Oklahoma and Frank Rich article

[FranklinDickson2018]

Just got my copy of NY Mag.  I truthfully didn't understand the conclusion of the article as it appears he is contradicting himself.  At the conclusion it appears that  he is justifying the staging based on tragic events that happened in Oklahoma at the turn of the last century. Or during the first quarter. Apparently these awful events shamefully didn't make the history books until recently. 

Here is Rich's final sentence which goes against the fact that the play was already written and adapted by R & H. In other words he reads a lot into their adaptation that I don't think they themselves read into it. He quotes the final lyrics to the title song and then writes: "But Rodgers and Hammerstein's patriotism was not mindless jingoism, and their art was not propaganda. They never would have let Jud's murder intrude on their show's celebratory climax with its triumphal sanctification of both marriage and statehood, had they not wanted us to see the blood of the Other America on Great America's hands." HUH? How can he be so sure? What am I missing? In an earlier paragraph he describes at great length how these turn of the century atrocities were covered up and not known. It appears he is contradicting himself.  I would hate to see what this same creative team would do with Sound of Music or South Pacific..... 

 

 

[henrikegerman]

^ not to mention Oklahoma is an adaptation of. Play with, if I’m not mistaken pretty much the same plot, characters and ending.

[BenElliott]

Well, South Pacific and The Sound of Music aren't fluffy pieces of theatre. Both deal with very serious subjects. I think Oklahoma! does have a critical viewpoint on American history and patriotism. There's certainly a case to make that the somewhat violent ending of Oklahoma! is there to make a point, especially considering what Hammerstein wrote into his other shows. I think the staging of this current revival with it's *SPOILER* blood soaked wedding sequence is really just bringing out the point that Rodgers and Hammerstein were trying to make. And on top of all of that, it's important that directors take different approaches to these classic works. I'm not interested in seeing Oklahoma! done the same way that it's been done for nearly a century. That's how classics die. You have to adjust it for a modern lens. People have a sentimental attachment to Oklahoma! because it's been passed off as a lush, sweeping rom-com, but there's also the possibility that it's somewhat of a political thriller. I read that Daniel Fish stripped any pre-conceived notions of what OK should be and performed it as if it were a new work. Respectfully, I think a lot of the naysayers of this production are just uncomfortable with having to see a piece that they know and love in a darker light, even if the book and score remain completely intact.

[OlBlueEyes]

In 1943 we were in a two front World War. Marines were crawling around in muddy, disease ridden tropical islands getting their limbs blown off and bomber crews over Germany were taking the last plunge from the skies so frequently that when Glenn Miller, the most famous Big Band leader, went down in a plane crash over the English Channel no one even noticed.

Jingoism does very well in such times.

I have read more than once -- don't shoot I'm just the messenger -- that off duty military personnel went to see Oklahoma to be reminded of what they were fighting to preserve.

The Brooks Atkinson theater, the Walter Kerr theater. No one is going to name a theater after Frank Rich. 

[GavestonPS]

I think people noticed when Glenn Miller's plane went missing, OlBlueEyes. Otherwise, I think your account of the early 1940s is spot on; I too understand that the cheap seats and standing room at OKLAHOMA! were filled with soldiers and sailors in uniform and on their way to the European front. There's a reason why it wasn't just the longest running musical until MY FAIR LADY, but that it was longest in its day by 3 or more times.

And (I'm back to Rich's essay now) OF COURSE a dark view of America is written into GREEN GROW THE LILACS and OKLAHOMA! I'm not saying the musical incorporates the Tulsa race riots, but there is a reason critics and producers and the writers themselves were sent scurrying to come up with a new term (the "musical play" for a show that was too dark to be properly called a "musical comedy", and too serious to be called an operetta.

But the outsider, Jud Fry, was written by two, ultimate insiders (albeit Jewish), who view the marginalized more negatively than most of us do today. We're much less likely to assume those who "don't fit in" are entirely to blame themselves. The popularity of OKLAHOMA!--and that star-spangled anthem of a title song--have made the piece appear ever lighter over the decades, but the darkness was always there. Just as it was in SHOW BOAT, which Hammerstein wrote almost two decades earlier.

I haven't seen it, but the descriptions suggest the current revival uses Brechtian methods to put the darkness back into OKLAHOMA! where it belongs.

[Kad]

I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make here, OlBlueEyes- That we should leave Oklahoma alone because it inspired the troops in WW2?

[OlBlueEyes]

Kad said: "I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make here, OlBlueEyes- That we should leave Oklahoma alone because it inspired the troops in WW2?"

My comment had nothing to do with the current revival. I was trying to tell the OP why it was not surprising that  Rodgers and Hammerstein kept the story simple and the music closing on an upbeat anthem.

When you're in the middle of a war, and a war we were not even winning yet, the entertainment you serve up to the public is light, patriotic and full of hope. It just wasn't a time when R & H were going to present to the public an allusion to dark doings that happened many years ago.

Of course Glenn Miller was missed, but at that time he was in the military to present concerts to the troops and was flying from England to France to organize one. On a typical day of the air war over Europe when we may have lost 400 airmen, the news that Miller and his plane were missing did not cause a "stop the presses" breaking news story around the world as it would have in peacetime.

[Niles Silvers]

What about all of the Native Americans who died or were forced onto barren tracts so these cheery white folk could steal the land?  Oh yeah, this story is so uplifting!  

[After Eight]

"I'm not interested in seeing Oklahoma! done the same way that it's been done for nearly a century."

And others aren't interested in seeing it done the way Daniel Fish and you want it done.

"That's how classics die. "

Uh, the Rembrandts in the museum still seem pretty alive to me. So do the classical music pieces I hear played unscathed in the concert hall. And so would Oklahoma!, My Fair Lady, Flower Drum Song and Cinderella if they were performed the RIGHT way.

"You have to adjust it for a modern lens."

A modern distorted/fractured lens? No thank you.  I'll opt for an old CLEAR lens.

"People have a sentimental attachment to Oklahoma! because it's been passed off as a lush, sweeping rom-com,"

Please don't presume to know or inform others why they may have an attachment to Oklahoma!, sentimental or otherwise. 

"Respectfully, I think a lot of the naysayers of this production are just uncomfortable with having to see a piece that they know and love in a darker light, even if the book and score remain completely intact."

Respectfully.... or presumptuously?

 

[After Eight]

"No one is going to name a theater after Frank Rich."

 

Let's pray not.