Carefully Taught: American History Through Broadway Musicals, by Cary Ginell (Applause Theatre & Cinema Books, 2022)
—Cathy Ritchie
His title harks back to one of South Pacific's many landmark songs, but Cary Ginell uses the catch phrase as a stepping-off point in his unique blend of musical theater survey and historical Grand Tour. Carefully Taught is likely to appeal to performing arts groupies and facts-and-figures scholars alike. When I heard the book’s subtitle, I expected a semi-academic essay on the topic, but instead, Ginell highlights 40 musicals, chosen based on historical eras, fashions, incidents, and the individual movers/shakers involved—and his detailed reference-type content should hold readers’ attention.
In a helpful Introduction, Ginell explains the criteria used in selecting his particular 40. He has purposely excluded works set outside the United States (e.g., Titanic, The King and I, The Sound of Music), as he plans to deal with them in a future book. He also omits “biographical musicals” such as Jersey Boys and Beautiful: the Carole King Musical, although he does find room for “biographically-based” works such as Annie Get Your Gun and Gypsy because, as he puts it: “they de-emphasized biographical detail in favor of depictions of specific eras in American history.” But worry not: what Ginell does bring us is a lively mix of the legendary, the somewhat obscure, and the practically-never-heard-of, as he offers both entertainment and new perspectives on this essential American art form.
He lists his shows in chronological order by the era depicted. Thus, we begin with 1776 and conclude with Assassins. For each entry, he provides historical context; time period/setting used; Broadway performance dates; book and score creators; cast album information (if one was produced), and both “major characters” and the original actors who portrayed them.
He then moves on to “historical background,” setting each show within its American context. “Production notes” describes the journey each work took from lightbulb flash in a brain through its stages of creation, including problems faced and (maybe) eventually solved. These two sections vary in length for each entry and are impressively engrossing. The final sub-portion is devoted to “score,” as Ginell examines each show’s songs and offers summary comments on their quality and effectiveness. His format is identical for each of the chosen 40, and I found his analyses very well-conceived.
Along the way, Ginell does us theater buffs a fine service, as he brings to light several shows about which I had known nary a thing, while offering fresh praise of older works no longer on everyone’s lips. In the “unknown” category, for example, there’s Baby Case, about the Lindbergh baby kidnapping; Fly Blackbird, based on the civil rights movement; and Dearest Enemy, set during the American Revolution. And in the “deserves new attention” area, he offers the musicals Bandstand, Finian’s Rainbow, Li’l Abner, and Shenandoah, among others.
On the flip side, Ginell doesn’t hesitate to share his opinion as to why a given show may have closed after a mere handful of performances, and/or never inspired a cast album. He can be merciless: for example, declaring Frank Wildhorn’s 1999 Civil War a “flop” offering “a bookless song cycle with no plot and no continuity to connect one scene to another…rendering the most tragic event in American history emotionally inert.” And there are others.
This book makes fine scattershot browsing, though reading it straight through offers pleasures as well. Cary Ginell has produced an intriguing look at one particular aspect of American theatre development—just right for those of us who “don’t know much about history….”
