Today, I am blogging about the “Trying Out” Realm. I was thinking about the music that we could use for this realm, if we ended up deciding that we definitely wanted to do that. Last week as James and I were brainstorming this realm, we came up with the scenario of a talent scout being caught into a real audition, mistaken as aun actor. He was completely unprepared and forced into audition for an impatient director. He was humiliated, and experienced what a lot of the actors that he works to find experience every day, rejection.
So, whilst brainstorming some music in lyrics, I came up with a few ideas. In the reading, “Building Dialogue, Lyrics, and Choreography,” it talks about the thoughts of the “victim” and the thoughts of the “bystander.” Example used for the Victim being, “I’ve got a right to be here, why are you bothering me? I was minding my own business, I didn’t ask for this.” And an example for Bystander being, “They’re just arguing, there’s nothing I can do. If I don’t say anything, It’s like saying it’s okay.”
This is what I see happening in the realm. The Scout would be the Victim in this scene, and the Director is the Bystander.
Director: Take it from me, it’s a dirty world. It’s a biting bee.
Scout: Take it from me, they’ll spit you up, to watch you bleed.
Director (or duet): Don’t look so doomed. Let ‘em do, what they came to do.
It’s a very indirect and poetic way of explaining the situation, and with any music for a musical, the less Disney, the more powerful it’s going to be. So, I really like the idea of using underscoring throughout the play, and making the actual songs intense and memorable. I have a song I’d like to tweak, and change the lyrics around a bit for this show. But, I definitely see it working.
Hi Grace,
ReplyDeleteI agree very much with making the songs intense. I think the "disney-fication" is a sticky issue due to the sports topic. Sports, like Disney, is very commercial. There's a kind of world that these industries sell that's profitable, enticing, and spectacular. Playing against these qualities with a musical is a noble goal. And it's interesting in terms of where we are placing ourselves in the entertainment market. We are low budget, we are academic, small audience. I don't think that the small list of adjectives I just made necessarily contradicts the list I made for Disney and sports, it will be interesting negotiating that line in the actual production.