We need to talk about Mean Girls...
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On Wednesdays, we talk about the new Mean Girls movie and why studios don't wanna say the "M" word anymore.
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day 1000000000000000000000000000000000000 of asking you to cover raggedy ann.... pretty pretty please???
We're getting close to Beauty and the Beast's 30th anniversary on Broadway. Is that something you are going to cover this year?
“Nobody hates musicals. They just haven’t found theirs yet.” Is what I’ve been saying for YEARS
they need to go back to animated musicals. I would love hadestown to be animated.
Mines beetle juice
When I was a teenager I wasn’t really into the live action musicals, I mean grew with the Disney renaissance with their music, but hadn’t really discovered a musical that I like and get immersed in.
Lol this sounds like something a musical theater person would say.
it's so profound, because I too thought that musicals just weren't my jam until I watched Starkid
In this version, Janice and Damien don't really come across as outcasts. The meanness was definitely toned down to cater to what adults think Gen Z sensitivities are.
yeah, this phrases it pretty well. by minimizing the racism and homophobia of the students at the school, it kind of does a disservice to all the queer and poc kids watching now. of course removing things like nonsensical asian names is definitely a needed change, but i feel like pretending gen z is chill with everyone who's different doesn't reflect the reality (source- im a zoomer)
Giving Janice and Damien romantic interests felt like box checking more than anything else. We don't know their names or anything about them or their relationships, just that they had a romantic interest. It felt very superficial. There were a lot of characters from the original that could have been developed as well. @@MB-og3dw
Meanwhile, Gen Z grew up on the original
@@MB-og3dwdo you really want a bunch of white (primarily straight) writes to write a bunch of racist homophobic shit?
@@MB-og3dwso we’re just ignoring that the main point of Janice being an outcast because she was framed as a lesbian who was a predator to her straight friends? That’s a pretty big part of the narrative
I’m wary of musical movies. I just want pro shots like Hamilton. Sometimes the movie just doesn’t capture the same magic that the stage does.
I really hoped when Hamilton proshot did so well that they'd continue down that line with other ones. But sadly that momentum seemed to have died too.
Tick tick boom was really good
But sometimes you get films like In the Heights. Where certain sequences take advantage of the film medium to create spectacle the stage could never hope to achieve. Case in point: 96,000.
I was just about to say, in the heights movie was absolutely phenomenal. When done right, and with the right material, by a crew who wants to honour the fact that it is a musical, they can def be good.
@@MK-gv1wd Not really! Since Hamilton we've got proshots from Come from away, Six, Waitress, Heathers, Everyone's talking about Jamie and Anything Goes (I think that's all, but they might be more)
It felt like the movie was embarrassed about the fact it was a musical. Felt like the movie just wanted to be a beat for beat remake of the original with some modern updates and then did the songs out of obligation
Felt the same for The Color Purple.
really? i got the opposite vibe. the choreography was great, at least compared to something like dear even hansen. it wasnt afraid to be a movie adaptation of a musical adaptation of a movie
Someone needs to start a "Is This A Musical" website so we can all set out expectations accurately.
Yeah! It would be like “Does the Dog Die” but for movie musicals
Exactly!!
Agree! I'm not anti-musical but not knowing that Wonka was one really negatively affected my view of it.... despite listening to certain songs from the soundtrack on repeat.
Why did they change so much the song “stupid with love?”
Like the song was so relatable! That’s how we all felt on our first crush and now it felt so lifeless.
They said they made it that way to appeal to mainstream audience but this way the og fans of the movie are confused and the musicals fans are mad.
yes, that version sucks! it worked so well on Broadway with the jokes having time to land, the movie version is so rushed and although i liked the new instrumental (it reminded me of Warblers from Glee), the lyrics lost all their fun
Likely regardless of Angourie being an excellent actress, she has a significantly smaller vocal range than the original score required. Presumably the same reason Apex Predator was reworked to be Damian and Janis, and why the ‘girl that doesn’t even go there’ ends up singing the finale.
Not that its more mainstream, that it fits the medium - film is different from stage and songs like Stupid with Love and It Roars does not fit the vibe at all. Both those songs sound too Disney.
I remember I listened to “Stupid with Love” for SO LONG because it felt very relatable and it’s a banger but the new one is so lifeless 😭
I liked this version of stupid with love it seemed more dreamy/having a daydream kinda feeling & how she was just feeling that as a vibe in it. It goes well with the visual in my opinion.
The movie was filmed in my town!! and when I tell you, the craziness of seeing these people around doing everyday stuff lol. a lot of my friends were extras, one of my friends even went to the high school it was filmed at so in a way he went back to high school lol. Another friend of mine sold Renee Rapp a keyboard at the music store he works at. But the peak for me was seeing Tina Fey in my local target and thinking “that woman looks like Tina Fey” but it just was Tina Fey.
Omgggg that's amazing! How long were they there filming for? Can you add more details that seems seriously cool!
That’s so fetch 🩷
Yo that is so cool!!
@@litehouseaj2394 I think it was about 2, 3 months? It was pretty short. But it was filmed at a catholic high school some friends of mine went to, that had just closed the previous year. There was a lot locally that was done. Friends of mine were even tasked with making fake art projects and took fake class photos that would go on to “dress up” the classroom sets. And heard from friends of mine that worked as extras, all the main actors were very kind and professional but apparently Angourie and Auli'i were the most socialble and talkative to everyone.
