Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Musical Theatre/Archive 13

Awards

I'm going to start working on a template for awards in the sandbox. If anyone wants to put in some input, feel free. — MusicMaker5376 19:05, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Great work so far! I think it is much better to have it like this rather than a table/list. Ofcourse some of this info will be in the productions sections but yes, really liking the idea!!

The Comedy of Errors (1976 musical)

Does anyone have time to beef this stub up a little? Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:19, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

May I suggest that when a request like this is made, if someone is going to tackle the edit he or she might mention that here so everyone else will know it's in the process of being edited. After doing considerable research and writing, I got a conflict edit response when I tried to submit my changes, which I'm sure anyone who has experienced this knows is very frustrating! It's partly my fault, because I didn't follow my own advice. :) Thanks. LiteraryMaven (talk • contrib) 16:06, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Deepest apologies, I was called away from the computer, I will make it up to you somehow, I promise. I'm sure that whatever you add will be far superior to my dinky little bits, anyway. (As penance, I shall retire for the day in public red-faced --embarrassed --disgrace.)JeanColumbia (talk) 16:15, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

No need to apologize at all! Since there's no way to know two (or more) people are working on an article at the same time, I thought it might be helpful to everyone if an editor taking up an invitation to work on a stub mentions it so people will know someone has responded. In any event, with what we both have added, the article is getting longer and better! LiteraryMaven (talk • contrib) 16:31, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Great work, Jean and Maven! Another option is to put the {{in use}} tag on the article while editing. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:07, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

I never knew about that tag! Thanks for the very helpful hint. LiteraryMaven (talk • contrib) 17:26, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Template:Gershwins

This template includes Sweet and Low as a work by Ira Gershwin. He contributed lyrics to only two songs in this revue. Is there a guideline that suggests how much of a production should be credited to a composer, lyricist, etc. before it should be included in his template? If not, how do others feel about this? Thank you for your feedback. LiteraryMaven (talk • contrib) 16:28, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

I would remove it from his template. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:05, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Done! LiteraryMaven (talk • contrib) 17:29, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

La Cage aux Folles (musical)

This article contains the following statement: "A gay-themed project was risky in the early years of the AIDS epidemic, even though many Broadway performers, crew members, and devotees were gay. But the creative team—all gay men—felt that such a show was the tonic needed by those suffering from the illness and to combat the overt homophobia that had surfaced in some quarters due to the threat posed by the epidemic." It isn't referenced and sounds like POV to me. 172.163.45.22 (talk) 14:00, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

I would conclude exactly the opposite: This sounds like it is based on a book or books about musicals. I agree that the statement needs a reference. -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:42, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

I just read Mainly on Directing: Gypsy, West Side Story, and Other Musicals by Arthur Laurents, which has some good information about La Cage I will incorporate into the article. LiteraryMaven (talk • contrib) 15:13, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Thats great! I've just gotton a book called Jerry Herman: The Lyrics, and for each song it has thoughs and notes by jerry herman on them. I'll try incorporating some when im done with my uni move (Move to london tomorrow!)Mark E (talk) 16:36, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Yay! This is what Wikiprojects are for! If you look above on this talk page, some other sources are also suggested. -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:49, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Loving the work! Found out alot of interesting stuff from the background section there!

Im useless at putting stuff into my own words so rather than make a mess here is a little bit from the jerry herman lyrics book that I think sums up his own feelings on la cage perfectly.

"Following the smashing opening night performance of August 21, 1983, Jerry Herman walked out of the Palace Theatre onto Times Square. He knew he had nothing else to prove, he had shown his critics as well as his detractors that he could still write a big Broadway hit. And, with nothing else to prove, he vowed never to write another show for Broadway." From page 224 of Jerry Hermans Lyrics by Ken Bloom. Mark E (talk) 17:43, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

I shortened the quote and put it at the end of the original production discussion. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:59, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Great!!! Just look at all the progress in the last month. The size of the article has doubled in the past month, and the quality of the text is far superior!

Template/Instructions for musical theatre infobox

The detailed instructions for the template for the musicals infobox are gone, looks like someone changed the title, but did not move the instructions. I'm lost. Template:Infobox_Musical. JeanColumbia (talk) 12:44, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Fixed. — MusicMaker5376 14:54, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Miranda Sings

Musical theatre fans: If you have never seen Miranda Sings, check this out: Miranda performs Eponine's death scene from Les Mis at Birdland, September 2009 and Miranda giving vocal coaching to the Broadway cast of Rock of Ages. Enjoy. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:38, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

One week offer

I should have a bit of time in the next week. For the next week, if you nominate any freely-licenced musical-theatre-related sounds at Wikipedia:Featured sound candidates, I'll listen to them, and see if I can't improve them with a bit of audio editing, such as hiss reduction or click removal.

