there's no song on Broadway right now where you're like, wow, you said all the words.

[1:04:58] Tommy: Yeah, exactly.

[1:04:59] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:05:00] Tommy: Uh huh.

[1:05:00] Jimi: And like, you know, it's interesting to see that dissent.

[1:05:03] Tommy: Um, I don't there's not a particular reason to point to why.

[1:05:08] Jimi: And I don't know how we got here, but well, I feel like it's just it's actually just difficult.

[1:05:13] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:05:14] Jimi: Do you know what I mean?

[1:05:15] Tommy: And to make it, you know, for something like not getting married today, yeah.

[1:05:19] Jimi: One of the best contemporary patter songs.

[1:05:21] Tommy: Yes, absolutely.

[1:05:23] Jimi: Like to wedge all that plot in there.

[1:05:25] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:05:26] Jimi: Do you know what I mean?

[1:05:27] Tommy: And to keep it being funny.

[1:05:29] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:05:30] Tommy: That's really difficult.

[1:05:32] Jimi: That's really impressive.

[1:05:33] Tommy: Because that's the thing is it's like you couldn't have like a ballad patter song.

[1:05:37] Jimi: Right.

[1:05:37] Tommy: That wouldn't work.

[1:05:38] Jimi: That would be odd.

[1:05:39] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:05:40] Jimi: That'd be very, very odd.

[1:05:41] Tommy: Um But even like, you know, Hamilton, the contemporary recreation of everything we love about musical theater.

[1:05:50] Jimi: It's it's patter songs we would probably more likely call rap or hip hop.

[1:05:56] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:05:56] Jimi: And like the impressiveness isn't so much in, you know, maybe something like guns and ships.

[1:06:04] Tommy: Uh-huh.

[1:06:04] Jimi: Maybe.

[1:06:05] Tommy: But it's impressive for a slew of other reasons.

[1:06:08] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:06:09] Tommy: Only one of which is that it's a a well-written patter song.

[1:06:14] Jimi: Um it's it's a trend that's that's dying.

[1:06:17] Tommy: Well, that's I mean, like, in many ways, and this will sound stupid, but like in anyways, that's where rap came from.

[1:06:23] Jimi: Like it's saying words, seeing smart words fast.

[1:06:26] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:06:27] Jimi: Do you know what I mean?

[1:06:28] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:06:29] Jimi: I mean, there there's probably an argument to make that like modern Major General is one of the first rap songs.

[1:06:36] Tommy: Which is really insulting to a bunch of you know, cultural backgrounds.

[1:06:41] Jimi: But you know, there's elements there.

[1:06:44] Tommy: There's some connection there.

[1:06:46] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:06:46] Tommy: Literally, if you're Tom Lehrer.

[1:06:53] Jimi: Um All that to say, Gilbert and Sullivan, knowingly or not, really they set us up.

[1:06:53] Tommy: They set us up for success.

[1:07:03] Jimi: They did indeed.

[1:07:05] Tommy: Absolutely.

[1:07:06] Jimi: Thanks, Chaps.

[1:08:59] Jimi: Okay, so that was the pirates, the pirates of Penzance.

[1:08:59] Tommy: The Pirates of Penzance!

[1:09:06] Jimi: Have you ever done um you know the warm up like one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, four, five, one, two, three, and et cetera.

[1:09:18] Tommy: That sounds unfamiliar to me.

[1:09:19] Jimi: Okay. It's just like a concentration mind glow thing. Um, the pirates of Penzance, we did Pirates of Penzance, Pirates of Penzance, Pirates of Penzance, Pirates of Penzance, Pirates of Penzance, Pirates.

[1:09:31] Tommy: I will I will tell you, my one of my biggest connections to Pirates of Penzance, um, the song We Go, the the Caps of the Away We Go, yep.

[1:09:39] Jimi: Yep.

[1:09:40] Tommy: Um sounds very, very similar to uh my college's um like fight song. Um we were the Redbirds and one of my friends in college who was in Pirates of Penzance in high school, um liked to sing, go, ye red birds, go to glory, go and fight and fight and die, die.

