It can safely be said that when literary texts are utilized or adapted by a musician to create a new work of art, it is seldom that a diminished or lessened product results. Rather, such a merging usually enlarges & enhances both text and tune. These essays offer an analysis of several adaptations, and attempt to assess just what the musicians or writers have modified or changed from to the original as they re-form it into an altogether different media.
The Oxford Handbook of Musical Theatre Screen Adaptations traces how the genre of the stage-to-screen musical has evolved, from The Jazz Singer to The Wizard of Oz, Roberta, and Into the Woods.
It can safely be said that when literary texts are utilized or adapted by a musician to create a new work of art, it is seldom that a diminished or lessened product results. Rather, such a merging usually enlarges and enhances both text and tune, perhaps significantly changing the message of the original. Discovering exactly what the new form has to offer and how it relates to the text or melody that preceded it is often a daunting task, requiring a close examination of both the author’s and the composer’s intent. The essays in this collection offer an analysis of several adaptations, some successful, some not so successful, and attempt to assess just what the musicians or writers have modified or changed from to the original as they re-form it into an altogether different media. Ranging from Pasternak’s appropriation of Tchaikovsky to Britten’s operatic versions of Billy Budd and the Turn of the Screw, from Celan’s use of fugal technique in his “Todesfuge” to the way that the musicianship of several women writers found voice in their writing, a broad spectrum of collaborations is examined. As readers examine an author’s respect for a long dead musician (Hopkins’ admiration of Purcell) or as they discover how John Harbison worked to transform Fitzgerald’s musicality in The Great Gatsby, it will be evident that musical adaptations often provide a richness that the originals did not possess and that the potential for greatness is heightened when the arts intersect.
Based on the musical that inspired the Netflix film starring Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, Kerry Washington, Keegan-Michael Key, James Corden, Andrew Rannells, and Ariana DeBose! Emma Nolan and Alyssa Greene share the same goal: debut as a couple at their senior prom. Only a few things stand in their way—okay, maybe more than a few. For one, Alyssa hasn’t come out yet. It’s not that she doesn’t want to, but with a mother on the PTA who will stop at nothing to prevent same-sex couples from attending prom, it’s not a conversation she’s eager to have—with good reason. Before long, Mrs. Greene has the entire town backing her up, and it’s starting to look as though Emma and Alyssa won’t get their happily-ever-after. Then, out of the blue, two Broadway stars arrive on the scene to fight on the girls’ behalf (and get a little publicity along the way). But when their good intentions fall flat, it’s up to Emma and Alyssa to take matters into their own hands and show their small Indiana town—and the world—that love is love is love. ENGLISH DESCRIPTION Based on the musical that inspired the Netflix film starring Meryl Streep, Nicole Kidman, Kerry Washington, Keegan-Michael Key, James Corden, Andrew Rannells, and Ariana DeBose! Emma Nolan and Alyssa Greene share the same goal: debut as a couple at their senior prom. Only a few things stand in their way—okay, maybe more than a few. For one, Alyssa hasn’t come out yet. It’s not that she doesn’t want to, but with a mother on the PTA who will stop at nothing to prevent same-sex couples from attending prom, it’s not a conversation she’s eager to have—with good reason. Before long, Mrs. Greene has the entire town backing her up, and it’s starting to look as though Emma and Alyssa won’t get their happily-ever-after. Then, out of the blue, two Broadway stars arrive on the scene to fight on the girls’ behalf (and get a little publicity along the way). But when their good intentions fall flat, it’s up to Emma and Alyssa to take matters into their own hands and show their small Indiana town—and the world—that love is love is love.
