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On August 17th, 1993 I delved into the world of live musical theatre for what I believe was the first time. Of course I had seen a few musicals on television in my day – The Wizard Of Oz and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang spring to mind – and I wasn’t crazy about the whole randomly-breaking-into-song thing so I figured I’d best start with a ringer: Jesus Christ Superstar featuring Dennis DeYoung in the role of Pontius Pilate.
How could I go wrong seeing one of the most famous rock musicals of all time starring the lead singer from the great(ish) classic rock band, Styx?
And truthfully I don’t know, but somehow I went wrong.
It was my first time in the O’Keefe Centre (which briefly became the Hummingbird Centre before being renamed the Sony Centre for the Performing Arts). It’s a pretty legendary room in Toronto, having hosted The Who, The Grateful Dead, David Bowie, Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin and The Beastie Boys (among many others); not too shabby for a medium-sized, single-balconied soft-seater.
But I was here to find out how Andrew Lloyd Weber rocked the Bible into the hippie era, and unfortunately I left shaking my head, still wondering. Maybe I was reading too much into the ‘rock’ part (it didn’t sound very rockin’ to me), maybe I couldn’t help but to be disappointed hearing DeYoung sing without hearing a single Styx song (I’m sure they could have squeezed Renegade into the storyline without too much trouble), or maybe I just couldn’t get over the silliness of suddenly jumping from dramatic scenes to choreographed song-and-dance numbers.
Which would indicate that I just don’t like musicals.
I thought exactly that for decades after this show. Through the two or three musicals I played guitar for when I was in university, through such megahits as Book Of Mormon and Green Day’s American Idiot, and all the way up until I saw Come From Away on Broadway. Come From Away made me laugh, it made cry, it made me tap my foot and sing along, but most importantly Come From Away confirmed that I did in fact like musicals and further, it was absolute proof that all the previous musicals I had seen were precisely as lame as I had thought they were.
Including this one, though I suppose it wasn’t terrible. And I guess if I was being completely honest I’d have to admit that American Idiot was pretty okay, and I had a pretty good time playing guitar for the Little Shop of Horrors run at my alma mater, but to be fair I had just bought a new wah-wah pedal so I could have just been that.
Todd Man Out 