[1:10:02] Jimi: Die, die, die.

[1:10:03] Tommy: Which like isn't terribly appropriate at a football game. Um, and yeah, but you know, it's insidious. We can't help, we can't get away from it. It's everywhere.

[1:10:11] Jimi: Hey, are you ready for the Reddit rundown?

[1:10:14] Tommy: We got follow-up, Reddit Rundown follow-up. I think we should make uh um like uh jingle.

[1:10:20] Jimi: It's the Reddit rundown follow-up.

[1:10:24] Tommy: Is that has bad, good?

[1:10:26] Jimi: Let's no, let's let's do this.

[1:10:28] Tommy: No, right, I'm gonna compose in my head.

[1:10:31] Jimi: Um run on down to the Reddit rundown.

[1:10:34] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:10:36] Jimi: Run on down to the Reddit rundown.

[1:10:40] Tommy: Or come on down to the Reddit rundown.

[1:10:46] Jimi: You you sing it, and I'll go, yeah.

[1:10:49] Tommy: Yeah, okay.

[1:10:50] Jimi: No, I'm not. I've just got embarrassed, sorry. So I thought it might be fun, but it won't be.

[1:10:56] Tommy: Um excellent. So um let's, yeah, we so we talked about this in the last podcast for Heathers. If you haven't listened to Heathers, go listen to Heathers. And we're gonna our podcast, it's Jim and Tomic's musical theatre happy hour, and we always run over, so we're gonna try and speed through these.

[1:11:12] Jimi: Exactamundo.

[1:11:14] Tommy: Um, what are Ian Ian Thomas Mack said, what are the Jimmy and Tomic Musical Theater Happy Hour Trash called?

[1:11:21] Jimi: I don't know. My my trash is called mashed potatoes, but we need some trash.

[1:11:25] Tommy: Yeah, we need stra I need some trash. Give me some trash.

[1:11:28] Jimi: Uh in the UK, we call it rubbish. Um so yeah, let us know. Answers in the back of a postcard, guys.

[1:11:36] Tommy: Um also, so we did it again. Tommy and I uh have this thing where every time we do a podcast, we like wish something into existence. Um it always happens.

[1:11:46] Jimi: It literally always happens. I can't remember off the top of my head the other ones, but it always happens.

[1:11:52] Tommy: Um and uh we wished Heathers into existence. So it's EO underscore one two three, let us know the other palace is doing a workshop of Heathers in English.

[1:12:02] Jimi: Exactly. Exactly.

[1:12:04] Tommy: Yeah. We also had Saturn Police tell us loads about animatics.

[1:12:11] Jimi: Apparently, animatic is a like industry term.

[1:12:15] Tommy: Yeah, who knew?

[1:12:16] Jimi: Yeah, exactly. So, you know, it's a storyboarding. And actually, it makes sense because you see it quite a lot at the end of see things like Pixar films.

[1:12:27] Tommy: And they're like all the scenes they've cut earlier.

[1:12:29] Jimi: Yeah, they're deleted scenes and stuff like that. They're these exact same animatic things.

[1:12:33] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:12:34] Jimi: I wonder if it says something about the future of Heathers the musical as like an animated movie. The fact that so many people feel gravitated to these animatics for it.

[1:12:43] Tommy: Yeah, exactly. So, well, because the first what I remember that one of the first ones I ever saw was actually a wicked one.

[1:12:49] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:12:50] Tommy: That's very popular on YouTube.

[1:12:51] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:12:51] Tommy: And I was like, oh my god, this is so good, and this would work perfectly as an animation.

[1:12:55] Jimi: So it could happen. And you know, and she would just are usually a Saturn police. I don't, they were just saying that like a lot of their people are wanting to be professional storyboard artists.

[1:13:09] Tommy: And what a what a great way to start by adapting these non-animated things into animated things.

[1:13:14] Jimi: Exactly. Exactamundo.

[1:13:17] Tommy: We also find out about uh uh gender bending production.

