Why are there no Queer Women in Musicals? | Queer Female Representation in Musical Theatre
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ก.พ. 2021
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Why aren't there many Queer Women in Musical Theatre Shows?
As a celebration of LGBT+ History Month in the UK I'm taking a closer look at the comparatively sparse role queer female characters have played in the Musical Theatre canon.
Check it out and let me know your thoughts down in the comments section.
Many thanks to Rach and Lottie who feature as special guests in this video and provided heartfelt and passionate accounts.
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I hope you've enjoyed this video, if you'd like to see more of the Stagey content I'm making including exclusive musical previews, West End interviews and general theatrical madness, subscribe to my channel! ⬇️
/ mickeyjotheatre - บันเทิง
One of my issues with The Prom is that it promises to be about this young lesbian couple but instead focuses most of its storytelling on the four old broadway hacks that have almost nothing to do with the plot.
I like the prom, but hate the old famous people sections, but I do enjoy love thy neighbor. Everything else can be burned
Since you mentioned Starkid, Firebringer has an almost entirely female cast, and the two leads get together in the end and basically form a matriarchy ❤
Charlotte and Cordelia (the couple in falsettos) are super realistic though, with jobs that aren’t your run of the mill jobs, they genuinely care about each other and rely on each other for guidance.
I gotta say we need more representation in theatre and I 100% agree with everything that’s been said. And I have a massive connection with the prom and I love it so much as I see myself both in Emma and Alyssa but i wish there was more of them in the film/show. Incredible video once again :)
Yes, Fun Home does have a plot about trying to understand her dad and why he committed suicide, but 2 of its biggest numbers - Ring of Keys (the first song written for the show) and Changing My Major - are very much lesbian love songs.
Yes, yes, yes. “Telephone Wire,” especially the rendition of just Big Al…that solo rendition is on replay.
The couple that wrote "Come From Away" (Irene Sankoff and David Hein) had a musical prior to that based on David Hein's experiences. It is called "My Mother's Lesbian Jewish Wiccan Wedding". I haven't seen it, but it seemed to be fairly well-received? I saw an interview where David Hein explains that the situation in "Come From Away" where the two Kevins are in the pub and the three people in the pub explain that their relatives are LGBT+ is word for word from when he and Irene were researching Come From Away in Newfoundland and they were with a group of people and they were asked if they had written any musicals before and they told them the title and that was their reaction to it :)
I saw "MMLJWW" in Toronto when it was in previews and l hated it so MUCH. I had to leave. I was experiencing lesbian second hand embarrassment. The whole thing made me cringe. Everyone l knew was expecting me to love it and l didn't.
Jagged has a bisexual lead called Frankie who has a girlfriend called Jo who was originally non binary but they made them cis when it went to broadway for no good reason( probably to feel less bad about having a cis actress play them and have a non binary trans man as the understudy). There’s no gay men on stage or even head canon gay men.
Ahhhhh thanks for clueing me in, I'd read a little bit about the casting controversy but didn't want to wade in without a full understanding.
Also head canon gay men is a whoooole other concept that I'm definitely gonna talk about in another video because it bothers me endlessly!
Yay for colour purple! I loved this vid. I thought it was great casting that the couple in the prom were actually LGBTQ+, doesn’t happen often enough!
There's a wonderful musical that started Tommy Tune's directing career back in 1976 (yeah, I'm OLD!) called 'The Club' that was comprised entirely of 'lesbian drag kings' performing actual songs from the Edwardian era, as if they were members of an upper-class men's club. Wish someone would do a revival - it was amazing.
“Pays to advertise “ love it 😂 another great and enlightening video, sending warm wishes ! Loving your content since I’ve been watching it for the past few months. Your doing great and I can’t wait for the next video! Godbless
Thank you so much, glad you enjoyed! ❤
It's a murder mystery so people die, but there's also We Are The Tigers. All but one of the characters are teenage girls, several of whom are wlw!
Great video, thought i should mention there are queer women in A Chorus Line (Judy and possibly Sheila), maybe 🙃 and Enid In Legally Blonde, but she is a total stereotype
Sheila? I have only seen the movie, never picked that up.
Not to mention the pool boy and his boyfriend in legally blonde, heck they have a whole song about it. Quite a few gays in that show
To be fair, I am a sucker for Enid's hardcore lesbian stereotype. I can't help it, sis has some of the funniest lines and her verse in The Harvard Variations owns.