That reminds me of when Janis and Damian saw Ms. Norbury at Janis’ job in the original movie 😂
In The Heights was such a sad example. At the time it came out, I and many others didn't feel comfortable going to the cinemas yet. Couldn't risk my at-risk family. West Side Story I feel failed in the international marketing department, at least here I didn't hear ANYTHING about it until it was on its way out
Exactly! I don’t feel like the performance of movies released at that time can be properly judged. Nobody was going out yet. And ITH was released for streaming on the same day, that’s how I watched it 🤷🏼♀️
The last big successful musicals were probably La La Land & Greatest Showman? And I’d argue it’s because they are very good introductions to the genre
In the Heights wasn’t even a success on HBO Max so I find it hard to blame Covid for it
@@sketchycat6223outside of Disney of course. Wonka is doing very well
@@sketchycat6223Yeah. Not to mention they were original works. They had nothing to compare themselves to; blank slate.
Honestly I think another problem is the fucking budgets of these movies are crazy. Movie musicals used to be so much cheaper so they could make back their budget even with a nicher audience. I can't even guess what some of these movies are even spending that money on.
Absolutely!! The biggest lesson should be, don’t spend close to the budget of the first iron man movie for a movie musical 😅
The numbers are so unimaginative at times I swear I thought they were being UNDER-funded.
THANK YOU!! My biggest issue was that there’s absolutely no chance in hell that Regina would ever wear anything made by elf cosmetics.
She probably wouldn’t put anything less than 80 dollars on her face.
I think this movie was made more modern but relatable. I notice instantly it was word for word. It felt weird but the way the music captures the emotion of the moments and how the transition were used I loved.
Same i was like regina is rich why is she using elf? Like she’s gonna use products no one else can get not affordable products
Regina looks more like a cool mom than a popular highschool girl
I love musicals, but I don't think it's right to lie to or mislead audiences. Musical theater is better than that.
and youre not gonna trick people into liking musicals! 😂lmao, people who dont like them REALLY dont like them.
The really tragic thing is that West Side Story and In The Heights were so good. And of course Tick Tick Boom was incredible (and rekindled my crush on Andrew Garfield) and I hope it did really well for Netflix.
I hope the musicals movies continue.....
I loved tick tick boom❤
Agreed!!
“nobody hates musicals, they just haven’t found theirs yet” is one of the truest, best statements i’ve ever heard. one of my best friends is the furthest thing from a musical theatre fan, but came to see me as drew in my college’s rock of ages production and adored it because of his love for eighties music. there’s a musical for everyone- they just have to explore !
So true!! Like there’s Legally Blonde then there’s Chicago or Hamilton! There’s so many AMAZING musicals!!
this is hilariously inaccurate 😂
The Color Purple absolutely marketed itself as a musical. There was singing and dancing in the trailer. Such a tragedy that more people saw Wonka and Mean Girls than TCP. It was incredible.
The Color Purple isn't released yet in Australia and I absolutely want to see it.
I don't entirely agree with people that say these movies aren't shown to be musicals in their advertising when they literally show clips of everyone dancing and such from their musical numbers in it even if it has dialogue playing instead of the song, they are still clearly musical parts, plus the title for Mean Girls literally has a musical note on it, and Wonka's synopsis that theatres use and such mentions that its a "mix of music and magic"
This comment was how I found out that TCP has been released already. In my country it won’t be released until February 8.
Can’t wait to see it.
@@MissCalaMari same here, I didn't know some countries already had it until I read the comments of this video
I didn't even know it was out yet!
I hate that people lump The Color Purple in with Wonka and Mean Girls because every trailer and every ad not only had shots of people dancing but also featured the music that's actually in the film, with each trailer and each ad showing more and more of the characters actually singing, which Mean Girls and especially Wonka did not do at all.
When the trailers for Wonka first came out I remember multiple clips of singing and dancing. Not trying to be rude I just remember being suprised people didn’t know Wonka was going to be a musical
There was one (the first one I think) that did not. And the internet being what it is nowadays, I'll just bet that people more likely to like musicals got the one with singing and dancing in their social media feed, and the people who don't care about musicals did not.
The first trailer I saw for it in front of Barbie had absolutely no indication it was a musical
In that regard, and I totally agree with you, The Color Purple was a lot less subtle, especially in correlation to obvious big group musical numbers.
I feel quite confident that Wicked will break the trend and be a hit because it’s the right kind of musical to be brought to the movies and marketed as such. Cats never belonged anywhere that wasn’t the stage, and Dear Evan Hansen has some kinda creepy aspects that don’t fit with the realism of movies. Many of the other musicals were victims of bad timing, or didn’t have enough draw for one reason or another. But Wicked has the right blend of story and spectacle for the silver screen, and casting is spot on.
We'll see, I can't remember who is directing but hopefully it's not someone hyper-focused on "realism".
@@andieallison6792 I just looked, and it’s Jon M. Chu, who is known for Crazy Rich Asians and In The Heights. I’m feeling pretty good about this.
I still think they should at least make the movies for people who like musicals, cause NONE of my friends liked this mean girls.
Also I’m still convinced that in the heights would have smashed it if released pre pandemic
It still hurts me to realise that people don’t get that they’re all the villain… that’s the point.
Mean Girl(s). Regina is a villain as much as she’s a victim - they all are.
