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Jekyll and Hyde (Musical)
Jan. 8th, 2020 10:56 pmSo I finally introduced myself properly to the classic story of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde via the 1994 concept album, which I actually stumbled upon quite by accident, and have found myself somewhat fixated on it, and so here I am jotting down some thoughts. First, a small handful of thoughts I had while listening to it:
- 'omg he's just a Ravenclaw gone out of control'
- 'see this is why a philosopher shouldn't be a chemist'
- 'YEAH THAT WOULD BE THE DRUGS, HENRY' (when Jekyll is all like 'gee I wonder why turning into a being of pure malice through agonizingly painful transformations is so EXCITING' early on before things really Escalated)
- 'THE ACTING, THE DRAMA, UGH WHY CAN PEOPLE SING THIS GOOD'
- 'D: WHYYYY ;~;'
To elaborate, I quite liked the story. xD Anthony Warlow was absolutely STUNNING as Jekyll and Hyde, he really has a beautiful voice and totally sells all the confusion and anguish and hope that Jekyll experiences throughout the story, as well as all the ill intent of Hyde. He portrays a Jekyll that is quite likable and admirably determined even if his goals were kind of insane from the beginning ("What makes a man do acts of evil...surely the answer and cure to this can be found with the right chemical formula let's do this what could possibly go wrong") and the fact that he becomes so detestable as Hyde (how much of Hyde's personality being unique/separate and how much is born from Jekyll's own buried flaws/desires is deliberately unclear and fascinating to ponder). His romance with Lisa, his fiancee, is very sweet (they had such a nice romance song! And I may not be big on romance in general, but a good musical number is certainly one way to sell me a couple as genuine and worthy of my support), and though it wasn't featured in as many parts of the story his friendship with John was great too. The subplots I wasn't quite as good at following in detail through song alone but there were nevertheless some moving songs dedicated to the side characters (JUSTICE FOR LUCY ;~;), which I liked as well. Man was the ending a total downer though, I mean it made sense and is entirely appropriate for a gothic thriller/cautionary tale, but UGH the acting was so good so it was just so upsetting.
I very much plan to read the book to have a more detailed review on the story (and to read some other gothic thriller classics like Frankenstein, since apparently the style speaks to me?), as I am admittedly right now primarily obsessed with the songs themselves and Warlow's ridiculously good singing (I could really just...go on and on about each one in detail, but I'll refrain lol). But yeah, definitely would recommend this version of the story to anyone whether they've seen/read other versions before or not, it's fantastic. Hopefully this leads to more literary/musical discoveries down the road!
- 'omg he's just a Ravenclaw gone out of control'
- 'see this is why a philosopher shouldn't be a chemist'
- 'YEAH THAT WOULD BE THE DRUGS, HENRY' (when Jekyll is all like 'gee I wonder why turning into a being of pure malice through agonizingly painful transformations is so EXCITING' early on before things really Escalated)
- 'THE ACTING, THE DRAMA, UGH WHY CAN PEOPLE SING THIS GOOD'
- 'D: WHYYYY ;~;'
To elaborate, I quite liked the story. xD Anthony Warlow was absolutely STUNNING as Jekyll and Hyde, he really has a beautiful voice and totally sells all the confusion and anguish and hope that Jekyll experiences throughout the story, as well as all the ill intent of Hyde. He portrays a Jekyll that is quite likable and admirably determined even if his goals were kind of insane from the beginning ("What makes a man do acts of evil...surely the answer and cure to this can be found with the right chemical formula let's do this what could possibly go wrong") and the fact that he becomes so detestable as Hyde (how much of Hyde's personality being unique/separate and how much is born from Jekyll's own buried flaws/desires is deliberately unclear and fascinating to ponder). His romance with Lisa, his fiancee, is very sweet (they had such a nice romance song! And I may not be big on romance in general, but a good musical number is certainly one way to sell me a couple as genuine and worthy of my support), and though it wasn't featured in as many parts of the story his friendship with John was great too. The subplots I wasn't quite as good at following in detail through song alone but there were nevertheless some moving songs dedicated to the side characters (JUSTICE FOR LUCY ;~;), which I liked as well. Man was the ending a total downer though, I mean it made sense and is entirely appropriate for a gothic thriller/cautionary tale, but UGH the acting was so good so it was just so upsetting.
I very much plan to read the book to have a more detailed review on the story (and to read some other gothic thriller classics like Frankenstein, since apparently the style speaks to me?), as I am admittedly right now primarily obsessed with the songs themselves and Warlow's ridiculously good singing (I could really just...go on and on about each one in detail, but I'll refrain lol). But yeah, definitely would recommend this version of the story to anyone whether they've seen/read other versions before or not, it's fantastic. Hopefully this leads to more literary/musical discoveries down the road!
