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[0:01] Jess: Torn between what is and what could be, it's hard to write the story when the story is writing me. When this great expectation meets this grave revelation, maybe this cover's not yours. When your book's full of questions, I don't throw this around liberally because it's really hard to get there. But what a masterpiece in technicalities and actual physical things happening on stage that made me feel in awe.

[1:11] Miranda: I agree with that. And just to give you some background on this, so for The Outsiders, the book was by Adam Rapp with Justin Levine. Music and lyrics by Jamestown Revival, which comprises Jonathan Clay and Zach Chance, as well as Justin Levine. And it was directed by Dana Taymor. Also, The Outsiders is based on the novel by S.E. Hinton and Frances Ford Coppola's motion picture, which is probably more well known. For me personally, I had absolutely zero background knowledge on The Outsiders. I have never read the book, I have never seen the movie before. And I think as we discussed before we saw it, it's something that I generally just lump in with 80s movies about white boys. I get them all mixed up.

I think I mixed this one up with The Lost Boys and The Goonies. I literally thought that Josh Brolin was in this movie, but he's absolutely not. It's all just white boys from the 80s for me. So I had no context for what this was. But I agree with you. I think its major point of strength is the staging. It has things that you have never seen before on a musical theatre stage, I think. And I think it was, as far as the story is told, very well presented.

[2:30] Jess: Now, I did read The Outsiders in high school, Miss Hill's 8th grade English class, and I also watched the film, the Frances Ford Coppola film. And here's my shocking, shocking remark: I did not like either of those experiences. I was not a fan of this book, I was not a fan of that film. I had a thoroughly good time watching this stage musical though, which was shocking to me. It is in that same vein of 80s white boys are upset about the world that they were given, but having removed from that and having it presented in this way and from this very point of view narration from our lead character Ponyboy, I don't think I've seen direct to audience communication done so effectively in a stage musical in a very long time, where it is done for both dramatic effect and comedic effect in equal measure, and it works so well.

I truly believe the best form for this story is on stage. Obviously, I cannot confirm or deny that perspective as I have not seen either. I would be very interested to see the movie itself now that I know who's in it.

[3:44] Miranda: Tom Cruise.

[3:46] Jess: Who else is in the movie?

[3:48] Miranda: Patrick Swayze.

[3:50] Jess: Rob Lowe. A lot of components of the Brat Pack there. I would be very interested to see how it translates because from what you have told me at least, it seems like maybe the book and movie had slightly more homoeroticism. Is that a fair take?

[4:10] Miranda: I just think it's more subtext than it is me. That's me reading into it because this really is a romance between Johnny Cage and Ponyboy. And when you watch it on screen and you have the intimacy and living in a church, it's just like, ooh, these boys are in love. And there's that vibe where on stage it kind of gives that air of removal and that kind of third wall break where it doesn't hit as much in that same way.

[4:36] Jess: That's what I was going to... Yeah, that would be my take. You kind of set me up with that as a potential thought for what I could expect, and it definitely was not that in my take. I'm sure that you could very appropriately and soundly have an interpretation of it that way, but from my reading of it, it was just more like very close friends who are sort of trauma-bonded almost by their experiences growing up in this time period, in this very difficult area, and being sort of downtrodden both economically and also socially as part of kind of a class system that exists in that era and then in that area specifically. I think in Oklahoma, if I'm remembering correctly.

[5:22] Miranda: Also, yeah, I thought those things were very well represented. One of the things that I thought was interesting is that in the playbill itself, they give a little bit of an excerpt from one of S.E. Hinton's, so I guess it was Susie Hinton's op-eds that she published in the New York Times in 1967 called "Teenagers Are For Real." And I'll read you a small excerpt of it because I thought that it was, I think, relevant to the show and also just to context of the time period. But it says, "All we hear is how teenagers are rebelling against authority, against country, against parents. This is partly true. It is more true that all we are doing most of the time is stopping and explaining why and getting as an answer, 'Because it's always been done that way.'

If there were more stopping and explaining why it's always been done this way, there'd be more understanding. Understanding breeds communication. There we are back at the root of the matter." And I think that that is a very poignant sort of excerpt that goes back to the heart of the story itself and also just the time period itself of having a lot of, you know, a lot of angst about society, which I think is pretty well represented in the musical.

[6:36] Jess: And also just a question for like the Boomers: where did that energy go? Where did that energy go?

[6:42] Miranda: It went to their $800 house they're selling for $2.6 million today.

[6:46] Jess: Yeah, they bought that thing for a penny and a few raspberries, and now they're able to sell it for $1.1 million. So, you know, they were willing to give up their soul in that exchange maybe. What do you think the plot, if you had to give a general summary, would be?