I only ask four things:

• The copyright status is solid. That generally means composition is public domain, and the recording freely licenced or itself in public domain. There's a school of thought that says that sounds as late as the 60s could be in PD in the US, but I find that dubious, so please stick to either pre-1923, Edison Records, out-of-copyright-in-its-own-country, or free-licenced recordings. This will, of course, limit us to fairly early musical theory.
• The description page is good, including as much information as possible, e.g. composer, lyricist, performer, date of recording, any reference numbers for the record or matrix, where you got the file, and so on. If you don't find everything, don't panic, but try to do it well, and use the {{Information}} template.
• If the recording is severely damaged, don't expect miracles. But I'll do my best, or give you a good reason why it's impractical.
• Upload the image to Commons if possible, but remember that different countries have different laws, and PD in the US may not be PD in the source country. PD in the source country is required for Commons, but merely PD in the U.S. is fine for uploading here.

If you have trouble converting to Ogg, I suggest Audacity. If you discover you need help, leave a note on my talk page (note that I can't convert Real Audio, but can probably find someone who can).

Shoemaker's Holiday ^{Over 208 FCs served} 10:19, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

Citing musicals

I'm trying to finish up Mewtwo, and I need to cite the musical Pokemon Live! in order to fully cover the subject, but I can't find a template to cite it. What's the general standard for this?--Kung Fu Man (talk) 16:53, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Hmm. Interesting question. Since we usually work on articles dealing with musicals themselves, I'm not sure that we've ever had to worry about it. I would suggest using the same format as a book, substituting the act and scene numbers for the page numbers, the production company for the publisher, and perhaps the dates of the production for the date of publication. However, you can probably get around all of that by phrasing it like, "In Pokemon Live!, Mewtwo was...." Others here may have other ideas, though. — MusicMaker5376 17:12, 26 September 2009 (UTC)

Popular pages

I have submitted this project to [1]. --Ysangkok (talk) 19:55, 30 September 2009 (UTC)

Kelly

This article was included in DYK which is how I became aware of it. It's a mess! I hope someone active in the musical theatre project will clean it up. LargoLarry (talk) 14:36, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

I cleaned it up, but it needs a plot summary. I don't understand the info in the article about the movie rights, which was confusingly mixed up with the info about the broadway show's budget. I think I've separated it now, but the film rights info is still confused. -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:25, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Pageview stats

After a recent request, I added WikiProject Musical Theatre to the list of projects to compile monthly pageview stats for. The data is the same used by http://stats.grok.se/en/ but the program is different, and includes the aggregate views from all redirects to each page. The stats are at Wikipedia:WikiProject Musical Theatre/Popular pages.

The page will be updated monthly with new data. The edits aren't marked as bot edits, so they will show up in watchlists. You can view more results, request a new project be added to the list, or request a configuration change for this project using the toolserver tool. If you have any comments or suggestions, please let me know. Thanks! Mr.Z-man 01:00, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. Can it also generate a chart showing views in the last year, say? -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:59, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

George Formby, Sr.

The article on music hall singer George Formby, Sr. is a cut and paste. See: http://www.wikipedia-watch.org/plagiarism/0485.html

Anyone want to try to rescue it? -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:10, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Normally I'd jump on this but I'm just about to be really busy until Tuesday, if no one else gets to it, I'll lend a hand. (And I'm worn out from reverting the IP who puts in false casts, must be some kind of game or obsessive ...hmmm...whatever).JeanColumbia (talk) 20:15, 4 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! Update: User:Tim riley already took care of this with the help of Jean on the photo sizing. -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:17, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

Many typos fixed

I just went through all the Category:Broadway musicals articles using WP:AWB and corrected many typos and performed some general fixes. If I have made any errors, please let me know so I can revert the edit. --Thomprod (talk) 23:56, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

New Member

I'm new to the project, and just thought I would introduce myself. Sean (talk || contribs) 04:54, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Welcome Sean! Any questions feel free to ask xMark E (talk) 12:16, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Welcome, Sean. What area(s) are you interested in? --Thomprod (talk) 23:01, 25 December 2009 (UTC)

Thank you both. I'm a current Thespian in High School so my expertise is more in modern musical theatre than the former, though I have a bit of knowledge in the former. Sean (talk || contribs) 05:29, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

Legally Blonde (musical)

I've put the article up for peer review because I want to improve it and get some feedback on where to go! Any feedback appreciated.

