[+] Oja, Carol. “On the Town After Dark: The Nightclub Scene.” In Bernstein Meets Broadway: Collaborative Art in a Time of War, 270-92. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.
The Nightclub scene from Bernstein’s On the Town encapsulates in microcosm the musical’s themes and overall montage aesthetic. Critics who espoused a “high-modernist ideology” that emphasized the originality of a single composer disapproved of Bernstein’s liberal borrowing of existing sounds, styles, and music. While not strictly a musical borrowing, this scene’s construction is itself a parody of real clubs in New York City and the established theatrical club scene tradition, as it subverts the traditional trope of danger associated with night clubs. For example, the music and text of “So Long” mimic and poke fun at Billy Rose’s club Diamond Horseshoe through the song’s use of showgirl “ooing” that was common to Rose’s establishment.
Works: Leonard Bernstein: On the Town (270-92), Mass (294).
Sources: Leonard Bernstein: On the Town (278-79); Anonymous: Come Up to My Place (280), I Can Cook Too (280); Judy Tuvim: The World’s Fair is Unfair (275-76); Gilbert and Sullivan: The Pirates of Penzance (289-90).
Index Classifications: 1900s
Contributed by: Sarah Kirkman
