The Happiest Corpse I've Ever Seen : The Last Twenty-Five Years of the Broadway Musical

Rating:
Summary: Even Cream of Wheat Has Lumps
Review: After giving us the glittering view of the past, Ethan turns his jaundiced eye on the last twenty-five years. To think that my three well worn copies of Titanic and the LaChiusa shows Marie Christine and the Wild Party were not merely the delusional preferences of some over weening musical fiend. My loathing for Andrew Lloyd-Weber and the other British spectacles has someone who gets to use gallons of ink to dispense the gall and vitriol I have ladled to friends and family. This book will not soothe the spirits of those who prefer the anodyne to the cerebreal. The last twenty five years of the musical have seen a dimunition of taste concomittant to the dimunition of the culture in general. The one criticism which dares not speak its name in this book is that the musical has become as unlikely a form of entertainment to the masses today as opera. Not every review in the book is resonable, but mostly every brickbat thrown lands on a well deserved target. As a baby boomer who grew up in the sticks and still sees the tours and rarely the original casts, his criticism rings true to someone whose closest tie to a show is the compact disc. Just as folks over fifty need a colonoscopy, an unpleasant procedure, musical lover should read this book. Some time the truth hurts, but only for a little and only the first time. Funny, engrossing, but not well edited. Patti Lu?? With all the manure being shoveled around couldnt the editor spring for the PONE?? A minor quibble.

Rating:
Summary: All that is wrong with the modern musical theatre
Review: Ethan Mordden had been attending Broadway shows since the mid 1950s. He has been writing intelligently about musical theatre ever since his first book on the subject, BETTER FOOT FORWARD, in 1977.

His recent series covering the musicals decade by decade comes to a fitting close with the aptly named THE HAPPIEST CORPSE I'VE EVER SEEN.

Mordden is not a writer for people looking for an introduction or overview. He demands that his readers have good familiarity with the shows he is talking about, as well as a decent grasp of the English language. (This appears to have frustrated some readers who have given the book less than favorable reviews here.) if you don't know teh shows he is talking about, get to your library and check out the cast album and the script.

The period covered is 1980 to the present. No one will ever mistake this time as Broadway's golden years. Intelligent, richly textured shows endure limited runs while the public flocks to see (multiple times, it appears) CATS (a musical that won a Tony for "best book" even though it has no book!)

The author takes us through the few good shows (GRAND HOTEL, TITANIC, THE WILD PARTY, SWEET SMELL OF SUCCESS, AMOR)plus a handful of other notable shows (SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE, PASSION, STEEL PIER, A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE, RAGTIME) along with some that while not great were at least entertaining (LA CAGE AUX FOLLES, WOMAN OF THE YEAR, THE PRODUCERS, CRAZY FOR YOU.) But he spends a good deal of time blasting what he calls "the new stupidity." Stupid shows (AIN'T BROADWAY GRAND), Stupid awards (like naming CONTACT the year's Best Musical when CONTACT is a dance show set to pre-recorded songs and not in any way shape or form a 'musical') and stupid audiences flocking to see stage adaptations of familiar movies (FOOTLOOSE), pop song catalogues recycled (MAMMA MIA), badly done revivals (take your choice), and empty specatcles (CATS.)

You may not always agree wth his opinions, and that is fine. good writing should challange you. And very few Broadway shows do that anymore.

Rating:
Summary: Poorly Edited and Often Non-sensical
Review: Ethan Mordden's editors have allowed him to ruin what could possibly have been a good book. This is the worst of his books on the various decades of the Broadway musical as the faults of the seventies book have widened into gulfs. His political ramblings (often just slightly right of Ann Coulter and making as much sense) seep through the book, dragging it down. The French people are slammed a number of times, along with the ACLU, Burt Lancaster (apparently, according to Ethan a good friend of Stalin) and the left in general, while the author defends Bush (and it does take some looking back over the page to figure out how he fits all this into a book on musical theatre). The author's train of thought wanders like a bitter old man all over the page in search of a target, any target. It is often hard to stomach. The truly sad fact about this is that the author often has quite cogent things to say about a particular musical and when he does stick to that, it can actually make one want to look at the work again. An editor should have cleaned the work up before before allowing it on stage to greet its public. The author is capable of better work.

