"Fidgety Fairy Tales" - The Mental Health Musical

A new fairy tale musical is about to tour schools during October in Northland, Minnesota, specifically to raise awareness about the delicate subject of mental illness. (The poster from the September preview run at the Hilton is shown above.)

From Duluth News Tribune:

In this fairy tale, Little Hood has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and gets distracted easily on the way to Grandmother’s house. Sleeping Handsome is a young prince who suffers from depression and decides to prick his finger on a spindle so he can fall asleep for a long time.

Rapunzel isn’t locked in her tower; she is staying there because she has an anxiety disorder that makes her terrified to leave.

Reportedly, the number of children being diagnosed with some form of mental illness is increasing, even among preschoolers, and the musical aims to send the message that suffering from such an illness is indeed a very real issue for kids but can be treated and is nothing to be ashamed of. It even attempts to highlight some positive aspects of some of the conditions, eg:

The hyperactivity that goes along with Little Hood’s ADHD, for example, can make her a great multi-tasker if channeled correctly.

You can find out more about the musical HERE and HERE (from the Star Tribune) including about the students acting both in the production and as ambassadors for mental health (one actor learned how to deal with his anxiety and is seeking to share his 'success story' with other kids) and theories for the rising numbers of children being diagnosed. They have a blog with additional pictures and information HERE. The page from the Minnesota Association for Children's Mental Health website (MACMH), profiling the musical, is HERE.

Public performances will be staged from October 22-24 in Cloquet, Minnesota.

"The Tale of the Beauty and the Tail of the Beast" - the Musical

Paul Boyd's musical interpretation of Beauty and the Beast is going to Belfast for a season (December 4th, 2009 to January 9th, 2010), this time with extensive rewrites and a new production which promises to be funnier than ever.

The revamped-rewritten musical "The Tale of the Beauty and the Tail of the Beast" will be staged by Belfast's Lyric Theater and sounds like a lot of fun.

Essentially, it's Madame LePrince de Beaumont's Beauty and the Beast as performed by an 18th century traveling theater troupe with all the players preoccupied with their own personal stories, resulting in a (smartly put-together) comedy of errors.

Paul Boyd is well known for his excellent musical adaptations of fairy tales in the UK. You can find out more about Paul HERE.From the Lyric Theater's UK website:

This fun-filled musical follows an 18th century acting troupe, Monsieur Affable’s Performing Players, one of whom has gone missing, another has delusions of grandeur and all are reading from a script that is entirely in the wrong order. This well known tale is given a hilarious and unusual twist. The multi-talented cast plays numerous roles delivering some of Paul Boyd’s funniest lines, cleverest lyrics and most captivating score.

Live music, played on stage by the actor-musicians wielding an impressive variety of instruments, is an integral part of the play and is a hailed aspect of the production. Here's a lovely preview (of the music) in the new 2009/2010 trailer:

You can find out more about the production HERE (and if you click on the link at the bottom of the page for more information you can see some photos from past productions too).

Tori Amos and The Light Princess

NOTE: My apologies to my email subscribers who got this post in their inbox without any content earlier today!

Singer-songwriter Tori Amos, who's music is famously "fairy tale influenced" is well into development on a new musical based on a short story fairy tale by George MacDonald: "The Light Princess".

If you're not aware of the story it's a short, funny tale (with lots of puns and tongue in cheek) about a gravity-deficient princess who has trouble falling into/in anything! (She was cursed at a christening by someone who was forgotten from the invitation list- of course).

With chapter titles such as:
"Won't I Just?", "She Can't Be Ours.", "She Laughs Too Much", "Try Metaphysics" and "Try a Drop of Water", you can see there's a lot of 'levity' to this tale.

You can read the story HERE, hear the story HERE and for those interested in studying the form and metaphor of the story further there's an essay by Elmer Schenke available to read online that discusses the story called "ANTIGRAVITY: MATTER AND THE IMAGINATION IN GEORGE MACDONALD AND EARLY SCIENCE FICTION" - you can read that HERE.

But back to the musical.

From the independent.co.uk:

It figures that Amos, 45, once dubbed "Queen of the Fairies", should be attracted by a story about a princess whose lack of gravity causes her to float above the world. But as the North Carolina-born singer and pianist points out, MacDonald's fantastical allegory has substance and a malleable, enduring resonance, the princess's "lightness" being a vehicle for Amos to explore modern-day illnesses such as anorexia, and other elements of MacDonald's work lending themselves to environmental themes.

This being Amos, we can expect the work (which she hopes to complete by 2010) to be packed with feminist ideas. "The thing about the original story I wasn't crazy about is that the princess's disability gets blamed on an old hag," she says. "We're not going to deal in spells cast by old ladies; we're dealing with problems caused by power and greed, many of which start with men."

This sounds like a weighty interpretation of a story in which humor is integral to both the telling and the tale so I'm curious as to how Tori balances those elements in her version. She's working with writer Samuel Adamson on the story and has already written a few of the songs for her feminist retelling of the story.

Again, from the independent.co.uk:

Amos says some of the music in the piece is Wagnerian in approach, while one song, "Delectable Guy Pain", was partly inspired by the Shirley Bassey hit "Big Spender". There's an aria for the princess that Amos likens to a darker take on "Memory" from Cats. "Whatever you think of Andrew Lloyd Webber, he knows what he's doing with a melodic arc," she adds.

(You can read the whole of the long article, which discuss Tori's current projects and releases HERE.)

Here's Tori on adapting to the different style of working, with the people from National Theater (from spinner.com):

"It seems to be a full-time commitment," she says of the musical. "I've never written for other people before. Writing for a company and researching their characters, understanding how they speak, working closely with the playwright ... I've never experienced anything quite like it before. The collaboration process that I have when I'm making records is that the material is written and then you're working on arrangements. With 'The Light Princess,' another scene might be written or added or changed, which then will mean that a completely different set of songs have to be written for that scene. I like to work, so I don't mind how much work it takes. I'm not saying I'll never write another one. I'm enjoying it. But if you're writing a musical, you better like your collaborators. I happen to get along with them very well."

You can learn more about Tori Amos, read lyrics from her songs and see lots of lovely things HERE at her website.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how this musical turns out!