The Scottsboro Boys

[theatreguy12]

I heard a number from The Scottsboro Boys on SiriusXM On Broadway today and was wondering what the general thought is on this musical. 

I know there was controversy surrounding the musical and it closed pretty quickly.  A friend and I went to see it and while she didn't like it (for much the same reason that the critics and other audience members didn't like it), I found myself oddly drawn to it.  I thought the music was really good, the performances outstanding, and though an uncomfortable subject, still an important story to tell.  Especially in this day and age.

It was truly heartbreaking what happened to those young men and it opened my eyes to a story I knew little about.

I know this was probably discussed back when, but would this show have been more accepted as a straight play rather than a musical.  Is that part of what the audiences were saying back when it opened?  Or did it go even deeper than that? I wasn't a member of the boards at that time.  I could do a search I know, but I was just curious what others thought of it now that we're a few years removed from the shows opening, and closing.

[MarkBearSF]

I was lucky to catch the excellent tour led by Hal Linden. I agree - it's a breathtaking work. The production, directed by Susan Stroman, was very simple, using only chairs and an occasional plank. The score is one of Kander and Ebb's best. It deserved better. However, it's a difficult story and a hard sell. I don't know if it ever could be a commercial hit - but it might have fared better under a non-profit. 

And, at Tony time, not only did it have the disadvantage of being a long-closed show, it was up against the phenomenon of Book of Mormon.  

As for the controversy, I'm not sure there was all that much once people saw what was being done. A blackface minstrel show sounds like most insulting idea ever, but once the story is told through the blacks in blackface and the minstrel show conventions are subverted, it becomes perfect.

[dramamama611]

I thought it was brilliant.  Loved it, immensely. It might be the only show I've ever been upset about its premature closing.

People were told to be upset that it was a minstrel show....and never shown the light as to WHY they chose that structure. 

Twas a pity to be sure. My favorite show of the season.

[AC126748]

I don't think the "controversy" surrounding the show contributed to its premature closure in any meaningful way. It was always a risky prospect for a commercial Broadway production: a thought-provoking adult musical about a dark historical subject, with no big box office names. 

The show itself and the production were brilliant. There's a reason why it earned so many Tony nominations despite being long-closed, although it didn't stand a chance against the BOM juggernaut. 

[dramamama611]

I hear you, but I'm not sure I agree wholly.   This is a show that should have brought in African American audiences in DROVES as did the original TCP.  I'm not sure why it didn't.

 

I was disappointed that the producers backed out so quickly. 

[LarryD2]

The producers also did not market aggressively to African American groups, as other shows with predominantly African American casts (The Color Purple, the 2013 Trip to Bountiful revival) have. That was a mistake.

[newintown]

I thought it was easily the best show of the season, but it was about something real and ugly, and it was about race. A Broadway musical is only going to succeed if it appeals to the yahoos from the hinterlands (which includes New Jersey and Connecticut), and the yahoos won't go to an ugly musical about race; if you make race issues cute, like in Hairspray, or simpleminded, like in Memphis, they'll accept it, but not otherwise.

[kdogg36]

Count me among those who loved it. I was spellbound to the extent that I barely remember breathing for 90 minutes when I saw it. The staging was brilliant and the framing device was perfect.

I was very excited on Tony nomination day when it received so many nominations. I wish it had won for score at least, but as others have said, the overall result was a foregone conclusion that year. I'm not 100% sure but I think Scottsboro Boys may have received the most nominations in Tony history without getting a win. 

[Jeffrey Karasarides]

kdogg36 said: "I'm not 100% sure but I think Scottsboro Boys may have received the most nominations in Tony history without getting a win."

It did, even beating the previous record held by two other Kander & Ebb shows, Chicago and Steel Pier.

[Mister Matt]

I wish there had been an actual national tour!  There was a mini-tour of sorts that played limited engagements in Philadelphia, San Diego, San Francisco and Los Angeles.  Porchlight Theatre in Chicago has a production opening next month, so I'm planning to catch it just to get an opportunity to see a live production of the show.

[Scarywarhol]

Being away during the whole run is a regret I have never gotten over. 

[ljay889]

I thought it was very powerful. Scottsboro and The Visit were very tough commercial sells, but I am so grateful that both made it to Broadway.

[KnewItWhenIWasInFron]

I'm with those who loved the show and who think the controversy/problematic marketing hurt it immensely. I suspect plenty of people were intimidated or put off by by the (ill-informed) picketers.

[MarkBearSF]

And YES - I think it could be revived. Perhaps a few years from now - but almost certainly by a non-profit like Roundabout.

I would hope they would base it on the Stroman staging, which was perfect IMHO.

...and the limited set requirements would make it a candidate for an Encores! production (perhaps their summer program).

 

[BakerWilliams]

I liked the score, but it felt not confrontational enough for me. Shocking satire doesn't really juxtapose well with genuine emotionality. Pick one. Yes, it's Broadway and you have to appease your audience somewhat, but coming post-Wooster Group Emperor Jones, I couldn't help but feel it was all bark and no bite.

Fantastic dancing though.

[yellibean2]

I saw it in Boston a few days after the election. Needless to say, I wasn't exactly in the mood for it, but I thought it was absolutely fantastic - and it seems that other audiences agreed since it's been extended a few times, so much so that it is currently overlapping with another one of Speakeasy's productions. A subversive and perfectly uncomfortable piece that reminded me on a few levels of Cabaret. 

