So, I saw "Mama Mia," the musical on Broadway a couple of weeks ago, and I'm still wearing my happy 70s dancing pants. Does anyone have a cure for getting ABBA music to stop playing over and over again in their head? I know, you're saying to yourself, why would anyone want to stop ABBA music, but believe me, this is getting ridiculous.
But that's not why I'm writing this post. I have a problem with the ending of the musical. What started as a little niggling annoyance is now really bothering me. Even more than the endless repetitions of "Take a Chance on Me" in my head. I guess I should make a spoiler alert at this point (as if anyone is going to see "Mama Mia" for the plot). All the same, SPOILER ALERT. Anyway, the musical ends with the main character, a twenty-year-old, deciding last-minute that she's to young to get married and instead she will go backpacking across Europe with her boyfriend. This is supposedly the joyful dance-in-the-aisles ending to an exuberant musical.
Maybe I'm an old-fashioned prude or maybe I'm an old-fashioned romantic, but since when did the last-minute refusal to get married constitute a happy ending? As far as I could tell, marriage was the next obvious step for the romantic leads in this show. They were both good people, they respected each other, and they were in love with each other. The only reason they gave for not getting married was that they had their whole lives ahead of them. What was that supposed to mean? That it's unwise to make a commitment when you have so much time in which to undo that commitment? That being married will make backpacking through Europe impossible because only single people can do something so crrrrazy? So dumb.
I'm not saying that marriage wouldn't completely change the universe for any twenty-year-old because it does. I'm not saying that getting married shouldn't mean that you'll never be romantically in love with anyone else because it should. I'm just saying that backing out of a wedding is not a happy, exuberant ending. It's just . . . an ending. Giving up a marriage to someone you love and respect is giving up an adventure with higher emotional highs and lower emotional lows than you ever thought possible when you were single. Come on, musical, get it right! Surely whoever realized that a curtain call is best when done in florescent jumpsuits must be wise enough to know that.
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4 comments:
I have a lot of thoughts on this subject - there is this idea that is being sold to us that the ideal, or even typical, woman is this happy-go-lucky swinging single who only wants to have fun and would rather not have a man to commit to her in any kind of long-term way. I don't think that girl exists.
Most women want to be in a relationship - the more commitment, the better, as long as the guy really is going to keep up his end of the deal. And we're sort of being told that the best way to be the perfect woman (to whom men will be willing to commit), is to not require or even want any kind of committed relationship at all. Someone is trying to trick us.
About the problem of trying to turn off the soundtrack in your head -
I totally sympathize. That happens to me all the time. Not always with Abba, but sometimes. Even a word or phrase can set me off. One of the streets in a study I'm working on is called Electric Avenue. You can imagine...
I recommend filling your MP3 player with music that is interesting to listen to, but not catchy in a way that it would get stuck in your head. And listen to it for at least 3 hours a day. Be make sure there is at least 8 hours of music on your MP3 player though because even the State of Union speech could get stuck in your head if you listen to it enough.
I recommend:
Architecture in Helsinki
Dashboard Confessional
Polyphonic Spree
Andrew Bird
MoTab
Death Cab for Cutie
Kings of Convenience
Classical Music
You want to talk about street names getting songs stuck in your head? Yeah, I'm living in New York. Guess which subway is closest to my apartment? The A-Train. Downtown. 42nd Street stop. Etc. I'm a mess. I thought it would stop after a month, but it hasn't.
I'll try your mp3 player trick but only because I'm desperate. In spite of my whining I think that songs that DON'T get stuck in your head are boring.
What's this I'm hearing? Songs that don't get stuck in your head are boring? This from a musician? What about all that classical music you made your piano students listen to? You think that classical music is boring? I mean, I kind of think so too, but I didn't think you thought so.
Or maybe you mean that you sometimes get classical music stuck in your head too. That must be interesting. I wonder what it would be like to walk around with the 1812 Overture playing in your head.
I basically have a portable radio player in my head that never stops, which is why I can justify being plugged into an iPod for hours and hours at a time because at least with the iPod I can control what music is playing in my head. I guess, in theory, I should be able to control my own thoughts as easily as I can my iPod. Hmmm.
I wake up with a song playing in my head every morning. Usually, it's something I've been listening to lately. Like this morning, it was Neko Case, which was cool. But the other day, it was The Music Man. I don't know why. I haven't heard that music in forever.
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