fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2189 ]

[ SECRET POST #2189 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2189 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 084 secrets from Secret Submission Post #313.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 1 2 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ], [ 1 2 - posted twice ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

To be honest, I don't get it either. I know a few songs, but that's all. The musical never made it big in my country and many people around me were baffled that it even existed. To us it's just the book and the non-singing films.

But, then again, I barely know the musical. Maybe if I saw it/saw the film I'd understand?

This also applies to me. I know only the book and 1935 film. :/

AYRT

My teacher made us watch it in primary school (I can't remember if it was the 1935 version or the 1958 one). I remember that we were all so appalled by Fantine's fate!

SA

I've just checked my country's biggest website about cinema and read the commentaries about the film. They range from "I'm excited" to "not sure" all the way to "BLASPHEMY". I'm curious to see how well it will do commercially...

(as you can guess, I'm French)

I always thought it was weird that neither of the big English musicals based on nineteenth century French novels made it big in France--I mean, Phantom I sort of get, because the author was more known for his mystery stuff, but Les Miserables is enough of a cultural institution that people can cry "blasphemy" about adapting it, and the first concept album for the stage show was in French. Okay, so they changed up a lot of stuff, like tacking a more hopeful "All revolutionaries go to Heaven" ending on for the English-speaking audience, but still, it seems odd that there's never been a fully staged French language production of Les Miserables.

I recall, while reading the notes regarding a film about the French Revolution, that the director had said that the French still remain conflicted about the revolution. Not French, so no idea how true that is, and also aware that Les Miserables is post-revolutionary France, but it still deals with the same issues, so maybe there's something to it.

There were several revolutions. Les Misérables takes place during the 1830-1832 revolutionary riots and it was written after the 1848 revolution.
Regarding the 1789 revolution, though, there are several debates: was it really a revolution led by poor people or by bourgeois wanting to gain more power? could the Terror have been avoided? etc...
Some deliberately paint the revolutionaries (Robespierre, for one) as blood-thirsty pre-communists. Others want to justify their actions, and n popular culture, revolutionaries are certainly more romanticised than the monarchy, even in films about the monarchy during that time. But it's mainly a debate between historians and writers. A politically charged one, admittedly: in some areas of the country, where the counter-revolution was strong, you're more likely to find monuments and traces recalling the counter-revolutionaries, areas that are today rather more Catholic and rather more right-winged. In my area, exclusively made of poor farmers, we burned down almost every castle we could find. We are rather more left-winged and rather less Catholic, even today.

The French version played at the Palais des Sports for a few months, though, right? From what I've read, it was pretty successful. And again in Paris in 1991 (though this was "redone" to follow the English production)

neither of the big English musicals based on nineteenth century French novels

The Scarlet Pimpernel is crying rn

I'm not sure where the Scarlet Pimpernel comes in, since that was a 20th century English novel (and I don't think the musical version could be called 'big').

(Phantom was also the 20th century, of course, but it at least hits 2/3 points.)

sorry--I meant set then, because otherwise I would have thrown Pimpernel and Hunchback in, too.

We're not really into musicals. Some are successful, some are VERY successful, but it's not a cultural thing as it is in the US and the UK.
I've looked around, and it seems that the stage version of Les Misérables, when it was first shown around the 1980s in France (first concept) was rather successful, or at least critically acclaimed where it was shown in Paris - but nowhere else and the CD version appeared ten years later, apparently, that probably explains why it never made it to cult status. By comparison, the musical Starmania, around the same time, had a huge national success thanks to CD sales.

Regarding the ending though, Victor Hugo himself believed in God but absolutely hated the Church, and many revolutionaries shared this belief to varying degrees. But his endings were generally bleak, the bleak cherry on a bleak icing. I'm not sure how that would go with Hugo purists, but many teenagers today probably don't remember the original ending so...

Yeah. The few extremely successful French musicals I know about are just as much pop-music sensation as they are theatre--it doesn't have much traction as a serious art form. There isn't even really a word for a serious musical, is there? It's just "comédie musicale." One of the touring English productions of Les Misérables made a stop at the Théâtre du Châtelet while I was studying in Paris, and I laughed so hard I couldn't breathe when I saw it billed as a musical comedy.

I suspect some of the "BLASPHEMY!" reactions might be fuelled by that, in fact. Underneath all the muttering about goddamn Anglos bastardizing our classic literature and selling it to the world without even understanding it, there's the assumption that we've taken Les Misérables and turned it into Mozart l'Opéra Rock. Or Disney's Hunchback of Notre-Dame.

However! If you haven't seen the musical, it's actually a pretty good adaptation of the novel. Not perfectly accurate all the time, but more faithful than a lot of the film adaptations with similar running times, which is impressive considering the limitations of the stage. (There actually was one ragingly successful French-language production, in Québec, and I think it was successful because they treated it as an adaptation of the novel rather than "Les Miz: The Hit Musical Sensation.") And the film version is even more respectful of the source material; most of the changes they made to the musical were to restore stuff from the book that had to be cut for live performance.

Exactly.