[1:13:21] Jimi: Yeah, Z.Y. King and and Sammy Elliott told us about this. Um by the way, I really hope that Sammy Elliott is actually just the actor Sam Elliott.

[1:13:28] Tommy: Probably that seems I think I generally think it probably is. Um, and how how do you feel about this gender bending production of Heathers?

[1:13:35] Jimi: I'm kind of fascinated by it. I mean, the th that's a joy of amateur theatre, isn't it? Where you just do it and do it ever the hell you want.

[1:13:40] Tommy: You can play.

[1:13:41] Jimi: Yeah. Um, and apparently it worked. Like, like there's a whole Tumblr that we found out devoted to this production.

[1:13:48] Tommy: Of course there is.

[1:13:49] Jimi: What the hell is Heathers? Like, no, of course there's there are whole Tumblrs dedicated to the guy who carries carrots in that one scene in the movie version of Le Miz. Like, of course.

[1:13:57] Tommy: I know, but this isn't this an amateur production. I mean, it is Berkeley, so it's it's good, but like it's baffling.

[1:14:04] Jimi: Um, but no, I really like the the idea of it.

[1:14:08] Tommy: Yeah, and it kind of calls into question a lot of other different themes. Do you know what I mean?

[1:14:15] Jimi: It's really it's very interesting. Um, especially because they're you know, this is not like what what so what's gender bent? JD's gender bent, and that's about it.

[1:14:24] Tommy: Yes, yeah, exactly. Are you gonna gender bend curtain ram or like you know, probably not, but then there's you know, even just questions of like all the the gay slurs that happen throughout the thing, they gain a little bit more weight.

[1:14:39] Jimi: Yeah, exactly. So I think, yeah, so they kind of change that into um things like you know, like waffle muncher and shit like that.

[1:14:48] Tommy: Um, apparently. Um which you know, I think is is like it does, and it cre their relationship between Veronica and JD, um it it kind of it just brings a whole new light onto this.

[1:15:03] Jimi: Yeah, well, and it's interesting in the pre in the perspective that like you know, you look at the all the um occurrences of school violence, whether it's school bombings or school shootings that are perpetrated by male identifying people, men, um, and like to gen then gender bend this into a female world, it makes you think and question a lot of things.

[1:15:26] Tommy: Yeah, a hundred percent.

[1:15:28] Jimi: A hundred percent. So, yeah, very, very fascinating.

[1:15:30] Tommy: Now, the other thing, Thomas, um shining the light in your eyes, mate.

[1:15:35] Jimi: Um, so many people, um, but we had uh Her Royal Highness, Queen Mab, um, and Mavid 74 particularly.

[1:15:47] Tommy: Yeah, um, call uh call you out, Tommy.

[1:15:51] Jimi: I know, I know, and it's because I went on such a rant in um City of Angels about the lyrics.

[1:15:57] Tommy: And there are crappy lyrics in Heathers. Absolutely, I will give you that.

[1:16:02] Jimi: And this is something I've been sorting through and I I don't have a good answer for. I'm more okay with it in Heathers.

[1:16:06] Tommy: Um I'm more okay with it in a musical about vomiting up corn nuts than I am in a musical that kind of prides itself on like the the film noir genre prides itself on wordplay and poetry more so than I think a campy 80s movie adaptation, certainly with darker tones.

[1:16:30] Jimi: Um and there's like some elevation to the satire there, whereas like City of Angels is more of an homage than a satire, and for some reason that lets me excuse some more clumsy lyrics.

[1:16:45] Tommy: Um, and you're right, they're clumsy lyrics.

[1:16:48] Jimi: Um, and I don't know why I'm more okay with them, but I am. Do you know why you're okay with them?

[1:16:54] Tommy: Because everyone's allowed their own opinion, aren't they?

[1:16:57] Jimi: Yeah, I don't I don't like giving myself that justification. I feel that's an easy way out. But I don't know. I'm interested. This will be your this will be your journey.

[1:17:07] Tommy: This will be Tommy's journey.

[1:17:09] Jimi: Maybe.