Put this up for GA now. Mark E (talk) 17:24, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Hi, Mark. The article is looking very nice and is very well organized. The only comments I would note are that you do not discuss, first, how the musical came to be adapted from the film, the assembly of the writing team, and the early history of the creation of the show. Also, other than the plot summary, there is no discussion of the show itself - for example its themes or how it might be viewed from a feminist viewpoint, and how it fits into the theatre scene (for example, there is a trend in the last decade or so, of popular films being turned into musicals, such as Shrek, The Producers, Color Purple, etc.) You might look for what has been written about the film in terms of the discussion of themes. There is no discussion of the music itself (and comparison to other contemporary pop musicals). Are there any influences in the music that relate to the themes (Harvard fight song, etc?), or that are unusual on Broadway? There is also no description of how the book of the musical differs from the screenplay of the film. What was added and discarded in adapting it for the stage (except the music, obviously). Finally, has the musical changed much since it debuted on Broadway? Any rewrites for subsequent productions? You can check Wikipedia:WikiProject Musical Theatre/Article Structure as a checklist/guideline. I hope this helps! All the best, -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:20, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Will have a dig about for stuff this next week :). There is such a backlog of GA noms I wanted to nom it sooner rather than later haha. Mark E (talk) 19:56, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

By the way any advice where to get info on how it came to be adapted and the early history? Also How would i source something on how it fits into the theatre scene and themes and music?

For history of the genesis of the show, you could start by looking at the press reports of the San Francisco tryout (which, by the way, needs to be described more. Who was in it? Was it the same director/choreographer?) Often authors talk about that sort of stuff in interviews early on. You might continue to find background about the genesis in interviews and press reports both before and after it opened on Broadway. As for the theatre scene, try John Kenrick's 2008 book or whatever very recent musical theatre books might mention the new trends, etc. For themes and analysis of book and music, again, a thorough examination of the the press reports and reviews should give some information; new musical theatre books might give some discussion; sometimes the vocal score sold at big sheet music stores might have a preface/introduction/afterword about it; likewise, if the script is sold anywhere, major libraries would have a copy, and there might be a good discussion in a preface/intro/afterword. Also liner notes to the recordings.... Season's Greetings! -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:36, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Minimusical

Is this a real genre, or just a description of a shortened form of a musical? This article seems dubious to me. Note that an editor also recently added a paragraph about it to Musical theatre, which I streamlined. -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:37, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

We actually used to do minimusicals in college. However, what we did and what the article describes aren't, strictly speaking, legal. Samuel French came down on us. They are shortened musicals, keeping major songs and a handful of scenes.

Someone tried prodding the article, but it was removed. It can go to AFD. — MusicMaker5376 19:30, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Infobox + film

Recently someone was adding film versions to infoboxes. I tried looking up the Template:infobox pages but it says nothing about not including films. Perhaps someone could include that? (A shortcut might be helpful. :) ) -- kosboot (talk) 19:42, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

That would be me. I searched the archives of the talk page, but I the only thing I found was a discussion on it, and someone asking about including the film and ONE person saying no without any sort of justification. Then another person claiming that they had settled the matter the previous year, but I never found any mention of it. (Perhaps I'm looking in the wrong place?) I found arguments for including them and excluding them, and so far, I cannot find an official ruling from the project. In August of 2007, there was a discussion about it, but of the dozens of members, a small number commented on the matter. The infobox says Productions, not stage productions (Yes, it would be implied that it means stage, but I found examples where that's not the case). Musicals like Applause list the US Television version under productions, and that aired on television, not on the stage for an audience. Hair is a good article, and it contains a link to the film in its infobox. Show Boat includes all 3 film versions. Yes, I'm a member of WP:FILMS, but I'm not trying to make the film version take over the article or make the pages part of WP:FILMS. I think that if they're mentioned in the articles as adaptations, then they should be included in the infoboxes so that readers can quickly see whether or not they're related at all. Wool Mintons (talk) 20:42, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree that we should make a decision and reflect it in our guidelines. IMO the film is not a "production" of the musical. The film version is not the same show as the stage musical (that's why our policy is to give them separate articles). I think it is better to keep infoboxes as short as possible. I'd rather exclude the film versions from the musical infoboxes unless it is actually a film of the stage musical. The film and other adaptations should be mentioned in the article under an appropriate caption, and if the film was successful or otherwise particularly notable, it can also be mentioned in the WP:LEAD. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:44, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