They need to stop trying to excuse villains for being who they are or doing the things they do.
Someone can be a victim and a villain - that's the nature of human existence, duality is a part of wholeness. No one is able to be "good" all the time. Good is also a matter of perspective. Like you might think that you *know* what is right and what is wrong and that your enforced opinions of those moral perspectives make you a "good person" and I conversely might assume from those actions that you're a judgy, probably controlling person with a fragile ego who needs therapy. Perspectives are personal and enforcing yours doesn't matter to anyone but you.@@venuslove-i1v
@@PhimbleG-d Yeah, but being a victim does not excuse harming other people. This is the problem with most movies today. They are trying to soften the villains, as if what they did is not so bad even if it scars another for life. It leaves the idea that people should not be responsible for their own actions and should always use the victim card to cover up their crimes or wrongdoing. If your actions are directly harming someone else this is when there needs to be a more balanced mind. It's odd to expect others to give you a pass when you are treating others poorly and making others a victim. I'm not going to give a r*pist a pass just because he was abused a a child. He literally harmed someone else and made someone else a victim with him. Yet, stories today will try to normalize this, taking away the purpose and meaning behind why those stories mean something to humanity in the first place.
OMFG are you telling me SOME PEOPLE ARE BAD?! I CANNOT BELIEVE IT. I HAVE NEVER BEEN TREATED BADLY IN MY WHOLE LIFE... I HAD NO IDEA! HOW COULD YOU BURST MY BUBBLE (with your pseudo intellectual fad sociological victim branding)?
THIS IS SARCASM ! ! !
TRY TO UNDERSTAND.
Just because being a victim is fashionable right now doesn't make you or your cause worthy. Read some philosophy. I'm sorry bad things happen BUT YOU DO BAD THINGS TOO. We're all victims, we're all villains THAT'S HUMANITY.
Get a clue - I don't care what you think - you might like to think if I'm arguing I do care but I just like arguing - and you like EVERYONE have done others damage. Intentionally or unintentionally. Wake up, you are a victim and a villain as much as anyone else and if you think you aren't try actually talking to people, no one goes through life easy, everyone suffers, you're not innocent - not least for judging others or pushing false moral narratives.
If you ever bother to actually study morality you'll find it's a matter of opinion. Try Nietzsche - you won't like it (or likely understand it) but you need it. Your personal morality like your overblown opinions are your own. Stop pushing them on others. You might find some cluster of people to become your victim echo chamber but all that does is create social divides. You accomplish NOTHING by making yourself "morally superior" to others - other than division.
Go live on your little victim island if that's what you SO DESPERATELY want. But don't think art or culture should care about you. Art is about expressing things that can't easily be said at it's best it's complex and whole - not a one-sided BOO HOO POOR ME narrative.@@venuslove-i1v
I mean, at the end of the day, audiences will quickly figure out what these companies are doing. Like, keep calling these secret musicals 'new twists' and audiences will stop going to see them because they will eventually figure out what's going on. Also, as a musical lover, I hate that companies can't just be honest and say "hey this new movie is a musical!", because that means that I won't go watch these movies because I don't know they are musicals! I didn't know Wonka was a musical, but I do now because of this video. The other two I know only through knowing of their original Broadway productions, but that's not knowledge that everyone will have going into these movies. >_>
you didnt know Wonka is a musical? the trailer shows scenes that are obvious musical numbers and the original movie was quite musical. Same with Mean Girls that showed some of the musical scenes in the trailer and also has a musical note in the title logo
@@Ranga3595if there is no singing in the trailer, I think it’s pretty understandable to not think a movie is a musical. It could just be a grand scene from the movie, not a dance number. I didn’t know Wonka was a musical and I LOVE musicals. I just thought it was another pointless remake.
@@LaurenLaass it showed big dance numbers, some with characters mouths moving like singing or long notes, and the description mentions its "a mix of music and magic". also, the trailers and marketing show its a prequel to the original
on the reverse - i would have seen mean girls or wonka if they weren't musicals - but id be pissed if i went out of my way to see a movie and it turned out to be a musical. a musical is a very specific and very polarizing genre - people like to know what they are paying for.
that being said, the entire discussion of this movie since the first trailer revolved around it being a musical - it is odd they didnt market it as a musical, but the fans of the broadway show made it very clear that this was not the mean girls for me, lol. (i appreciate the hustle, its just not for me).
I had no idea wonka was a musical until I saw it in theaters. I was definitely surprised when they started singing.
Based off the data you’ve shown, it seems more likely that that people prefer musicals made for the film medium rather than film musical adaptations. La La Land, The Greatest Showman, and Wonka were all written and produced for the screen. I’m not familiar with Rocketman, but I think it’s the only one that doesn’t follow those guidelines.
Adapting to another medium can be really difficult, and measuring the success or the popularity between mediums can be even more so. I wonder if the way the success/popularity of a musical is measured is somehow negatively impacting what producers believe will make a successful film adaptation.
18:32 i think it's important to note that in the heights, dear evan hansen, and west side story all came out mid pandemic when most movies tanked unless they were spiderman. in the heights didn't even get a proper theatrical release in australia because we went into a lockdown. pre pandemic we had the greatest showman which was an absolute smash hit and unapologetically marketed itself as a musical
Ok do we think that if they re-released In The Heights in the summer, if it would do better?
