This transcript was automatically generated and might contain errors.

[0:00] Jimi: The recording has begun.

[0:01] Tommy: Oh yeah.

[0:03] Jimi: So now we've got like 12 like so the video's on, that's already happening.

[0:07] Tommy: We're doing this.

[0:08] Jimi: Now we need to speak.

[0:09] Tommy: As if we haven't spoken.

[0:10] Jimi: We need I wanna can we hire an old timey uh uh movie studio person to stand around and be like, mm you know, marker, speed, rolling, yeah, exactly.

[0:21] Tommy: Yeah, do that classic thing that happens in the Tootsie film where the guy standing with the cue cards with all of the light just pure SML just gives the light.

[0:30] Jimi: Just give us the light.

[0:30] Tommy: Yeah, exact not a lot of people know this, Jimmy, but our podcast is entirely scripted.

[0:35] Jimi: Fully scripted, yeah.

[0:36] Tommy: We're so grateful to our script writers, they're just incredible.

[0:41] Jimi: Wouldn't that be funny if that was like a big reveal?

[0:43] Tommy: Yeah, I know the season two to three z season three change, I think didn't go over very well.

[0:48] Jimi: Exactly.

[0:48] Tommy: Well when the showrunner left, it was just it was hopeless.

[0:51] Jimi: It just don't make it.

[0:54] Tommy: I know.

[0:54] Jimi: Especially since we're gonna do it.

[0:56] Tommy: How do you feel about us getting rid of Chevy Chase and replacing him with a different actor?

[1:01] Jimi: I don't feel good about it at all, to be honest.

[1:03] Tommy: I think it's fine.

[1:04] Jimi: Um because what's gonna happen is we're gonna lose Donald Glover.

[1:07] Tommy: What are we doing?

[1:08] Jimi: That's true, and we are nothing.

[1:09] Tommy: This podcast is nothing is nothing without Donald Glover.

[1:13] Jimi: Donald Glover, that's what they say.

[1:18] Tommy: Welcome to Jim and Tomic's musical theatre happy hour.

[1:21] Jimi: I'm Jimmy.

[1:22] Tommy: And I'm Tommy, and this is the only musical theatre podcast with Angostura bitters.

[1:27] Jimi: And opening night jitters.

[1:29] Tommy: Ooooo here.

[1:31] Jimi: We take apart your favorite shows, muddle them together with a shot of buffinery, and pour you a refreshing glass of musical theatre conversation.

[1:41] Tommy: Jimi, what are you drinking?

[1:43] Jimi: Mm probably celebratory champagne.

[1:47] Tommy: Cheers.

[1:48] Jimi: Cheers.

[1:48] Tommy: I was gonna say from the mythical land of Genovia, but that's the wrong That's that's very wrong.

[1:55] Jimi: Different thing.

[1:56] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:56] Jimi: Although they don't really do they ever name the kingdom.

[1:59] Tommy: No.

[2:00] Jimi: But it's in Europe.

[2:01] Tommy: Yeah.

[2:01] Jimi: But vaguely indistinguishable Europe.

[2:04] Tommy: Yeah.

[2:04] Jimi: Because I can't remember where like the Disney one is set.

[2:07] Tommy: Yeah, I mean they're all vaguely European, but anyway, it was just like me and what are we talking about?

[2:12] Tommy: Well, it could only be No, oh, I need to do a quiz question.

[2:15] Jimi: Yes.

[2:16] Tommy: Wait, you're reading it.

[2:17] Jimi: Oh, um, I get a quiz question for you to tell you what we're doing.

[2:20] Tommy: Oh my god, dude.

[2:21] Jimi: You ready?

[2:21] Tommy: Um Chance the Rapper recently saw inspiration for perhaps one of the most unlikely of places.

[2:26] Jimi: One of the songs in this Golden Age musical.

[2:29] Tommy: What musical could it be, Jimmy?

[2:31] Jimi: Obviously.

[2:33] Tommy: It's Cinderella.

[2:35] Jimi: The Prince is doing a ball.

[2:37] Tommy: The Prince is giving up all yeah.

[2:42] Jimi: And that's not more.

[2:43] Tommy: The Prince is giving up all.

[2:45] Jimi: The Prince is giving a ball.

[2:49] Tommy: His Royal Highness Christopher Rupert Change is giving up all the balls giving up all the Prince is giving It feels weird saying Cinderella.

[3:06] Jimi: I I like out loud.

[3:07] Tommy: Do you know what I mean?

[3:08] Jimi: I feel like we're kids.

[3:11] Tommy: It does In fact I've got the Disney Castle in the background.

[3:14] Jimi: You do have yeah, there it is.

[3:15] Tommy: Kind of it looks like the haunted mansion.

[3:18] Jimi: Yeah, it's a bit it's a bit um what is it, Minus Morgul in Lord of the Rings.

[3:23] Tommy: It's got that vibe.

[3:24] Jimi: But that's fine.

[3:25] Tommy: Um yeah, so wait, before we go any further, I discovered a weird coincidence today.

[3:31] Jimi: Yeah, tell me more.

[3:33] Tommy: So it turns out Chance the Rapper is so deeply nestled in the world of Cinderella that it's just gonna spell the rest of his life, I think.

[3:42] Jimi: Uh huh.

[3:42] Tommy: So um in May, just there, uh huh, two minutes ago, um Randy released a song called Baby Mama.

[3:50] Jimi: Okay, Chance the Rapper.

[3:53] Tommy: Huh.

[3:53] Jimi: Who know.

[3:55] Tommy: I know.

[3:56] Jimi: It's actually quite so.

[3:57] Tommy: I we'll have to And also to tie in musical theater, uh huh, the video uh was choreographed, um and like designed, inspired by um rhythm of life from Sweet Charity.

[4:12] Jimi: Huh.

[4:12] Tommy: That's fascinating.

[4:14] Jimi: What's going on?

[4:15] Tommy: One of course worlds are blending together.

[4:18] Jimi: Our quiz question refers to Chance's song Zanies and Fools, um, which is uh, you know, an homage to the song Impossible from Cinderella, if not, you know, remix is the wrong word, covers the wrong word, but in the case.

[4:32] Tommy: Kind of like it samples it briefly.

[4:33] Jimi: Right.

[4:34] Tommy: But also doesn't sample it any version.

[4:36] Jimi: But you know, he takes the music.

[4:38] Tommy: Yeah.

[4:38] Jimi: I hope he got in touch with RH.

[4:40] Tommy: I'm sure he did.

[4:41] Jimi: I am always fascinated because like RH has a lot of I forget what they call them.

[4:46] Tommy: Um they're like R and H remixes or reimagined or um where they do um new age covers of their old songs with contemporary actors in a contemporary space.

[5:04] Jimi: It just doesn't feel like a very uh Rogers and Hammerstein thing to do.

[5:08] Tommy: I'll find a link and put some in the show notes.

[5:10] Jimi: Um but they're you know, it is having worked with the Rogers and Hammerstein organization who sometimes licenses things in America.

[5:18] Tommy: They seem like a very stodgy organization.

[5:21] Jimi: Um and so it's always interesting to hear when they do something I don't know.

[5:26] Tommy: Progressive as the thing, so th yeah, I agree.

[5:30] Jimi: But then they also have like in the heights in legally blonde.

[5:32] Tommy: Right.

[5:33] Jimi: For us anyway.

[5:33] Tommy: Yeah.

[5:34] Jimi: I don't know if well we just um Concord has that.

[5:36] Tommy: Don't get me started on Concord Theatricals.

[5:39] Jimi: Sorry, Concord people if you're listening.

[5:41] Tommy: You gotta get your shit together.

[5:43] Jimi: Come on guys.

[5:45] Tommy: I've not used them yet, so I mean I have no idea no one's used them yet so but um but don't they own everything?

[5:52] Jimi: They merged right around the time when people stopped doing theater.

[5:55] Tommy: So oh okay convenient.

[5:56] Jimi: Yeah well Cinderella, as we mentioned, has music book and lyrics by Rogers and Hammerstein.

[6:02] Tommy: Do they ever split up who writes what do they ever say?

[6:06] Jimi: Yeah so music is Rogers book and lyrics and lyrics is Hammerstein.

[6:10] Tommy: And I'm sure it's much more um and this is our first original television musical, Jimmy Yeah exactly Born on the T V.

[6:19] Tommy: Um it premiered on CBS on March thirty first, nineteen fifty seven um and then went to the stage.

[6:26] Jimi: Yeah so it had a stage premiere uh in London um at the Coliseum uh but not like officially like officially but not like oh it's you know the Cinderella you know and love from the TV.

[6:42] Tommy: Right.

[6:42] Jimi: It was like and we're also doing it on stage overall that kind of eye.

[6:47] Tommy: And then like it lived on TV.

[6:48] Jimi: Went back there was another version that came out in 65 and it really didn't hit the stage big time till the mid nineties for the New York City exactly.

[6:57] Tommy: Yeah yeah yeah.

[6:58] Jimi: Um and of course what I think most people, certainly most people our generation, uh know Cinderella as is the incredible Disney plus whis Whitney Houston uh televised recording in nineteen ninety seven.

[7:13] Tommy: Yes, great production.

[7:14] Jimi: And then it had uh it's was it I have to was it listed as a revival in twenty thirteen?

[7:21] Tommy: No, it was a new It was a new musical.

[7:23] Jimi: It's such a fascinating thing to be a new musical in twenty thirteen using songs originally written and popularized in fifty seven.

[7:31] Tommy: Yeah, exactly.

[7:33] Jimi: Yeah, it's madness.

[7:34] Tommy: But yeah, it's Broadway.

[7:38] Jimi: Yeah, new book.

[7:39] Tommy: Um yeah, interesting interesting journey for this show, certainly.

[7:43] Jimi: For sure.

[7:44] Tommy: But I think it's one of those things, like I feel like every iteration that is had, it's almost felt like its own unique thing.

[7:50] Jimi: Like beyond just like the kind of contemporary RH revivals that we know today.

[7:56] Tommy: Right.

[7:57] Jimi: It's not just like, oh we've really polished the set in this one or, you know, like Oklahoma where we've really kind of retold the story in the same way, but it's all the same content guys.

[8:05] Tommy: Like the content changes dramatically exactly which it's situated it makes it weird for like an R and H because all the rest of their canon is on the other side of that, you know.

[8:15] Jimi: The original Alma was made for the stage and you're always iterating on that version.

[8:20] Tommy: Whereas this is you know, kind of lives as a set of puzzle pieces almost.

[8:24] Jimi: Not anymore now that a twenty thirteen version a thing.

[8:28] Tommy: Yeah.

[8:29] Jimi: And I think so the um the sixties one was licensed for a while and I think that was the one that prior to twenty thirteen that was the one that you you could license.

[8:40] Tommy: Yeah, that makes sense.

[8:41] Jimi: Yes.

[8:42] Tommy: Um but yeah shall we um I think the best way to to journey through the wonderful story of Cinderella is to look at each iteration in turn.

[8:52] Jimi: Hop in my time machine.

[8:53] Tommy: Let's head back to 1957.

[8:55] Jimi: I'm as mild and just meek as a moss.

[8:59] Tommy: When I hear a command, I obey.

[9:03] Jimi: But I know of a smart in my house when no one can stand in my way.

[9:15] Tommy: In my own little corner in my own little chair.

[9:29] Jimi: On the wing of my fancy, I can fly anywhere, and the world will open its arms to me.

[9:42] Tommy: I'm a young Norwegian princess or a milk maid.

[9:49] Jimi: I'm the greatest primadonna in the land.

[9:56] Tommy: I'm an heiress who has always had her silk made by her own flock of silkworms in Japan.

[10:10] Jimi: I'm a girl and go mad for love's a game.

[10:15] Tommy: I can play with a cool and confident kind of air, just as long as I stay in my own little corner, all alone in my own little chair.

[10:39] Jimi: Is that your TARDIS?

[10:41] Tommy: What's your TARDIS?

[10:42] Jimi: Well I it's like asking people to do a Chewbacca impression.

[10:45] Tommy: Like no one actually knows how to do it, you know?

[10:48] Jimi: Welcome to nineteen fifty seven, Jimmy.

[10:51] Tommy: It's really cool.

[10:52] Jimi: Everything's in black and white, did you know that?

[10:55] Tommy: It is, and I'm in a lovely dress.

