Dude (musical)
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Dude is a rock musical with a book and lyrics by Gerome Ragni and music by Galt MacDermot.
An allegory about good and evil, the conflict between mankind's creative and destructive urges, the power of love, and the joy to be found in simple pleasures, it is peopled by characters named Mother Earth, Suzie Moon, Bread, Texaco, Esso, Extra, Shadow, Halo, World War Too, and the like. Reba and Harold, actors who believe they have been cast in Richard III, instead find themselves portraying Adam and Eve in a Garden of Eden-like setting, where they are tempted by Zero and give birth to son Dude. He grows up and succumbs to the temptations of bizarre sexual practices and illicit drugs, leaving his parents guilt-ridden, until Guide #33 assures them life is merely show business and everything has a happy ending.
To accommodate the multimedia presentation, The Broadway Theatre was gutted and reconverted, at a cost of $800,000, into an arena filled with ramps, runways, catwalks, columns, trapezes, trapdoors, and all the mechanical and electronic gear required to bring it to life. Performers mingled among audience members, seated in areas designated "valleys," "foothills," and "hills." The musicians were divided, with brass and woodwinds against the wall of one side of the playing area and strings at the other. The overall effect was of a circus being performed in a primeval forest.
After sixteen previews, Dude opened on October 9, 1972. Universally crucified by the critics, who found it incomprehensible, it ran for only sixteen performances. The cast, directed by Tom O'Horgan, included Nell Carter, Rae Allen, Salome Bey, and Ralph Carter, who won the Drama Desk Award for Most Promising Performer.
A mere five weeks later, MacDermot (who with Ragni had created the wildly successful Hair) would experience another major failure with the flop musical Via Galactica.
[edit] Song list
Act I
- Theater/Theater
- A-Stage
- The Mountains
- Pears and Peaches
- Eat It
- Wah Wah Wah
- Suzie Moon
- Y.O.U.
- I Love My Boo Boo
- Hum Drum Life
- Who's It?
- Talk to Me About Love
- Goodbyes
- I'm Small
- You Can Do Nothing About It
- The Handsomest Man
- Electric Prophet
- No-One
Act II
- Who Will Be the Children
- Go Holy Ghost
- A Song to Sing
- A Dawn
- The Days of This Life
- I Never Knew
- Air Male
- Undo
- The Earth
- My Darling I Love You March
- So Long Dude
- Dude All Dude
- Peace Peace
- Jesus Hi
- Baby Breath
- Sweet Dreams
[edit] References
- Broadway Musicals: A Hundred Year History by David H. Lewis, published by McFarland & Company (2002), page 104 (ISBN 0-786-41269-0)
- Not Since Carrie: Forty Years of Broadway Musical Flops by Ken Mandelbaum, published by St. Martin's Press (1998), pages 22-24 (ISBN 0-312-08273-8)