Rating:
Summary: With the emphasis on "corpse"
Review: For over a decade, Ethan Mordden has been chronicling the American Musical decade by decade-one book per each(although not necessarily writing them in chronological order) so that, with one notable exception discussed below, he has created nothing less than the definitive history of an American Art Form. Always opinionated, endlessly entertaining, the books have been about joy and they have spread it. Until now. Mordden sees the last quarter century of musicals as nothing less than a betrayal of all that has gone before... and he just may be right! To be sure, he finds some bright spots along the way. These, however, appear more and more to be like the stopped clock that is right twice a day! He, and I think most afficienados would agree, feels that the American Musical today is in the hands of hacks and it ain't gonna get better. The why, you may well ask, read this? Because it is so damned much fun! Wit and intelligence bounce from every page so that we realize that, in the proper hands, even a diatribe can be immensly entertaing! Books in the series published thus far cover the 20's, 40's, 50' 60's, 70's and this latest. Mordden WILL be covering the 30's in his final volume. One gets the impression that he held off so that his final work could return to his feeling of love for the art.

Rating:
Summary: Very disappointing end to the Decades Series...
Review: Fortunately, there is one more book forthcoming in Ethan Mordden's invaluable decade-by-decade chronicle of The Broadway Musical (the 1930's book will be out in '05). Fortunate because the current volume is a huge let-down in comparison to the earlier books. It had seemed, prior to this book, that Mordden's over-arching theory about the end of The Golden Age of Broadway Musicals in the late 1970s was part of a larger deep encompassing theory about Broadway's relevance to popular culture. Now, he reveals that his theory is simply that what he calls the "New Stupidity" was enough to kill Broadway. In his opinion, people have now become too uncultured and simple for the sophisticated pleasures of Broadway. He goes on for pages illustrating this "New Stupidity," evidenced by such things as a copy editor refusing to fix a mistakenly identified song title because everyone will know what he means (that's "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" instead of "Over the Rainbow.") Meanwhile, the book itself, like the other books in the series is sadly full of its own mistakes (example: he describes Arthur Freed's talent as a composer as "unenterprisingly tuneful in tonic-dominant harmony," on pg 38; Freed, however, as a friend of mine pointed out, was a lyricist). This simply disproves his own point about the New Stupidity. It's not that we're stupider now--everyone, even the most knowledgeable of us, makes mistakes. The problem is that Broadway became irrelevant to the literate and sophisticated folks too. They still exist, but they're staying home to watch Six Feet Under instead of slapping down $300 for two tickets to Dance of the Vampires.

The fact is, it is always tempting to say that a time in the past was smarter, more virtuous, etc., but it's almost always disproved by time. Even in the beloved Golden Age, a great deal of what might easily be called dreck held national attention.

Mordden also allows his right-wing politics to sloppily spill into his discussions of several shows, getting somewhat fanatical in chastising Ragtime for its support of terrorism. Yes, terrorism. Well, maybe it's not the worst point in the world, but it's a little fanatical. As is much of the book.

He also says Marie Christine's score is on a par with Company's and that the NY Philharmonic concert of Sweeney Todd may qualify as the best revival of a show in history. Many of us will disagree. And isn't it a little disproportionate to chastise Ragtime's support of terrorism but reserve no similar judgment for Sweeney's turning of his razor on the necks of all of London?

Also, the omissions here seem particularly notable. Mordden spills more than a little ink on the modest My Life With Albertine, but renders hardly two sentences (and no critique) on the comparably small show of Jason Robert Brown's, The Last Five Years, considered by many to be one of the best new musicals to see New York in the last decade.

Still, it is valuable to have Mordden's take on this final era of the genre, and despite its disappointments, it makes for an interesting read for Broadway fans.






Rating:
Summary: (Mostly) disappointing and depressing
Review: I had read Mendelbaum, and I'd read Scott Miller, and yes, even the Banfield Sondheim book, so when I finally got an Ethan Mordden book for Christmas, I was hoping that this famous chronicler of the musical would have something new and interesting. Unfortunately, if there is anything new or interesting about Mordden's writing, it's not likely found in this unstructured, sometimes incoherant book. He presents his often off-the-wall opinions as facts, and I feel sorry for anyone picking up this for the first time and thinking that it should be taken at face value. (Is Marie Christine, the show that even Audra McDonald couldn't save, really the most important new show in 25 years? And why is the heartbreaking and beautiful Floyd Collins dismissed in a paragraph as "not as good as Violet"?)

