FEATURE:
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IN THIS PHOTO: Jordan Dobson (left) as Prince Sebastian and Linedy Genao as Cinderella in the musical, Bad Cinderella, at the Imperial Theater in Manhattan/PHOTO CREDIT: Sara Krulwich/The New York Times
Empowering Feminist Broadway Musicals and the Role of Modern Pop
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I was struck by a feature…
IN THIS PHOTO: Lauren Zakrin (second from left) as the Little Mermaid gets her voice back upon reading The Feminine Mystique in Once Upon a One More Time/PHOTO CREDIT: Sara Krulwich/The New York Times
from The New York Times. It relates to music but is more concerned with Broadway musicals. It got me thinking about feminist music and whether there are many examples in the modern Pop market. I am going to sample quite heavily from the article. I think it adds context, not only to musicals on Broadway perceived as feminist and whether the retelling of classics is progressive and meaningful or is lacking. Also, whether Pop and Pop music written by men can provide useful form of feminist discourse:
“During the first act of “Once Upon a One More Time,” the Broadway jukebox musical that grooves to the Britney Spears oeuvre, a fairy godmother arrives with a present for Cinderella. A gown? No. Glass slippers? No. Cin has enough already. Instead, her godmother gifts her a copy of Betty Friedan’s 1963 best seller, “The Feminine Mystique.”
It’s a clumsy gesture in the show, which plans to close next month. (Feminist thought has advanced in 60 years!) And arguably emblematic of a recent spate of Broadway musicals that set feminism to a pop beat, including “Six,” a zippy modern retelling of the lives of Henry VIII’s six wives; “& Juliet,” whose protagonist, miraculously alive, embarks on a girls’ trip of self-discovery; and “Bad Cinderella” (now closed), a chaotic rejiggering of the classic fairy tale. Aimed at girls and women (historically the majority of Broadway ticket buyers), these shows may be sincere attempts to engage with women’s issues — or they’re hollow efforts to capitalize on calls for change. Empty political gestures on Broadway? To quote a song used in two of these shows: “Oops! … I did it again.”
On a recent morning, Laura Collins-Hughes, contributing theater critic and reporter; Salamishah Tillet, critic at large; and Lindsay Zoladz, pop music critic, gathered to debate facts and fairy tales. They discussed how narrowly these shows define empowerment, if they define it at all, and why Prince Charming gets the best song. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.
Why do you think we’re seeing these shows now? Is it a cynical attempt to appeal to female ticket buyers or something more organic?
TILLET These shows, despite their best intentions, seem limited by their source material. There was a lot of Cinderella this year! The publicity appeal of anything Cinderella is obvious, so for Broadway theaters struggling to get audiences back into the theater, of course it is a ploy.
COLLINS-HUGHES “Bad Cinderella” could have been so much more than it was. It is a messy show, it’s always been a messy show, but in London it was actually fun. It had a bit of substance to it. And magic. The feminism, which was so clear and so dramatically propulsive in the London version, was wiped away for Broadway.
I took my daughter to “Bad Cinderella” and afterward we had a conversation about the show’s messaging, which was confused at best. Is it asking too much of a musical to also have great messages?
COLLINS-HUGHES This question makes me think we all live in fear of that riposte that often greets girls and women who won’t laugh along at a joke that’s not funny: “Where’s your sense of humor?” It’s perfectly legitimate to recoil from a show whose message bugs you, and all the more if it’s at odds with its girl-power, you-be-you marketing.
And yet if a show is successful enough in other ways, the messaging may not matter. That was my delighted experience of “& Juliet.”
TILLET This was definitely my favorite pop feminist musical of the year. I was genuinely intrigued by the conceit of what happens if Juliet doesn’t die. What life does she make for herself beyond the formula prescribed for her? The musical opens up possibilities for her as a protagonist. And with its thoughtful casting of Lorna Courtney as a Black Juliet and Justin David Sullivan as the nonbinary character, May, it enables us to see Shakespeare differently, too.
COLLINS-HUGHES When it has a top-notch cast, “& Juliet” is a blast. But I am baffled that people perceive it as feminist. It really is not.
ZOLADZ Say more!
COLLINS-HUGHES I don’t mean that it’s anti-feminist, but I don’t think it’s particularly female-centered — not on Juliet, nor on Anne Hathaway [Shakespeare’s wife], who gets one of the subplots.
With the exception of “Six,” these shows are largely created by men. Does that explain anything?
COLLINS-HUGHES Of course. It’s not that men can’t and don’t write women well or can’t imagine women’s lives. And it’s certainly not that artists should stick to writing only about people just like them. But they are writing from the outside. That can come with a lot of blind spots and a lot of misapprehensions.
All of these musicals use a pop vernacular, “Bad Cinderella” somewhat less so. Is pop, particularly pop written and produced by men, a useful form for feminist discourse?
ZOLADZ Something I’ve been thinking about regarding “Once Upon a One More Time” and especially “& Juliet,” which uses the songs of the massive millennial hitmaker Max Martin, is the lyrical limitation of a lot of modern pop music. Martin and the generation of pop architects who followed him treat lyrics almost as an afterthought. Martin has referred to his method of songwriting as “melodic math.” “& Juliet” was fun and more cleverly written than “Once Upon a One More Time,” but a lot of that had to do with the ironic distance between the lyrics themselves and the winking, metatextual way the characters employed them — like when “I Want It That Way,” by the Backstreet Boys, becomes not so much a love song as a narration of an argument between Shakespeare and his wife, who have conflicting opinions about how his latest play should end.
TILLET I hated a lot of those pop songs and found them anti-feminist when they originally came out, but when I sang along with the “& Juliet” audience and my tween daughter, I found that they aged better than I had expected. Or maybe, because I’m now middle-age, I’m mistaking nostalgia for progress.
