Jukebox Hero

The power of popular music to save the Broadway Musical.

Broadway musicals have an incredible evocative quality about them: one note or lyric, whether joyful or somber, can bring out many emotions. That evocative quality is the power of Broadway: it can make a person cry without her permission or make her laugh hysterically. Despite this power, Broadway shows and their music are often written off as histrionic, melodramatic, and cliché. Because of these opinions, Broadway declined rapidly in popularity in the 1970’s and 1980’s. During these decades, Broadway music no longer matched the popular music of the time, and audiences felt that disconnect. However, Broadway ticket sales and audience attendance have been on the rise since the 1985-1986 season (Statistics). One of the most prominent reasons for this rise in popularity is the allowance and inclusion of popular music on Broadway.

While the popular music styles of the 1940’s and 1950’s shone through on Broadway, the styles of the 1960’s, 1970’s, and 1980’s did not. Rather, the music from the 1940’s and 1950’s was still being written for Broadway shows, and audiences were not impressed. When Broadway began to adapt to the musical changes happening in the world, audiences felt that change and returned to the Broadway musical once again. While the Broadway musical may not be so mainstream as to hear songs from Rent or Hamilton played on the radio, the music for such shows was modeled after popular rock and hip-hop music with which the audience member can engage. In order for Broadway to remain successful, it must continue to adapt to the popular musical styles of the times, meaning the incorporation of rock and hip-hop music, among other popular music styles, is how Broadway will succeed in the twenty-first century.

The 1930’s saw the emergence of Cole Porter as a Broadway composer superstar while “American popular song was dominated by composers and lyricists trained in New York” (Stempel, 2011, p. 263). Porter’s music was “definitive of an era,” dominating both popular music heard on the radio as well as Broadway musicals (Stempel, 2011, p. 264). According to Hamilton: an American musical composer Lin-Manuel Miranda, in the 1930’s and 1940’s, “Musical theater was the popular music- it was jazz. You would go hear a Cole Porter song on the radio and then you would go spend ten bucks to buy a ticket and hear that song on Broadway that night” (Lunden, 2016). Because the popular music of the time was able to be heard on Broadway, musical theater experienced massive success. Shows such as Porter’s Anything Goes and Kiss Me Kate were hallmarks of the era, and their catchy jazz-like tunes drew in audiences not because they matched the popular music style of the time, but because they truly were the popular music of the time.

From here, Broadway continued its Golden Age, with artists such as the famed Rodgers and Hammerstein collaborating to produce timeless shows. The duo composed together from 1942 to Hammerstein’s death in 1960, creating numerous successful musicals such as Carousel and The Sound of Music (Stempel, 2011, p. 291). Hammerstein believed that Broadway musicals were “plays before they were anything else,” an opinion that created a shift in emphasis for Broadway theater (Stempel, 2011, p. 292). This revolutionary opinion redirected the view of the Broadway musical from a live musical performance (like vaudeville) to a more serious musical drama. For example, the plot of The Sound of Music is intense and just as important for the show as the music. This particular era of the Broadway musical would boom throughout the 1960’s, resulting in classic Broadway hits such as Oklahoma! (1943), South Pacific (1949), The King and I (1951), and My Fair Lady (1956). However, despite the incredible success Broadway experienced during its Golden Age, the eventual taste of the Broadway theatergoer would change, causing a decline in the popularity of musical theater.

Much like America’s economy that experiences a period of “bust” following a period of “boom,” Broadway suffered greatly following its Golden Age. Through the 1970’s and 1980’s, the Broadway musical’s Golden Age came to an end, and shows were no longer experiencing unparalleled success. Carrie, a 1988 musical based on Stephen King’s popular horror novel, closed in just three days after only five performances (Carrie). The failure of such shows was partially due to the fact that “the audience was not expanding in proportionate support” because shows “could no longer be hits in the commercial sense.” Additionally, “Americans as a whole ceased to take their hit parade from Broadway” (Mordden, 2003, p. 7). In short, Americans were no longer enjoying the Broadway musical, partially due to its music that had spoiled and grown outdated. Musicals like A Chorus Line that were produced in the 1970’s kept that style of the 1920’s, something that no longer held the interest of audiences. While this show was successful amongst loyal Broadway theatergoers, it failed to bring in new audiences. This lack of fresh theatergoers contributed to the rapid decline of the Broadway musical. The popularity of bands such as Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, and Queen throughout the 1970’s and 1980’s led to a drastic change in musical tastes to which Broadway could not quickly adapt. Songs such as Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” were vastly different from Cole Porter’s “Too Darn Hot,” but Broadway musicals were unable to reflect that difference. However, something changed after the failures of the 1970’s and 1980’s that set up Broadway’s current successes: modern popular music was introduced to the stage.