I know I’m going to enjoy this video, but I have to say that The Lightning Thief was based on the book, the movie didn’t really have anything to do with it 😅
This is a fair point hahaha it's mainly just a little teaser for what's to come next week :P
@@WaitintheWings oh? 👀
There's one issue with your analysis of the budgets and the losses of the films.
You just accounted for the reported production budget. However, it's widely known in the industry that the actual cost of a film is close to 3 times the value given to the production budget. Marketing alone usually doubles the budget, then you have to add the theatre cuts, the interests for the bank loans, any reshoots that might happen, etc.
So, for example, that abomination that was the "Cats" film, cost between 80-100 million when it comes to production budget. Let's say it was 90 million.
Now let's be very VERY generous and, instead of tripling it to get the actual cost (270), we just double it. That's 180 million dollars that the film cost to produce.
I grossed 75 million. That means that, IF we're VERY VERY generous, "Cats" lost 105 million dollars. But if we're more realistic, though, then it lost close to 200 million dollars. Not 20 million. 200 million.
And it also means "Matilda" WAS a flop as well, 'cause it LOST at the very least 15 million dollars.
Wonka has turned a profit, HOWEVER, so far it's sitting at a profit of only 125 million.
When you apply the correct formula to all these films, yeah, it'll just make the argument even stronger for NOT promoting the films as musicals.
Theaters slowly opening up after COVID in 2021 (plus audiences not quite ready yet to see movies again in public) definitely did not help In the Heights or West Side Story.
Thing about Wonka: it came out during a period where there was really no competition. The only thing really playing at my local theater at the time was Aquaman 2 & and buncha smaller productions (seriously did anybody know that The Beekeeper was coming out?)
Cady saying the full product name of the Elf product, despite it being blatant product placement, felt very in character to me. like her not knowing how to shorten it felt right.
I agree with most of your thoughts except the music. I don't mind that they rearranged the music to sound more like pop music but in doing so they stripped all the energy out of the songs. They feel very flat and one note now. The songs just aren't memorable enough to strip them down like they are in the movie.
I’d disagree with the sentiment that film studios might have it right. The data that needed to also be analyzed to make a concise study is most Disney films. With the exception of recent bombs, Disney’s animated musicals have kept the cultural movie musical alive. How the Broadway musical to film adaptation started falling apart is writers not understanding the core of what made the stage production work.
In The Heights added so many things that took context away from the music. Dear Evan Hansen was a creepy nepobaby production that didn’t solidly focus the main story.
There are other factors at play here.
I do think that there are other factors at play, but I also think that it’s fair to ignore Disney’s animated films when looking at the data as an outlier.
The truth is that general audiences treat animation differently than they do live action. There is still a mentality amongst general audiences that animation is “for kids”, and it’s why most animated projects are either 1. Produced on children’s networks, or 2. An adult comedy series Ala the Simpsons or family guy. While we are now seeing more dramatic animated series dedicated to adults, they usually are adjacent to communities that enjoy anime (invincible appealing to comic fans, and Castlevania appealing to gamers), so it’s not as much of a shift to them. To say that Disney musicals are treated equally to other musicals means to ignore the general audience’s attitudes towards animation, especially Disney. Heck, Disney even tried to make a live action musical with the film “Newsies”, which bombed hard at the box office but did very well when adapted to Broadway. Mary Poppins is probably Disney’s most highly profited musical, but that was also the 60’s when they were still popular. Times have changed amongst general consumers.
While there is some truth that the studio executives aren’t entirely right, there is enough evidence to show that they know what they’re doing. In 2007, the film “Sweeney Todd” was heavily advertised as a horror film about a barber that kills people. It generated a decent profit, but shocked audiences when it became widely known it was a musical. While you could argue that it damaged the audiences trust, it at least managed to make a profit, which is better than many other musicals that advertised themselves as such.
Like I said, I think you are partially right, but there is a clear pattern from the past 30 years. I disagree with your claim about in the heights, as general audiences didn’t know that, plus a lot of people in the comments are praising the film still. I think Covid is a bigger factor than that, as every film suffered, but you can’t ignore the history and how a majority of musicals not marketed as musicals tend to do better than those marketed as such.
@@phabiorulesOf course Covid was a factor with In The Heights and other films released around the same time. But cutting out the odd writing choices made for the film adaptation also ignores what has been really swiftly cutting many movies down; word of mouth.
With many things getting a straight to streaming ticket at the time, word of mouth hinges on if folks check something out. And ITH had terrible feedback. So did Dear Evan Hansen. And Cats. And West Side Story, which has *always* had so many issues that non-white audiences have historically panned. There are exterior factors.
With how recently Encanto songs took over radio play, regardless if people see animation as a “mature” medium or not, Disney films have kept theatrical musicals kicking. That’s the litmus here.
The only real difference between the “successful” musicals that did not boast their true genre is that a majority of them are original IP with nothing to compare them to.
An asterisk should be put with In the Heights and West Side Story because of people's pandemic hangups.
In the Heights was on HBO Max and wasn’t even a success there
@@Danbo22987but HBO Max is America only, isn’t it? You definitely can’t access it here at least. So in terms of global numbers which is what they’re looking at, it’s still going to be cinema numbers that matter the most I would think.
@@Danbo22987 that isn't indicative of anything.
@@Danbo22987Such a niche platform. If it had been on Disney+ or Netflix, we might have a more representative result.