[7:02] Miranda: For me, I thought it was kind of untraditional in the sense that it felt almost like a slice of life type movie, sort of like a Juno almost, where there's not, well maybe not Juno particularly, but it's just sort of like the focus is just on like the relationships and the lives of these few people, giving sort of a slice of what their individual lives look like. But I think definitely it got a little bit more plot heavy in the second act. But I would say generally it's almost like a West Side Story type dynamic where you've got two sections of town, the east side and the west side that are the more posh Socs on one side, and then you've got the greasers on the other side who are more low-class blue-collar folks.

And there's just basically the dynamic of infighting between those two groups for survival and also just like a portrait of life at that time and the difficulties that came with it for me. And then you also have the core relationships of this found family, which we have in the greasers, and this blood family where you have Ponyboy, his brother Sodapop, and his eldest brother who I am forgetting the name of. And for some reason, I feel like it's Daryl. And the domestic side of that really feels compelling to me. And the movie especially does not dwell on that. And I remember that was really the thing that I felt connected to in the books. And here I am very glad, maybe to a fault, in Act 2 they really leaned into that being the emotional core opposed to the Johnny Cage and Ponyboy connection.

[8:46] Jess: I do want to highlight, while this is a slice of life kind of story, it is visually impressive at every turn. It is an extravaganza. It is something to be seen so much that like the fight scenes are the most impressive part of this. There is no real dancing, there is no real choreography outside of these really intense, beautifully staged, well-lit fight scenes. And you don't talk about sound design here that is almost what is at the forefront, is the sound and how it is used to tell the story narratively. And I've never seen flashlights being used both as narrative tools for searchlights as well as lighting. The actors are lighting the other characters on stage. There's stuff I've never seen before as far as stagecraft goes.

I've been bringing up the Act 2 climax, which is rain on stage used for a fight scene. And I'm just like trying to figure out the logistics of microphones and trying to figure out when they got turned off and when they were removed and when they get put back on. It is a logistical nightmare, I imagine, behind the scenes, but such theatrical magic on stage.

[10:12] Miranda: Yeah, I use this turn of phrase a lot when I discuss musicals: it is a magic trick. And there are more and less elements in certain shows, but this one definitely has a lot of magic tricks. And also something I thought of frequently while I was watching it is only young people could do this. There are definitely a lot of things that the main actors are doing on stage that is incredibly risky in my mind for actors to be doing, to be climbing on sets without clear supports and flipping over each other and, you know, hopping off of things. All of that stuff, the choreography was very impressive.

[10:56] Miranda: The songs go, I like them and there were a few numbers that I did really enjoy. I think the Great Expectations song was probably my favorite moment with all of the different harmonies kind of coming together at one. That's like a very intense moment where it feels very appropriate to have that kind of, to have that song be used. So I did enjoy the songs, but I think more impressive than that was, yes, the choreography, the use of the lighting, you know, using things to tell you where you are in time and also in story and in emotion. I will say if you're a fellow visual snow syndrome sufferer, this may not be for you. They do flashlights into your eyes very frequently and it also can be very dark at times. That would be my one complaint, but that's like a very, very personal complaint. Otherwise, I think, yeah, the sound design and also the lighting choices were very, very effective to tell the story and also to tell you who the characters were.

[12:02] Jess: I know I'm often the negative one between us at these and I hate being it, but this is a pet peeve with me in modern musical theatre. I don't love when people that aren't musical theatre writers write for musical theatre. Every hundredth time it happens, you get a Sara Bareilles who really understands it with Waitress. Most of the other times, the songs kind of stop the story as opposed to tell the story. And here, that was very much the case, aside from maybe two songs. And both of them belong to the gentleman that leads the Greasers, who is probably the MVP if I had to pick an actor. I would say that both of his songs really kind of stop the show in a good way, whereas the rest of the songs were so, let's stop and have a song, and then we're going to have the plot, then we're going to stop and have a song, that part of me was truly wondering if I would have enjoyed it more if it was a play, like a straight play with the same effects.

But the songs were good, they just weren't pushing the story, so I was frustrated almost. That is a pet peeve of mine where I'm just like, maybe if we found someone that was trained in musical theatre writing to kind of zhuzh these up a bit, because the songs are there, the storytelling just wasn't for me. So I hate to say it, but I'm pretty sure I'm paraphrasing Hal Prince like, when you're, when you leave a musical, you're not humming the set design, and that's kind of how I felt at the end of it.

[13:35] Miranda: I would agree partially. I think the songs were a bit of a mixed bag in the sense that, you know, as I've said multiple times, I think often musical theatre does have songs that are musical theatre-y, that sort of like, we had a story that we decided we had to tell in song that wasn't necessarily meant to be in song, like that, there's just the quality of it. I always use like Legally Blonde or Mean Girls as an example sometimes of those songs, where it's just like—

[13:57] Jess: She doesn't like those ones.

[13:58] Miranda: Those are fine. Let's not be, I'm not a hater. They're fine, and there are a lot of things about those that I like, but there is a specific quality to musicals sometimes where it's so musical theatre-y that it almost takes you out of it, and there was some of those in here, and I agree that sometimes the songs do sort of stop the progress of the show itself, and that's a problem I see all the time. So it did have a little bit of that, but I think it also had enough that it was still very enjoyable, and other moments were very redeeming of those things for me personally. So I overall liked them, and like I said, great expectations, I think, and a lot of the harmonies that they were able to achieve were some of my favourite parts when they were all sort of singing in tandem, and that moment in particular felt like the emotion was big enough that it needed a song, needed to be said in song.