@@EllieC130 oh hell yeah. She’s hilarious. And gay or European is actually my favorite song in the show
Absolutely loved this - just discovered your channel, subscribed straight away. Currently researching for my dissertation around the topic of LBGTQ+ representation in musical theatre and this was so helpful, thank you!
Mama in “Chicago” is either gay or bisexual or pansexual (depends who plays her really). In the script she is referred to as “butch” and “diesel” by Billy (who is prone to very homophobic language in the original script, calling his tailor a “dump fruit” - the “polished” version (1996 onwards) most of that is cut except for his references to Mama) - she’s the only one that immediately comes to mind.
Very interesting! The movie definitely retains more overt references to her sexuality than the current stage version, but I would love to see and know more about the original, less sanitised version!
@@MickeyJoTheatre You can buy it - the published script is the 1975 version. It’s not sanitised per se, just cut by about 20% to focus the plot and move away from social commentary vignettes that didn’t forward the plot.
Yeah I was about to say something like this. Me watching Queen Latifah’s When You’re Good to Mama performance did,,, things. Also feels very gay. Would love an overtly gay performance. I need more dom femmes in my life.
Not me getting 27 seconds into the video and subscribing immediately haha
Aw thank you so much!
Of course! I really enjoy the content and I love Musical theatre! And as a lesbian myself I agree whole heartedly with everything said :)
I wish there was more Asexual representation. I'm sex-repulsed, so I'd love to see some more representation.
And when there is potential ace representation, like a certain ice queen, people try to force sexuality onto it...
Question for you MickeyJo: what shows would be fun to cross-gender cast and make into a lesbian story? (I'd pay good money to see stylish butch lesbian as Sky Masterson)
I know it's not a musical, but her naked skin, is a beautiful play that heavily features a lesbian couple during the suffrage movement- definitely worth a read.
Fun Home? Andrew Lippa’s Wild Party? Falsettos?
He did mention Falsettos & Fun Home.
Lempicka which is at La Jolla now headed for broadway is about the life of painter Tamera deLempicka
Fun Home is the only musical that has come to mind with a queer woman as the (co)leading character. She's divided in three where the father isn't but her character exists and it's HER story!
Love Fun Home soooo much. I saw it at first at The Public and have been a fan ever since.
I mean … Lorraine in Nick & Nora, Matron in Hairspray, Enid in Legally Blonde, Madeleine and Sally in The Wild Party, Celie and Shug, Maureen and Joanne, Charlotte and Cordelia in Falsettos, Alison in Fun Home, Kate in If/Then, Rafaela in Grand Hotel, The Prom.
She kills monsters is pretty cool! It's a straight play, but has great representation
Jane Lynch, 6 foot tall Irish CAtholic lesbian played MRs. Brice in Funny Girls UGh
One of the earliest musicals that had an openly gay man in a major role was LADY IN THE DARK. From the 1940s, it starred Gertrude Lawrence and the gay man was played by Danny Kaye. His role was cut out of the movie version of LITD as well as movie of Lawrence's life,, STAR. As far as lesbian representation, Mama Rose in GYPSY was lesbian in real life but that was left out of the musical. Vera Charles in Mame is still a little suspect to me. And how can you "ugh" THE PRODUCERS? It's a farce and it uses all stereotypes and over the top characters. Shirley Markowitz was the lighting designer not the set designer. Mel Brooks did that because many of Broadway's most famous lighting designers were lesbian. So yes, it's a stereotype. How about a musical version of The Killing of Sister George?
Zanna Don't. A musical where being gay is normal and straight not.
This is an interesting conversation with many reasons and answers to it.. Even though I love The Prom as such I am also questioning why they needed to have 4 broadway-divas in the story in order to make it fly? As I see it they sterotype the broadway community into something selfish and laughable... I would have wanted to see the story unfold without them... Just Emma and her struggles and relationship...
now, I do see gay people (?) in more shows... I can see Mdm Giry in Phantom as one.. but.. I also question where her daughter Meg comes from? SInce Mdm been a confidant of Eric (The Phantom, for those who doesnt know) is he also the father of Meg? Then we have Carlotta...:)
But, can we get a proper lesbian musical , that is not sidelined by gay men? Maybe one on Gentleman Jack? There are plenty of stories out there that could be made into one. :)
Time for me to get my queer female musical on the West End..
don't be shy drop your @
Thanks for the representative content!