The color purple being an outlier in that last comparison is so sus to me. i was trying to see that yesterday, it having been only a few weeks since it came out, and it was only playing in far away suburbs i can't reach! And I live in a major city. I wonder if it was hurt by coming out on christmas or if the marketing just wasn't there. I definitely saw more ads for wonka and mean girls
It’s crazy that wonka is still out in theaters but I can’t watch The Color Purple anywhere after it was out for two weeks. I also can’t find it in any of my theaters. Oh well I guess I can buy it on Amazon video and just watch it at home. At least I was smart enough to invest in a nice set of speakers for my tv so it won’t be too bad. 😅
I miss when the cast of movie musicals went on all the morning talk shows and actually sang. The cast of Rent was all over the place singing live because they could. Do movie musical casts still do this? I remember when live action Beauty and the Beast came out the cast did interviews but no one sang, presumably because Emma Watson wasn’t a strong live vocalist.
with the percy jackson show coming out i think it would be the perfect time to talk about the musical
yes! i genuinely enjoyed the lightning thief musical, it showed that it cared about the source material and understood its audience (young kids and young adults who love the original series) implicitly. the musical has a lot of really good character work, too, even for characters like luke castellan who don’t get their motivation genuinely understood until the later books… the good kid reprise in last day of summer gives me CHILLS every time i listen to
@@sareizareads me too! ugh james hayden rodriguez just SELLS it every time!
He knew and he was cooking
@@Kai-rc7fw i must be the oracle of delphi with how i predicted it 2 weeks before it dropped
We saw Mean Girls on Broadway 4 times, it’s such a fun show! My musical theatre friends & I rented out a theatre for a private screening. We sang along like it’s Broadway Karaoke Night & used popcorn as confetti. We’ve done this for every other movie musical release, it’s become our tradition. (Yes, we clean up the popcorn ourselves.)
Can i join your friend list? You guys sound like fun😁
I need friends like this
This sounds like a lot of fun, but throwing popcorn around so theater workers have to clean it up? Come on.
Do you clean up that popcorn confetti?
Yes, we do.@@bex1107
“Gretchen and Kendra, respectively”
Excuse me, sir? 🤣 Most Karen like moment ever there.
Yes the opening numbers of mean girls might be high, but half my theater walked out after the 2nd song. So when ppl who hate musicals learn it’s a musical, they won’t wanna go. And when ppl learn it’s not nearly as good as the original, they also won’t wanna go
THIS. Honestly a musical movie can’t win over both “sides” so easily and this one definitely didn’t. Not marketing it as a musical will make people who don’t like musicals feel scammed and give it bad reviews while toning down the songs so much like they did just make liking it real hard for people who like musicals. They just wanted the money I guess.
I think for me one of the biggest things with this film is how it felt like there was another breath of life in the musical. They took a musical that ultimately I wasn't a big fan of, and played with its score and made it into a movie that I ultimately really enjoyed. Great to see you upload this on a Wednesday... and you wore pink !
as someone whose a bigger fan of the mean girls stage musical, it was kinda disappointing and sad to me to see what odd changes they did with the score for the movie (stupid with love is probably my biggest issue with the changes for me). but this is all just my opinion, i'm so glad other people have different opinions on this that differ from my own
I think there may be a confounding variable here. 6 movies that you mentioned were based on existing people or properties that provided a way to pull in audiences that did not have to rely on the musical aspect (Matilda, Greatest Showman, Rocketman, Wonka, The Color Purple, and Mean Girls). All of these movies are profitable, save for the Color Purple which probably will be by the end of its theatrical run. The movies mentioned that were not based on existing properties or people were almost all not profitable (save for La La Land). I think the dilemma here is that original movie musicals are largely missing the two crowds that would keep them profitable, general audiences and movie connoisseurs. La la Land catered to the more intellectual movie audiences while the properties that are based on existing properties have the appeal of "Oh I've heard of that!" It is a similar phenomena with musicals based on movies on Broadway. The Lion King, Hamilton, Mean Girls, etc. can draw in general audiences that are not plugged into the musical theatre scene because the marketing makes them think "Oh I'm partially familiar with this property and I liked that thing this is based off of so this feels like a safer bet than something I know nothing about". Movie Musicals that are not based on something else can't hide behind established familiarity like these movies with established collective knowledge can. That's why they can say "Bold new take" because there IS and existing take. For all their other faults, Dear Evan Hansen, Cats, Tick Tick Boom, etc. cannot do that because their entire appeal is that they are really good musicals. So while I do see your point in the trend of marketing, I think it is a misguided trend that fails to see the real causation here.
Cady is not a senior, she is a junior. Aaron is a senior
“Nobody hates musicals, they just haven’t found theirs yet.” Is so true. Started dating my boyfriend and even though he’s a gay man he’s never really seen a musical or had much interest in musical theater. I on the other hand am a theatre gay so that had to change and change QUICKLY. I remember the first one that I took him to was a regional production of Sunday In the Park With George and telling him “oh you are going to love this. It will really speak to you. You are very much like George” and he says “I doubt it. Things rarely speak to me nowadays” well sufficed to say but that has now become his favorite show of all time. Every musical he watches he now compares to Sunday and so far according to him nothing has matched up. A Little Night Music though got very close for him. 😆
m so gutted over In The Heights and it’s loss… saw it in the cinema several times, actually bought the DVD in the era of streaming and bought it on Sky… absolutely love it so much, and desperate for it to come back out in the UK theatre scene ❤️
I can't talk about La La Land, but I'm pretty sure most people knew The Greatest Showman & Rocket Man were musicals, at least after the opening weekend.