[10:58] Jimi: I do so like what is wild, and it's hard to find specific research about this, but nineteen fifty seven, early television had to be live for the most part.

[11:09] Tommy: Um because of the way technology worked.

[11:11] Jimi: And like live in that like everything you're seeing on the screen, they're doing basically right now, save for some speed of light calculations.

[11:20] Tommy: Um like that's just how all TV was for you know, maybe through the mid-sixties until we started getting some more like uh film technology, um and then eventually VHS is in the eighties and nineties.

[11:32] Jimi: Um but it means like that's why t television program television channels would go off the air at night because people would go to sleep.

[11:41] Tommy: And it wasn't like you can play reruns or info marshals all night, it'd just be like you know somewhere recording them.

[11:46] Jimi: They'd there'd be nothing there, or it's like a shot of an American flag and someone leaves the camera pointing at it all night and then they come back tomorrow morning.

[11:53] Tommy: Um and so that is the world in which this live musical is being created.

[11:59] Jimi: As opposed to nowadays where like a live musical is they wouldn't have called this a live musical at the time.

[12:04] Tommy: They would have just called it a musical because everything's live.

[12:07] Jimi: Yeah, uh, it wouldn't necessarily be like, oh my god, the perk is that is live.

[12:12] Tommy: What could that would just be?

[12:14] Jimi: Yeah.

[12:15] Tommy: And everyone would be really nervous.

[12:16] Jimi: Um okay, that makes a lot of sense.

[12:17] Tommy: Well, yeah, 'cause the prior to this, I think the main kind of live musical event had obviously been Peter Pan.

[12:25] Jimi: Um, which I think was only a few years before.

[12:28] Tommy: It was only a few years before.

[12:29] Jimi: Hugely successful.

[12:31] Tommy: Yeah.

[12:31] Jimi: And then you do Peter Pan is is how it was researching that for when the when do you when the live vr new version of Peter Pan happened that I learned all this.

[12:40] Tommy: But there were I believe I'm pulling this out of my head, so this might be slightly inaccurate, but I think there were two initially live performed versions that we don't have records of.

[12:50] Jimi: Right.

[12:50] Tommy: And then the technology got updated enough that they restaged it and then it was easier to record things.

[12:57] Jimi: Yeah.

[12:57] Tommy: And so if you've ever seen the color recorded version of the Mary Martin Peter Pan that's from like the sixties.

[13:05] Jimi: That's what you're watching.

[13:06] Tommy: It's a couple times later.

[13:06] Jimi: Um so that we're right in that border, and it's why we are lucky enough to have uh uh it's called a kinescope version of this telecast.

[13:17] Tommy: But this was new technology.

[13:19] Jimi: Exactly.

[13:19] Tommy: And so that um telec this was only discovered like relatively recently.

[13:25] Jimi: So it was buried in the CBS archives for years and they thought it just didn't exist and they were all quite sad about that. Um, but I don't know who found it and when, but hey, thank goodness they did. So they've got it's it's a film recording of the dress rehearsal, um, of what became the live event.

[13:43] Tommy: Yeah.

[13:43] Jimi: Um, which is so it's so cool. Like what an amazing thing to discover that at this late stage.

[13:49] Tommy: Well, and I didn't know till we we started talking about the show that it was the dress rehearsal either and that it wasn't the live version.

[13:55] Jimi: And that makes so much more sense because at the time they weren't recording it for archives' sake. They were recording it to see what it looked like, so that they knew for tomorrow what was gonna work and what they needed to fix.

[14:08] Tommy: What needed fixed.

[14:09] Jimi: Exactly, exactly. Um, so uh yeah, I think that is just it's it's so cool. And apparently they had this like big embargo uh with the cast that the cast couldn't see it.

[14:20] Tommy: Uh huh.

[14:21] Jimi: Because obviously all of these stage actors that they were working with are not used to being able to see themselves.

[14:26] Tommy: Right.

[14:27] Jimi: And so the director was really concerned that the cast would see it and get really paranoid about how they look or you know, what they're doing and get far too much in their head, which I think is such a cool yeah kind of conceit, because I I mean I don't really know obviously I've not worked in a professional probably show, but I imagine there's probably some people who do spend a lot of time looking at the performance because we're we're much more used to like a televisual lens as opposed to thinking like I don't want to know what I look like because I'm just gonna be in the moment on you know I mean on the stage.

[15:01] Tommy: Yeah.

[15:02] Jimi: Um, I've often wondered, and I haven't found any good like sociological studies of this, but like in the same way that uh musical theatre changed after we invented body microphones, and then the art form changed around it, like with the kind of stuff we made became different. Like, has performance in general changed once like as record as film recording, video recording became a thing and then became more accessible so that you could do just that, so that you could look at and see and assess your performance.

[15:33] Tommy: Because certainly for years you'd had no way to do that.

[15:36] Jimi: Totally. Well, because I feel like it must, because I know there's so many interviews and stuff that I've seen of um like stage actors who have moved into film or something, and they're always told, You're far too loud. Like, calm write down. Like I guess this is TV now.

[15:51] Tommy: Yeah.

[15:51] Jimi: Um, and they keep you're not getting told to pr to bring it back.

[15:53] Tommy: So I I don't doubt that there has been a huge there's some you know brain change difference made there.

[15:59] Jimi: Yeah, yeah, for sure. Um, but yeah, so that's 1957 telecast.

[16:03] Tommy: It exists and it's it's it is weirdly kinda wonderful.

[16:06] Jimi: Yeah. Um, in a very like uh the 1950s kind of way.

[16:13] Tommy: Yeah.

[16:13] Jimi: Um, like is this the best way to watch the Cinderella musical?

[16:18] Tommy: Probably not.

[16:19] Jimi: Hands down no um not at all. Um, but is it worth watching for Julie Andrews alone?

[16:27] Tommy: Absolutely.

[16:28] Jimi: A hundred percent. She is stellar in it.

[16:31] Tommy: She's so good.

[16:32] Jimi: And it is like, yeah. I just I forgot how it's one of those things like even though I've watched all of her so and like, you know, I've watched Mary Revolving so recently, but you just all every time she pops up, you're like, oh my god, you are so good.

[16:44] Tommy: Right.

[16:45] Jimi: And this is pre-Sound of Music.

[16:47] Tommy: Um, you know, that was 65. This was so this happened, I think simultaneously with My Free Lady.

[16:52] Jimi: She was on Broadway with My Free Lady at this moment.

[16:55] Tommy: That makes sense.

[16:55] Jimi: Um and then filmed this. So she still knew, like, she's still not Julie Andrews at this point.

[17:01] Tommy: Yeah.

[17:01] Jimi: Well is crazy. It's also just an interesting um like art study.

[17:07] Tommy: Like certainly the whole thing's a time capsule, right?

[17:10] Jimi: Um, and we don't have a lot of recordings from this time because of the technological stuff. And I just find it interesting that it is an early example of what we know to be this Broadway musical theater style, rather than Hammerstein, you know, inventing it as they go, right?

[17:26] Tommy: Yeah.

[17:27] Jimi: Adapted for television. As opposed to a film of a play or a film of a musical, um, like on stage.

[17:35] Tommy: Like there's sets, there's you know, camera angles, they've made some choices here, and it's early television, so there's a ton of limitations just based on like the size of the camera and how close you have to be to the microphone and stuff um but it's you know they they had to start it they were inventing this stuff as they went along exactly um and it was hugely successful so um yeah it was from a documentary about they were said apparently that it would take about a hundred and ten years for that many people who watched it was something like a hundred and five million people in the US alone.

[18:15] Tommy: Yeah.

[18:16] Jimi: Also like I think it was broadcast in Canada. It was also broadcast in like the territories in Cuba and that um so like I it must have been higher up into the 120s or something.

[18:28] Tommy: Um like that many people watching that obviously at that time it was the biggest event ever.

[18:33] Jimi: Absolutely and I looked up the stats as well today and it's still in like the top ten.

[18:37] Tommy: Yeah.

[18:37] Jimi: Um which is it's crazy.

[18:39] Tommy: Um but yeah so that I think a hundred and ten years for that many people to go and see it if it wasn't it's a good one.

[18:47] Jimi: But it was just a stage production yeah.

[18:49] Tommy: Which is mad to think.

[18:50] Jimi: It does like it's a huge I mean we when I remember uh uh take a drink now I remember uh when we were having conversations during the cast recording of Comet um about like the vast inequity between you know if like a show never gets a cast recording how few people will exist well will he hear it at all you know if if a film if it if a if a show never gets a a pro shot or some kind of adaptation like this, how few people see it.

[19:18] Tommy: Um and it is it's interesting to talk about it nowadays where there is this kind of like bootleg discourse that's been going on during quarantines and you know of like an equity statement.

[19:28] Jimi: Um plus like Hamilton on Disney Plus, like this stuff is uh is fresh again.

[19:33] Tommy: Just the question of how should we be doing musical theater so that everyone has access to it.

[19:38] Jimi: Um exactly. And this is and we've been talking about it since 1957.

[19:43] Tommy: Well that's it. I I just I think it's a it is it's a really interesting point, and um it it did kind of get me thinking because I mean obviously we know that it at that time you only had a handful of channels.

[19:54] Jimi: Right.

[19:55] Tommy: You know what I mean, and people paid attention to things like what's happening in the theatre.

[20:00] Jimi: Oh yeah.

[20:00] Tommy: Do you know what I mean? Like people were like, oh, fantastic.

[20:03] Jimi: Um we'll watch that.

[20:05] Tommy: Uh and like for example, they did a huge um kind of press run-up um to it, which is again kind of unprecedented for this.

[20:13] Jimi: So they did A, they did a cast album, right?

[20:16] Tommy: Um, which is nuts, um, that was set for release the Monday after it premiered, which I think is so smart, that's really kind of genius.

[20:26] Jimi: Um then they also had Rogers and Hammerstein go on Ed Sullivan um, which we know from Bible Birdie is a huge deal.

[20:34] Tommy: Right.

[20:35] Jimi: Um, and they went on to ed and they did a song from the show.

[20:41] Tommy: Uh and again, in those times that was such an exciting thing because it was like, oh my god.

[20:47] Jimi: Right.

[20:47] Tommy: The new, you know, whereas now like that would get dropped on YouTube.

[20:52] Jimi: Right, exactly.

[20:52] Tommy: Like, you know, Good Morning America every other Monday is like, and now we're gonna watch the cast of Hades Town perform whatever.

[20:58] Jimi: Right, exactly and you've already heard it ten years ago because um Aeneas Mitchell did a Instagram live of her in the studio.

[21:04] Tommy: Like there's no you know, I mean there's no like anticipation build up.

[21:08] Jimi: So I can totally understand why it it wouldn't have the same impact.

[21:14] Tommy: Yeah.

[21:16] Jimi: But obviously with you know theatre having a big question mark over it this could be a really interesting way of kind of doing it again.

[21:29] Tommy: Like just doing a different Yeah.

[21:31] Jimi: Like a a show a show written for you know distance broadcasting explicitly.

[21:37] Tommy: Right.

[21:38] Jimi: Exactly. Now I had a I had a browser and obviously there has been a few that people have done really quickly and just really quick turnover and and produce things.

[21:46] Tommy: Yeah.

[21:47] Jimi: Um and there's a lot of like we'll do last five years because you know we don't need to talk right in the same space.

[21:54] Tommy: It suits itself.

[21:55] Jimi: Right. Um but I wonder like as time goes on are people gonna think well I don't need to write this show for a house.

[22:04] Tommy: Right.

[22:05] Jimi: Because I now know that we've got all of these myriads of streaming services and who knows if people are actually gonna want to go into a house.

[22:14] Tommy: Right.

[22:15] Jimi: You know what I mean? Is actually streaming gonna be the best way forward.

[22:19] Tommy: Well um and it does like the because this is written as a three act musical likely partially because that's for the time but I also imagine the length is like this is as long as like we can kinda go before we all kind of just need to take a commercial break for a second to like move the set to get to the next place and yeah you know and like Peter Pan televised is the same way.

[22:42] Tommy: Whereas stage musicals have shifted to a one or two act structure to keep people in the seats so they don't leave.

[22:48] Jimi: And like will we start seeing the art form change again because of this.

[22:53] Tommy: Exactly.