From the top of my head, I can only think of Starmania, La Légende de Jimmy and Notre-Dame de Paris as really big hits (La Légende de Jimmy, a bit less, but it is still remembered today, I doubt others like the musical Romeo and Juliet will be in thirty years, or at least, not as much). Except for a few exceptions, musicals really are seen as Mozart l'Opéra Rock: outrageous costumes, rather bland pop music, and dancers writhing around. You've nailed it.

Regarding the Hunchback, I can't remember what was said of the film when it was released. Apparently, from what i could gather, people knew it was Disney and weren't surprised, even though they lamented a bit over the easy happy ending. I enjoyed it though, but I'm a bit bitter by the fact that Frollo was made into a judge and not a priest when he was actually both. But I suppose leaving his profession ambiguous was a way of avoiding a backlash the kind of which Disney would still be hearing about even today.

And yes, there's not other word for musical except "comédie musicale" although sometimes people use "musical play" to avoid the "comedy" label.

Thank you for your advice! I'll try to see the film if I can find the time. I've heard Anne Hathaway's rendition of I Dreamed a Dream and she sure packed a punch!

I really like Hunchback as long as I think of it as something Disney came up with, not as an adaptation of Notre-Dame de Paris.

Frollo being a judge rather than a priest is a strange artefact of American culture: our first major screen version was produced in an era (I want to say the 1930s, but I'm not sure) where the industry practiced strict moral censorship of films, and even after the standards loosened up, subsequent adaptations modelled themselves on the first one and certain changes became ingrained. I don't know whether Disney would've changed Frollo's profession if this tradition didn't exist, but as things stand, if they had made him a priest it would've been a deliberate break from tradition towards something more scandalous.

*g* I'm not sure I would describe the music in Mozart l'Opéra Rock as "bland" so much as "way too catchy." I've never even seen the damn thing and I can still go around for days with Tatoue-Moi stuck in my head.

Tatoue-moi sur tes seins, fais-le du bout de meeeeeees lèvres...

I see what you mean. If asked, I wouldn't be able to name one song from Mozart l'Opéra Rock, but I instantly had the chorus in my head when you mentioned the song.

Have you heard the Les Rois du Monde song from Roméo et Juliette? Ridiculously catchy, and my friends and me can't stop thinking about it when we walk side by side (the official video is largely responsible for this, and unintentionally hilarious).

(and yes, exactly to all of your other points!)

Yup. No idea what the show's even about, except that maybe someone thought Amadeus would be even better if you reimagined it as an 18th-century Velvet Goldmine, but it has so many earworms that I just know I'm going to spend the rest of today singing "Je! voue! mes nuits! à l'assassymphonie, aux requieeeeeeems" under my breath.

Haven't heard anything from Roméo et Juliette, although I've heard of it. I'll have to look up the video when I get home, because the unintentionally-hilarious music videos that introduced me to Mozart l'Opéra Rock are amazing. Though probably not in the way the creators intended them to be.

Just looked up the synopsis for Mozart, l'Opéra Rock. It's apparently a retelling of his life.I would never have guessed! To me it looked like a love story between Mozart and a woman, with leather, bondage and lots of eyeliner.

Will you tell me when you manage to watch the Roméo et Juliette "Les Rois du Monde" video? :D

But, then again, I barely know the musical. Maybe if I saw it/saw the film I'd understand?

Yes.

Why is this so difficult? I have never seen nor read anything to do with Les Miserables. Yet even I can grasp that understanding the musical requires actually seeing the musical.

What is it about you people that makes this so difficult? I wonder how you view other things about which your knowledge is, at best, cursory. Do you doubt its usefulness because you, yourself, have not personally experienced it, regardless of what others have experienced? Do you, say, deny the efficacy of certain cancer drugs because you haven't been present during their administration?

Slow down.

I'm French. I've read the book and watched film adaptations. The musical NEVER made it big in France. People scorn it when they even know it exists. They think it's a blasphemy. The adaptation might flop very hard in my country (or not, we never know). So yes, I was brought up by a whole country to even doubt the emotional impact of the musical and its artistic relevance.

However, I've read accounts from people who were deeply affected by the musical. Who love it to bits. So yes, it made me reconsider my previous stance on the matter.

Does the fact that one was brought up to think a certain way mean that it is right for one to think a certain way?

No, but it explains it. And I didn't say that it was right. I don't think it either.

Just wanted to say that I can totally get not really understanding the draw of the musical, especially everyone around you had the general attitude that it was blasphemy. Which makes sense, since the book is a classic and people are probably going to be less inclined to be all over a musical about some pretty heavy subject matter, especially when the subject matter in question is part of your country's history. I think the musical does a good job of paying homage to the book, but I think it would be easy to see that it's a musical and assume that it's trivializing the subject matter.

I enjoy both the book and the musical, but I do view the musical as it's own thing. It's related, definitely, but there are a lot of differences. And, really, musicals are just not for everyone.

You do realize that starting an entire paragraph with "what is it with you people" kind of makes you a huge asshole, right?

/hates the condescending vibe

I think many of us who love the musical loved it as teenagers (a common age for entry into both book and musical Les Miz fandom, for some reason), and so the movie brings up all those teenage FEELINGS. Which is not necessarily going to work for adults seeing the musical for the first time.

Anyway, I know I turn into a 16-year-old again when I watch the movie. There's nothing objective about the experience.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ SECRET POST #2189 ]

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