THE GREATEST SHOWMAN : Soundtrack

[jo]

If I may diverge a little --


Keala fooling around with Seth Rudetsky on various characters from Les Miserables ( she once played of Mme Thenardier) --




Hugh was in the film adaptation of Les Miserables... and later on, the "twain" did meet in THE GREATEST SHOWMAN


Jo

[jo]

Male cover of THIS IS ME --

[jo]

A review of the soundtrack album itself --

www.thegatewayonline.ca/2018/02/review-the-greatest-showman/

Re the reprises -- I also thought when I first heard the album that they seemed unnecessary and without much flair -- until I saw the movie!

*The reprise of A MILLION DREAMS was brilliant and poignant -- it shows the repetitive theme voiced initially by the young Phineas, then by the mature Phineas, and eventually by the young daughters having their own dreams! Loved that moment when the two young girls seemed to have imbibed their father's optimistic outlook and started thinking of their own fanstasy world!

*The reprise of NEVER ENOUGH was likewise a great dramatic moment -- hurt and maybe unjustifiably vengeful, it foretells what Jenny Lind is about to do to wreck not just Barnum's business fortunes but also his marriage. A very dramatic exclamation point of hurt and anger!

I wonder if the reviewer has seen the movie...or even if she had seen it, chose to ignore the context of those two reprises.

Jo

[jo]

[jo]

The songs are really becoming a craze!

http://instagram.com/p/BerOOFTnbcl

[jo]

Inspiring kids for their talent show!

[jo]

Such energy!

[jo]

www.billboard.com/articles/columns/chart-beat/8097755/billboard-200-chart-moves-def-leppard-hysteria-top-40

— Soundtrack, The Greatest Showman – No. 2 — For the first time since the Billboard 200 transitioned to an equivalent album units-ranked tally in December of 2014, a soundtrack has scored four weeks of 100,000-plus units. The Greatest Showman, which holds at No. 2 on the chart, earned 109,000 units (up 5 percent) in the week ending Jan. 25 — which is also its fourth straight week of 100,000-plus units. Previously, among soundtracks, the Fifty Shades of Grey album logged three 100,000-plus weeks in 2015.

[jo]

[jo]

Quite a distinct privilege for THIS IS ME to become the NBC Winter OLympics musical theme --

THIS IS ME will be the musical theme for NBC coverage of the WINTER OLYMPICS!


sports.yahoo.com/nbc-keala-settle-spark-attention-160508583.html

NBC to Use Keala Settle’s ‘This Is Me’ to Spark Attention for Winter Olympics

Brian Steinberg
VarietyFeb 4, 2018 12:05 AM

The network known for airing “This Is Us” hopes to harness the power of “This Is Me.”

The hit song, sung by Keala Settle and used in the soundtrack to the movie “The Greatest Showman,” will be used by NBC Olympics leading up to and during the PyeongChang Olympic Winter Games, NBC Olympics and Atlantic Records announced today. The track was co-produced and written by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul

The song will be featured in promotional spots to run across NBCUniversal’s broadcast, cable, digital, social, and radio platforms, including during NBC’s coverage of Super Bowl LII this Sunday. The song will also be used by NBC Olympics’ production at strategic times during its 2,400 hours of PyeongChang programming, including within NBC’s primetime coverage on Friday, February 9, the night of the Opening Ceremony.

“The song’s messages of celebrating diversity and individual uniqueness couldn’t be more well suited for the themes and spirit of what the Olympics stand for,” said Kevin Weaver, Atlantic Records President, West Coast, in a statement. “It’s an honor for all of us involved with The Greatest Showman to have had the song chosen to be connected to NBC’s coverage of the PyeongChang Olympic Winter Games.”

“With less than a week until the start of The Winter Olympics, ‘This Is Me’ is the perfect song to connect viewers with Olympic athletes on a human level,” said Jenny Storms, CMO, NBC Sports Group, in a statement. “Beginning with a powerful spot that will be seen by the massive Super Bowl audience and continuing up to and throughout the Games, this inspiring song perfectly complements the stories we’re telling about the athletes’ journeys from ordinary to extraordinary.”