[22:53] Jimi: Like, yeah, thinking like factoring in commercial brakes, because that's that was the thing is when they wrote it, they factored in the commercial breaks.

[23:00] Tommy: Right.

[23:00] Jimi: And that's what's different when you look at things like Grease Live or The Wiz Live, the commercial base come and you're like why here starring like that.

[23:08] Tommy: Uh huh.

[23:08] Jimi: You're just like that wasn't the right beat to do that in.

[23:11] Tommy: Like there was no other beat that you could have done it.

[23:13] Jimi: There's no perfect time, but it just wasn't the right moment to take a break.

[23:17] Tommy: Yeah.

[23:17] Jimi: Whereas this it was like bit of a big number or end of a romantic scene with a big orchestral swell.

[23:23] Tommy: Bum commercial break.

[23:26] Jimi: So it was like little intervals basically.

[23:28] Tommy: Yeah.

[23:28] Jimi: Um that you had, which is just that's very smart.

[23:32] Tommy: Yeah.

[23:33] Jimi: Of course. You know what I mean?

[23:34] Tommy: Like to to cater for that specifically.

[23:36] Jimi: So um, yeah, I don't know.

[23:38] Tommy: I just feel like because when we were chatting about in Beetlejuice, and I was obviously talking about like, oh you know, TikTok is the end of musical theater, blah blah blah.

[23:46] Jimi: Um but uh actually what are we gonna see like some kind of weird TikTok musical?

[23:53] Tommy: Like, are people gonna be thinking, well, I need to think of new platforms?

[23:58] Jimi: I mean, and I've had this thought with how accessible and I think uh coveted after these days, like virtual reality headsets are becoming.

[24:05] Tommy: And like if we're do we see, you know, television was this new and exciting medium, and the the masters of the form musical theater were like, let's figure out how we're gonna use this medium with our form.

[24:20] Tommy: Yeah.

[24:21] Jimi: Will we we've got a new medium now, like immersive virtual reality.

[24:25] Tommy: Do I mean we see it with all the developing technology, not necessarily musical theater, but even like with Quibi coming up with like, well, this is stuff you can only see on your phone because phones are a newer thing, and like the m the media is made or the the media is made for the medium, and will we start podcast musicals?

[24:45] Tommy: Yeah.

[24:46] Jimi: Like and written for the thing.

[24:49] Tommy: Um, so it's just interesting to see how these performance venues kind of overlap, especially with our art form that is so tied to the stage in its like, you know, prototype version.

[25:03] Jimi: Yeah.

[25:04] Tommy: That like when you start leaving the stage and embracing the other, you know, the the dangly bits of the form, um how that changes things.

[25:13] Jimi: For sure.

[25:14] Tommy: Um yeah, I don't know.

[25:15] Jimi: I think i it's it's uh very kind of new frontiery, interesting idea.

[25:21] Tommy: Like, will that be the the renaissance that we get after a dark period?

[25:26] Jimi: Yeah, you know, I mean, is that what's gonna happen where it's like actually you're gonna be able to create art literally wherever you want to and it can be good.

[25:34] Tommy: Um yeah, I d I don't know.

[25:36] Jimi: Yeah, can you imagine though? You were just as you're talking about M VR.

[25:39] Tommy: Can you imagine watching comet and VR?

[25:40] Jimi: Oh, it would be great.

[25:41] Tommy: It would be like the that's like the perfect I know.

[25:44] Jimi: Well and that's that's the thing I wonder, like I've had this thought, you know, we're so we're recording in August of twenty twenty.

[25:51] Tommy: Um you know, the the world's being hit by the coronavirus pandemic.

[25:55] Jimi: Um if you're listening to this in fifty years and you're like, what's going on?

[25:58] Tommy: Um and there's a lot of internet discourse these days.

[26:01] Jimi: Oh, also Hamilton was released and these on Disney Plus and these two things together have created a massive amount of internet discourse around like bootlegs of musicals and should musicals be performed in just New York, and there's a whole discussion of equity around this.

[26:15] Tommy: Um you know, and like th there was a bunch of ragging on uh the uh uh Lincoln Center Libraries archives and like why can't they just release the archives?

[26:24] Jimi: You know, why are they like holding these things down?

[26:26] Tommy: And there's a tough conversation for sure, but like and and also a conversation like pro shoots are expensive and there's lots of rights to manage with this.

[26:36] Jimi: But you plop a VR recording bulb down in one seat for Great Comet, do the show, you're done.

[26:47] Jimi: Um I got to uh play around with a VR headset uh recently, and there is actually a three it's funny you mentioned Beetlejuice.

[26:57] Tommy: Uh I think Good Morning America did a 360 recording of Beetlejuice.

[27:02] Jimi: And I watched it, and like I've seen it on a computer where you can like scroll around and look.

[27:07] Tommy: But when you put the headset on and watch the thing, like and I'm a techie guy, I found myself like looking down in the orchestra pit and like looking up at the spotlights, and like, you know, it's just a different it it is more close to obviously feeling like you're watching the show.

[27:26] Jimi: You know, and so then it becomes this question, like even with Cinderella, I wonder if they had these conversations at the time, or if they just moved so quickly that like they didn't get as heady about it as we get at heady about everything.

[27:37] Tommy: If they had the conversation, like, should we do this in VR?

[27:39] Jimi: Yeah, exactly.

[27:40] Tommy: Like should we pull out our secret VR?

[27:42] Jimi: But like w was there a plan at one point to just like get a you know, have fewer sets, do it like a stage show.

[27:50] Tommy: Um you know, because that's the form they knew, or like because you can tell they went the other way.

[27:56] Jimi: They make a lot of choices around like we can only do this because we have television cameras.

[28:01] Tommy: And even like Jimmy and I were talking before about the um uh the dress transformation, which on the fifty-seven version, you know, as in as much special effects as they can, they like overlaying a sparkle.

[28:14] Jimi: Yep, and like they pan away from Julie Andrews and the fairy godmother kinda like stands there for a second, and then they pan back to Julie Andrews and she's in the dress, right?

[28:23] Tommy: Much harder to do on stage, and also much less impressive if she like leaves and comes back, to the point where by the time you hit the twenty thirteen version, we'll get there later on my segue, um, they have to invest in like a really fantastical costume transformation to sell that moment.

[28:39] Jimi: And like, you couldn't have done that sort of thing, maybe in the fifties, not nearly as successfully.

[28:48] Tommy: I mean, it would be hugely pioneering if they did.

[28:50] Jimi: Right.

[28:51] Tommy: You know what I mean?

[28:51] Jimi: Like they would have they would have had to spend a lot of time because like quick changes over the as you can kind of chart quick changes over the years.

[28:59] Tommy: Yeah.

[29:00] Jimi: And even just in in recent years, like the difference between like the legally blonde quick change to the uh Cinderella quick change, that's what a six-year difference.

[29:09] Tommy: Yeah.

[29:09] Jimi: But it's huge.

[29:10] Tommy: Like the actual difference is huge.

[29:11] Jimi: Even just the, you know, like apples to apples, the like Hyperion Disney Parks frozen show, uh dress transformation and then the Broadway version frozen dress transformation are vastly different.

[29:24] Tommy: And they're, you know, two, three years apart.

[29:26] Jimi: Certainly there's more money going on, but

[29:26] Tommy: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[29:29] Jimi: It is interesting, like w m Cinderella, if we wanna if uh uh uh br a living breathing part of it has to be this dress transformation, right?

[29:39] Tommy: Which it feels like it needs to, if we're song spotting or moment spotting, this is an important moment.

[29:44] Jimi: Mm-hmm.

[29:44] Tommy: As a stage show is much more complicated in fifty-seven, so maybe Cinderella isn't suited for adaptation at the time.

[29:52] Jimi: But we got this brand new fangled thing called television.

[29:55] Tommy: Let's try it there.

[29:56] Jimi: It's cool.

[29:57] Tommy: It's cool to see that kind of come together.

[30:00] Jimi: For sure.

[30:00] Tommy: Um, so yeah, so all that being said, I definitely watch the telecast, but don't let that be your first outing.

[30:09] Jimi: I would I would say I would whisper in like skim through the telecast.

[30:13] Tommy: No, it's so short.

[30:14] Jimi: It's only like an hour and twenty.

[30:16] Tommy: That's probably even less than that.

[30:18] Jimi: Like, it's real short.

[30:20] Tommy: And it's just the lightest thing on in in existence.

[30:24] Jimi: It's lighter than the Disney film.

[30:26] Tommy: Yeah.

[30:26] Jimi: I find it.

[30:27] Tommy: Do you know I mean like the Disney film has more apparel.

[30:29] Jimi: Yeah, that's true.

[30:29] Tommy: Um absolutely true.

[30:32] Jimi: Um, and it's just very like the Cinderella story full stop.

[30:36] Tommy: Right.

[30:36] Jimi: Uh and the one of the stepsisters, I can't remember her name.

[30:40] Tommy: She's great.

[30:42] Jimi: Yes.

[30:42] Tommy: I who I would let stepsister stepmother, Dream Rolls, and Cinderella.

[30:47] Jimi: For me.

[30:47] Tommy: Thank you very much.

[30:48] Jimi: Yes, please.

[30:49] Tommy: Cool.

[30:50] Jimi: We'll work that out for you, T.

[30:51] Tommy: We we would be great stepsisters.

[30:55] Jimi: To be honest, I'm very tall.

[30:58] Tommy: And I'm I'm bitchy, so you're bitchy.

[31:02] Jimi: And I do snort when I laugh.

[31:04] Tommy: There you go.

[31:04] Jimi: And I do have curls that are matted to my four.

[31:07] Tommy: Well, I guess that's the 97 one.

[31:08] Jimi: Well, when we do the gender bed Cinderella story, that's that's what can happen.

[31:13] Tommy: I'm sure this is not original, but we can call it Cinder Fella.

[31:18] Jimi: That isn't original, but yes, we can.

[31:22] Tommy: Sure.

[31:23] Jimi: Sure thing.

[31:23] Tommy: Alright, Jimmy.

[31:24] Jimi: Hop back in my time machine.

[31:25] Tommy: We gotta go forward a couple years.

[31:27] Jimi: But the world is full of zenies and fools who don't believe in sensible rules.

[31:36] Tommy: I won't believe what sensible people say.

[31:39] Jimi: And because these depth didn't doing it, dubs keep building up and puzzle hopes Impossible.

[31:45] Tommy: Things are happening every day.

[31:52] Jimi: Impossible.

[31:54] Jimi: Impossible.

[31:56] Jimi: Impossible.

[31:58] Jimi: Impossible.

[32:00] Jimi: Impossible.

[32:02] Jimi: Impossible.

[32:04] Jimi: Impossible.

[32:11] Tommy: No, no, I want to do Dun Dun Dun.

[32:17] Jimi: No, but see, it doesn't.

[32:18] Tommy: The time machine itself doesn't make a noise.

[32:20] Jimi: But a dumb bum bum.

[32:24] Tommy: Here we are.

[32:25] Jimi: 1997.

[32:26] Tommy: I was eight.

[32:27] Jimi: Well, that was a jump.

[32:29] Tommy: I feel a little I was eight in 1997.

[32:33] Jimi: Um, I probably watched this on television when it premiered.

[32:37] Tommy: Um I don't have the most memories of being eight, but I'm nearly caught.

[32:41] Jimi: Like we watched the wonderful world of Disney every Sunday or whatever.

[32:45] Tommy: So I didn't.

[32:47] Jimi: Because it wasn't broadcast in the United Kingdom.

[32:50] Tommy: That's fair.

[32:50] Jimi: That's fair.

[32:51] Tommy: So I would have.

[32:54] Jimi: I love this movie.

[32:56] Tommy: The uh Brandy and Whitney Houston version of Cinderella, um, which is I think its colloquial title at this point.

[33:04] Jimi: Yeah, I know, exactly.

[33:06] Tommy: Calling it just Cinderella is weird.

[33:08] Jimi: Right.

[33:08] Tommy: It's the Whitney Houston Cinderella.

[33:09] Jimi: It's the Whitney Houston Cinderella.

[33:11] Tommy: Yeah.

[33:12] Jimi: Um it literally says that at the start.

[33:15] Tommy: Uh, she was a producer.

[33:16] Jimi: Disney and Whitney Houston.

[33:17] Tommy: Yeah, she's exact.