Furthermore, Mordden insults his audience so much as being stupider than him that the factual and textual errors are absolutely unforgivable. Example: Twyla Tharp's dance show "Movin' Out" is called, incorrectly, "Movin' On" not once but TWICE on the SAME PAGE. I guess you're not as smart as you thought, huh, Ethan?

Overall, I'd steer anyone looking for a decent chronicle of musicals away from this book, especially if you are not already well-read on the subject. Perhaps Mordden's other books are better, but I probably won't buy any after this load of rubbish. Try Ken Mendelbaum, who actually respects the art form and his audience.. For all our sakes.

Rating:
Summary: Mordden cycle comes to inadequate end
Review: I have followed Ethan Mordden's journey through the Broadway musical with great interest and relish. He is a writer of wit and smarts and has the capacity to bring forgotten masterpieces to life on the page.

Why then is this final instalment riddled with agressive and irrelevant snipes at "the Left"? It's as if he wants to draw some link between the decline of the musical in cultural terms with what he calls the "moral relativism" of American liberals, but his subject matter consistently lets him down. He is unable to make the case, so he resorts to unworthy sniping instead. If it's nlot relevant, leave it out.

What is it with Broadway commentators? Mark Steyn too tries to square his reactionary politics with his love for perhaps the DEFINITIVE expression of American Liberal Art - the Broadway Musical.

It leaves a sour taste in the mouth. I will read his 30s instalment when published next year, but I find myself already armed with intellectual "pre-emptive strikes" against what he may conclude about the work of, say, Marc Blitzstein.

Ugly.

Rating:
Summary: One of the most frustrating reads in quite some time
Review: I reviewed this book for Talkin' Broadway [...] I have never been so frustrated reading a book as I was reading this one. While there is no doubt that Mordden is a knowledgeable aficionado of Musical Theater, he also comes across as bigoted, hypocritical and even homophobic (and considering that he is a gay man himself, this is more than a little appalling).

When he sticks to simply writing about the shows, he can be clear and incisive. At those moments he ranks with the best writers of theatrical criticism. Then on a dime he will sideswipe the reader with an absurd blanket statement, such as dismissing "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" and "Bat Boy" due to the fact that "...the farther we get from shows with a valid role for Barbara Cook, the farther we get from what is enjoyable" yet extolling Michael John LaChiusa's "Hello Again" and "Marie Christine" or William Finn's "Falsettos," neither of which contain roles truly suitable for Cook. Comments like "...those who truly love the musical - basically gay men and Frank Rich..." and "The Full Monty tells of married couples and teaches homo tolerance" go beyond eye-rolling into purely offensive. And the inclusion of "The Tap Dance Kid" into a chapter entitled "Why Can't Susan Smith and Timothy McVeigh Have a Musical? Hitler Has One" that explores shows like "Capeman" and "Assassins" is even worse (and including "Movin' Out," constantly called "Movin' On," and "The Full Monty" into a chapter on musicals on the disenfranchised, since he believes that the white working-class male is a minority due to actions by "... special interest groups, lone-ranger spoilers and the ACLU [that] make war on everything from the Pledge of Allegiance to Christmas..." is just plain head-scratchingly wrong.

Most disturbing of all, however, is a frothing rant against "Ragtime" that ends the chapter. While it is perplexing that Mordden can consider "Ragtime" an exultation of terrorism due to Coalhouse's targeting of firehouses but can equate the `losers' in Assassins with "Islamists killing the symbol of the success they can not have," his statement that "Ragtime" "reveals how slavishly Broadway buys snake oil from the wreckers and stooges of the hard left" belongs more in a treatise by Rush Limbaugh or Bill O'Reilly than in a critical essay on an art form.

Rating:
Summary: Bitter and Cranky
Review: Mordden's other musical history books are so informative and entertaining. This one is angry, bitter, cranky, condescending, and not terribly well written. The book's organization is messy at best, his right-wing politics needlessly intrusive, and his opinion of current musical theatre offensive and closed-minded. In fact, the musial theatre is healthier, more exciting, more inventive than at almost any other time in history. At what other time did we have brilliant experiments like Urinetown, Bat Boy, Songs for a New World, The Last Five Years, Avenue Q, A New Brain, Euphoria, Dream True, A Light in the Piazza, etc.? Mordden is just a fuddy-duddy who can't see what a glorious time this is for the art form.