Broadway Musicals Stage to Screen

In a way, it's unfortunate that film makers couldn't just film the live productions of Broadway musicals. There's just something about watching a live show. But they would have to include a lot of close-ups of the actors and perhaps the action would be too stultified for film. So they decide to make a film of the original Broadway musical. But in some cases, they make certain changes to accommodate the new media. They may leave out an important song just because to include it would make the film run too long. Or in some cases they may not only delete a song, but add a new one in its place. They may even change the order of the songs.
Here are a few examples.
In what is considered the first real Broadway musical, "Oklahoma," when they made it into a film, they left out the song "Lonely Room," which gives crucial insight into the character of Jed, the farmhand. There was also a song sung by the peddler, called "It's a scandal" which was left out as well. That's two songs which I feel were crucial as they gave further insight into those two characters, minor characters though they be.
In the Broadway musical, Annie, they changed the beautiful "N.Y.C" song to a syrupy "Let's Go To The Movies," and left out entirely the first singing of "Tomorrow" at the orphanage and 2 political songs: "we'd like to thank you, Herbert Hoover" and "We're Getting a New Deal For Christmas." They also changed "You won't be an Orphan for long" to "We got Annie," which was in the first draft. They also added a rather neat musical exchange between Mrs. Hanigan and Warbucks when he tries to get her to sign the adoption papers.
In South Pacific, they left out "You Gotta Be Carefully Taught" because of fear of offending someone.
Fortunately Lerner & Lowe's hit Broadway musical "My Fair Lady" survived without any changes, even though the movie of their earlier hit musical, "Brigadoon," left out a few numbers including a beautiful dream ballet between the bride and groom and the humorous "My mother's wedding day." With their other hit Broadway musical, "Camelot," 3 songs were left out of the film version, "Before I Gaze at You Again," which shows Lancelot's first reaction to realizing he's in love with Arthur's wife and is a sort-of-opposite of his later musical declaration, "If Ever I would leave you," "The Seven Deadly Virtues," which gives further insight into the depth of evil present in the character of Mordred, and "Fie on Goodness," which shows the discontent which the knights eventually felt with Arthur's "Might for Right" order. "Follow me" is there but in the wrong place. It's supposed to show the spirit of Nymue's luring away of Merlin toward the beginning, but is use for background of Arthur's trip to the forest toward the end.
Perhaps the worst offender was "The Sound of Music." In the film version, "My favorite Things," which was supposed to celebrate the joy of living even in a nunnery, was moved from the Abby to the bedroom scene. "Lonely Goatherd," which was originally sung in the bedroom scene was made into an elaborate puppet show. Then they added a new song by the composer. "I have Confidence," to be sung by Maria on the way to the Captain's house. But that is not the worst of what they did. They left out the very crucial "How Can Love Survive?" sung by Max and the Baroness to show the hopelessness of love between two rich people, as well as the song "No way to Stop It," sung primarily by Max and the baroness as a protest to Captain's strong stance against the Nazis. They also replaced "Ordinary Couple," the poignant love song between Maria and the Captain, which made a perfect contrast to "How Can Love Survive?" with the syrupy sentimental and theologically incorrect song "I Must Have Done Something Good."

Film producers also tend to want to draw out any action toward the end before the last musical number, making too long of time between numbers, the prime examples being "The Sound of Music" and "Annie."

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