The 20th Century Fox film, “The Greatest Showman,” has grossed $270 million worldwide and is inspired by the story of P.T. Barnum. The movie is directed by Michael Gracey, with songs co-produced and written by Pasek and Paul, co-produced by Greg Wells and executive produced by Alex Lacamoire. The movie stars Hugh Jackman with Michelle Williams, Zendaya, Zac Efron, and Rebecca Ferguson.

[jo]

[jo]

[mamaleh]

Nicely done!

Ellen

[jo]

The beauty and power of THIS IS ME, including the musical structure --

www.classicfm.com/discover-music/music-theory/this-is-me-greatest-showman-analysis/

[jo]

www.theringer.com/music/2018/2/5/16971368/greatest-showman-soundtrack-success

What a condescending, patronizing, ignorant exposition of the soundtrack of THE GREATEST SHOWMAN

He spends miles of analysis but yet can't pinpoint what makes the musical score of THE GREATEST SHOWMAN work!

He is obviously ignorant of musical theatre! He does not realize that the movie is a seamless fusion of the story and the music! The songs advance the plot as much as dialog does, the songs illuminate on the characters as much as intense moments in a drama does! Pay attention to the lyrics, Mr. Author! Don't take the songs in isolation and pass judgment as if they existed separately. The movie contains many heartfelt messages that are shown in quotations ( "the noblest art is to make people happy"), in dialog ("comfort is the enemy of progress", " nobody made a difference by being like everybody else" etc) and some are embedded in songs (the shattering song about being different and loving oneself " This is me!" or the epiphany "From now on...")...

Only one lesson from the movie on why people love it!

Because the movie speaks to us!


How --

Because the cast is exceptionally strong and gives us their best portrayal!

Because the music seduces us as it combines artfully with the storytelling!

[mamaleh]

The reviewer sounds like a millennial with a crush on Zac Efron, LOL. So much wrongheadedness in one little piece. Tsk, tsk.

Ellen

[jo]

The soundtrack, likewise, is populist to a fault, every song a Voltron-esque evocation of various current pop and rock stars. Jackman drives opening number “The Greatest Show,” channeling the noirish arena-rock of Muse on the moody verses and the starry-eyed, slightly anonymous pop cheese of Walk the Moon or Bastille on the sunburst choruses.

I wonder if he even bothered to read the album credits? Did he know that in addition to Pasek and Paul, that the third songwriter of this song that frames the beginning and the end of the movie is Ryan Lewis?

I wonder if he realizes that the various producers of this song and the album include Greg Wells, Justin Paul, Ryan Lewis, Joseph Trapanese, and Alex Lacamoire? Certainly not small fry! Only Grammy, Tony, and Oscar winners and noted film composers!

[jo]

This is just beautiful .....

Sometimes, Justin Paul ( who I am assuming writes all the music) is almost as gifted as the talent for melody of Andrew Lloyd Webber!

Maybe someone or some group will do an instrumental version of the musical score of THE GREATEST SHOWMAN!


Jo

[jo]

This may have already been posted earlier ( around November) -- but the article takes on special meaning now that we have seen the movie and heard the entire musical score ( whether as performance numbers or character looks)!

From Deadline.com --

‘The Greatest Showman’ Songwriters Benj Pasek & Justin Paul On The Revitalization Of The Original Hollywood Musical
by Matt Grobar
November 17, 2017 1:12pm


Upon cursory examination of the films taken on by Broadway songwriters Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, a theme emerges. Oscar winners last year for La La Land, whose P.T. Barnum pic The Greatest Showman bows later this year, the pair are suckers for larger-than-life stories of show business trials and triumphs, who have played an integral role in reviving the original Hollywood musical. While the films are both enamored with the glow of showbiz, The Greatest Showman is also a great departure from the former film, a period piece for viewers of all ages, centering on Barnum’s pioneering creation of the Barnum & Bailey circus.