COLLINS-HUGHES Inattention to lyrics is a limitation of jukebox musicals, but it doesn’t hold for original pop songs, which can be whatever the writer makes them. It would help, though, if more of the songwriters getting musicals produced were women.
ZOLADZ I generally pay more attention to pop music than Broadway musicals, so I found the sound of these shows to be quite striking. Modern pop’s influence is everywhere, especially in a show like “Six,” which is full of electronic beats, hip-hop cadences and direct nods to artists like Beyoncé and Ariana Grande. Is that a trend you have observed over time? And given that this is such a golden age for female pop stars, do you think that crossover appeal has something to do with the rise of these empowerment musicals?”.
IN THIS PHOTO: Lindsay Zoladz
There was a lot to think about with that article and interview. I know a bit about Broadway musicals. I was not aware of feminist takes and retellings of classic texts and fairy tales. You can see how diversified feminism and roles celebrating female empowerment have become on Broadway. A lot of additional points were raised in that article from The New York Times. The fact that the storytelling is not completing and impactful. Many of the Pop songs used in musicals not empowering or their messages are dated. A question was raised regarding the Barbie movie and whether that will impact Broadway. It did mix modern Pop songs into a film that is feminist. Songs that do ask important questions. Even though the tracks were varied and excellent, maybe it was more the film’s messages rather than the songs’ that created that impression and impact. It is fascinating trying to transform and evolve modern Broadway so that its feminism is effective and useful and can fully engage and inspire its largest audience. As an article from The New York Times in 2019 noted: maybe it is the men who write shows that need ‘fixing’ and not the women:
“Empowering the female lead may be a celebratory hook for selling a show, particularly given that women buy the bulk of Broadway tickets. But on closer inspection, it is rarely the women that require revision. The streetwalking Vivian Ward, stage-dominating Lilli Vanessi and hardscrabble Eliza Doolittle are not lacking in grit. An additional injection of strength risks turning them into bland, uncomplicated superwomen.
No, the real problem with these stories is the men. They are terrible, and yet they have the audacity to believe they can teach these women lessons, and to come out on the other side looking like plausible romantic leads. A modern production’s success rests on how it tames its man”.
There are a lot of interesting discussion and questions. If Broadway musicals do have feminist tales and takes, is it still stuck on the traditional ideas of liberations and emancipation in terms of romantic relationships and love?! That feeling that empowerment comes through getting out of a bad relationship or independence?! Few that discuss careers, politics and anything outside of that. There are a few examples that buck that trend, though I wonder whether too this mixture of modern Pop beats and stories coming into Broadway musical is lacking something. Are there enough feminist anthems today? There was once upon a time, yet the trend and demand has maybe moved away from that. I guess there are examples from the past few years of diverse and empowering Pop songs. Representation of women behind the scenes has always been quite poor. I do wonder whether there are still too many imbalances when it comes to women writing Broadway musicals. In the technical crew and working behind the scenes. If representation on stage has broadened and increased, is there enough of a drive to create these meaningful and compelling stories of female empowerment and independence?
I wonder about the role modern music can play and whether we are enough choices when it comes to songs that can bring a story to life and drive the narrative. Also, and going back to the original source of The New York Times, there are even problems highlighted with the Barbie film. That the Kens are quite bland. They also get the big dance numbers. That ‘Broadway moment’, rather than being women in the spotlight, features the Kens. I know the Barbies have their awesome raging party scene where it is interrupted by Stereotypical Barbie’s (Margot Robbie) thoughts of death. Many feel that musicals squarely aimed at women or singularly about women are not interesting enough to appeal. I feel that there are modern successful women at the forefront of music – such as Beyoncé – who write empowering songs and have these careers that are not about power and commercial success. Many feminist Broadway music and plays that discuss and focus on female empowerment leave it there. No nuance and discussion around the way power can corrupt. Maybe Broadway itself has an issue when it comes to sincere and purposeful musicals about feminism and empowerment due to empty gestures and clumsy politics. I wonder whether the music used is there as backdrop or drives the story. Too much a case of the musicals being Pop concerts - and not a perfect balance of powerful female-led musicals with Pop effectively used as a score.
Lindsay Zoladz noted (regarding modern Broadway feminist examples) that “the overarching problem with these musicals is the way they fail to define terms, presenting “empowerment” and “feminism” as given, unexamined virtues”. I do not have the answers. It is clear that many modern Broadway shows and musicals narrowly define empowerment. Is this also the case in music?! The majority of empowering songs from women about love and getting out of relationships?! I do think that Pop music has some modern and original feminist examples that go beyond bad love. If Broadway and Pop can connect effectively and there is a meaningful show that engages with the need for change (and the messaging is clear). Broadening the source material. Songs written by men can work as a feminist anthem in a Broadway music, though there is that desire to bring women to the front and ensure there their voices and words are being highlighted. If some Broadway musicals are benefitting from modern Pop’s inclusion and women’s voices scoring scenes, there is still that disconnect when it comes to casting and diversity. Many of the shows written by men and from their viewpoint. A need to review and balance things. The demand for feminist musicals and shows might react to the fact that its largest audience is women. The way incredible modern women in music are so influential and successful. Maybe not enough examples of musicals and plays that get that blend right when it comes to the music, casting and messaging. There are some incredible modern female Pop and R&B artists. Great women in Rap whose music can brilliantly work in Broadway musicals. Some amazing actresses who are coming through. A diversity and embarrassment of riches that will be realised soon enough. Ensuring that female writers are promoted and given space and opportunities. Broadway musicals that are empowering and whose feminism is purposeful and has meaning. If that is realised – however gradually but with commitment – then that will be…
A potent combination.