[33:18] Jimi: The story goes, um that Whitney Houston was initially producing it to be cast as Cinderella.

[33:18] Tommy: As Cinderella.

[33:27] Jimi: And then discovered or met or learned more about Brandy and said, No, no, no, this girl has to do it.

[33:33] Tommy: And Brandy, very flattered, said, I will only do it if you be the fairy godmother.

[33:37] Jimi: Um and it's a really sweet, you know, that's also what happened in real life, right?

[33:42] Tommy: That's the show biz story.

[33:44] Jimi: Is Whitney was like this one and then Brandy happened.

[33:48] Tommy: Yeah, because I don't know where this is in like Brandy's timeline.

[33:51] Jimi: Like what I did watch was Moesha.

[33:54] Tommy: I love Moesha.

[33:55] Jimi: Um so I don't know when 'cause I'm sure Moesha would have happened.

[34:01] Tommy: Sure.

[34:02] Jimi: At this point.

[34:04] Tommy: 'Cause she wasn't like she was still Brandy, like she was known.

[34:07] Jimi: Right, as you know, the artist known as Brandy.

[34:10] Tommy: Yeah.

[34:11] Jimi: It wasn't like, oh, who is this new?

[34:12] Tommy: This is probably right around the beginning of Moesha.

[34:14] Jimi: I think it what does it say?

[34:15] Tommy: Ninety six.

[34:16] Jimi: So we're right.

[34:18] Tommy: Okay, cool.

[34:18] Jimi: You know, Brandy's had maybe like a season.

[34:21] Tommy: Yeah.

[34:21] Jimi: Uh Brandy's becoming brandy.

[34:24] Tommy: But that would be right around you know, if it's premiered in ninety seven, that's right when the show would be in production, right?

[34:28] Jimi: Ninety six ish.

[34:29] Tommy: Exactly.

[34:30] Jimi: That's how long it would take.

[34:32] Tommy: Um so and it is that that makes sense.

[34:35] Jimi: It is a great, great movie.

[34:37] Tommy: Um it is uh uh it's hard to find these days, unfortunately.

[34:42] Jimi: Um it's not on Disney Plus, which is ridiculous.

[34:46] Tommy: She's doing uh Brandy's doing a huge um like Twitter campaign currently happening, get Retween Kids.

[34:53] Jimi: Uh where she's trying to get it on Disney Plus.

[34:55] Tommy: I'm so curious why it's not, because Disney would want to put everything in anything they have on their streaming service, and so like I wonder if there's some weird rights consideration with the Rogers and Hammerstein organization that is throwing your wrench in the worst.

[35:11] Jimi: Or they're like waiting.

[35:13] Tommy: Right.

[35:13] Jimi: You know, I mean, because obviously they're gonna let the dust settle on Hamilton.

[35:17] Tommy: Right.

[35:17] Jimi: And then it's like yeah, could be a good thing.

[35:20] Tommy: Although having them both at once, so like your watch after Hamilton is you liked this, try Cinderella.

[35:25] Jimi: Would have been a good one.

[35:26] Tommy: Right.

[35:26] Jimi: I mean, they've still got like their section on Disney Plus of like, you know, powerful black stories.

[35:32] Tommy: Like that it's weird that that's not on it.

[35:36] Jimi: Yeah, it's real weird that it's not on it, and you know, Disney Plus should get on it.

[35:40] Tommy: Um but you should you can find it elsewhere.

[35:44] Jimi: Yes.

[35:47] Tommy: But um the biggest thing this show is known for uh is how multicultural it is.

[35:52] Jimi: Um and I do like I always I h hate the word multicultural, but I don't know a better word, you know.

[35:59] Tommy: Diverse.

[36:00] Jimi: Yeah, that's a good word for it.

[36:02] Tommy: Super diverse, yeah.

[36:03] Jimi: Um, you know, beyond just uh Brandy and Whitney very much being the first black actresses in their roles um in any major production that I know of I mean literally Brandy was the first black princess.

[36:16] Tommy: Yeah.

[36:16] Jimi: The threat black Disney princess Black Disney princess, let's be real.

[36:20] Tommy: Yeah.

[36:21] Jimi: Um yeah, like at that point in the nineties, we had not had that in common parlance.

[36:26] Tommy: Right at all.

[36:27] Jimi: Right.

[36:27] Tommy: She was the first.

[36:29] Jimi: Yeah.

[36:29] Tommy: Um and that's incredible.

[36:32] Jimi: It is wonderful.

[36:33] Tommy: But not only that, um, you know, they the the production actively goes out of its way to make um, you know, diverse casting decisions.

[36:44] Jimi: So the king and queen are played by Whoopi Goldberg, a black woman, and Victor Garber, a white man, who have an Asian son, um, the prince played by Paulo Montalban.

[36:44] Tommy: Paulo Montalban.

[36:57] Jimi: Um starring.

[36:59] Tommy: There was then he was an unknown.

[37:01] Jimi: He was um yeah, he was in the chorus of the King and I.

[37:05] Tommy: And he got plucked from that.

[37:06] Jimi: Huh.

[37:07] Tommy: Which I think is really cool.

[37:08] Jimi: Yeah, and they're all great.

[37:10] Tommy: And like the the cast is super diverse.

[37:13] Jimi: Bernada Peters is the stepsister and or is the stepmother and the one of the stepsisters is white, one of the stepsisters is black.

[37:19] Tommy: Like they're going out of their way to like I don't know.

[37:23] Jimi: Be like it's it's cool.

[37:26] Tommy: This is a matter.

[37:26] Jimi: This is what it is.

[37:27] Tommy: This is representation, this is diversity.

[37:29] Jimi: And like, for any time that's breaking a lot of molds and like dismantling some white supremacy that exists in musical theaters existence, for ninety seven, this is progressive.

[37:42] Tommy: This is great.

[37:43] Jimi: Totally.

[37:43] Tommy: Um for sure.

[37:45] Jimi: It's really it's quite divine.

[37:47] Tommy: Yeah, I I really love it.

[37:48] Jimi: Um because also it's not like it's also not turned into like the issues that you know I mean, they're not it's they've not added in a race subplot or anything like that.

[38:02] Tommy: Exactly.

[38:02] Jimi: It's just this lovely fairy tale utopia where actually race here isn't an issue.

[38:09] Tommy: Yeah.

[38:10] Jimi: What I mean what I read was the only um other like certainly they made a lot of like musically motivated changes.

[38:17] Tommy: Um, but there was one it's bad.

[38:21] Jimi: Um there was only one uh uh honestly racially motivat motivated lyric change.

[38:26] Tommy: Um in my own little corner, uh she sings about originally Julie Andrews fantasizes about being a slave in Calcutta, and already we have a lot of problems here.

[38:37] Jimi: Um and in the Brandy version, uh Brandy fantasizes about being a slave in Egypt.

[38:43] Tommy: Um which also, like, I think there's a l a lot to unpack in all these statements, to be honest.

[38:50] Jimi: But that's it.

[38:51] Tommy: Um and there's a lot of power in that too, because as much as it isn't a show about, you know, diversity or racial issues, it still becomes a show about these things just because of the casting choices.

[39:05] Jimi: Um which is great, and what it should be.

[39:07] Tommy: Like it's such a a beautiful gem in its existence.

[39:11] Jimi: Certainly with flaws, but you know.

[39:12] Tommy: And even but even like as you said, like with the music, they actually they didn't change it a vast amount.

[39:18] Jimi: Like it was madely reorchestrated.

[39:20] Tommy: It's not like oh you're gonna get the R and B version.

[39:24] Jimi: Like you could s you could impossible.

[39:26] Tommy: Like it's not.

[39:27] Jimi: It's just got a bit more of a drum track in the back.

[39:29] Tommy: Like um and I that's what I really really love as well, because it shows that even just down to singing, it's not like, oh, you're black, so you need to sing R and B.

[39:42] Jimi: Right.

[39:42] Tommy: Do you know I mean, which I think you sometimes see quite a lot.

[39:46] Jimi: And sure, like sale like a celebration of rhythm and blues.

[39:52] Tommy: Perfect.

[39:52] Jimi: Absolutely when it's necessary.

[39:54] Tommy: But also, why not throw, yeah, you can also sing legit Rogers and Hammerstein.

[39:59] Jimi: Exactly.

[39:59] Tommy: And it is Rogers and Hammerstein especially is such a powerful and interesting choice.

[40:06] Jimi: And not that I mean, I haven't done vast research into Rodgers and Hammerstein's history, but I do think you can kind of page through their corpus of work and get a sense that they're about as racist as someone who's writing in the nineteen fifties and nineteen sixties is. You know?

[40:23] Tommy: We all saw psychic.

[40:25] Jimi: Right, exactly. Like you kinda you kinda get it. And it's not, you know it's not something to encourage, it's not something to be proud of and it is of its time. Yeah, and certainly they have a very white sound, which is problematic and I understand that that statement is problematic I want to name that but well it's why it's interesting. Yeah, just just on that point like I read an article recently that was talking about, in fact I think it was linked to us by one of our listeners when we were talking about Brownface and Droot and they were like wait till you see Otello and so I read about that and I was like holy smokes actually this is happening this is rife in the opera world.

[41:13] Jimi: Yes.

[41:14] Tommy: Right. Which is and then so it's basically just reading about how it's written for literally for white voices.

[41:22] Jimi: Right. Do you know what I mean, quote unquote. Like that is is how it's and that and it's so and I was like that doesn't make sense at all because that's implying that there's never been any opera singers of color.

[41:37] Tommy: Right.

[41:38] Jimi: Like that's not true.

[41:40] Tommy: Right.

[41:41] Jimi: Um but it does it does become self-fulfilling within its within the art form, right?

[41:46] Tommy: Exactly, exactly and so obviously Rodgers and Hammerstein are born out of that operetta world, so the songs that they are writing could nestle into that quite neatly they're seeped in the structure.

[41:59] Jimi: Exactly but it just goes to show that actually their music is very good because when you've got someone like Whitney belting it out it's actually it works perfectly fine and is still extremely enjoyable. And if you've got someone like Brandy singing a bit more tenderly it's still perfect nice, it might not be coloratura, you know, soprano.

[42:23] Tommy: Well and and I bet you Brandy could have. Like, that's the thing, right? Brandy's singing it how Brandy sings, and that's fine.

[42:32] Jimi: Yeah because everyone should sing how they sing. You know. There is like and it yeah, I find I find our conversations difficult because even our parlance of this discourse is seeped in some of the inherent racism that's in the world of musical theater in in the world of performance.

[42:52] Tommy: And so it's hard to talk about it without stepping in it a little bit.

[42:55] Jimi: Um but like everyone should be allowed to sing with their own natural voice. Like, if Carol Channing can sing how she sings Hello Dolly, then there is no right sound, quote unquote, for these things. And anything that implies or creates this is, you know, uh uh racist and gatekeeping in its existence.

[43:19] Tommy: And exactly this movie proves it.

[43:22] Jimi: And it fully proves it. It's really great for that reason.

[43:27] Tommy: Um also like it's just it's just lovely.

[43:31] Jimi: Oh, it's so good. It's really lovely.

[43:34] Tommy: Yeah, I rewatched it last night. I absolutely need to link it into the show notes because I think it is my magnum opus video I've ever made. But um I had a couple beverages with some friends on Musical Theatre Mash oh maybe half a decade ago now.

[43:48] Jimi: Um, and we watched this, and like it's it is the most egotistical thing to quote jokes that you've made in the past to your friends and still find them funny, and it is still something I do on a weekly basis from watching Brandy.

[44:05] Tommy: Well, there you go.

[44:06] Jimi: Yeah.

[44:07] Tommy: Do you want to give it a shout out right here for the the Musical Mash fans?

[44:11] Jimi: The let's see. What jokes do I enjoy the most? See now you put me on the spot and I can't think of any.

[44:17] Tommy: I know what one I would pick.

[44:18] Jimi: Which one's your favorite?

[44:22] Tommy: The Pastable.

[44:23] Jimi: I'm still on their um mailing list and they still send me marketing emails. When this video came out, I got a lot of very confused tweets from whoever runs this local pasta chain of restaurants in Chicago, Illinois. Why am I getting tweets about Cinderella and the video?

[44:41] Tommy: It's weird.