But yes, I think, as you said before, the most impressive moment to me is that fight scene in the rain, and I think it is meant to be, that's the big climax sort of of the whole production, where it's raining, and also something we haven't mentioned yet is that the entire floor is all this sort of like rock, like almost like you'd be on a playground with some very loose rocks, so every time they would dance around or move or run, they would be sliding around or kicking up these rocks, and so that was used to great effect in that, in the fight scene, which was, yeah, like basically a choreographed dance of them sort of like, it looked very brutal and beautiful. It did look very brutal and very fight-like, as well as being very like choreographed and like gorgeous in movement.

[15:37] Jess: I remember at the Tony Awards, they performed, like as opposed to performing a proper song, which they kind of did, they performed that fight scene at the Tony Awards, and I, that was what most people went away with, and I was just entering like, there's no way we're getting that, there's no way, I think I had a conversation with you beforehand, there's no way we're getting that rain machine fight, it's not happening. It leads me to wonder if when the Notebook tours, if we're gonna get their rain sequence too, we'll see. I do want to talk Tonys for a brief moment, because this won Best Musical at the Tonys, the 2024 Tonys, but lost Best Book and Best Music to a show we'll be seeing in a few weeks, Suffs by Shaina Taube, and Shaina Taube is a proper musical theater writer, in my opinion.

However, I think the book in this is a lot more impressive than the book to Suffs. But it's also confusing, like they picked this for Best Musical, but did not award either its book or its score. It's like, are you impressed by the actual stagecraft, or are you impressed by the time you had? Explain, Tony voters, explain.

[17:09] Miranda: I want to say a few more things, this cast, as young as it is, absolutely perfect in what they're doing, and building camaraderie, and making it feel honest, and I know they're on the road together and spending all these days together, but it often doesn't translate, and here it really, really does. You feel the connections of people that are related, feel related. I would say, without a doubt, if you can go see this, go see it. You're going to have a good time and leave feeling so many feelings, heartbreak, joy, all the things you want in a theatrical experience.

[17:27] Jess: Miranda, what is your overall thoughts on your cheese rating?

[17:33] Miranda: My overall thoughts is that coming in with absolutely no context and zero expectations, I had a very good time. I very much enjoyed it, and despite them flashing lights in my eyes 24-7 while I was seeing the show, I think everything about it is used to the greatest effect, to tell the story in the best way possible. I think it would be hard to beat as far as the other adaptations, so I'm excited to see how those compare, but overall, very enjoyable. As you said, the cast, absolutely amazing, 10 out of 10. I cannot believe some of the things they were doing. The general talent, of course, in singing, but also the dancing and the general athleticism required for those roles is a very, very high bar, so I was just very impressed.

It's just very impressive and enjoyable to watch. I think my cheese rating would be, I don't know if they still make these, they must, those old Kraft singles, individually packaged American cheese Kraft singles, yes. That would be my cheese rating for this, because it does feel like it is kind of a slice of life Americana from that particular period in time. So yeah, that would be my rating. Go see it if you can.

[18:45] Jess: I agree, and if I'm to bring one more bit of criticism onto my overall thoughts, the romantic plot between Ponyboy and Cherry never works for me in any adaptation. She feels like, you know, just a connection to, like, the Socs and a piece of not-gay, so you don't think Ponyboy is gay. But aside from that, I had a great time. I'm giving this government cheese because they're too poor to afford real cheese. Now, correct me if I'm wrong, our next show we will be seeing is The Lion King at the Detroit Opera House on March 12th, and this is going to be, I believe, my third time seeing The Lion King. Is it your second?

[19:29] Miranda: It might also be my third time, third or fourth, because I think I saw it, I know I saw it when I was a kid, and I think we saw it together a couple years ago. So yeah, this is going to be my third or fourth time. So I'm still excited for it. It's always a good time. Lion King is always a good time.

[19:44] Jess: That is baby's first vague theatrical, like, we are taking the big ideas of avant-garde theater and breaking it down to a Disney digestible way. It is the most financially profitable thing Disney has ever made. That musical has made more money than any film they've ever done. It is effective for a reason, and already, like, you don't have to wait for our opinions. I've done an episode with Andrew on it. It's a good show, and I can't wait to see it and talk about it more. I hear they've cut it down a little bit for timing, so a couple songs might have gotten cut. So I'm curious to see how that implements. I mean, sometimes that's a good thing. Sometimes that's fine. Less so in Shrek the Musical, though.

[20:31] Miranda: No, just thank you again to ATG and Broadway, and I hope that you all enjoyed the episode. Thank you very much, and we'll see you next time on Theatre in the Deep.