As soon as I started playing
it one thing was very clear, this could very well be a companion piece to
SPAMALOT. I believe the action takes place in
the same time frame; besides that, the music also reminded me of the Monty
Python’s musical.
Although he wrote one of my
all time favorite songs (“Human Again” from BEAUTY AND THE BEAST”), I’m not
a huge fan of Alan Menken, but he surely knows how to write good songs. He has
a special touch for beautiful emotional pop ballads, but he also manages to
give us strong conventional musical songs.
The first song I heard was “A
Day in Richard’s Life”, which with its pop-rock rhythm scared me a bit, but
“Comedy Gold” followed it and I relaxed. This is not Menken’s best score, but
it has more than a couple of good songs. Among them, my favorite is the very
Broadwayish “No One But You”, sung by the ladies leaded by Mallory Jansen. The
title song is pure Menken and so is the romantic duet “Love is Strange” and the
romantic quartet “Maybe You’re Not the Worst Thing Ever”. The lyrics by Glenn
Slater don’t seem to take anything seriously and easily put a smile on our
face.
Joshua Sasse and Timothy
Omundson, as Galavant and King Richard, seem to have fun and so does the rest
of the cast, specially Ben Presley. I just wish they gave Faith Prince a little
bit more to sing. But this is an amusing score and some of the tunes are quiet
hummable.
Rate: 6 (from 1 to 10)
There is no character called "King Arthur" in GALAVANT. Also, the BEAUTY AND THE BEAST song is titled "Human Again" not "Be Human Again."
ReplyDeleteThank you, I've just edited my review. I haven't seen the GALAVANT television series and I was convinced that King Arthur was one of the characters. As for "Human Again", I don't know where I had my head. Once again thanks for your remarks.
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