What do you think are the greatest musicals? Here are my selections:
1. My Fair Lady
2. Oliver
3. Chicago
4. Gigi
5. Fiddler On The Roof
If this board gets any reaction, I'll justify my selections. For now, I'll just rate them one thru five.
My favourite is The Sound Of Music. As for the greatest... I'm not sure I can answer that.
How do you define greatest?
While I don't feel I can give a helpful response, I am interested to hear your justifications for those five.
How do I define greatest? You ask a difficult question. I never really defined it in my mind. Thinking about it now, I guess my meaning was "as perceived by others" but with some personal biases also.
Personally, I have always liked Carousel and Guys and Dolls. I did not include them in my top five because Carousel was just never received well by experts. And although Guys and Dolls was the most popular Broadway musical of all time, I have never been a big fan of the movie. Brando and Simmons just can't sing.
My picks of one thru four all won Oscars for best picture and Fiddler was nominated. I guess my rank of one thru four is subjective at that point.
There are other musicals that won Oscars also. Your pick, Sound of Music, won an Oscar for best picture as well as West Side Story. I picked Fiddler over them simply because of personal bias. I like Sound of Music; also, I recognize that it is one of the most popular pictures of all time. It even rivals Gone With The Wind. As far as West Side Story, I recognize its' brilliance but it's too heavy for me.
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If you count Beauty & the Beast as a musical, I'm actually going to throw my weight behind it and say it's my favourite and up there with any ever made!
shareWe're talking any musical whether an adaption of a Broadway show or a movie musical. So, it would be ok to pick Singin' in the Rain or Bandwagon.
I like your selections. We agree on no. 1 being My Fair Lady. Did you realize that every other choice that you made were by Rodgers and Hammerstein except Showboat. Even on Showboat, the lyricist was Oscar Hammerstein.
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Kismet.
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I don't know which are the greatest but these are my own favourites:
1) My Fair Lady
2) Fiddler on the Roof
3) The Sound of Music
The 'funest':
Music Man
Fantasticks (Greatest if longevity counts)
My Fair Lady
Hello Dolly
Cats
But, I've always been partial to Rodgers & Hammerstein:
South Pacific (my vote for greatest)
The King and I
--- CHAS
C'mon. I love My Fair Lady, but West Side Story is potentially better. The others in your list, imho, don't even touch these two. I'll admit I haven't seen Oliver since I was a child.
shareWest Side Story should seriously get more recognition, it's a glorious masterpiece, and sometimes I think that I'm the only one who loves or even knows that movie.
shareMy Fair Lady is up there for me. It is very complete, Music, Acting etc
Oliver and Chicago are ok but have great music
Gigi and Fiddler on the roof are good too
No room for The Sound Of Music in your top 5? I always thought it was a top 5 for musicals, Julie Andrews singing was just something.
Others that people have mentioned are great also West Side Story, Singin' In The Rain etc
Funny Face is another one I enjoy a fair bit
Yankee Doodle Dandy is music related and also a good flick
Geez there were some top notch musicals back in the day when I think about it. Its depressing thinking cinema wise there arent a whole lot of decent ones that get promoted heavily. You never tend to hear of them.
High School Musical, Hairspray (remake moreso, original was meh) and Camp Rock were promoted heavily and they are all rubbish IMO