The popularity of bands such as Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, and Queen throughout the 1970’s and 1980’s led to a drastic change in musical tastes to which Broadway could not quickly adapt.

Shows such as Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Jesus Christ Superstar (1970), Richard O’Brien’s The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975), Charlie Smalls’ The Wiz (1975), and Johnathan Larson’s Rent (1996) took popular music and placed it on Broadway, introducing the audience to a new form of showtune. Broadway songs such as “The Sun Will Come out Tomorrow” were not exactly considered “cool,” but no one could deny the “cool-ness” of Webber’s “Damned for All Time/Blood Money,” O’Brien’s “The Time Warp,” or Larson’s “Out Tonight” that have rock beats like any song one would hear on the radio. Thus, we reach the most modern era of the Broadway musical, the 1990’s through the twenty-first century, where popular music has infiltrated Broadway in multiple ways.

Popular music has entered Broadway in many forms, the most common of which is the “jukebox musical.” The jukebox musical is a show that contains music that was previously composed by a popular artist. For example, the long-running show Mamma Mia! (1999) has a soundtrack composed entirely of songs written and made popular by the band ABBA. The plot for Mamma Mia! was then composed around the songs. Other jukebox musicals such as The Who’s Tommy (1969), The Beatles’ Beatlemania (1977), The Four Seasons’ Jersey Boys (2005), and Carole King’s Beautiful (2015) have been outstanding hits on Broadway and are virtually infallible ways to bring in an audience. Jukebox musicals intelligently take music that was already made popular by the audience’s favorite singers and bands, and place it into a Broadway show, almost guaranteeing success. Millie Taylor discusses this success in her book, Musical Theatre, Realism, and Entertainment, saying, "The re-use of existing songs in new settings allows intertextual and personal associations in reception. This contributes to the sense of familiarity and nostalgia experienced by audience members, which in turn allows them to be removed from their everyday lives, to relive fantasies and memories, and to participate in singing and dancing. This infectious experience of joyful community involves the audience as participants in the event, which contributes to the entertainment felt as a result of attendance. And entertainment is the point" (Taylor, 2012).

As Taylor points out, jukebox musicals evoke feelings of nostalgia from the audience, with the music they have enjoyed throughout their lives such as ABBA’s “Waterloo” and Carole King’s “Natural Woman” bringing pleasant memories to the forefront. The evocation of these memories leads the audience to associate pleasant feelings with their attendance, encouraging theatergoers both new and loyal to attend more Broadway musicals in the future. In short, jukebox musicals are a prime example of Broadway’s successful adaptation to modern music styles because they welcome in new audiences and are also able to be enjoyed by current theatergoers.

Theater critic Ken Mandelbaum (2005) has a less optimistic view of the jukebox musical, saying they “take the easy way out by taking their scores from pre-existing catalogues of popular song hits.” Despite this negative view of the genre, Mandelbaum begrudgingly admits that they have been successful in the past, addressing shows such as Mamma Mia! and All Shook Up. While Mandelbaum may not appreciate the jukebox musical as a genre due to its unoriginality, he has to acknowledge the popularity of musicals that use those “pre-existing catalogues of popular music.” Placing Carole King tracks into a musical about her life is not unoriginal: it is inspired. It takes a significant amount of planning and weeding to choose the tracks that will be used from King’s vast and stunning catalogue and construct a story around them. Furthermore, Beautiful: The Carole King Musical has a gorgeous, heart-wrenching storyline that is far from unoriginal. The show is Tony-Award-winning and has grossed $214,851,398 since its opening in 2014 (Beautiful). Clearly, audiences agree with Millie Taylor and want to relive the songs that shaped their lives. Now, they can relive those songs set to a story, making them even more powerful. This incorporation of already beloved popular music into the Broadway show appeals to both the loyal theatergoer and popular music fans, appeasing both audiences simultaneously. Through using music that has already been made popular by pop music artists, Broadway is adapting to the changing music scene, bringing in songs that the audience has enjoyed throughout their lives.