Below, the songwriting duo reflect on a moment in time that has allowed them to bring their musical talents to both the stage and the big screen.


How did you come to work on The Greatest Showman?

Justin Paul: Through a series of coincidences and lucky timing, we happened to be in LA back in 2013. We were having a general meeting at Fox with someone, and they said, “Hey, my colleague down the hall is working on a musical. You’re Broadway guys—you should talk to him if he’s in.” We went down the hall and he was like, “Here’s the mood reel. The director is this guy Michael Gracey—he’s a first time director and real visionary. Let me see if he’s in town right now.”
Within a matter of days, we found ourselves in a room with Michael, who had no idea who we were, and had no reason to. But he, like a champ, pitched the film, what his vision of it was going to be. He pitched it as this timeless tale of P.T. Barnum inventing the American circus, and really leaned into the fact that it was a man who was ahead of his time. Michael always talked about him as a Steve Jobs, or the Jay-Z of his day—the original impresario, who was able to bring color and life and magic to an otherwise gray world, really open people’s eyes—create some mischief, and some wonder.
He wanted the music to be contemporary. We thought that was really bizarre and intriguing, and that was one of the reasons that we really perked up. It was this period tale, but he said, “The choreography’s going to be contemporary, the music wants to be contemporary.” We resolved to write a couple of songs in that week while we were still in LA, and pitched them to Michael. He came over and listened to them, and that started our collaboration.


Can you give a sense of the range of music heard in this film, and what it meant to approach the project with a contemporary sensibility?

Paul: Michael really wanted the music to live in a contemporary place, or at least influenced by contemporary music. I think there were some other false starts with other songwriters, and what we figured out through trial and error with Michael is that he was looking for songs that at least attempted to straddle two worlds. It was the world of musical theater—book songs, story songs that carried the narrative, and told a story through the lyrics, and would be fed by those characters in that moment—balancing that with a musical sound that was influenced by contemporary music.
It was never trying to create something that was just for the radio—trying to be ‘2017,’ or whatever it was. Through the music production, and somewhat through the songwriting, it would be influenced by something contemporary. Michael referenced everything from Billy Joel, to Elton John, to Ingrid Michaelson, to Beyoncé, to Adele, finding contemporary-sounding music that still told a story. That’s what we tried to do.

There’s definitely a gospel influence. For us, any time you’re writing something that wants to be inspiring—or as I said, the idea of Barnum bringing color to a gray world—there’s something in the sound of gospel that felt right. Michael was a good collaborator in the process, and was guiding us all along the way.


Is it purely coincidental that The Greatest Showman and La La Land are two showbiz stories hanging on characters with larger-than-life dreams—and you wrote songs for both?

Paul: I think to a certain extent it’s coincidental, but I also think musical storytelling lends itself to stories that are about people with ideas, and visions, and dreams that are larger than life. I think entertainment lends itself to the same sort of big thinking—believing in the impossible, and making it come true. It wasn’t our goal to get involved with projects, necessarily, that exist in that space. But I definitely think that music and song has an opportunity to expand the world in a really unique way. You’re able to get to the core of big emotions very quickly, and you’re able to show a world much bigger than it actually is.


Pasek: I think there’s also something to the realism of film. It’s not necessary, but it’s nice when in a story—in a musical—you can find a blend, where there’s some songs that are diegetic or performed, along with some songs that are from characters.

In La La Land, Sebastian’s moment in the club, and those performances, those are real performances that are just musical by nature. Same with The Greatest Showman: there are certain numbers that are really performed. They’re in the ‘show,’ in the circus. Those are really being performed, and then we also have character numbers, where it’s the character speaking from their heart and their mind. That’s a nice thing about show business, needing stories that allow you to blend both of those kind of songs into stories.


With the success of La La Land, we’re seeing a resurgence of the original musical. What kind of line can you draw between that project and The Greatest Showman, in terms of cause and effect?