[1:17:10] Tommy: Yeah, because uh the it's a thing, I don't bring it up as much, but I feel this way all the time and all sorts of musicals about lazy and less lazy lyrics.

[1:17:17] Jimi: Um, and like, did you give that phrase a second look over? There's not a better rhyme you can pull there, question mark.

[1:17:24] Tommy: Um and I do, you know, I didn't bring it up in the Heathers podcast. I didn't because it wasn't on my mind, but it was totally on my mind in the City of Angels podcast.

[1:17:33] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:17:34] Tommy: Um I think well, I think it's just because people are saying because City of Angels, the standard of lyrics is so much higher across the board, yeah, to then laud something where the standard is so much lower.

[1:17:47] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:17:47] Tommy: I think that's the thing that people are having issues with.

[1:17:50] Jimi: But yeah, it's more so that like in City of Angels it sticks out to me, and in Heathers it didn't.

[1:17:56] Tommy: And you know, I pride myself on musical theater analysis. And those two things are incongruous with each other.

[1:18:04] Jimi: I don't know. Who knows?

[1:18:06] Tommy: But hey, the people are mad.

[1:18:08] Jimi: The pitchforks are flying. I'm sorry, mashed potatoes, and insert gym and Tomic musical theater trash here.

[1:18:16] Tommy: Exactly.

[1:18:17] Jimi: I thought maybe the alcoholics, but I don't know if that's a bit.

[1:18:17] Tommy: I don't know if we want to encourage that too much.

[1:18:22] Jimi: I guess.

[1:18:23] Tommy: Um the alcoholics, no, it doesn't work.

[1:18:27] Jimi: Like jolly alcoholics, no.

[1:18:28] Tommy: Um we're not, we're not we are not nearly as clever as the collective of all our listeners.

[1:18:33] Jimi: Absolutely.

[1:18:35] Tommy: Um so that was the Reddit Rundobe. Woo!

[1:18:37] Jimi: Let us know if you like that if you want us to do it next week.

[1:18:40] Tommy: So, Tommy, do you want to know what we will be getting up to next week?

[1:18:45] Jimi: Absolutely.

[1:18:47] Tommy: Excellent. Well, I got a question for you, buddy. Um. This musical that we'll be talking about is immensely funny from the get go, but did you know many of its funniest moments developed from actor ad libs and stage mishaps?

[1:19:02] Jimi: So from accidentally throwing a coat across the stage onto a court rack perfectly and getting a standing ovation to being trapped on stage because of a malfunctioning door. Um what musical did this happen in?

[1:19:16] Tommy: That sounds hilarious, whatever it is.

[1:19:19] Jimi: I'm laughing.

[1:19:21] Tommy: I can hear it.

[1:19:23] Jimi: Ha ha ha!

[1:19:25] Tommy: Um if you want to get in contact with us, I'm MusicalMash on Twitter or Musical Theatre Mash on YouTube.

[1:19:31] Jimi: And I am Asan Hendricks on Twitter and YouTube.

[1:19:35] Tommy: Or you can contact us on our joint Twitter account, Jim and Tomic.

[1:19:40] Jimi: Or check out our website, Jim and Tomic.com, which is a link to the Reddit discussion.

[1:19:44] Tommy: And you know all about that already.

[1:19:46] Jimi: You do.

[1:19:46] Tommy: We talk about it too much.

[1:19:48] Jimi: Um please tell your friends all about us. That would be fabulous.

[1:19:54] Tommy: And we'll see you next week.

[1:19:56] Jimi: See you then.

[1:19:57] Tommy: Bye bye.

[1:19:58] Jimi: Ciao for now.

[1:20:12] Tommy: We go, we go, we go, we go, and now we run go to run to ra and now we go.

[1:20:12] Jimi: Ra.

[1:20:12] Tommy: And now we go.

[1:20:22] Jimi: This is the end.

[1:20:23] Tommy: This is the end, and now we go of the podcast.

[1:20:23] Jimi: And now we go.

[1:20:27] Tommy: We go.

[1:20:31] Jimi: Right.