Bi love! 💕💜💙
Is there literally a single bi female character in musical theatre at all...
Frankie from Jagged Little Pill
Maureen is considerer BI BAITING?
I think it's important to talk about LGBT+ issues - extremely important - but what I want to see is good representation that isn't the centre plot. That's what I like about ETAJ because him wanting to be a drag queen is the plot, and him being gay is just a thing about him that is relevant and explored but not central while still being the main character
Joanne and Maureen were the first ones to come to mind as well from rent I love them
i’m kind of late but in Barcelona, a company named La Cicatriz, made a small catalan musical (2 actresses and 2 musicians) called “Una llum tímida” (a shy light) about the love story between two girls during the spanish dictatorship, it’s based on a true story and it’s devastating as you can imagine. As a queer woman watching that show felt bittersweet, on one hand you have one of the few (not the say the only) saphic musical, but on the other hand it’s so exhausting that the only saphic representation that we get is always so dramatic and pessimistic
Hi I'm late to the party but I love your channel so much this is the content I've been looking for
I admit I'm two years later to this, and it still hadn't changed very much, but there was an off-broadway musical called Between the Lines that seems stellar. I can't get to NY, so I didn't see it in person, but I love the cast album. It included a closeted lesbian popular girl (who it seems like asked a girl out by the end). Unfortunately the musical is mostly about the lead female, so the closeted lesbian character isn't as central to the story as I'd like, but at least it's a more accurate (and positive) high school representation of questioning/forming/dealing with a non-straight sexual identity as a female. There is also a nonbinary character played by a nonbinary performer who is breaking out of the "female" gender role/stereotypes (so not technically a queer "female" but they aren't a queer "male" either.
I believe the Jo character in Jagged Little Pill is either non-binary or their gender identity is suggested to be somewhere on the trans spectrum. However, my issue with the character is that they are underwritten and not given the same amount of time and focus as the other characters. However, they do get the best song in the show.
May be a play rather than a musical but I got to see a piece at Manchester's Royal Exchange that was about a girl discovering her sexuality and a lesbian relationship, was amazing!
Sally Bowles from Cabaret is bi.
This is an older show that is never done these days but Rafaella from Grand Hotel is one example of a lesbian character who is portrayed well in my opinion
The flag in the thumbnail btw is wrong !
Hello MickeyJo I don't know if you have clarified this but in this video is not clear which Musical adaptation of the poem by Joseph Moncure March "The Wild Party" you are referring to because you just show a poster of the film directed by James Ivory:
So is it the Broadway show, composed by Michael John LaChiusa, which followed the poem very closely, and an off-Broadway production, composed by Andrew Lippa, which took some artistic liberties with the poem?
Ah! I was referring to the Lippa version at this point as I'm less familiar with the LaChiusa but you make am excellent point that that absolutely deserved clarification!
Not gonna happen babe. All economics. If straight women have a choice between seeing a hetero romance with gorgeous guys or watching lesbians at $150 a ticket they will choose hetero. It is their story. I believe Getting My Act together and talking it on the road was lesbian. Off BWY. Probably more off BWY as less expensive and can take more chances
It's more a reflection of the male dominance in the theater. Name me one female Maestro of a major orchestra?
I never thought about this before. I knew there was plenty of LGBTQ shows and characters to go around, but I never realized there was not enough representation for lesbians. So thank you for pointing that out.
I hope we will see lesbian representation in theater in the near future as well as maybe bisexual, trans, nonbinary and asexual representation.
“It shoulda been you” had a lesbian couple but as a plot twist!
Oh yes! I thought that character was actually done quite well! Also her song "A little bit less than"
The majority of theater goers are straight women and gay men. Economics dictate what is produced.
I love your shirt!
As it’s potentially coming back, Lizzie- no men at all and, whilst it’s only conjecture historically, heavily features Lizzie’s relationship with Alice
Mickey Jo- I agree with you about the lesbian representation in The Producers. It is SO cringe worthy.
That's why I watch Steven Universe
Historical context
Thanks!
You're gay?! I 'm shocked! Shocked I say.
But a fair point about representation.
