The Big Score

I've received a lot of entries in our little game of guessing which movie version of a Broadway musical used the entire score from the stage production with no deletions and no additions. The answer I was assuming was My Fair Lady. By the time that one was committed to film, the cast album was one of the best-selling records ever made, and many knew its every note by heart and considered every one sacred. I suspect the producers of the movie were even afraid to change the arrangements very much.

The only two other films anyone suggested were West Side Story and 1776. The latter, when filmed, used the Broadway score exactly but as we all know (or can read about here if we don't), "Cool Conservative Men" was deleted for the movie's general release and has only been restored in recent home video versions.

West Side Story sort of qualifies, depending on how you define the rules. One of the ballet numbers was cut, though strains of it show up as underscore elsewhere in the film. Several songs — including the lyrics for "America" — were rewritten. The list of songs that are sung is the same, though they aren't in the same order.

My pal Tom Hegeman raises an interesting point: "Another question to ask regarding adding new songs to filmed versions of musicals to be eligible for an Oscar — have any of those added songs ever won?" I just looked it up and while a lot of the added-for-the-film tunes were nominated, they don't fare so well on Oscar Night. The very first Academy Award for Best Song went to "The Continental," which was added to the score of The Gay Divorcee, which was the movie version of the musical, The Gay Divorce. That was in 1934. The next time it happened is arguable. In 1941, the Oscar for Best Song went to "The Last Time I Saw Paris," which was written for the movie, Lady Be Good. What makes it arguable is that the movie is almost not an adaptation of the 1924 stage musical of the same name. It uses the name and a few of the songs and that's about it.

After that, the only other example I note on the list was a long time coming: "You Must Love Me," which was written for the 1996 film of Evita. I may have missed one other long ago, but it sure looks like these songs which are added to maybe win an Oscar almost never win Oscars.

Okay, last call: Can anyone think of another movie that adapts a stage musical and does every single song with no tunes cut and no tunes added? I don't know if there is one but if there is, let's figure out what it is.