Popular music has entered Broadway through other means as well, and a common way is the composition of new music that resembles the pop, rock, and hip-hop genres. Several musicals have incorporated popular music into their shows, contributing to the success of the Broadway musical since its decline in the 1970’s and 1980’s. For the purpose of this essay, it is best to discuss three shows with soundtracks fashioned out of popular music whose impacts on musical theater have been truly revolutionary. These three shows are Jesus Christ Superstar, Rent, and Hamilton: an American musical. The groundbreaking soundtrack to Jesus Christ Superstar irreversibly changed the Broadway musical, ushering the theater out of an era of outdated music. Responding to the AIDS crisis occurring in the theater community, Rent’s innovative rock score was like nothing before it, weaving social issues such as disease, poverty, and politics with a rock music style. Hamilton: an American Musical may not have been the first show to introduce hip-hop music to Broadway, but it would become the most popular Broadway musical to ever utilize the genre (Vine, 2018). For these reasons, Jesus Christ Superstar, Rent, and Hamilton are the three shows with popular-music-based scores that will be discussed in this essay.

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Jesus Christ Superstar first premiered in 1970 when Broadway was struggling to succeed, but has stood the test of time, garnering three revivals, a 1973 Oscar-nominated movie adaptation, and a 2018 live television performance starring famous popular artists such as John Legend and Alice Cooper. Additionally, the musical has become a “staple of regional, community, and school theaters across the country (Frank, 1988). Jesus Christ Superstar was nominated for five Tony Awards, including Best Original Score, and won a coveted Drama Desk Award for Most Promising Composer. While Jesus Christ Superstar was originally unsuccessful in England, it was “a smash hit” in the United States and “set a record at the time for advance ticket sales” (Brockell, 2018). Through its many awards and financial success, it is clear that Jesus Christ Superstar’s popular music-based score was a hit with audiences.

Regarding the success of Jesus Christ Superstar, composer Andrew Lloyd Webber says that the show was not originally written for the stage. In fact, the album was composed with the intention “putting it on a turntable” (Webber). Scored with typical rock beats, Jesus Christ Superstar “changed the terrain of what a Broadway musical could be” (Webber). The show warns of the glorification of celebrities, using Jesus’ final days as an allegory, and the music from the show echoes the dangers of this glorification, using pop music to emphasize the point. Much like how The Black Crook was the first Broadway musical to set the stage for other musicals to follow, Jesus Christ Superstar was the first show of a new era of Broadway. Because of Webber’s successful rock music score, the showtune no longer had to resemble outdated music: it could fall into any music genre. While Jesus Christ Superstar is an older example of popular music emerging on Broadway, several shows have come after Andrew Lloyd Webber’s successful allegory that also employ popular music.

The showtune no longer had to resemble outdated music: it could fall into any music genre.

Another show fashioned out of popular music is Rent (1996), the story of several young artists struggling to survive when faced with poverty, eviction, and the AIDS crisis. Just weeks after Rent hit Broadway, Variety called the musical “the best show in years, if not decades” adding that the show “undoubtedly will be the first musical in years to reach a non-theater audience” (Gerard, 1996). Rent’s popular music-based soundtrack was enough to bring in new audiences, unlike traditional shows like A Chorus Line that pandered to the typical Broadway audience. Variety continued to rave about the show, saying, “Rent makes the musical theater joyously important again” (Gerard, 1996). This importance was felt by audience members including, Leslie Odom Jr., best known for his role as the original Aaron Burr in the Broadway show Hamilton. While Odom was originally just a fan of the musical, he would eventually star in Rent as his first Broadway show. In his autobiography, Failing Up, Odom discusses the popularity of Rent, saying, “Jonathan Larson composed a tuneful and emotional Broadway score fashioned in modern rock and pop music. It sounded like music you’d hear on contemporary radio,” (Odom, 2018, p. 35). He later describes the album as “one continuous favorite song” (Odom, 2018, p. 38). Rent opened on April 29, 1996 and remained open on Broadway for twelve years. In those twelve years, the show had 5,123 performances, won The Pulitzer Prize in 1996, and received ten Tony Award nominations and four wins including Best Musical and Best Original Score (Rent). As Odom said, the significance of Rent’s score resides in its contemporary quality that makes it sound like typical popular music. The show rose so quickly in popularity because of its ability to sound like “music you’d hear on contemporary radio.” Rent is a fantastic example of popular music succeeding on Broadway, proving that the incorporation of changing music styles into musical theater is crucial to its success.