There's a reason why we have our skills: we didn't stay in that closet for so long to not flaunt it.
As someone who hasn't watched or heard all of Wicked, but has read the book (wich btw is lame as fuck) not making Elfaba and Glinda a couple was the single stupidest lost opportunity in the world of retcon, it was the only way possible to make that book at least somewhat less lame
Interesting video but the simple answer is that most Broadway musicals are created by gay men so that's why you have more gay characters- you did not mention "Aspects of Love" which does have a lesbian romance but the women are also involved with men so they would be seeing as bi. A lesbian composer might do a musical bio about a famous lesbian historical figure
that's not quite true, that "most broadway musicals are created by gay men". Quite a lot of broadway musicals have been written by and developed by straight men (and most of the too-few women of Broadway musical writers are straight as well). Heavy-hitter straight-indentified musical writers include: both Rodgers & Hammerstein, Frank Loesser, Irving Berlin, Cy Coleman, Jule Styne, Lerner (but I think Loewe is rumored gay despite marriage), Bock & Harnick, Charles Strouse and Lee Adams, Comden & Green (female/male respectively), Meredith Willson, (Tom Jones & Harvey Schmidt I'm not sure about from a cursory look), Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, Maury Yeston, Frank Wildhorn, Jason Robert Brown, Adam Guettel, David Yazbek, Pasek & Paul are gay/straight, even Jonathan Larson as far as we know. Book writers like notable straight bookwriters include Bob Martin (of The Prom and Drowsy Chaperone gay fame), Joseph Stein, Peter Stone, James Lapine, John Weidman, Itamar Moses, and many more, and of course major directors like George Abbott and Bob Fosse, have been straight -- while the notable majority of choreographers are gay, many were not. Notable gays in musical theater are many of course and include Cole Porter, Kander & Ebb, Jerry Herman, Stephen Sondheim (though many of his book writers are straight), and the bi-sexual Bernstein, Michael Bennett, Tommy Tune, Jerome Robbins, and many more. But I think you can see it's not really accurate to say "most" are by gays, and it all depends on which shows someone knows. But to be familiar with any era of Broadway musicals is to know many musicals by gays and many by straights.
Not that it's good representation, but Legally Blonde has Enid Hoopes
Bad girls
Lesbians in " Color Purple" ... where? Shug at the most was bi-sexual" not gay.
It's been.awhile since seeing "Legally Blonde: the Musical", but is Enid Hoopes overtly a lesbian? Though there is a whole song dedicated to finding the sexuality of two gay men.
Why are you only looking at only modern shows . Loads of older musical have more subtle lesbian characters ? Also frozen. West side story
Elsa isn't canonically queer.
And West side story doesn't have queer women, just a tomboy character
Mame / aunt Eller oklahoma
I understand how you and allot of audience members and Broadway fans feel, but then you need to have the creatives or writers who are in these categories, write and compose and creat these stories that you want to see on stage, you cant really force or expect the creators of hit musicals to cover and write about everyone. I think the only person to talk to about that would be Lin Manuel, and if you want to see your story told than you need to write and compose them if you are a lagbtq creator and composer and writer. Someone put the color purple on stage, and so it can be done. but sitting back and arguing or being upset doesn't get these shows created and put on stage or filmed. You need to write or create it for yourself or get people you trust to take an idea and bring it to life. Mickey, your awesome, great job with this video, and the women that were in it great job and you don't get to many LGBTQ audience especially women talking about these things very much. ate least not in NYC, not sure how the London theater scene is.
"The Wild Party" ..the song you mean must be the lesbian song " An Old-Fashioned Love Song" . I know that song. I have perforemed that song in campy drag for fundraising . It is not a stange song it is a great song. No she does not end the song with a racial slur. The last line is " An old-fashioned dyke like me " She is calling herself a dyke. So now the word dyke is no longer acceptable? It is slang...not a slur. More WOKE crap, And yep..when I perform that song I wear a sweatshirt and a short wig...I make it totally stereo typical. People LOVE when I do that number. No one has ever been upset by me performing that number.
Honestly, just reading about it was a little upsetting 🤷♂️
@@MickeyJoTheatre Reading about what ? My comments?...ya gotta learn to laugh at yourself sometimes.
Falsettos! There's littrly 2 lesbians singing about how they're lesbians from next door .