Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Gossip, the musical

Last night I had a crazy dream.  This in itself is not a strange occurrence - I usually have a crazy dream every night - maybe I'll write about lucid dreaming sometime in the future.

This dream was crazier than most though.  In my dream, I was composing a musical.  Here's the general plot line.  If Andrew Lloyd Webber is reading this, feel free to use my idea, as long as the royalty cheques start flooding in.

The musical starts with a group of students at an arts school.  Everyone has big Hollywood dreams.  Cue a big musical number (in which I was designing sets, writing lyrics, choreographing dances, etc).  All of the students but one realize that they aren't going to make it big, and decide to go to journalism school instead.  (That's a logic progression, right?  Stupid subconscious).

Anyway, in my brain, this was an awesome musical number... but then I remember thinking to myself (my conscious speaking to my subconscious) that the staging was less Jubilee and more Jubilations - whatever - those shows still make money for the author.

Our protagonist, Jack Bramble, becomes a gossip columnist, mostly because he was smitten with a former classmate and now Hollywood ingénue, who shall remain nameless because I didn't dream up a good name.  The story was filled with unrequited love and jealousy on the part of Jack, who used his gossip column to denigrate would-be suitors of the young starlet.  There may have been paparazzi-induced murders as well.  (Think Sweeny Todd).

Anyway, the second act of the play turns things on its head, as Jack becomes an advice columnist, like Dear Abby.  The young starlet, becoming jaded with the Hollywood lifestyle, writes for advice on how to deal with the hollowness of Hollywood relationships.  Jack responds, drawing from his own hollow experience, without realizing that he's writing to the source of his sorrow.

Unfortunately, I woke up before the ending, so I didn't get to find out if this was a tragic love story like Romeo and Juliet, or more of a comedy, like Clueless.

Maybe tonight, I'll get the rest of the story.  I'll be sure to take my blank music sheets with me to bed.

2 comments:

Janine said...

I'd love to see a Clueless ending. And when this goes to production, I hope you can find a way to add our Rasputin number.

Greg Loveday said...

The first line of this made me think of a song. Ain't nothing gonna break my stride !!

Look forward to opening night :)