I agree that a revival would be great - maybe another off-Broadway incarnation will have an easier time finding the audience it deserves.

[GavestonPS]

BakerWilliams said: "I liked the score, but it felt not confrontational enough for me. Shocking satire doesn't really juxtapose well with genuine emotionality. Pick one. Yes, it's Broadway and you have to appease your audience somewhat, but coming post-Wooster Group Emperor Jones, I couldn't help but feel it was all bark and no bite.

Fantastic dancing though.

 

"

At last a kindred spirit! I agree the score is gorgeous and the tour staging was quite engaging. But, as I posted in the thread at the time, I thought it was the political protest equivalent of a Hallmark card, or put another way, a case of picking low-hanging fruit.

Of course, false accusations are wrong, perjury in court is especially reprehensible.

Of course, the justice system was slanted against African Americans in the 1930s, especially in the Deep South.

Of course, the justice system everywhere is too often a victim of the politics of the moment.

All set safely in the past so those who wanted to think racism is a problem solved were allowed to do so.

Marketing issues are one thing, but in terms of the actual show, the problem wasn't that it was too controversial, but that it wasn't controversial enough. (And people need to read a history book before they organize a protest. Minstrelsy was originally an AA form of theater; it was later taken up by whites in blackface. It was a key contributor to what we now call "American" musical theater.)

[newintown]

"Minstrelsy was originally an AA form of theater; it was later taken up by whites in blackface."

I confess that I have never heard that statement before - do you have any kind of legitimate footnote for it? Everything I have ever read (or can find at this moment) states that minstrel shows had their origin in blackface characters (that is, white men in blackface) from theatrical pieces as early as the late 1700s.

[luvcaroline]

Saw this in LA during the mini-tour and it was one of my top five theatre experiences. It's also the show that made me a Joshua Henry fan for life. 

[MarkBearSF]

OMG!  I've been hearing the great reports of him as Burr and have been looking forward to seeing him here in SF. I didn't realize that I've already been blown away by him here once already, in Scottsboro Boys. 

[theatreguy12]

I was glad to be able to see him in Shuffle Along too.  Great performer.   He was outstanding in The Scottsboro Boys.  I really did like this musical a lot.  It was a very important story to tell.  In whatever format.

[Fan123]

It's been ages since I heard the OBCR of this show, and I've never seen it live. I'm curious; might somebody who knows/remembers the show better than I, mind advising if the show has one of those "show the audience their affinity with the 'bad action' " hooks that Cabaret and Chicago have? That's my less-than-eloquent way of describing moments like the song "What Would You Do?" in Cabaret, in which the audience is asked to honestly consider if they would have taken a brave stand against the Nazis, or instead acted out of self-preservation. Another such moment is Velma and Roxie's final dialogue in Chicago, gleefully thanking the audience for feeding two murderers' fame and thus helping them get acquitted. Off the top of my head I don't remember such a moment in the OBCR, but it's been a long time. It might have been conveyed visually or via unrecorded dialogue anyway.

[Someone in a Tree2]

I don't believe either the script or score of SCOTTSBORO BOYS contains the kind of pointed implication of the audience's collective guilt that you're speaking of. The show is plenty strong enough and its moral center perfectly clear without any overt finger-pointing. 

[Fan123]

Thanks for your help; that's fair enough. I might give the show another try sometime, see if my impression of it changes (or, was remembered correctly to begin with).

[GavestonPS]

newintown said: ""Minstrelsy was originally an AA form of theater; it was later taken up by whites in blackface."

I confess that I have never heard that statement before - do you have any kind of legitimate footnote for it? Everything I have ever read (or can find at this moment) states that minstrel shows had their origin in blackface characters (that is, white men in blackface) from theatrical pieces as early as the late 1700s.

 

"

The problem, newintown, is that minstrel shows have become so stigmatized by our outrage at the use of blackface that we think of the two as synonymous. It's hard to find internet sources that don't begin with the issue of "When did when white men starting corking their faces?" In fact and though the practice became universal (even black men wore artificial "blackface" by the late 1840s, there was a lot to minstrelsy other than make-up.

See this site for example:

https://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/jackson/minstrel/minstrel.html

 

"The Minstrel Show presents us with a strange, fascinating and awful phenomenon.... But in the US they began in the 1830s, with working class white men dressing up as plantation slaves. These men imitated black musical and dance forms, combining savage parody of black Americans with genuine fondness for African American cultural forms...."

(Emphasis added.) As I'm sure you noticed, there's no way white men corked their faces and imitated AA forms of song and dance UNLESS those AA forms predated blackface.

In serious academic sources (dissertations, etc.), you'll find young academics reclaiming the contribution of early African American minstrels to the history of our national song and dance. Yes, later white parodies were appalling; but they in no way detract from the performances they were imitating.

I.e., "blackface minstrelsy" may have begun with white performers in the 1830s or early 1840s, but it wasn't blackface that gave us the American musical. It was, in large part, the song and dance that began earlier with African American minstrel performers.

The following site shows an ad for the Virginia Minstrels in 1843, often called the first true example of "blackface minstrelsy". You'll notice that though the performers were white with corked faces, the material they perform is billed as "THE CELEBRATED NEGRO MELODIES". I'm in no way excusing the use of blackface by white actors, but I think the contribution of AA music and song is the greater legacy.

http://www.allday.com/the-history-and-legacy-of-minstrel-shows-2180790936.html