Perhaps the most famous (and recent) example of popular music dominating Broadway comes in the form of the success of Hamilton: An American Musical. The hip-hop musical exploded into popularity in 2015, launching its young composer, Lin-Manuel Miranda to Andrew-Lloyd-Webber-level fame and garnering outstanding reviews from The New York Times where Ben Brantley (2015) advises theatergoers to “mortgage their houses and lease their children to acquire tickets” to see the hit Broadway show. As Lin-Manuel Miranda told Andrew Lloyd Webber, “Cats is about as bad of an elevator pitch as Hamilton” (Webber). In truth, the story of Alexander Hamilton, the first secretary of America’s treasury, told through musical format is not the best pitch. However, when hip-hop beats and rap music are added into the story, it becomes an instant success.

Miranda’s lyrics are genius and revolutionary, and the cast album of Hamilton even hit number one on the Rap Albums chart (Lunden, 2016). The musical has sold 1.46 million copies of the album worldwide, making it the fifth best-selling Broadway cast album of all time (Culwell-Block). The show was nominated for a record sixteen Tony Awards, winning eleven, including Best Musical and Best Original Score. In addition to these awards, Miranda received the Pulitzer Prize in 2016 (Hamilton). The show also swept at London’s Olivier Awards, taking home seven wins from its thirteen nominations, tying the show for the most wins in Olivier Award history (Turner, 2018). The awards are not the only proof of the show’s success. Broadway attendance reached a thirty-one year high in the 2015-2016 season, when Hamilton made its debut (Statistics). The New York Times calls Hamilton “proof that the American musical is not only surviving but also evolving in ways that should allow it to thrive and transmogrify in years to come” (Brantley, 2015). Through the renown that it has achieved, it is clear that Hamilton is yet another example of the success of popular music on Broadway, allowing Broadway to change and grow. Putting hip-hop and rap music onto Broadway was an extremely risky maneuver, but the wild success of Hamilton has proven that when theater adapts to modern music styles, success is inevitable.

Broadway music has made another monumental shift towards popular music, this time in terms of the composers themselves. Sara Bareilles and Duncan Sheik are popular music artists who have made the migration from pop star to Broadway composer. Sara Bareilles composed the music for the Broadway show, Waitress, the story of a woman who becomes pregnant and begins an affair with her obstetrician while plotting ways to escape her abusive marriage. Bareilles is best known for her pop songs such as “Brave” and “Love Song,” and with this history as a popular music success, her “loyal fan base is packing the theater every night” (Lunden, 2016). Bareilles discusses this enthusiastic response to Waitress, saying, “They're coming—some of them— just as fans of mine, but also curious about this new project. It's sort of outside the box for me, and they are being introduced to a whole new medium” (Lunden, 2016). Not only is popular music itself drawing new fans into the theater, the celebrity-power behind pop-star-composed Broadway music is bringing in new fans as well.

With Waitress grossing $101,693,509 since its April 2016 premiere (Waitress), it is obvious that Bareilles’ fans are packing the theater, along with other Broadway fans intrigued by popular music in the theater. Broadway’s use of a chart-topping pop artist as a composer for a musical has drawn in new audience members, something many other musicals such as A Chorus Line could not necessarily accomplish. Drawing in these new theatergoers is crucial to the success of Broadway because the theater cannot survive merely on the funds from typical theatergoers; it needs new audience members as well. Additionally, shows with pop star composers have added music to Broadway that is “authentic” in a way that is different from the music of Jesus Christ Superstar or Rent. In other words, the showtunes are popular music that were actually composed by pop stars as opposed to popular music that was composed by writers like Andrew Lloyd Webber or Jonathan Larson.

