No./4 2021: the year of the musical
From In The Heights and West Side Story to Dear Evan Hansen and Annette, we’re in the middle of a moviemusical revival. The people behind them explain why
FILM TRENDS ARE cyclical — one decade the Western is everywhere; next it’s deader than Liberty Valance — but even by those standards, the movie musical is back in a big way. The coming months will see heavy-hitting Broadway adaptations including Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story, Stephen Chbosky’s Dear Evan Hansen and Lin-manuel Miranda’s Tick Tick… Boom!
— not to mention recent efforts such as Jonathan Butterell’s Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, In The Heights, Vivo and Leos Carax’s Annette. The musical has conquered Hollywood quicker than you can say “Suddenly Seymour”. But why now?
“Things were held over from 2020, so this is two years’ worth of musicals,” says Chbosky. “But if you look at Youtube or Tiktok, music and dance has become such a cinematic expression for people in their lives that it makes sense.”
That’s partly thanks to the paradigm-shifting success of Hamilton and the gateway experience it provided; partly because performance is a surefire way to go viral on Tiktok. But it’s also due to a more socially aware, fervently felt crop of musicals. In an age of Trump and Covid, they’re attempting to directly discuss big issues, from immigration to isolation to acceptance, and bring liberal Broadway ideals to the masses.
“One of the reasons that it was so tough to hold [In The Heights] for a year was that I felt like its message of inclusion is really vital,” Miranda tells Empire. “But it continues to resonate in that way. It continues to make people feel seen who hadn’t previously felt seen in musical theatre.”
Spielberg has spoken similarly about West Side Story, describing it as “not only a product of its time, but that time has returned… with a kind of social fury” and as a story that addresses “xenophobia and racial prejudice”. Everybody’s Talking About Jamie is not just a coming-of-age story but a defiant shout against homophobia; Dear Evan Hansen is a social-media age tale of lies and loneliness. It’s a world away from pointless
jellicle cats or bad-tempered operatic spectres.
Many of these stories are about teens, because the high emotion of that age lends itself to the musical form and because, “When you’re young, you use music in such a tribal way,” says Chbosky. “It’s part of forging your identity.” The intensity of a musical allows you to express that passion — even in an adult musical like Annette
— that might be an ideal antidote to lockdown ennui. “The power of a musical is all that you can mix that you cannot mix in normal films,” says director Leos Carax. “Funny and deep at the same time, or grotesque and emotional at the same time. [It’s] this crazy freedom you get from music.”
With live performance only slowly drawing crowds back in large numbers, the movie musical could ease us back into collective experiences. “Fear makes us act in strange ways and see each other as not connected,” says Jamie director Jonathan Butterell. “This story [of Jamie] is simple. At the centre of it is joy. I would hope that joy starts to break down barriers and bring people together.” Together like rama lama lama ka dinga da dinga dong? Let’s hope so.