Title: Kurt Vonnegut's God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater
Media: Musical
Approx length: 1 hour 41 minutes (whole musical), cast album is 54 minutes
Where to find it: The 2017 cast album is legally available on Youtube, Spotify, etc. A bootleg of the encores performance is available, just message me if you want a link to that. Some highlights from the Encores performance can be found here.
What is it, in summary?: Eliot Rosewater, the millionaire heir of a conservative factory magnate/Senator, comes back from World War II with a social conscience and decides to dedicate his father's tax-dodging "charity" to improving the lives of people. Then shit goes down because of an unscrupulous lawyer and his depressed insurance salesman cousin. AND the musical's the first collab between Alan Menken and Howard Ashman.
What do you love about it?: It's a ridiculously funny satire that talks about economic disparity, power, the guilt of figuring out that your entire lifestyle is because the last three generations of men in your family were dicks, PTSD, corporate advertising as Americana, and the Volunteer Fire Brigade. It's absolutely wild. Plus with the Menken/Ashman duo doing music and lyrics you KNOW it's going to be good.
What sort of things are you likely to request for it?: The ending is satisfying but leaves a lot of unanswered questions about what happens next, so probably a canon continuation.
Are there sections of canon (rather than the whole canon) that can be consumed by themselves to fulfill your requests, or that showcase particular characters and relationships?: You'll probably be able to get by on the cast album and a good summary of the plot, but watching the whole bootleg is probably best because there's quite a bit of detail to the book.
Content warnings: Eliot Rosewater has PTSD from WWII. Civilian casualties of war. 50s-accurate ableism (though brief and pretty goofily satirical).
Kurt Vonnegut's God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater (the musical version, not the book lmao)
Media: Musical
Approx length: 1 hour 41 minutes (whole musical), cast album is 54 minutes
Where to find it: The 2017 cast album is legally available on Youtube, Spotify, etc. A bootleg of the encores performance is available, just message me if you want a link to that. Some highlights from the Encores performance can be found here.
What is it, in summary?: Eliot Rosewater, the millionaire heir of a conservative factory magnate/Senator, comes back from World War II with a social conscience and decides to dedicate his father's tax-dodging "charity" to improving the lives of people. Then shit goes down because of an unscrupulous lawyer and his depressed insurance salesman cousin. AND the musical's the first collab between Alan Menken and Howard Ashman.
What do you love about it?: It's a ridiculously funny satire that talks about economic disparity, power, the guilt of figuring out that your entire lifestyle is because the last three generations of men in your family were dicks, PTSD, corporate advertising as Americana, and the Volunteer Fire Brigade. It's absolutely wild. Plus with the Menken/Ashman duo doing music and lyrics you KNOW it's going to be good.
What sort of things are you likely to request for it?: The ending is satisfying but leaves a lot of unanswered questions about what happens next, so probably a canon continuation.
Are there sections of canon (rather than the whole canon) that can be consumed by themselves to fulfill your requests, or that showcase particular characters and relationships?: You'll probably be able to get by on the cast album and a good summary of the plot, but watching the whole bootleg is probably best because there's quite a bit of detail to the book.
Content warnings: Eliot Rosewater has PTSD from WWII. Civilian casualties of war. 50s-accurate ableism (though brief and pretty goofily satirical).