Broadway productions of musicals such as The King and I, Oliver!, Sweeney Todd, and Jekyll and Hyde became huge theatrical hits. Remarkably, all were based on one-hundred-year-old British novels or memoirs. What could possibly explain their enormous success? Victorians on Broadway is a wide-ranging interdisciplinary study of live stage musicals from the mid- to late twentieth century adapted from British literature written between 1837 and 1886. Investigating musical dramatizations of works by Charles Dickens, Charlotte Brontë, Christina Rossetti, Robert Louis Stevenson, and others, Sharon Aronofsky Weltman reveals what these musicals teach us about the Victorian books from which they derive and considers their enduring popularity and impact on our modern culture. Providing a front row seat to the hits (as well as the flops), Weltman situates these adaptations within the history of musical theater: the Golden Age of Broadway, the concept musicals of the 1970s and 1980s, and the era of pop mega-musicals, revealing Broadway's debt to melodrama. With an expertise in Victorian literature, Weltman draws on reviews, critical analyses, and interviews with such luminaries as Stephen Sondheim, Polly Pen, Frank Wildhorn, and Rowan Atkinson to understand this popular trend in American theater. Exploring themes of race, religion, gender, and class, Weltman focuses attention on how these theatrical adaptations fit into aesthetic and intellectual movements while demonstrating the complexity of their enduring legacy.
This handbook offers students and researchers compact orientation in their study of intermedial phenomena in Anglophone literary texts and cultures by introducing them to current academic debates, theoretical concepts and methodologies. By combining theory with text analysis and contextual anchoring, it introduces students and scholars alike to a vast field of research which encompasses concepts such as intermediality, multi- and plurimediality, intermedial reference, transmediality, ekphrasis, as well as related concepts such as visual culture, remediation, adaptation, and multimodality, which are all discussed in connection with literary examples. Hence each of the 30 contributions spans both a theoretical approach and concrete analysis of literary texts from different centuries and different Anglophone cultures.
One of the most beloved film musicals of all time, The Wizard of Oz represents an enduring family favorite and cultural classic. Yet there is much more to the story than meets the eye, and the MGM movie is just one of many ways in which it has been represented. In this lively and wide-ranging book, editors Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh bring together insights from eleven experts into the varied musical forms this great American myth has taken in the past century. Starting with the early adaptations of L. Frank Baum's story, the book also explores the writing, composition and reception of the MGM film, its importance in queer culture, stage adaptations of the movie, cult classic The Wiz, Stephen Schwartz's Broadway blockbuster Wicked, and the cultural afterlife of the iconic Arlen-Harburg songs. What emerges is a vivid overview of how music - on stage and screen - has been an essential part of the story's journey to become a centerpiece of American culture.
What does it mean to author a piece of music? What transforms the performance scripts written down by musicians into authored books? In this fascinating cultural history of Western music’s adaptation to print, Kate van Orden looks at how musical authorship first developed through the medium of printing. When music printing began in the sixteenth century, publication did not always involve the composer: printers used the names of famous composers to market books that might include little or none of their music. Publishing sacred music could be career-building for a composer, while some types of popular song proved too light to support a reputation in print, no matter how quickly they sold. Van Orden addresses the complexities that arose for music and musicians in the burgeoning cultures of print, concluding that authoring books of polyphony gained only uneven cultural traction across a century in which composers were still first and foremost performers.
A Theory of Adaptation explores the continuous development of creative adaptation, and argues that the practice of adapting is central to the story-telling imagination. Linda Hutcheon develops a theory of adaptation through a range of media, from film and opera, to video games, pop music and theme parks, analysing the breadth, scope and creative possibilities within each. This new edition is supplemented by a new preface from the author, discussing both new adaptive forms/platforms and recent critical developments in the study of adaptation. It also features an illuminating new epilogue from Siobhan O’Flynn, focusing on adaptation in the context of digital media. She considers the impact of transmedia practices and properties on the form and practice of adaptation, as well as studying the extension of game narrative across media platforms, fan-based adaptation (from Twitter and Facebook to home movies), and the adaptation of books to digital formats. A Theory of Adaptation is the ideal guide to this ever evolving field of study and is essential reading for anyone interested in adaptation in the context of literary and media studies.