Paul: It’s funny: The development of Greatest Showman did start before La La Land really swung into gear. Then, La La Land swung into gear and got made. Now, Greatest Showman’s coming out, and Showman‘s just a different kind of film. There are all kinds of factors that related into it slowly developing. I think that La La Land—to no credit of our own, but really to Damien [Chazelle, director] and his vision; he and Justin [Hurwitz, composer], who really pioneered the project from the start—I do think that it probably gave anyone who was working on a musical at that time confidence.

It said that there is an audience that’s willing to go, if it’s a well-made film, and spend an evening or an afternoon, watching characters go through those kinds of motions, and sing through those types of emotions, and willing to go on the ride.

That definitely gave confidence to anyone working on Greatest Showman. They’re related in that they’re musicals. But really, they’re different kinds of movies, and I think they’re for different audiences. Greatest Showman is a family film at Christmas time, and I think we were all excited to be writing something that could be for the whole family.


The Greatest Showman cast features a good mix of Hollywood and Broadway stars. What did they bring to the process?

Paul: Someone like Hugh is a bona fide Broadway star and a Hollywood star. He came to real prominence when he played the lead role in Oklahoma! in London. He really comes from that world. We felt incredibly lucky that we had so many folks who are perceived to be film stars who actually have tremendous talents in the musical theater world.

Then, we were really fortunate to have folks like Keala Settle, who we’ve known for a really long time in the Broadway community, who is a fantastic musical theater actress who has been in everything from Hairspray, to Waitress, to Priscilla, Queen of the Desert—tons of Broadway shows. It was a really wonderful mix of folks that maybe started in musical theater and then came to the film world. Then, people whose first time [it was], being in a movie musical, but really brought their talents directly from Broadway to the proceeding.

We really can speak to everyone in the cast having tremendous musical theater chops. It’s a delight when people that you don’t know, who come from the world of musical theater, get to show that they really grew up in that tradition.
Which songs in this film are you most proud of?

Pasek: One that comes up often, that I think is representative of the film and the tone of the songs, is a song called “This Is Me.” It’s sung by Keala Settle, who plays Lettie, the bearded lady. Michael had always talked to us about writing a moment for the oddities when they really claimed their identity.

In this story, there’s an element of empowerment for that group of “oddities”—a moment for them to step into the spotlight and own who they are. It was a fun, pressurized moment of writing. We’re really happy with how it came out.
Keala’s performance is so special. There’s tiny bits of it in the trailer, but we’re so excited for everyone to experience that full number. She really, truly owns it.


What are the biggest challenges you’ve faced with The Greatest Showman?

Pasek: When you’re writing an original musical, it means that you’re not looking at any story that’s already in place, and everything can continue to shift at any moment in time. For instance, with “This Is Me”—in the original draft, we never had a big song moment for Lettie, in particular. It’s an anthemic moment for the oddities, and you find those moments as you go about writing.

What that means is that you need to give yourself the appropriate amount of time to be able to investigate different storylines, different characters. Find the best places for where songs can go. Be willing to cut songs that aren’t working. That’s the nature of developing a story from whole cloth. You’re not looking to anything else to build the story up from. It takes a good chunk of time, and you’re constantly scrapping things, writing new things, going back to old versions, seeing if you can come up with something better. Eventually, you begin to weave together a story that hopefully makes sense, and that you’re proud of. It’s a really satisfying process, but one that is time consuming, and has to be developed over many years.


Can you reflect on the moment you’re in now, following successes on screen and stage with La La Land and Dear Evan Hansen?

Pasek: It’s exciting. To be totally honest, I think we just feel very lucky. We feel really excited that this is a moment in time in which audiences are eager and willing to go on these kinds of musical journeys. I’m not sure even 10 or 15 years ago that we were in quite this kind of moment. We also realize that in three or five or 10 or 15 years, there might not be this kind of moment again. These things do tend to come in phases.