[44:42] Jimi: I'm surprised that they didn't get in touch, to be honest.

[44:44] Tommy: I know. I would I literally said Pastable call me and we'll work something out on the video.

[44:50] Jimi: Absolutely. They did have done a full yeah, a full parody. Every Musical Theatre Mash video after that would have been like this episode of Musical Theatre Mash is brought to you by the Pastable. Get twenty percent off.

[45:02] Tommy: Yeah, exactly. I'm doing a twenty percent discount of a file this month, guys. Just putting the code musical mash.

[45:10] Jimi: Um, yeah. I do want to talk about literally, um literally, not literally, specifically the adaptation because it's obvious it's not the exact same as the 57 Telecast.

[45:24] Tommy: Um and I think they did some interesting good things.

[45:29] Jimi: Yes. What I did find fun was there's actually a lot of homage in the Brandy version to the original telecast. So um the uh in my own little corner, I guess like the latter half of Emma Little Corner is literally like shot for shot, um Julia Andrew's Brandy and when she's climbing up the shooting stuff and that's it's lovely.

[45:54] Tommy: Yeah, that is lovely. I didn't even think about that, but it totally is with the staircase and the start like hiding at the same you know, I mean like the same kind of idea.

[46:00] Jimi: And it doesn't feel it feels like an homage. It doesn't feel like lazy direction.

[46:03] Tommy: Right, right. No. You know what I mean? 'Cause it's not like it's hugely deeply original.

[46:09] Jimi: And at the time well, I guess I wonder if when the fifty s the fifty seven one must have just been re-released by the time they were doing this.

[46:17] Tommy: Like they probably had seen it, but I think they found that recording in the late two thousands.

[46:22] Jimi: Oh really?

[46:23] Tommy: So it didn't. So they they didn't have the video.

[46:27] Jimi: Right? That's a good point. You know I'm sure it's a good idea. I'm sure there's production shots and stuff like it it isn't, you know, I wonder how 'cause it this was directed by Rob Marshall, so I wonder.

[46:29] Tommy: I know. I'm so curious about that.

[46:38] Jimi: If you know Rob Marshall, ask him.

[46:40] Tommy: Why the staircase?

[46:42] Jimi: Yeah, can you please ask him?

[46:43] Tommy: Yeah, don't add any clear spot. Just ask him.

[46:46] Jimi: Yeah, probably. That'd be weird.

[46:47] Tommy: That'd be so weird.

[46:48] Jimi: Um but no, so particularly I want to talk about um two of the new songs, um and kind of inverted commas new um because they're from the R and H catalogue.

[47:01] Tommy: New to the show.

[47:02] Jimi: New to the show, exactly. Um so they included uh The Sweetest Sounds, which is sung um it's a duet with Cinders and Christopher.

[47:13] Tommy: Yeah.

[47:14] Jimi: Um and uh like very nice like in its own right, it's just it's just nice. It's very like, oh I am I like this music in me kind of thing. You have Bernadette Peters, you wanna give her a song. You wanna give her another song if you can.

[47:27] Tommy: Like and then uh what I love is the the framing of Sweet Sounds at the start with the finale of There is Music in You and just that nice little tie that uh this idea of like you know, music and and singing uh is your like power, like that's your thing that you can latch on to and you know, move mountains.

[47:54] Jimi: Like I just really like that motif, yeah, um that they pulled because it's not like the sweet sounds and music in you are from the same thing.

[48:02] Tommy: Right.

[48:02] Jimi: Um I think music in you was written just for Mary Martin for a random movie.

[48:06] Tommy: Right.

[48:07] Jimi: Um but I love that they had that thought of bringing those two things together to create this motif, yeah.

[48:15] Tommy: Um which works really well for someone like Cinderella who you know uh is has her own little corner where she's singing her songs and living her fantasies, you know what I mean?

[48:27] Jimi: And it's all about like, yeah, that is a beautiful thing to celebrate. I just thought that was really yeah, it's very clear. Intelligent when it comes to adapting it because obviously they they could have just pulled any old thing from the songbook, um which they did do in 2013 that we'll obviously talk about in a little bit.

[48:46] Tommy: Um but I l I think there's just there's intelligence behind that, and also the fact that like there is music in you is the perfect finale for Cinderella.

[48:55] Jimi: Oh, it's great. It's perfect.

[48:56] Tommy: It's perfect.

[48:57] Jimi: Like it's insane how good that fits.

[49:00] Tommy: And I do wonder if like I get this sense about Rodgers and Hammerstein sometimes. I love their stuff. I really do enjoy it as much as I find some of it stodgy and some of it steeped in racism.

[49:11] Jimi: Um like it's it's clever and lyrical and easy to listen to, and it all kind of seems like you could just throw it all in a big bag, pick seven of them and make a musical out of it, you know.

[49:22] Tommy: I mean potentially, but like we're talking about a different it's a different thing.

[49:26] Jimi: It's a different age. I mean it's how that's how you wrote musical theater was just pick from your bag.

[49:31] Tommy: Um I don't know, I just think it I think it works surprisingly well. And what it does is um for the first time uh it's really given Cinderella a strong narrative.

[49:46] Jimi: Yeah, which is hard as opposed to just hard to do.

[49:48] Tommy: Yeah, yeah. Exactly. As opposed to just being the Cinderella story, it's now more focused on, well, let's see Cinderella as an individual.

[49:55] Jimi: Right.

[49:56] Tommy: And how like how is she making her decisions?

[49:59] Jimi: Yeah, what is causing her to make these decisions and you know, what is the result of her making these decisions.

[50:05] Tommy: Yeah.

[50:05] Jimi: Um, which I think is really great because not only, you know, are these young black girls seeing, oh my god, princess, but also seeing princess who is, you know, fully free thinker.

[50:18] Tommy: Fully fledged, yeah.

[50:20] Jimi: Exactly, exactly. And like powerful. It's all about like make your own destiny. Like you can do it.

[50:25] Tommy: Yeah.

[50:27] Jimi: And it does like I think they did that across the board with this adaptation.

[50:32] Tommy: Um, I think more so even than 57, just with some of the like, you know, minor book updates and even just some like staging and moment decisions from scene to scene about like mm making real human characters in what is a fairy tale.

[50:48] Jimi: Um I think, you know, it is it is perilous to try to adapt a fairy tale, especially something like Cinderella, you know.

[50:56] Tommy: You gotta have the slipper, you got she's gotta change an address.

[51:00] Jimi: Like, there's some things that have to be a part of the story, and they don't make a lot of sense.

[51:05] Tommy: Um because they're, you know, mistranslations and oral tradition passed down and appreciated.

[51:11] Jimi: But it's also the stuff that people are looking for when they come to see the thing.

[51:15] Tommy: Um we were talking about it when we watched it last night, like how ridiculous it is that no one recognizes Cinderella at all throughout the entire movie back and forth, like, you know, or that like Cinderella meets the prince at the beginning in the hat market before he's the prince and introduces herself and then he doesn't recognize her at all and she's at the ball.

[51:37] Jimi: Like then like she doesn't she doesn't recognize him really either as the peasant from the marketplace.

[51:46] Tommy: Yeah yeah yeah like and then you know maybe Bernadette Peters kind of recognizes her but the stepsisters sing a whole song like she's such a weird looking girl haven't seen anyone like her like you really have to and like no one thinks about this because it's well done like yes it's a fantasy world and we've staged it in this whimsical way to let you know this.

[52:07] Jimi: But to then like along with some of that stuff some of the more um you know uh impactful stuff is like we call we have the phrase evil stepmother for a reason.

[52:19] Tommy: Like it's a it's a it's a motif from this thing, right?

[52:24] Jimi: And the stepsisters and the stepmother get some moments in here that really humanize them and like really make it like you know when I was watching it last night there's a backstory you can build that like Bernadette Peters is I'm just gonna keep calling her Bernadette Peters um is so pissed that her biological daughters are these you know rolling idiots and her non-biological daughter is you know smart and clever and so has done all these things to set up her biological daughters for success and you know throw her stepdaughter under the bus and you know how did like you see her get frustrated with the you know how how dull some of her daughters' statements are um and like it's humanizing it doesn't it's very human it doesn't make her it does it makes her a little less evil she's still evil like she's still a bad person but well giving her some motivation there in a fairy tale in something that is you know as fluffy as sugar cake like that's a great thing to do it makes it interesting it makes it worth it.

[53:34] Tommy: Exactly, I think like I this is something I really appreciate about the R and H Cinderella is the inclusion of the song "A Lovely Night," which is when they all sing together as a family and remember the night that they just had. And obviously, it's in the '57, in the original it was like this fun back and forth where it was like, were you there? How do you know that's blah blah blah blah blah? Oh, and now the stepmother's joining in, and that's funny because she's so evil.

[54:04] Jimi: Yeah.

[54:04] Tommy: And this like it is a bit more because when I, I don't know, I guess just because it might just be because Bernadette and she's very talented, but you can see the switch. You can see her reminiscing about something that isn't just, oh, it was such a lovely ball. It was more like, oh, something in my past, love, it's, you know, I mean, etc.

[54:26] Jimi: Yeah.

[54:27] Tommy: Um, and then she has that moment where she realizes that it was Brandy.

[54:32] Jimi: Right.

[54:33] Tommy: And then she goes, she has evil incredible switch, so evil, and then has that really cut, I can't remember what she says, that really cutting speech on the stairs. It's so, and it's mean like this place is a die. And it's like, yeah, it just so like soul forced, and it's that in the '80s, it's that really human bitterness. It's not the classic Disney, you know, you're only lit in your eyes, evil.

[54:56] Jimi: Yeah, it is just very human.

[54:58] Tommy: I'm angry and I'm taking it out on you. Yeah, you know, I mean, it's that kind of thing. Um, and I love that because like you say, this is the Cinderella story, this is the frothy fairy tale.

[55:09] Jimi: Yeah, and even I noticed this time through, because I have discounted the lyrics as being kind of fluffy in the show, but it is in the DNA of the thing. Like some of the, you know, um, I think, uh, do I love you because you're beautiful? I'd never really like I've heard that song a thousand times, but I've never really listened to it.

[55:26] Tommy: Yeah.

[55:27] Jimi: What an honest, like love song. And I'm not counting, I'm not really expecting these two authors from the '50s to be like super girl power-y. Um, but the question, like, do I love you because you're beautiful, or are you beautiful because I love you, is such a gorgeous sentiment in a world where it could be like this amazingly gorgeous woman walked in and I was swept with her beauty, and like it's not what it's saying. You know, there are even like little quips in the whole thing where it's like you fell, you know, I think, uh, Paulo Montaban's, uh, Whoopi Goldberg and Victor Garber like asked the question, like, you fell in love overnight? That's ridiculous. Like, they lampshade some of the fairy tale things, um, in such a beautiful way.

[56:16] Tommy: Or even like, um, uh, the Stepsisters Lament, you know, right what a fellow like a girl like her. If you dive into those lyrics, it's very much like why would, why would he like such a, you know, she's nothing. She's a bubble. She's, you know, she could pop in a second. Um, not like, you know, uh, uh, oh, I'm so sad that she's more beautiful than me. Um, like there's an honest, acceptable frustration from the quote unquote evil stepsisters.

[56:48] Jimi: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[56:49] Tommy: Where they could have like been, and they do become mean, but they're not mean all the time. They're humans too.

[56:54] Jimi: They're still human, yeah, exactly.

[56:56] Tommy: There's still something behind it. It's not just classic fairy tale villain. Right.

[57:02] Jimi: That's all you are.

[57:03] Tommy: There is a backstory there. And like, um, they didn't need to, I think is my point. It's Cinderella. It didn't.

[57:10] Jimi: Right.

[57:11] Tommy: And they didn't in the '57.

[57:12] Jimi: Right.

[57:12] Tommy: They did in the '57. The Disney movie doesn't take any, you know, the evil stepsisters and the evil stepmother are evil, and they're just evil, and they're shitty people. Gus Gus has more character than them. You know what I mean?

[57:24] Jimi: It's true.

[57:26] Tommy: Yeah. Um, and that's what I think is really smart about this, is that they've just thought more about it and have just been able to be like, well, what story can we tell?

[57:37] Jimi: Sure.

[57:37] Tommy: Um, and I love that obviously Whitney has also had this idea of like, I want to paint a multicultural diverse picture here.