I feel the big difference is whether something goes viral in a positive way about a movie before release. With ad free streaming services & TH-cam with Premium or Ad Blockers being the biggest ways people watch media, positive virility is the only way you can make sure people know about your film.
I also think the difference between some of these movies is how some are adaptions of shows and others are it’s own thing
I have to say I disagree with the notion that misleading advertising campaigns are ever a good thing. On top of the immediate backlash from a betrayed audience, that tactic risks alienating your potential “cult” following in the future. Studios need to embrace musicals for what they are, immediate niche projects that payoff in the long term. A winning formula seems to be keeping production costs as low as possible early on. The big budget musical is probably going to become a really hard sell in Hollywood. It will be telling to track Wicked part 1 and 2…
This is why Gen Z should be using IMDb more often
the whole movie budget thing has one problem. a movie has to do at LEAST twice its budget before it has recouped its costs. it is better to assume 2.5 times its budget to pick the point where it makes a profit.
Wonka is basically... profitable, but not profitable enough for the kind of money spend on it.
“Nobody hates musicals, they just haven’t found theirs yet” is so true and I’ve also been saying the same thing about history. Everybody likes learning about SOME KIND of history
“Nobody hates musicals, they just haven’t found theirs yet.” It’s just like with anime, I swear!
Heathers the Musical would have been a much better movie adaptation. It has that edge and that bite but the songs still speak to a younger audience. They released this movie way too soon. The musical just came out on Broadway and I don’t think has had a chance to even develop a more larger and loyal following that you get after years of community theatre productions and national tours.
Great video! I love the love for Starkid, as well. Long live Starkid!
how well a movie depends on a lot of other factors too, I think. Wonka stars Timothee Chalamet who is like, America's favorite heartthrob, and The Greatest Showman had Hugh Jackman, Zendaya, and Zac Efron. In The Heights had really talented actors, but they weren't the *huge* mainstream names that people knew (aside from the fact that it was released during a pandemic). Anthony Ramos is a broadway star. It's different. Advertising it as a musical v. not doing it feels like kind of a small factor, tbh.
I'm so glad you exist, I just don't see this kind of content about musicals enough. If anyone out there wants to respond to this comment with recommendations so I can get my algorithm on board with this, feel free!
*How to make me tear up in a Panera part 1*
@@WaitintheWings 😂😂💖💖💖
MickeyJoTheater is the only other consistent theater channel I have found so far
Gretchen and WHO? My girl Karen is the moment
I was like..who tf is Kendra??
@@rachaellarson842same LOL
I hear you about the red dot! How I interpret the red dot/phone fiasco is that it's meant to convey present action - ie: it's being recorded in 'real time' by the character. I find it effective when used to convey that the character is presently recording, but when it's used to show something previously recorded it makes no sense! Great video, love. the channel!
When you said - nobody doesnt like musical, i immediately remembered about "the guy who didnt like musicals" from starkids 😂
Great video, btw ❤
You know, as much as I enjoyed the 2024 movie, I have to admit the new orchestrations for "Sexy" and "Apex Predator" will take some getting used to.
Also, I have a feeling the $95M budget for Cats mostly came from the A-list celebrities in the cast and the VFX work needed to make them look like cats. Doesn't help that director Tom Hooper wouldn't let the cast wear motion capture suits on the grounds that their performances would be restricted (tell that to Andy Serkis).
I don't think the numbers say much but rather what was going on those years. I wonder if those three films came out today or before covid, we would be saying something different. I don't think the studios are on to something. I can see them trying to use these numbers as an argument and leave out what hit the world in 2020-2022.
There’s some great questions like “why” “who asked for this” “who cares” “the original was already good”.
But I think the better question is… why didn’t they go in? Why didn’t they show the bitchiness and pettiness of some female-female interactions.
Also, euphoria has done it.
Fun fact about it switching from streaming to theatrical. They only had to hire 25 union bg actors instead of 85. I'm sure it saved them tons of money considering they wrapped 2 weeks behind schedule and there were several days when shooting went over 16 hours (look up golden time)
The blatant product placement was a little distracting for me, though didn't hamper my enjoyment. The ELF and Spotify plugs were the most obvious, but then they had Lindsay Lohan cameo to literally plug Seatgeek! 😅
this line change was frustrating cus the original line was just “sponsored by….no one” which i personally think is a better joke, but no, they had to squeeze in one more sponsorship i guess. all the love for lindsay lohan tho, we were hyped when she showed up
I can't believe more people from the original didn't make the time to do cameos. Seeing Lindsay Lohan host the math competition was sweet! @@lustforlimerence
I don’t mind movies not being marketed as musicals. Like you said, at least we’re getting musicals.
I thought Mean Girls was… fine. Several of the cast did a great job (mainly Renee Rapp who I’d let stomp on my head with her Louboutin heel)
That being said… I did not love Ms Rice as Cady. She was fine, but you could tell she didn’t have the experience, ESPECIALLY when her counter part is Ms Rapp. An example of this was having to pull back Regina’s solos as to not overpower the other cast. Booooo, let my girl sing.