But right now, it’s just really exciting. There is a sense that musicals are not completely uncool. People are willing to invest in that kind of storytelling; in that kind of journey, as an audience. For however long that lasts, it’s a really exciting ride to be on.

Paul: We feel very lucky that so many folks who are peers of ours, and people that we look up to—and, on a good day, we would call colleagues—really pushed boundaries, and created works that allowed for that to be the case. It’s just creating a world where people are excited about storytelling through music, and letting songs progress narrative. We feel very lucky that so many people have created stories that way, that audiences have sparked to.

He wanted the music to be contemporary. We thought that was really bizarre and intriguing, and that was one of the reasons that we really perked up. It was this period tale, but he said, “The choreography’s going to be contemporary, the music wants to be contemporary.” We resolved to write a couple of songs in that week while we were still in LA, and pitched them to Michael. He came over and listened to them, and that started our collaboration.

And that first song that they wrote was A MILLION DREAMS!

[jo]

Also, at around the same time and now with the benefit of hindsight, The Hollywood Reporter published a similar interview.

Here is an interesting part --

What makes P.T. Barnum ideal movie-musical material?

BENJ PASEK It's a story that exists in this fantastical, larger-than-life world. P.T. Barnum was a man who was not defined by the world that he lived in; he was really a dreamer and wanted the world to exist not as it is but what it could be. When a character is so inspired that they can't just speak their emotions, the world provides a justification for why singing can exist — to express these outsized emotions.

JUSTIN PAUL And a story with an entertainer at the center naturally lends itself to a bit of spectacle.



How did you find yourself pushing the limits of seasoned stage star Hugh Jackman?

PAUL We were, of course, intimidated because he's such a master of musical theater, especially onscreen. But we were also inspired to write for a lead character that will be portrayed by Hugh, with all of his abilities and his vocal range and everything. It gives a songwriter such clear parameters of the playground, and with Hugh, it's a really big one.

Michael Gracey, the director, wanted the music to have more of the spirit of pop songs and contemporary music while still being traditional in a musical theater storytelling sense. That's not something that Hugh has done as much; we know him as a classic song-and-dance man of everything from Oklahoma! to The Boy From Oz and Les Miserables. It was exciting to collaborate on pushing his vocal abilities into a visceral, athletic, contemporary sound.

[jo]

A little earlier ( September), Variety wrote about the songwriters and their music in the movie. At that time, it was all expectations for us -- the tremendous success and popularity of the musical score was likely never anticipated by both the songwriters and the singers

Songwriters Benj Pasek, Justin Paul Fashion High-Flying Score for ‘The Greatest Showman’
By Jon Burlingame @jonburlingame
Jon Burlingame


When “The Greatest Showman” opens on Christmas Day, no one will be surprised that Benj Pasek and Justin Paul penned the songs for the P.T. Barnum story. After all, the two are the hottest songwriters in America after their Oscar win for “La La Land” in February and their Tony win for “Dear Evan Hansen” in June. The surprise is that they started work on “The Greatest Showman” before anyone had ever heard of either “La La Land” or “Evan Hansen.” They’ve been on the project for three and a half years, working closely with director Michael Gracey.

Variety was given an exclusive first listen to the Pasek and Paul songs, and while post-production on the 20th Century Fox movie is still underway, it’s clear that this latest effort by the 32-year-old musical-theater wunderkinds will merit serious consideration come awards season.



For instance, “From Now On,” the big moment in the last act for Barnum (Hugh Jackman) as he faces a critical stage in his life and career, is uplifting and powerful. “This Is Me,” which arrives halfway into the film, will be much talked about. Sung by the unusual people Barnum discovers and presents in his show, it’s a rousing, identity-affirming anthem for misfits that may have a life beyond the screen. It’s featured in the film’s trailer, sung by Broadway singer and TV and film actress Keala Settle (“Waitress”) in her second film role after 2015’s “Ricki and the Flash.”



