That old song and dance

It's no secret that musical theatre is the heart of Broadway. Since Cats and Phantom of the Opera first premiered in New York in the 1980s, lavish designs and richly produced soundtracks have been par for the theatregoer's course. Today, Wicked, Spamalot and The Lion King are so far above every other Broadway production in sales and popularity that straight plays have a hard time making headlines. As a consumer of culture, this leaves me to wonder, is it that musicals are just more in touch with what Americans want in their art right now, or is it that plays just aren't as good as they used to be?

There are good arguments on both sides. On the one hand, it makes sense that American audiences, especially New York audiences, want the escapism provided by musicals and fantastic storylines. The world we're living in continues to grow more and more complicated. Economy, politics, terrorism and natural disasters weigh heavy on our collective psyche, and the theatre has always been a place where we could leave our cares at the door and let the power of imagination carry us away for three hours plus intermission. As we make our way into a new millennium, maybe we crave the magic of the Land of Oz and the farce of Python's Camelot.

On the other hand, maybe it's less about what we want than about what we're given. It's not that the scripts for non-musical productions are bad — many of them are revivals of smash hits from classic playwrights like Neil Simon. In fact, Simon's The Odd Couple and Barefoot in the Park, both currently open, are some of the best scripts of the 20th century. And it's not bad acting-- Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick of The Odd Couple are arguably the best team on the stage this decade. So what is it about these plays that fails to connect with audiences in the way that big budget musicals seem to?

I think it's just bad timing. Neil Simon's humor is rooted in a common understanding of the way the world works that seems hopelessly old-fashioned in 2006. Even the best revival of 1960s dialogue is still firmly planted in the past, and these shows won't do well again until audiences can take them as period pieces instead of timeless classics.

It's not just revivals that are failing to connect, though. There are also a handful of new plays that, while unanimously praised by critics, just haven't been able to garner broad audience appeal. Despite four Tonys and a Pulitizer Prize, for example, John Patrick Shanley's Doubt continues its run just below the shiny surface of mainstream glamour. Doubt is a nuanced, important, well-told story that opened with an incredibly talented cast, and still its ticket sales pale in comparison to those big musical spectacles. It seems that no amount of quality in a play can push it to the top of the pack.

A sort of irony about this disharmony between plays and musicals reveals itself when the past year of Broadway is compared to the past year in film. This year in Hollywood has been about movies that challenge and push the envelope. Brokeback Mountain, Crash, Good Night and Good Luck among other Oscar nominees prove that movie-watchers are ready to examine difficult social and political issues at the theatre. Or, at least, that the people who make movies are ready to take real risks in their art. Perhaps the difference is that stage productions have a less immediate payoff and a more limited audience. A film can be viewed in any city in the country by millions of viewers at any given time. It's easier to take a risk with a film. Perhaps the reason that risky, brilliant plays like Doubt can boast only lukewarm support is just that theatregoers prefer their introspection to be delivered by Netflix and consumed in the privacy of their own homes, and would rather laugh and sing along when viewing a show in public. Likely, it's a combination of these two and many other cultural factors.

While it's difficult to parse out the reasons why plays have a hard time finding a voice now in the age of the special-effects musical, it's important to keep holding out hope that one of the many straight plays that open on Broadway might be a real contender. In the next few months, I'll be crossing my fingers that Richard Greenberg's Three Days of Rain or Herman Woulk's The Caine Mutiny Court Martial will bring the spotlight back onto a stage that stands alone, without an orchestra. If Julia Roberts' and David Schwimmer's star power (the leads in the aforementioned shows, respectively) can bring the audiences in, maybe the stories and the characters can keep them coming back.