Take A Look at Disney

4/24/14

Musical Fridays # 128: Screen Vs. Stage: Newsies







Hello &  welcome  back  to   A Look at Disney and to Music  Fridays.  Today,  I'm introducing a new  segment, simply titled Screen Vs.  Stage, where I take a film that was later adapted by Disney into a stage production and compare the musical numbers and today,  I'm getting things off by looking at one of my favorite musicals that would later become  one of my favorite plays as I compare the music of Newsies.  Now seeing as there were new songs written for the play,  I will not be looking at those and I will be going by the film's song order, even though the play may  have a different track  order and oh,  I'm excluding  reprises.   Let's  begin.





This  number really sets the tone for the movie and what to expect and you get to meet the boys in this number and get to know them and it does a good job of introducing   each character as you get   to know  them  and it is just so upbeat and infectious that I find  myself singing along.  There's really  not much  more  I can say  on it other than  that.  Sure,  it does  get a repetitive  in certain  areas but it's still a great number.  All of  the boys do a great number  singing in this number but there are things that left me confused  such as the Nuns  coming and saying  Jesus will  save you.   That felt  like it came out of  nowhere. 




They are essentially the same song and while  I love the movie,  I almost think that the play  has better  singing quality here.  Not knocking   the actors  in the movie as I love  but something about the play  is just a bit more infectious  and the play  actually fixed  my complaint about the nuns as by showing bringing drinks to the Newsies and thus explaining why they were there.   This is easily one of the best numbers in the show and yeah, I gotta give it to the Stage in this round.


 





This  is one  of the greatest  numbers  in the movie and yeah,  it's an "I Want"  song but it is so heartbreaking as Jack  just wants to get out of here and get a better life for himself as he's never had a real family.   All of his life,  he's felt beaten  down and like  no one has given him a fair chance.




The song  in the play  takes  on a different meaning  as Jack  beats himself  up over not being able to protect  his fellow  Newsies, who he views as his brothers and he wants to escape and leave because  he's feel that he can't be the leader that his brothers need.   Honestly,  this  version  can bring me to tears.  This is just so sad because  you can  just hear Jack beating himself up  and Santa  Fe  in both the movie and  the play  are an escape  to a better life but in the play,  Santa Fe is also ans escape  for Jack to hide that he's scared.   I have to give this round to the stage.







 

This  is easily in my opinion, the worst song  in the film,  I have nothing  against  Ann-Margaret  and she does a fine job in the role of Medda Larkson  but she was one of my two least favorite characters in the film.   And  I get what this was supposed to be but it's just so boring and takes me out of the story.   I mean,   with Medda, she's  an old family friend of Jack's and she's letting him hide from being caught  by guys that are chasing him but this number has nothing to do with the rest of the film.





One of the biggest improvements from screen to stage  was Medda  and  her  song from the film was thankfully  dropped and replaced with this much better number that is  funny,  has a lot of life to it, and is very vibrant and lively.  Again, like  Medda's  song from the film, it has no barring on the overall plot but  I'm willing to give it a pass as it's  more enjoyable.   And yeah,   I know  these are two different songs but they're sung  by the same character and have the same idea of showing off who she is and what her show is like and in that regard,  stage wins.










This is the song, where the boys  come together   as union  to fight Pulitzer  and Hearst   and this is where they decide to go on strike  and Jack  is made the leader.  In  the  movie, this song  comes  after Santa Fe but in the play,  the order is switched,  giving the songs different meanings.  Honestly,  this is in my opinion, one of the two best songs  in the movie. 




For  all intents  and purposes, this  version is better and the singing  is more powerful but  I don't  know,  I love  it but  I gotta go with  the movie on this one.   It's hard because this is just as good but if  I were forced to choose the version of this (which I am),  I'd  listen to the movie version over the stage version.  Both are excellent but I just prefer the film version.  So, this goes to the screen.






This  is my other favorite song from Newsies and many fans consider this number to be the anthem of the film and  it's  not hard to see why.  This number perfectly  goes  hand in hand with the previous song as again, you see the boys coming together and uniting, and saying we aren't going to take the way, you've been treating us any longer.




I gotta be honest and say that this is the hardest vote because again, this number is equally as good as the film version.  Ugh,  I don't  know I like them both but which one, which one, which one.   The dance break in the middle of this one is really cool with how they dance on the newspapers and  again,  it does a good job of  uniting the boys but at the same  the time,  the movie version is one of my all time favorite  Disney songs and I loved that version first but this version is  just as much  fun.  I gotta go with the movie,  so this one goes to screen. 




This  was the hardest  one  to make my mind up on as they are both great.




This  one  is  the better version  because  this one is about  one of my favorite  characters from the film, Brian  Denton, the only news reporter  that was willing to take on the boys'  story and report and  he became a father figure to the Newsies and this version is the boys celebrating the only one that would stand up for them and  this version  is better because Denton got cut from the play.   Yeah,  I'm biased but he's one of the best characters in the movie.





Again,  this number isn't  bad  but my bias towards   Denton  is going to make me   choose   the film version  over this one and as I mentioned,  Denton was scrapped from the play and replaced with a female  news reporter that also replaced  the bland love interest  from the film and became Jack's  new love interest.  That was an improvement but  still,  I gotta go with the screen version.





Once and For All  - Screen



I really do like this song and  it's a great number, where the boys  have finally  reached their limit and aren't going to take it anymore but I do have one  minor and I extremely  minor  nitpick.  I get what the film was going for  having  this be a montage and  having the song be sung over the montage felt like an odd choice to me as none of the other songs in the film were like that.


Once and For All - Stage

I like this number  better  as I find that it has more intensity to it and being a stage production,  it fixes  my minor  issue that I had with the film version.   I just  feel that the stage version  has more anger  to it, which   is needed to fuel the boys'  anger towards the situation.  So,  this version   goes to the stage.



 



























So,  by a score  of  4 -3,  the Stage version takes the win.  Again,  I like both the film and the play and they are both great soundtracks but the stage adaption improved upon some of the mistakes from the film and made it a better story and gave the songs a better chance to shine.   Both are great and if you've  never seen the film,  I would track it down and the play is now touring.  From this Fansie,   I love  Newises and this was a blast to do .  Let me know, if you'd  like to see more of these in the future. 

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