As a theatre gay, I get so sad when they put out a musical and it’s ass or not something I’d watch twice. Ultimately, I don’t think the movie adaptation has to be high camp like the original musical is, but at least don’t dumb it down for an audience that wouldn’t have bought a ticket if they HAD been told it was a musical.
I think an issue with the Musical "flops" is that they relied on their position as well known musicals (except the Hights which mostly relied on Hamilton). I don't think people mind going to watch musicals, but they need some other reason beyond "it's a musical" to want to go. I think people forget to sell the story in many of these cases. "Modern remake of the classic" isn't enough of a sell when there's a bunch of people who have no relation to the classic in the first place.
For Wicked, I'm actually hoping this would be successful, considering how very popular Wicked is and since their splitting into 2 parts, I hope somehow it would suppress the budget
Bebe wood as Kendra? Errmm don't you mean Karen? (5:35) I guess because of this blunder you owe me a video on Death Note The Musical
Ah drats. You got me there.
16:10 - Kinda true on that as I went to see the movie with my parents and my mom was like: "Oh? It's a musical." And honestly, I didn't know that either. (Or at least that there would be more than one song) Not that it didn't ruin our enjoyment of the movie, it's just a confirmation that it wasn't marketed as such.
I did not appreciate the lyric changes in this film adaption, nor how they chopped up certain songs and removed entire duets and verses. The actress of Cady was the weakest of the cast, she couldn’t carry any of her scenes to me, she just did not fit. Especially seeing as it appears she isn’t a singer, because they removed her verses-and some entire songs- of hers and gave them to other singers. Her descent into being a plastic isn’t slow and gradual, it’s randomly sudden near the third act. I hope this movie launches Renee Raps career cuz that’s clearly what is was made for. She’s literally the only person on the poster, when Regina isn’t the main character. But she definitely did carry the film, though this Regina is a bit too outwardly mean and isn’t subtle enough for it to make sense of why people trust her.
One thing you have to remember when looking at budgets for movies is that you have to double the listed amount to account for all the money that goes towards advertising. So the box office bombs like Cats and Dear Evan Hansen are even WORSE that you thought.
I am interested to see where this pop-skewed compositions will lead because I feel like the choice was made less to suit the context of the movie and more to be able to get streams and radio play. I am very curious what will happen to Wicked’s soundtrack and Once on this island
Smashing that like button so hard before I finish the ad reel, cuz WitW never disappoints
I WAS WAITING FOR THISSSSSS
Yeah, thats a valid point. Its so odd how its almost like doublespeak in marketing. Looking forward to joing patreon again soon, and I hope youre doing well
The elf product placement was like, the least offensive thing about this movie. The most being that they seemed to forget that comedies are supposed to have lots of jokes in them
mama this was horrible. misunderstood their audience so bad that they didn’t commit to either idea (modern version OR musical) and ended up doing a bad version of both.
I think what people fail to recognize is that Cats and West Side Story flopped not because they were bad adaptations or that people hate musicals, but because Cats was divisive even among people who like musicals and let’s face it, West Side Story is kind of boring. Most of us remember being forced to sit thru the original film adaptation and being bored. I love musicals and shows and I WAS BORED. No one has the attention span for long ballets anymore and a larger broader audience no longer understands the art of ballet street fighting. Dear Evan Hansen flopped as a movie because everyone saw an iffy trailer with a 30 something man in an awkward wig dressed as a teenager.
Seeing that Mean Girls 2024 has made $100+ million dollars in theaters on a $36 million dollar in just about a month is such a great achievement for everyone involved! I am also in the majority of people that enjoyed the film so I am celebrating for them!
when we asked for more musical films what we meant was more pro-shots a la Hamilfilm and we got DEH and this instead
The thing with the record button is, we're not meant to be watching a video that they recorded, we're watching the video *as* they record it, kind of from their perspective so it makes sense that we see the record button.
The choreography in this movie is so killer, I wasn't expecting how much fun I was going to have while watching the chero
ive got to be honest - i really appreciate the hard work and talent required to make a musical. genuinely! its why im subscribed to this channel! the bts stories are so fascinating!
- that being said, im one of those people that doesnt find a musical as an engaging narrative structure (for me!) i generally have a hard time understanding lyrics when im hearing songs for the first time - so for that to be a major part of the storytelling...i cant get into it. i also get worn out by song after song after song. a jukebox musical like moulin rouge is a little easier to digest, but even then i find myself skipping half the scenes. im glad the musical fans were so vocal in warning me this was a musical. 😂
i'll just add - the musical number in addams family values and the movie waiting for guffman really crack me up - but i feel like they're making fun of musicals? does that count? i guess i like them when they're trying to be bad lol.
i for some reason CAN NOT get why people dislike musicals. but you worded it fantastically, "they just havent found theirs yet." im now gonna live by that
Sure, marketing a musical as a non-musical may be more fiscally advantageous, but that doesn't make it right imo. Like... tell me what I'm buying!
This is the first i'm hearing of The Colour Purple movie!
Also I wasn't interested in Wonka until my Aunt went with her daughter and told me it was a musical, it just seemed like Hugo with less mystery or Greatest Showman without the music XD
Absolutely recommend you see TCP in theaters!!!!
Great video!!
