Hey Everyone! For today’s post, I’d like to welcome a very
special guest blogger, Megan. Megan is
my oldest friend (we literally new each other in diapers), and is currently a student
at SCAD. A few years back, right after
my study abroad experience, we took a train into New York City and saw Daniel
Radcliffe star in the musical “How to Succeed in Business Without Really
Trying.”
Seeing the performance was an incredible
experience for me. As soon as I had
heard the announcement on mugglenet.com that Radcliffe was going to be starring
in a musical, I knew that I just had to see it.
And lucky for me, I had someone willing to go with me.
If you were to ask me what my favorite song
was in the entire performance was I would most definitely say “Brotherhood of
Man.” I just love the lyrics and I loved
the dancing and energy that goes into each performance of it. But, I do have other favorites in the show
including, “Coffee Break,” “A Secretary is Not a Toy,” “Been a Long Day,” and
“I Believe in You.” I even had a painted
sign that I made with a quote from, “I Believe in You,” hanging in my apartment
in college.
Sadly, we didn’t get to meet Daniel
Radcliffe, but we did get John Larroquette to sign our playbills and a few of
the other dancers’ signatures as well.
Was I disappointed at the time given my slight Radcliffe obsession? Yes.
But I realized I was incredibly lucky to have even been able to go, and
quickly got over it.
If you haven’t seen any of the performances
from the cast then you’re definitely missing out. I’ll link one of them below so that you can
experience some of the magic. Also, be
sure to check out the Broadway Soundtrack for the musical (linked below). It’s amazing!
And now, for your reading pleasure, here
are our special guest’s thoughts for the day:
I’m
not sure which of us discovered that Daniel Radcliffe was starring in a musical
but we decided pretty much right away that we would figure out a way to get off
work, get together and travel to go see the musical in New York City over the
summer.
Now
I already had a little background into the show because I was a dancer in my
middle school production of the show and had seen the movie before; Allison
decided to go based on my opinion and of course he fact that Daniel Radcliffe
was in it. I’m not sure if any of you
have seen it but if you have let’s face it, it’s hysterical; it is witty in
both dialogue and lyrics. When I was
twelve I didn’t get every single reference or joke that was made but I caught
onto enough of them that I enjoyed the entire experience. It was incredibly different, both in seeing
the play in its entirety and now being eighteen and catching all the jokes,
seeing How to Succeed for the second time.
A Secretary is not a Toy in particular made a lot more sense- I knew when
I was performing that there were things going over my head but I didn’t realize
how much was CUT OUT until then.
Leading
up to the play I was anxious to see how Daniel Radcliffe would do at a
musical. The other cast members like
John Larroquette and Tammy Blanchard I was really
excited to see live and perform but he wasn’t someone who had done anything
like this before; plus I had seen a subpar version of Brotherhood of man as
part of the promotion for the musical closer to the date we were going. As it turned out I had nothing to worry
about. Radcliffe threw himself into the
role of J. Pierrepont Finch completely.
His energy level had gone way up from the one performance I had seen his
dancing, while certainty not the best on the stage, was raw and seemed larger
than his small frame. His singing had
also improved quite a bit. Unfortunately
the CD, which I of course bought, was recorded months earlier to be ready for
the opening of the show and his singing was nowhere near as good as when we got
to actually see the play, so that part is a little disappointing but I listen
to the CD all the time anyways…. like right now, or when I’m bored, or no other
music is appealing to me, or really whenever.
These songs are also extraordinarily easy to
quote in everyday life- even if no one else gets it. For example if I’m in a critique and someone
has a huge ego and is being pretentious what pops into my head?
“Big deal,
big rocket,
Thinks he has the world
In his pocket.”
And how many times do my family and I sing
this?
“Well, it's been a long,
Been a long, been a long,
Been a long day.”
Answer: All the time- pretty much every
day. The list goes on and on.