Drawing in these new theatergoers is crucial to the success of Broadway because the theater cannot survive merely on the funds from typical theatergoers; it needs new audience members as well.

On the opposite end of the spectrum from Bareilles’ Waitress is Duncan Sheik’s Broadway adaptation of American Psycho, the story of a Wall Street banker who also happens to be a vicious serial killer. As Sheik points out, the fans of such a story “are not your usual Broadway crowd” (Lunden, 2016). Therefore, they demand music that is atypical as well. The soundtrack to the show is “completely electronic,” giving it a vibe completely unique from other Broadway shows. Sheik says, “I started getting deeper and deeper into software as a way of making cool electronic music. That became the platform on which I was creating the score … early house music and early techno and a lot of electronic pop music” (Gans, 2016). This “cool electronic music” in addition to other popular music, like that of Bareilles, is what Sheik says is “how the theater will stay alive and thrive” (Lunden, 2016). Electronic music is vastly different from the music of other Broadway shows, and while the show did not enjoy a lengthy run like Beautiful or Waitress, it did gross $5,627,478 in just fifty-four performances (American Psycho), proving that its time on the stage, while short-lived, was successful. In addition to his success with American Psycho, Sheik composed the music for the Tony-Award-winning rock musical Spring Awakening. Sheik received a Tony Award and a Grammy for his popular music-based score, and the 2006 show also garnered a United States tour, a West End run, and a 2015 Broadway revival (Spring Awakening).

Sheik’s success on Broadway is tied to his origins as a popular music artist as well as his ability to create a Broadway showtune that mimics the rock music and electronic music genres. The incorporation of Sheik’s pop artist composition skills into the Broadway musical has not only added fresh, new sound to Broadway but has pandered to different, unique audiences that previous Broadway shows did not reach. Sheik’s popular music composition skills have brought in new audiences and proved the success of popular music on Broadway, much like Bareilles did with her popular-music-style compositions. The scores composed by both Bareilles and Sheik are fantastic examples of Broadway adapting to changes in modern music and experiencing success as a result. Both artists have reached new audiences with their scores and experienced successful runs on Broadway, proving that it is necessary for Broadway to incorporate popular music into shows in order to survive in the modern era.

In 1970, Jesus Christ Superstar was unlike any musical before it. No longer did the Broadway musical require showtunes; it could be enjoyed by any listener. Similarly, Hamilton’s inclusion of hip-hop and rap music and Rent’s use of rock beats have ushered in a new kind of Broadway showtune. Popular artists such as Sara Bareilles who compose for Broadway shows have created a shift as well, bringing in new audiences and introducing them to a new medium. Similarly, popular artist Duncan Sheik has addressed an entirely new audience with his electronic music score, welcoming in new theatergoers. Broadway composer Frank Wildhorn explains the success of shows such as these, saying, “People who are fifty years old today grew up on Led Zeppelin. Times are changing, even on Broadway” (Reich, 2000). With the average age of the Broadway theatergoer being forty-two years old (Statistics), it only makes sense that they would want shows rooted in the beats of their favorite music. Just as Broadway musicals presented the popular music of the time in the 1940’s, they should continuously adapt to represent the changes in musical styles.

Broadway musicals have the power to evoke emotions, whether it be from new music or music that is already beloved. The incorporation of popular music into the Broadway musical, not only leads to profit and success, as proven by shows such as Jesus Christ Superstar, Rent, Waitress, and Hamilton, but it makes the experiences of the audience much more enjoyable. Audiences enjoy hearing music from their pasts as well as music that mimics modern popular music styles. Popular music came to Broadway at a time when the Broadway musical was failing and needed to bring patronage through its doors in order to succeed. Broadway eventually found the audiences it needed through producing musicals that featured popular music, rather than the outdated showtunes of a bygone era. The music of the 1940’s and 1950’s may still be on Broadway in the form of shows that have been revived such as Hello Dolly!, but the popular theater music now comes from fresh, new beats rooted in pop, rock, and hip-hop. The Broadway musical was saved and irreversibly changed by the incorporation of popular music, but much like Elphaba and Glinda in Wicked, it has been changed “for good.”