[57:47] Jimi: Yeah.

[57:47] Tommy: Um, put these people up in the, and it's so powerful. On ABC Family, uh, during prime time, telling a children's story. Like it was, I did a little bit of search and could find nothing. Um, I fully expected there to be something in 1997, you know, from some terrible paper or whatever that's like a black Cinderella? How dare they? And I couldn't.

[58:15] Jimi: Yeah, or just like, I see what you're doing.

[58:19] Tommy: Right. I couldn't find anything. I don't know if I didn't find the right corner, and I'm, but it makes me kind of happy that like it works.

[58:27] Jimi: Yeah, but it's just 'cause it's so unabashedly delightful, like there's nothing like there is nothing wrong with it. Oh, that they're not trying to paint any particular shortcuts, just no, no, no, this works.

[58:40] Tommy: It's also just a great movie from like the production design to like rewatching some of the special effects they do with the dress transformations for like 1997, man oh man, they are golden to like, you know, Whitney Houston flying around in their shimmery stuff.

[58:57] Jimi: Like the legs, but she can fly.

[59:00] Tommy: She can fly the CGI pumpkin. I do want to see the behind the scenes where like Whitney Houston standing on a skateboard that's some poor stage hand.

[59:04] Jimi: Yeah, that's literally what they just skateboard, but it was a truck that she was just riding on alongside.

[59:09] Tommy: I love that idea.

[59:10] Jimi: It's fantastic.

[59:11] Tommy: Very good. Um, no, it's, it is, it's really lovely. Um, I just want to put make one little last note, um, before we move on. Uh, so I take it you've never seen the My Little Pony movie.

[59:23] Jimi: I have not seen the My Little Pony movie, as you notice when I asked you about this when you put it in the show notes document earlier.

[59:30] Tommy: Exactly. If they ever did a live action.

[59:32] Jimi: Uh-huh.

[59:34] Tommy: I want those two stepsisters to play, um, Draggle and I can't remember the other one's name. Uh, but there's two, it's basically the same kind of construct of an evil witch and her two daughters or like young witches, and one is very, very tall and gangly, and one is a bit dumpier.

[59:54] Jimi: Um.

[59:54] Tommy: And they're just like really like crass, but have this really fun relationship with each other. Um, and these two would be perfect. So I'm excited for that to happen.

[1:00:08] Jimi: The live action My Little Pony movie.

[1:00:10] Tommy: By the way, the My Little Pony movie is really good.

[1:00:13] Jimi: I don't believe you.

[1:00:14] Tommy: We will have to cover it one day because it's a musical.

[1:00:18] Jimi: Okay, I'll put it on, put it on the list.

[1:00:21] Tommy: Maybe next week.

[1:00:23] Jimi: Typing sound, typing sound, typing sound.

[1:00:25] Tommy: Honestly though, it's real like it's the kind of thing, you know, have an edible stick it on, right? You'll have the time in your life. It's really good.

[1:00:36] Jimi: It's really good.

[1:00:40] Tommy: See, but now I don't like the setup of this 'cause now a bunch of people are gonna be in my Twitter being like, Tommy, you gotta watch this.

[1:00:47] Jimi: No, I don't think it was that popular.

[1:00:49] Tommy: Also it's really old. I think it's like seventies.

[1:00:53] Jimi: Really?

[1:00:54] Tommy: Oh, it's old My Little, 'cause there's new My Little Pony.

[1:00:57] Jimi: Oh no, it's not like 3D plays.

[1:01:00] Tommy: No, this is like, uh, OG I think it is it because like the main girl looks like she's, uh, kind of like hippie child.

[1:01:07] Jimi: Got it.

[1:01:08] Tommy: It's really good. I'm singing the song in my head right now.

[1:01:12] Jimi: That's, I'm sorry for you.

[1:01:14] Tommy: I'm not. I'm having the time of my life.

[1:01:17] Jimi: Quick! Jimi, hop in my time machine.

[1:01:21] Tommy: Are we going to My Little Pony Land?

[1:01:23] Jimi: I don't know what you're saying.

[1:01:24] Tommy: I was trying to think of another, uh, uh, like cinematic time machine as we traveled to 2013.

[1:01:29] Jimi: There will be one.

[1:01:30] Tommy: Or I just watched, uh, Endgame.

[1:01:34] Jimi: It doesn't make us end again, but yeah, we'll use that.

[1:01:58] Tommy: Or are you wonderful because I want you? Are you the sweet adventure stream as one time for...

[1:01:58] Jimi: Yes, so we're in 2013.

[1:02:37] Tommy: That was only seven years ago.

[1:02:39] Jimi: I know, it feels like... Actually, I say only.

[1:02:39] Tommy: I know.

[1:02:41] Jimi: That was a long time ago.

[1:02:41] Tommy: Even in when time moved at a normal speed.

[1:02:44] Jimi: Oh my god, seven years actually.

[1:02:46] Tommy: Yeah, that's crazy. I remember this.

[1:02:49] Jimi: That's wild.

[1:02:49] Tommy: Did 2013... I don't know if I made a Tony survival for this one, but this was right around the time when I was deeply into following the Tonies as an internet personality. Um, like I remember doing research about Cinderella. This was, ah, this was Pippin Year. This was Pippin, Drude, Annie, and Cinderella.

[1:03:10] Jimi: Wow.

[1:03:11] Tommy: Yeah, Jimmy made a long face, everyone listening via audio.

[1:03:15] Jimi: I did.

[1:03:16] Tommy: That's, yeah.

[1:03:19] Jimi: Yeah, I'm surprised.

[1:03:23] Tommy: Yeah. It's so, I agree. There is this weird disconnect in where I've decided these musicals happened as opposed to when they actually happened.

[1:03:31] Jimi: Like to me it was like three years ago.

[1:03:33] Tommy: Yeah, and then the non-revives were Kinky Boots, which one, Bring It On, Christmas Story, and Matilda.

[1:03:39] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:03:40] Tommy: Crazy Town.

[1:03:43] Jimi: Oh well.

[1:03:43] Tommy: There you go. That's, I mean that does that say something? It's timeless?

[1:03:47] Jimi: I, you know, maybe it is an interesting thought, and we can talk about it when we talk about the plot changes. But I do think Cinderella is such a nothing story at its core, right?

[1:03:57] Tommy: At this point, you know, um, because it is so trite, I think, and uh, isn't very, you know, like you're only good if you're married, women, right? It doesn't have the best morals, even at its deepest unpacking.

[1:04:12] Jimi: She has the beige of the Disney princess.

[1:04:14] Tommy: Yes.

[1:04:14] Jimi: Yes.

[1:04:15] Tommy: Um, and it's like all about like the, it's the quintessential princess story, I would argue. Um, and so, you know, it is an interesting question to ask. Like, does this music make it timeless? Does this, you know, this flavor of adaptation make it long lasting, or are we just stuck with Cinderella from now until the heat death of the universe?

[1:04:38] Tommy: Well, probably just because it was such an old story.

[1:04:40] Jimi: Right.

[1:04:40] Tommy: I was reading recently, like, there's like ancient China.

[1:04:43] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:04:44] Tommy: They have their own Cinderella story.

[1:04:45] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:04:46] Tommy: Ancient Greece, I think, had one too, like madness.

[1:04:49] Jimi: But love it.

[1:04:50] Tommy: Um, yeah, so hey, we're in 2013. It's on Broadway.

[1:04:54] Jimi: Wow.

[1:04:55] Tommy: My goodness.

[1:04:56] Jimi: For the first time.

[1:04:58] Tommy: Yeah. I don't know why it took so long to go to Broadway, because there were stick, you know, I mean, it wasn't like this will never be on a stage.

[1:05:09] Jimi: No.

[1:05:09] Tommy: It had to be an honest stage. Yeah, they were created like it had, they had made stage adaptations of it that were performed plenty.

[1:05:15] Jimi: Right.

[1:05:16] Tommy: I think it was even performed at like the Muni.

[1:05:18] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:05:19] Tommy: But not on Broadway.

[1:05:20] Jimi: But not on Broadway, and no one was like, oh, we'll transfer that. Really crazy.

[1:05:24] Tommy: Um, but hey, they decided that it was time. Um, and Douglas Carter Bean decided he was gonna write the book.

[1:05:34] Jimi: Um.

[1:05:34] Tommy: And he decided to mix it up yet again.

[1:05:40] Jimi: Yep.

[1:05:41] Tommy: Um, but I think what's quite cool is that like 1997 very much laid the foundations of this.

[1:05:52] Jimi: Yeah, it kind of paved the way, it started off being like this is a story about this girl Cinderella and how cool she is, you know what I mean?

[1:06:02] Tommy: And then 2013 was like, it is a story about Cinderella and how cool she is, and this is what makes her cool, and it just deep dives a little bit more into building Cinderella as a person, important, significant character.

[1:06:20] Jimi: Yeah, exactly.

[1:06:21] Tommy: Um, yeah, I think it's worth talking about the changes that they did for this one in terms of the score. There's a lot of them, and honest to fully frankly, Jimmy can keep them straight better than I can.

[1:06:47] Jimi: Um, but also quite interestingly, it's like this should have been in Cinderella. There's some that should have been in Cinderella.

[1:06:54] Tommy: Right.

[1:06:54] Jimi: So it opens with a new opening instead of "In My Own Little Corner" or the like the Brandy internet. Instead of that, it opens with Santino Fontana singing a song called "Me Who Am I," which was cut from our favorite musical, Me and Juliet. Know it by heart, I could tell you everything about it. Like, and it's such a shame that "Me Who Am I" was cut because, you know, that would just be good the icing on the cake.

[1:07:28] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:07:28] Jimi: Um, but basically it's just it's a song about being a prince fighting dragons and how awesome I am, yeah, kind of thing, um, but with a little bit for Lord. It's and it's quite an interesting, like decent enough I want song.

[1:07:42] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:07:43] Jimi: Um, it instantly it's like, oh, this is a different story because we're now looking at the prince.

[1:07:51] Tommy: Right, we're starting with a prince.

[1:07:52] Jimi: Really the first time that it's like we get to know the prince a bit more, because prior to this, I mean the 1957, he may as well not be there.

[1:08:03] Tommy: Right.

[1:08:03] Jimi: We barely and he's uh he's like the exciting incident for the whole damn show. But anyway.

[1:08:09] Tommy: Exactly.

[1:08:09] Jimi: Um, and then you know, uh it builds a little bit more Motorban in this very much he is a character. So we've got that one.

[1:08:18] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:08:19] Jimi: Um they've got "Now Is the Time." So this is in fact, like I'm just gonna run through what the story is. Yeah, because and it that will help you.

[1:08:29] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:08:29] Jimi: So if you haven't seen it, um, it's what I think you can buy the libretto go for it. It's its own unique thing. Um basically what um Douglas Carter being dead, uh was just I mean he's he can tell he's just like I want to write something for now. I want to write a contemporary story that has issues that people can relate to nowadays, which is you know, the very much the zeitgeist of Broadway writing at the moment, past ten years.

[1:09:04] Tommy: Um.

[1:09:04] Jimi: So what he's done, as well as diving more into Cinderella, he's also kind of decided to look at socialism. Um, why not?

[1:09:15] Tommy: Right, why not?

[1:09:16] Jimi: You know, baked in Cinderella's DNA of Cinderella is socialism. That's what the Grimms brothers are really talking about. Um, but yeah, so basically, um the prince, his parents are dead in this one, um, and there's kind of like a steward character um who sort of takes care of him and kind of runs the kingdom and the prince is sort of just the mouthpiece, just the mouthpieces, the face.

[1:09:39] Tommy: Um.

[1:09:39] Jimi: And he's about to be coronated and things like that. Um, so but you can tell quite early on that this steward guy is kind of got his own agenda, he gets the prince to sign off and stuff that the prince has not knows nothing about, blah blah blah blah. Um, and then there's a character called Jean Michel, who is uh sort of firebrand revolutionary um who wants to speak up for the people who haven't been heard and people have been apparently forced out their homes in this you know, insert kingdom name here. Um so Jean-Michel wants to speak to the prince, but the prince won't hear him because the steward guy is putting up this barrier, blah blah blah.

[1:10:22] Tommy: He also has this relationship, you can tell, with the Cinderella family.

