High Fidelity Review
It's a musical about a hipster slacker who openly judges your music collection and is bad at relationships. Of course they would cast an Oberlin graduate in the lead role.
The musical adaptation of High Fidelity had its world-premiere in Boston last week. Three things usually happen to movies that are adapted to the musical stage, any of which could have happened here:
(1) As a story that is already about music, using it constantly as a cultural and narrative reference point, it had the potential for a high-concept musical, intertwining the book with self-references to the score and reviving old genres through avant-pop tributes (ala the Scissor Sisters and disco, or Hairspray and pop music of the 60s).
(2) Working off of the soundtrack to the film, it had the potential to follow in the footsteps of Mamma Mia! and other shows that kidnap pop songs from Top 40 radio stations and force musical actors to essentially sing two hours of cover songs inbetween scenes that attempt to tie the numbers together in something that pretends to be a plot. Or even a theme.
(3) As yet another musical adaptation of an original film (like, oh, say The Producers, Hairspray, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The Color Purple, The Lion King, etc. etc.), it had the potential to be filled with numbers that took three or four lines of dialogue from the original and stretched them into long, predictable songs that come off as trying too hard and pale in comparison to the original.
What happened in High Fidelity was a mix of 1 and 3. (As for #2, the music is all original, which is admirable, but unfortunately pales in comparison to anything on the original soundtrack, and is forgettable to boot.) The moments when the music is used to flesh out a character (option 1) are the show's best, and actually justify the adaptation of the film. But more often, High Fidelity falls into option 3, and the cast becomes a cover band for John Cusack et. al.
And I'm not talking Cake's cover of "I Will Survive." I'm talking Madonna's cover of "American Pie." You know, when it probably sounded good on paper, but when Madonna gets into the recording studio, and you're the producer, you should really be saying to yourself, "B-side"? High Fidelity the musical is a really good B-side to the film, but it doesn't make a good album.
The musical adaptation of High Fidelity had its world-premiere in Boston last week. Three things usually happen to movies that are adapted to the musical stage, any of which could have happened here:
(1) As a story that is already about music, using it constantly as a cultural and narrative reference point, it had the potential for a high-concept musical, intertwining the book with self-references to the score and reviving old genres through avant-pop tributes (ala the Scissor Sisters and disco, or Hairspray and pop music of the 60s).
(2) Working off of the soundtrack to the film, it had the potential to follow in the footsteps of Mamma Mia! and other shows that kidnap pop songs from Top 40 radio stations and force musical actors to essentially sing two hours of cover songs inbetween scenes that attempt to tie the numbers together in something that pretends to be a plot. Or even a theme.
(3) As yet another musical adaptation of an original film (like, oh, say The Producers, Hairspray, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The Color Purple, The Lion King, etc. etc.), it had the potential to be filled with numbers that took three or four lines of dialogue from the original and stretched them into long, predictable songs that come off as trying too hard and pale in comparison to the original.
What happened in High Fidelity was a mix of 1 and 3. (As for #2, the music is all original, which is admirable, but unfortunately pales in comparison to anything on the original soundtrack, and is forgettable to boot.) The moments when the music is used to flesh out a character (option 1) are the show's best, and actually justify the adaptation of the film. But more often, High Fidelity falls into option 3, and the cast becomes a cover band for John Cusack et. al.
And I'm not talking Cake's cover of "I Will Survive." I'm talking Madonna's cover of "American Pie." You know, when it probably sounded good on paper, but when Madonna gets into the recording studio, and you're the producer, you should really be saying to yourself, "B-side"? High Fidelity the musical is a really good B-side to the film, but it doesn't make a good album.
posted by Ian at 10/01/2006 06:13:00 PM
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