I hated how toned down it was. Like if you’re going to make a musical…let it be a musical 😤
Hopefully The Color Purple will do well in it's released in Europe next week 😀
I’ll never forgive the world for letting the color purple flop, it was the best movie I saw all year
YES
you cant really blame the "world" for that when The Color Purple isn't released everywhere in the world, here in Australia it doesn't come out until January 25th
@@Ranga3595 it’s a figure of speech my guy, not that deep
@@uhuhuh1966 my comment wasn't deep, mate, calm down.
just simply stating the fact that it's kinda soon for the flop comment when it was the second highest grossing film released on Christmas in history and it hasn't released everywhere yet.
@@Ranga3595 you clearly don’t follow box office numbers, it had a great Christmas Day opening and then immediately dropped off and isn’t even in the top 10 box office in America anymore. It’s not going to make even its budget back, it flopped. I’m sorry to break it to you.
Part of the reason why a movie musical like RENT was so successful, in my opinion, is the fact that they used SIX of the EIGHT ORIGINAL Broadway cast in the film, who can ACTUALLY sing. Renee was the only reason I sat through this dumpster fire.
Look into how Sweeney Todd was marketed vs how much it made. That is the original "Hide that it's a musical" movie
I think that a lot of the box office revenue for musicals, especially when you look at Wonka, The Color Purple, and Mean Girls, somewhat shows that even if people don't like musicals and aren't expecting it, they'll still buy that product for name recognition alone. I saw all 3 of these movies within the first week of release and The Color Purple had 4 people (including myself) in the theater meanwhile the other two were really full and I ended up in less-than-desirable seating in the very front. This theory regarding name recognition also holds up somewhat with live theatre. I live near a touring theatre and this past year they hosted the casts of Aladdin, Hamilton, Hadestown, The Lion King, Dear Evan Hansen, and Fiddler on the Roof. Of all these, Hadestown and Fiddler had the least attendance (from what I saw) while Hamilton and Lion King had the most. When you compare these 4 examples, the first two are not widely known (in my experience) outside of the theatre community. At the same time, the latter two have had huge fanbases and recognizability outside of just the theatre community (especially with the "recent" pro-shot and live-action).
I don't know, it's just my take on why some of these movie musicals are doing better than others despite a pushback against musicals.
those numbers make me wonder even more about what the joker sequel is going to look like from reviews to sales to overall impressions from general audiences since while it is just following up a super popular and successful movie, it's been announced upfront that it's going to be a musical/have musical elements.
Love your shirt, given that it is, in fact, wednesday
20:55 idk about including Greatest Showman and Rocketman. They’re both biopics. And the Greatest Showman soundtrack went SUPER viral.
I’ll also add Color Purple has smaller theater reach than Wonka and Mean Girls. My local theaters are only playing Color Purple in 3 of them and one is in a city an hour away. Also doesn’t have pleasant nostalgia the way the other two do.
Just so people know, and I dislike when people say “it wasn’t marketed as a musical.” Because It was. There was singing, and dancing in the trailers, there is a music note in the A. People need to pay more attention. Don’t blame the marketing because your upset you don’t want singing and dancing in your classic movie. I love all three, the movie, the musical and the musical movie. Just like wonka! There was singing and dancing in the trailers.
I agree. The only thing I’ll say is that in the trailer that I watched the main song that plays is an Olivia Rodrigo song so I could understand how people could watch that trailer and think that characters are going to dance to pop songs in the film. But the note in the A in the logo should’ve given it away.
It's actually junior year in Mean Girls, not senior.
when i was watching the movie during that 15 minute no music break, i was like "wouldn't it be great if stop was in this movie", and then it wasn't
rip stop 😢
Already know this one is going to be a banger and I'm only 30 seconds or so in.
Hey! Is your WSS 21 analysis still up? I loved that one!
I think not everything needs to be a musical. Wonka was succesful because it made sense for a quirky character as a one of a kind chocolatier that wanted to innovate and also attract people to become a one man show with singing and dancing and inspiring people to do so. Mean girls... um... no one even was in the glee club or something. Out of place.
I think what happened with no marketing - to marketing - to no marketing was the fact that the musicals from a while ago that didn't really market to be musicals were incredible. La La Land is gorgeous and moving, I personally hate the Greatest Showman but I know it has a place in so many hearts based on not only the cast but the music. The musicals from the promo heavy era suffered from either being bad movies or secrets being revealed about cast members. Cats was just horrific really and Dear Evan Hansen had Ben Platt as a 75 year old playing a teen in a story that was far past being turned against by it's initial fanbase (i.e. them realizing how messed up the story and Evan are). In the Heights was good (never as good as the stage production) but I almost didn't watch simply because of Anthony Ramos (cheating), and I never saw West Side Story purely because of Ansel Elgort (sexual assault allegations). That doesn't account for the COVID release of some of those films too, and going off that i think part of why Wonka, in particular, has profited so much is because movies are only sort of coming back for families. If everything costs $50 you may as well take your kid to see a movie that'll keep them quiet for two hours - regardless of if it turned out a musical or not they would've taken their kid to see the kids movie.
I wonder why the movie musical has gone from an endearing, romantic concept that people loved, as in the era of Fred and Ginger, to something from which studios are actively distancing themselves? And why the industry chooses to market the movie musical as anything but- which angers the anti-musical crowd- while simultaneously getting rid of as much 'musical' as they can- which angers the pro-musical crowd- so nobody's happy. Why not make a ploy for the theatre kids?
(also, appreciate that you're wearing pink on Wednesday!)