[1:10:28] Jimi: Um and here's where the other major difference lies. Um, because uh we've still got the same format of stepmother, two stepsisters, Cinderella, but one of the stepsisters is kinda nice, it's kinda nice, even nicer than the 97 ones where they're just kind of nothing, like humane, yeah.

[1:10:47] Tommy: This one's genuine, like has nice moments where she has a redeeming thing, um, and also is involved in this kind of relationship with this Jean-Michel character.

[1:10:57] Jimi: Um, and yeah, so already there's a lot of this. There's a lot of new stuff. Um so that song that I was talking about before and "Now Is the Time" is kind of Jean-Michel's revolutionary number where he's trying to make a sort of call to arms to the people.

[1:11:14] Tommy: Yeah, um, but and I think quite intelligently they mash it up with the prince is giving a ball.

[1:11:22] Jimi: Um, and it is this idea of like, well, silence the revolutionary with all this pomp and circumstance, and they overlap it reasonably well for you know for literally two. Two different songs have the same songs being forced together. Um, but that was originally supposed to be in South Pacific.

[1:11:40] Tommy: Yeah, why um then with the stepsisters, we have a apostrophe placement change.

[1:11:51] Jimi: It's no longer stepsisters plural, it is stepsisters one. And again, I think I like it more.

[1:12:00] Tommy: Interesting.

[1:12:02] Jimi: Yes. Now like the Stepsisters of the Men as a duet is really good fun.

[1:12:08] Tommy: It's a ton of fun.

[1:12:10] Jimi: Um what this feels like is it feels like a sort of wash that man right out of my hair style RH female number.

[1:12:19] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:12:19] Jimi: Right? Where it's like really involved female chorus.

[1:12:24] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:12:25] Jimi: Um, like, yeah, it's it's it has that it's got like the many a new day vibe, but it's been sung by the stepsisters, so it's not like oh we're you know ingenues and romantic and it's all about love.

[1:12:39] Tommy: Right.

[1:12:39] Jimi: It's kind of all about love, but in a completely different way. And uh and that's what I quite love about it, because I'm like, well, that actually doesn't exist in the RH canon.

[1:12:48] Tommy: Yeah, like the comedy gal is always a soloist.

[1:12:52] Jimi: Right.

[1:12:53] Tommy: You know what I mean?

[1:12:54] Jimi: Um is that right?

[1:12:57] Tommy: Yeah, I'd have to look a little bit.

[1:12:58] Jimi: Yeah, Mr. Snow, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like all the like they have their song, right? Do you know what I mean?

[1:13:03] Tommy: And in the this time it was a duet, right?

[1:13:06] Jimi: But now as a chorus number, it just feels yeah, bit good, and again, it helps humanize the princesses a bit more, yeah, because it's like we're all on your side, right? We get you, we're singing along with you, yeah, kind of out.

[1:13:18] Tommy: So that's also different.

[1:13:20] Jimi: Then they've got the most random inclusion ever. With the song "He Was Tall."

[1:13:30] Tommy: It feels I like I wonder if we don't know enough about what happened here, you know?

[1:13:38] Jimi: Like, yeah, what was going on behind the curtain? Like even though they don't do that anymore. Like but yeah, this is it feels like, okay, this is a scene change. This is a covering. We can't get the song because they gotta, you know, we gotta mop up something or whatever.

[1:13:54] Tommy: Like Right.

[1:13:55] Jimi: Like, it's really weird. It's a very short song.

[1:14:00] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:14:00] Jimi: It was just the original opening to "Hello Young Lovers" from King and I that got cut.

[1:14:05] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:14:06] Jimi: Um and it means nothing. It does not admit. It literally is like the prince was tall.

[1:14:12] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:14:13] Jimi: That's that's that.

[1:14:15] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:14:16] Jimi: Very odd inclusion, and I would like to know the reason why. Like if that would be one of those things. I forgot to speak to Mr. Bean.

[1:14:22] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:14:22] Jimi: Uh I would say, what you playing that?

[1:14:26] Tommy: Right.

[1:14:26] Jimi: Or what's that got to say? Like, was there were there memos from R and H organization that were like, we'd like you to include at least five cut songs.

[1:14:35] Tommy: Or you know.

[1:14:36] Jimi: Yeah, exactly.

[1:14:36] Tommy: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:14:37] Jimi: Right. Like the and he's like, I'll just pick a short one and need to make records up. There is like so there is one interview with him, and he's like, this is the one I didn't tell anyone about, as if it's like oh my god, as he was tall thing from King and I. Like, no.

[1:14:52] Tommy: It is such a it's weird.

[1:14:55] Jimi: I do wonder, and it is because RH is is like pushing us to dabble into more of a an opera world. And then there is like there's a part of this discourse that we're not into people who came to see this show for the first time and didn't know what the changes were gonna be, were like, Oh, "Me Who Am I?" Oh man, me and Juliet. Like, I'm so excited that song gets some airtime. A Rogers and Hammerstein, great. Like, there are Rogers and Hammer stands.

[1:15:24] Tommy: Um.

[1:15:24] Jimi: But not to know the cut things from you know what I mean? Like you'd have to be deep stand for that.

[1:15:31] Tommy: Fair point.

[1:15:31] Jimi: Like it's not yeah, because it's not like it's a standard.

[1:15:34] Tommy: Right.

[1:15:35] Jimi: Quite the opposite. It's barely even it's not even really a full song in its original intention, right? Like the so literally the only thing I'm like, is this a nod to Into the Woods?

[1:15:47] Tommy: Huh.

[1:15:48] Jimi: How?

[1:15:48] Tommy: Right.

[1:15:49] Jimi: Um what's the song called?

[1:15:53] Tommy: Um, "He's a Very Nice Prince."

[1:15:55] Jimi: He was tall. Is that all he's tall?

[1:15:58] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:16:00] Jimi: Genuinely the only link I can see.

[1:16:04] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:16:04] Jimi: That'd be wild.

[1:16:06] Tommy: That's that's some like zodiac murderer shit, like, exactly.

[1:16:11] Jimi: Or like, yeah, I know, was like that much in love with Sondiam that he was like, Right. I don't know the reason. It's weird.

[1:16:19] Tommy: Anyway, um, they also brought back uh "Loneliness of Evening," um, which is uh Nabbi Pambi duet and they cut out um the sweetest sound and basically replaced it with this.

[1:16:38] Jimi: And I prefer the sweetest sound because of that. Because of the idea. Um this is just I mean it's nice.

[1:16:45] Tommy: Yeah, sure.

[1:16:46] Jimi: But it's Nabi Pambi.

[1:16:48] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:16:48] Jimi: Do you have that term?

[1:16:49] Tommy: Nabi Pambi?

[1:16:50] Jimi: I'm with you.

[1:16:51] Tommy: I don't know if I would use it in I would prefer to say fiddly fattily foodle, if we're being honest.

[1:16:57] Jimi: Well, we all would.

[1:16:59] Tommy: But you have to get right to say that.

[1:17:01] Jimi: So um and then obviously it finishes with the brand new finale of uh "There's a Musician New" which we know from is a wonderful choice.

[1:17:12] Tommy: Exactly.

[1:17:12] Jimi: So they're like the main changes.

[1:17:15] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:17:16] Jimi: Um and it is a very different beast. Wholly different show. Um and of course like that makes sense because it was written for television, right? You would want it to be as different as intentionally so.

[1:17:32] Tommy: Although I would say where these these changes don't seem entirely motivated by the form change, right? They're motivated by some like story updating.

[1:17:42] Jimi: It is just interesting because like no one would ever let you do this with Oklahoma.

[1:17:48] Tommy: R right?

[1:17:50] Jimi: Like to to play as fast and loose, like maybe uh Meet Me in St. Louis is and maybe is close to like this drastic of a change of poem, you know?

[1:18:01] Tommy: Um for m for the worst for St. Louis.

[1:18:04] Jimi: But it is also interesting because I enjoy some of the changes in the 2013 one. I think they add a new interesting thing, like a new interesting take on it. There is a humanization like it makes it feel a little less fluffy and a little more important while still letting the fluff exist.

[1:18:21] Tommy: But as we've discussed already at length, there's not a lot wrong with the ninety-seven version.

[1:18:27] Jimi: It's not terribly problematic or dated. I do wonder if the ninety-seven version presented in a two with a 2003 cast, which admittedly is not terribly diverse.

[1:18:38] Tommy: Um it's about as diverse as most Broadway shows of the day, which is very much not.

[1:18:42] Jimi: Um but and and so maybe that would lessen some of the joy and impact of the ninety-seven, but I think so.

[1:18:51] Tommy: I think like it it would make it it it's still quite fluffy.

[1:18:56] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:18:56] Tommy: Like ninety-seven is like Cinderella's a woman and you can do what you want.

[1:19:04] Jimi: You just need to make your dreams come true.

[1:19:05] Tommy: Right.

[1:19:05] Jimi: I mean, like that, like that theme is now in the thing.

[1:19:08] Tommy: Right.

[1:19:09] Jimi: Um, but that's all it is.

[1:19:11] Tommy: Right.

[1:19:11] Jimi: If if you're just reading it.

[1:19:13] Tommy: Right.

[1:19:14] Jimi: So I can see why they'd be like, we need to flesh things out.

[1:19:17] Tommy: And they do, like, the thing is is like the socialism thing isn't so left field.

[1:19:21] Jimi: Like they do integrate it into Cinderella's character.

[1:19:24] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:19:25] Jimi: Um, they have this thing where um towards the end uh basically Cinderella sets up the meeting between the prince and Jean-Michel, um, and she's like, This is a great thing that we need to do.

[1:19:39] Tommy: And John Mitchell, this is his calling, like, I need to be more than just fighting dragons, I wanna be like doing something and helping people.

[1:19:45] Jimi: And she's the kind of vehicle for that. And that's quite cool because it's that idea of like this would never have happened without Cinderella, and that's very empowering.

[1:19:55] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:19:55] Jimi: Because even in ninety-seven, yeah, there's none of that. There's n she the kind of all she does is has courage.

[1:20:02] Jimi: Right. And dreams, and then she gets them.

[1:20:05] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:20:06] Jimi: Whereas this is like she's actively active, basically. And I guess um I could see the like writer's room conversation when you're like, we want to infuse some kind of you know, discussion of an issue into Cinderella. Write all of them down on the board and let's start talking about 'em. It's like, well, we can't really unpack some of the like sexism or heteronormatism or you know, like uh preferences to marriage and like because they're so core to what are the key tenets of Cinderella for better or worse. Like you they're gonna get married at the end, right? They're gonna fall in love. You can't unpack that. So then what's left? Well, there is kind of a classism discussion going on here. Okay, how do we flesh that out? Boom. You've got the socialism line storyline.

[1:20:51] Tommy: Yeah.

[1:20:55] Jimi: Um and it's still like the main issues with it are is it's so broad strokes, yeah, that it's not like, wow, this is a commentary, like this is really like good. Um and there's loads of plot holes, but I think uh from the kind of bones that they had from 97 that was birthed like from the idea of 57, I think actually 2013 is probably the best they could have done.

[1:21:22] Tommy: Yeah, that's true.

[1:21:23] Jimi: Um and it's still enjoyable. It's still really lovely, and it is pure Fantasy.

[1:21:32] Tommy: Right.

[1:21:32] Jimi: It's still a fairy.

[1:21:37] Tommy: No.

[1:21:38] Jimi: And I guess like even like, you know, post the 2010s, we don't see a lot of just general like fairy tale taking itself seriously as a fairy tale. Like, there's a lot of, you know, whether you've got you're into the woodses, or even things like uh enchanted, um, like there's a lot of turning the fairy tale norm on its head, but there's not a lot of things that's like yeah, exactly. Like let's let's you know, flip this around and and make commentary using it. But there's not a lot of like we're just gonna tell little Red Riding Hood. We're not gonna put a whole you know, a horror spin on it, or make her live in New York, or you know, right?

[1:22:20] Jimi: Like and Cinderella's just Cinderella. They just they do their best to make it Cinderella while, you know, adapting what they can to make it not so feel like it it is from the eighteen hundreds.

[1:22:32] Tommy: Yeah, it'd feel like it's just like, well, I could have watched the Disney clock.

[1:22:34] Jimi: Right, exactly. Um so yeah, I totally appreciate what what they did um with it, and I think it's definitely still worth existing. And I don't know, like the next revival, is that gonna be different again?