Among the other original songs: “The Other Side,” sung by Jackman and Zac Efron (as Phillip Carlyle, whom Barnum convinces to join his company), and “Rewrite the Stars,” a duet performed by Efron and Zendaya (as an acrobat with whom he falls in love). Both are distinguished not only by their memorable music and lyrics but by Gracey’s eye-popping staging.

The challenge for Pasek and Paul was to make their material sound current — an odd request for a tale about a 19th-century character. “I always felt that Barnum was ahead of his time,” Gracey explains. “He saw the world differently. It felt right, in a film that was more about imagination than historical accuracy, to use contemporary music and contemporary dance.”



So Pasek and Paul — often with Gracey in the room — toiled for three years “to find that middle ground, achieving something that feels contemporary but does the necessary work of progressing the story forward,” Pasek says. Gracey would often point them in a modern-music direction: “Think about this Kanye song, or this Ingrid Michaelson song, or this Florence and the Machine song,” Paul says. Numbers were written and thrown out, and others rewritten. “And the next day,” adds Gracey, “if I couldn’t hum the tune, I would get together with them and say, ‘We didn’t crack it. We have to go back to the drawing board.’”

Pasek and Paul were, at the same time, working on the Broadway-bound “Evan Hansen,” which was introspective and dark and complicated, Pasek recalls. “One of the great joys of working on ‘The Greatest Showman’ was that it was a celebration of hope, joy, imagination” — and, Paul says, finishing his partner’s sentence, “wonder and magic and color.”



One aspect of the “modernization” scheme was to relax the pair’s usual method of “perfect rhyme” for the lyrics so that the songs wouldn’t sound “too theatrical,” says Paul. Another was to bring in a pop-music producer with no previous film experience to massage the songs in post-production.

Enter Greg Wells, a multiple Grammy nominee who has worked with everyone from Katy Perry and Adele to Pharrell Williams and Keith Urban. Despite his track record, he admits to being “quite intimidated” by the prospect of “The Greatest Showman.” Pasek and Paul were on hand two weeks ago in Wells’ Culver City studio “making final tweaks” to the music.

Notes Gracey: “You have the classical strings mixed with electronic beats. In doing that, you create your own universe, your own musical signature. Sometimes the songs lean a bit more toward musical theater, sometimes a bit more toward contemporary pop.”


Color Jackman a fan of the songwriters. “When I first started working with Justin and Benj, they encouraged me to try a different style of singing, and asked me to try a different vocal coach,” he tells Variety. “It was hard for me, because I had worked with the same one for nearly 10 years. But they said, ‘We want you to sound different for “Showman,” to have a different quality.’ They were always there to challenge and support me. Hopefully I will get to do many, many Broadway shows with them.”

[jo]

A chorus covers THIS IS ME --

[jo]

www.theguardian.com/film/shortcuts/2018/feb/07/big-choruses-greatest-showman-soundtrack-top-of-charts-hugh-jackman?CMP=twt_gu

Quite why The Greatest Showman soundtrack has found such a huge audience is a mystery to me: it’s not as if every single style on The Greatest Showman can’t be found done better elsewhere. Perhaps some of it is about context: in age of #MeToo and #blacklivesmatter, there’s something comforting about the feeling of “being on the right side” that This Is Me encourages – albeit that offering emotional and political support to the bearded lady community isn’t something liable to impinge on most listeners’ everyday lives.

The true appeal of the music, however, probably lies in Pasek and Paul’s way with a chorus. Subtlety be damned – these are refrains configured to flatten everything within a 50-mile radius; you can almost feel the shock waves from the massed voices. It’s music designed to take you from ennui to euphoria in the fastest possible time, with the least possible complication. And there will always be a market for that.

Still patronizing, with his comments on what makes the soundtrack stand out!

A Million Dreams/The Other Side/ Rewrite the Stars/Never Enough/Tightrope -- no choruses there!

Why can't critics accept that there is true beauty in this musical work of art?

[jo]

[jo]

Harmonies!

From Now On

http://instagram.com/p/Be6wE2KBers