The Movie Musical: The Art Form of the Musical

What is musical structure? How do we use music in a musical?

Well before Rodgers and Hammerstein wrote their "book musicals" (more on that later), Broadway was long known for its lavish productions and big exhibitions. Showmanship was never in short supply in musical revues full of singing and dancing, but plot most definitely was. If there was some sort of throughline in one of these shows, it played second fiddle to the spectacle, comedy, and (most importantly for many ticket buyers) the chorus girls.

And most plots (again, if they existed) centered around something theater-related. Think backstage musicals or puttin'-on-a-show revues. For a well-known film example, let's take 1954's White Christmas, the Crosby-Kaye-Clooney movie about two song-and-dance acts teaming for a fundraiser musical in snowy Vermont - all from the songbook of Irving Berlin. Almost every song has something to do with the characters' ability to perform. Of the first ten songs in the movie, in fact, seven take place in a performance or rehearsal of some kind. Two of the remaining three see the couples falling in love, actually advancing the plot in some way.

Plot was secondary.

Until Rodgers and Hammerstein.