[1:22:49] Tommy: Well like how does that how does that work? And there is um Isn't there a movie coming out or is that the ALW version?

[1:22:58] Jimi: So yes. We've got Angelo Weber's Cinderella Fast approaching on the horizon.

[1:23:04] Tommy: I know, run everyone, run.

[1:23:06] Jimi: The single worst art ever.

[1:23:10] Tommy: Single worst art ever.

[1:23:15] Jimi: Uh like I only know it's so bad because I've had to listen to Jimmy complain about it before.

[1:23:20] Tommy: It's so awful.

[1:23:24] Jimi: Like it makes something I'm trying to think of like a notoriously bad I'm thinking of my wall was really bad.

[1:23:30] Tommy: I don't know.

[1:23:31] Jimi: Someone like pearly.

[1:23:32] Tommy: Yeah, well, and there's just those like shows that like original pepper Pippen

[1:23:37] Jimi: Right.

[1:23:38] Tommy: Actually, no, it's decent.

[1:23:38] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:23:39] Tommy: They had typography.

[1:23:41] Jimi: This is pech.

[1:23:42] Tommy: Well, and it's pesh. Are they doing we're we're totally off base because this has nothing to do with the with Cinderella Rogers and Hammerstein version. It's just the same proto story.

[1:23:50] Jimi: Um but like so if you're in the artwork, Cinderella's like spray painting her dress on and it looks like an upside down heart or a butt.

[1:24:01] Tommy: Maybe.

[1:24:02] Jimi: It's a shoe.

[1:24:03] Tommy: Is it the shoe? Am I looking at the wrong Or is that the dress?

[1:24:06] Jimi: Oh no, that's the dress. Um it's just it's weird and stupid.

[1:24:11] Tommy: And like It looks like it was made on MSP.

[1:24:13] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:24:14] Tommy: And I do wonder, and like the font is stupid, but like the cat's logo is stupid too.

[1:24:18] Jimi: It's become iconic, but like, you know.

[1:24:20] Tommy: The cat's logo is fine.

[1:24:22] Jimi: I stop that.

[1:24:23] Tommy: Stop that, right?

[1:24:25] Jimi: The cat's logo is absolutely.

[1:24:26] Tommy: I had to get one in before the episode was over.

[1:24:28] Jimi: But I do wonder if we are seeing something reflected. Like are is it gonna be like Cinderella, but she does graffiti, you know, or like some who knows that's fancy old Fletcher and I'm done.

[1:24:42] Tommy: Did you see pitch?

[1:24:43] Jimi: Um you're rubbing off on me. Did I say did I use it right? Did I just use it right in the sentence?

[1:24:49] Tommy: Yes.

[1:24:54] Jimi: Excellent. Um yeah, it is pitch. I'm not excited for it.

[1:25:01] Tommy: Cause I'd much rather see this again.

[1:25:03] Jimi: Yeah.

[1:25:04] Tommy: Do sin I don't know I've literally not heard a single thing from the New Angelo Joe one, but I don't care.

[1:25:09] Jimi: Because I'd just rather have this.

[1:25:11] Tommy: I know it's gonna be better.

[1:25:15] Jimi: But hey.

[1:25:16] Tommy: You can still watch the ninety-seven Brandy and Whitney one.

[1:25:19] Jimi: So I'm not gonna do anything like this. Hurry up and get on Disney Plus though.

[1:25:23] Tommy: Come on now.

[1:25:23] Jimi: Michael is that Michael Eisner, are you listening?

[1:25:25] Tommy: Is that right?

[1:25:26] Jimi: He's the Disney guy.

[1:25:27] Tommy: Um He's the current Disney guy, I think.

[1:25:29] Jimi: Although there was some drama with that and they got fired. Disney Twitter is getting very close to musical theater Twitter these days, just in like followers' circles.

[1:25:35] Tommy: And I don't understand a lot of the words they use.

[1:25:39] Jimi: No.

[1:25:40] Tommy: Um, but either way, let's all retweet Brandy's tweet.

[1:25:45] Jimi: Let's make this happen. Imagine if it was us that did it.

[1:25:47] Tommy: I mean We tipped it over the edge.

[1:25:54] Jimi: Right?

[1:25:55] Tommy: We got Cloud.

[1:25:56] Jimi: We got something.

[1:25:57] Tommy: That's for sure.

[1:25:58] Jimi: We got to do that.

[1:25:59] Tommy: We have hey, Jimmy, it's possible.

[1:25:59] Jimi: It's possible.

[1:26:06] Tommy: Come on, join in.

[1:26:07] Jimi: I do enjoy like it's a song I enjoy. And no one has figured out how to do the little bit where the fairy godmother and Cinderella look at each other and just go, impossible.

[1:26:19] Tommy: Impossible.

[1:26:21] Jimi: Impossible.

[1:26:22] Tommy: Impossible.

[1:26:23] Jimi: Impossible.

[1:26:24] Tommy: Impossible.

[1:26:24] Jimi: Right?

[1:26:24] Tommy: I wish, like Well, it's better than what they did in 1957, which are just impossible.

[1:26:38] Jimi: Right.

[1:26:39] Tommy: Impossible.

[1:26:40] Jimi: Impossible.

[1:26:38] Tommy: Um I wish musically, like, if I were gonna give be giving show notes to Rogers and Hammerstein, I would say go back and intentionally re-syncopate them differently.

[1:26:51] Jimi: Cause right now, they're all uh they're written straight, right?

[1:26:56] Tommy: Impossible.

[1:26:56] Jimi: Impossible, impossible, like they're all on.

[1:27:00] Tommy: And make them all different.

[1:27:08] Jimi: Impossible.

[1:27:08] Tommy: Impossible.

[1:27:08] Jimi: Impossible.

[1:27:08] Tommy: Impossible.

[1:27:08] Jimi: Right?

[1:27:08] Tommy: Like, at least something, please.

[1:27:11] Jimi: I like it.

[1:27:13] Tommy: Thank you.

[1:27:14] Jimi: No, not yours.

[1:27:16] Tommy: The original.

[1:27:18] Jimi: Mine's Well, I say the original. I like Brandon Whitney Houston's version.

[1:27:22] Tommy: That's fair.

[1:27:23] Jimi: I just wish they did something other than look at each other and say impossible.

[1:27:26] Tommy: I wish I wish

[1:27:29] Jimi: Impossible.

[1:27:29] Tommy: Whitney, and I guess you don't like you don't want to give away that she does music or does magic.

[1:27:34] Jimi: Um too much.

[1:27:36] Tommy: Music.

[1:27:36] Jimi: What the heck's around the thing? It's been a long week. Um Whitney does. You don't want to give away that she does too much magic, because then there's the shock of like the mice turning into the thing and the you know, the pumpkin.

[1:27:45] Tommy: Right.

[1:27:45] Jimi: But it would be fun if like, you know, uh uh Whitney like snapped her fingers and a a candle lit, and Brandy went, impossible.

[1:27:56] Tommy: And Whitney went and like shrugged and was like, impossible, and then like, you know, did another magic thing and Brandy's like, Impo you know, like give give him something to do, instead of just like being on the other side of the table.

[1:28:08] Jimi: And it ruined the movie for me, let me tell you.

[1:28:11] Tommy: 2025 revival. Directed by us Cadills.

[1:28:15] Jimi: Cadills and snaps.

[1:28:16] Tommy: But just that scene, just that moment.

[1:28:18] Jimi: Rob Marshall call us.

[1:28:19] Tommy: That's the only thing that everything else will keep me saying.

[1:28:21] Jimi: Now you can go wherever you want to go.

[1:28:29] Tommy: Now you can do whatever you want to do.

[1:28:37] Jimi: Now you can be whatever you want to be.

[1:28:45] Tommy: And now under the song you will sing Lie in the sky.

[1:29:37] Jimi: Tommy.

[1:29:39] Tommy: That was Cinderella.

[1:29:40] Jimi: I'm glad we got it finished.

[1:29:41] Tommy: It stuff feels weird to say.

[1:29:44] Jimi: I do.

[1:29:45] Tommy: It is, and it's a line in the brandy version.

[1:29:47] Jimi: I don't think it's in the 57.

[1:29:50] Tommy: But uh, she meets the prince in the hat market and introduces herself and says, My name's Cinderella. I like to sit by the fire and play with the ass.

[1:30:01] Jimi: And like at least in the in the 13 one, they call her Ella, and it's like a nickname.

[1:30:07] Tommy: And like, we we get it.

[1:30:09] Jimi: But it's like the implication in the 97 one is that her her parents named her Cinderella and then later learned that she liked playing in the Cinders.

[1:30:23] Tommy: Well, I get I mean, or maybe just as a baby, she just kept walking towards the fire, and they were like, Oh wait, she loves this.

[1:30:30] Jimi: It's also a part that never really, you know.

[1:30:33] Tommy: You never really see her.

[1:30:34] Jimi: I guess she does sit by the fire in her own little corner in her own little room, but she doesn't really talk about it.

[1:30:39] Tommy: Anyway, I've got a quiz question for you.

[1:30:42] Jimi: Thank you.

[1:30:43] Tommy: What is it?

[1:30:45] Jimi: Our next episode features the latest outing of a composer who's been referred to as God in their past.

[1:30:52] Tommy: What could it be?

[1:30:54] Jimi: Asterisk, the composer is not Stephen Sunday one sundi.

[1:31:01] Tommy: Not yet.

[1:31:02] Jimi: Although I do love that one, but that're not doing that.

[1:31:03] Tommy: Um Sunday Mon Sunday.

[1:31:04] Jimi: Yeah, yeah.

[1:31:05] Tommy: That's great.

[1:31:06] Jimi: That's a great song.

[1:31:06] Tommy: Anyway, hey, if you want to get in touch with us, you absolutely can.

[1:31:12] Jimi: Uh our show, Twitter, and Instagram is at Jim and Tomic. That is J-I-M-A-N-D-T-O-M-I-C.

[1:31:18] Tommy: Uh or you can drop us an email on our website at Jim and Tomic.com.

[1:31:22] Jimi: And while you're there, you can check out our Patreon if you want to financially support the show. Thank you to our uh many new patrons who are joining us.

[1:31:29] Tommy: Um also, if you're interested, we are adding another tier to our Patreon.

[1:31:34] Jimi: Five dollars.

[1:31:34] Tommy: We're getting active excited.

[1:31:38] Jimi: Um Jimmy and I are uh video recording the podcast. We're not gonna release the whole thing because that's just too much.

[1:31:43] Tommy: But we are going to pull some clips of stuff that may or may not that probably didn't make the final cut.

[1:31:48] Jimi: Um that literally won't have made the final cut.

[1:31:51] Tommy: And the only way you can see it is uh behind this tier on Patreon.

[1:31:54] Jimi: So if that's the sort of thing that jazzes you up and you're interested in, check out that tier and uh uh and you can see those clips.

[1:32:01] Tommy: Yes, indeed, but hey, if you want to support us in any other way, then reviews over an Apple Podcast are still super duper helpful.

[1:32:08] Jimi: Or you can just tell your friends, but our biggest growth is by word of mouth.

[1:32:13] Tommy: You know, you tweets about us are so adorable um and so wonderful and like we'd uh it makes me so happy whenever people are like you know, retweeting like I'm looking for a new podcast.

[1:32:24] Jimi: Hey, check out this one. Thank you all for doing that.

[1:32:26] Tommy: Yeah, exactly. It's really really nice.

[1:32:27] Jimi: And honestly as well, keep sending us emails.

[1:32:30] Tommy: I really love the email.

[1:32:31] Jimi: Yeah, it's a fun way.

[1:32:32] Tommy: Fun way to pass the time.

[1:32:35] Jimi: Exactly, exactly.

[1:32:36] Tommy: And hey, that's all for this week.

[1:32:38] Jimi: Thank you for listening.

[1:32:39] Tommy: Cheers!

[1:32:58] Jimi: That is a terrible sonic experience.

[1:33:02] Tommy: Ah Metal Straw though.

[1:33:08] Jimi: Looks like you're calling us in for dinner.

[1:33:11] Tommy: What is that?

[1:33:11] Jimi: Have you seen that carroting?

[1:33:16] Tommy: I didn't know what you're talking about until you started to do it.

[1:33:18] Jimi: Woo!