I disagree. Film versions of musicals are usually the most accessible version of the show for most people. I don't think adding one line to the infobox will make it inordinately long. Infoboxes are meant to give information. Excluding the film has never made sense to me. — MusicMaker5376 01:02, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Within your own words is my discomfort: a film musical is not a "version." I feel it is an entirely separate work (as did Hollywood even by the early 1930s). It's an adaptation, but it's not a production. -- kosboot (talk) 20:37, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Some film versions of musicals are adaptations, in that there may be new songs, songs cut, plot elements changed, etc., and some versions are very true to their stage counterparts, aside from the general "opening up" necessary in transferring a stage work to film. However, most of the changes made aren't much more than some of the changes made in major revivals, or even some of the changes made in the trial period. These aren't two separate works -- King Lear and Hair are separate works. Hair and Hair are not. — MusicMaker5376 01:11, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

If I am reading this correctly, that is 2 people for including films in the infobox (me and Kosboot), and 2 people for excluding them (Wool and MM). Can we get more opinions? Perhaps we can poll the participants in the project, asking for their opinions? -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:36, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

ER, Ssilvers, you mean the reverse, yes? 2 for exclusion (me & you), and 2 for inclusion (Wool & MM) -- kosboot (talk) 23:14, 20 January 2010 (UTC)

Right. Sorry! -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:46, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Let's see if we can come to some sort of a consensus through discussion; more people may show up. If after a week or so we're still deadlocked, I'm all for a straw poll. — MusicMaker5376 01:11, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't really know with this one. Most of the musicals which have a film version have the "this article is about.. for the film see..." and I think this is a better way than having it in the infobox -- [posted by User:Mark E on 21 January 2010]

WP 1.0 bot announcement

This message is being sent to each WikiProject that participates in the WP 1.0 assessment system. On Saturday, January 23, 2010, the WP 1.0 bot will be upgraded. Your project does not need to take any action, but the appearance of your project's summary table will change. The upgrade will make many new, optional features available to all WikiProjects. Additional information is available at the WP 1.0 project homepage. — Carl (CBM · talk) 03:38, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

North Shore Music Theatre

I have done quite a bit of work redoing the article and wasent sure if it fell in this projects scope or not, anyways does anyone here know how to upload an image of the theatre? - Knowledgekid87 (talk) 19:59, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

You need a free image to upload. Do you have one? If so, we'd be happy to help. -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:59, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Request for comment on Biographies of living people

Hello Wikiproject! Currently there is a discussion which will decide whether wikipedia will delete 49,000 articles about a living person without references, here:

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Biographies of living people

Since biographies of living people covers so many topics, many wikiproject topics will be effected.

The two opposing positions which have the most support is:

1. supports the deletion of unreferenced articles about a living person, User:Jehochman
2. opposes the deletion of unreferenced articles about a living person, except in limited circumstances, User:Collect

Comments are welcome. Keep in mind that by default, editor's comments are hidden. Simply press edit next to the section to add your comment.

Please keep in mind that at this point, it seems that editors support deleting unreferenced BLP articles if they are not sourced, so your project may want to source these articles as soon as possible. See the next, message, which may help.

Tools to help your project with unreferenced Biographies of living people

List of cleanup articles for your project

If you don't already have this and are interested in creating a list of articles which need cleanup for your wikiproject see: Cleanup listings A list of examples is here

Moving unreferenced blp articles to a special "[[WP

Incubation|incubation pages"

If you are interested in moving unreferenced blp articles that your project covers, to a special "incubation page", contact me, User talk:Ikip

Watchlisting all unreferenced articles

If you are interested in watchlisting all of the unreferenced articles once you install Cleanup_listings, contact me, User talk:Ikip

Ikip 05:07, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

SFTVLGUY2

Does anyone remember banned user SFTVLGUY2? He created lots of articles but usually relied on a single source, and he stubbified lots of others and eventually was banned. In any case, several of his articles have been recently tagged by a bot as Unreferenced Biographies of Living Persons. If anyone wants to try to find references for them, here is the list:

1. Mark Lamos - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL
2. Jim Jacobs - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL
3. Lizbeth MacKay - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL
4. Marcia Lewis - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL
5. Mike Poulton - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL
6. Stephen Bogardus - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL
7. Martin Gottfried - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL
8. Barbara Parkins - Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:59, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I have nothing much to do for the rest of the day, I'll start at the top & work my way down. Before I do any work on an article, I'll use the great "inuse" template. (First is lunch, probably will start after 1:00pm). JeanColumbia (talk) 16:35, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Starting to work on Mark Lamos now (12:23pm, EST) JeanColumbia (talk) 17:23, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Mark Lamos is finished (1:32pm). Will advise when I start the next.JeanColumbia (talk) 18:33, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Starting Marcia Lewis now (2:07pm).JeanColumbia (talk) 19:07, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Finished Marcia Lewis (3:22pm).JeanColumbia (talk) 20:22, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Lizbeth MacKay is the next article I'll work on, now. (4:15pm). JeanColumbia (talk) 21:15, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Finished Lizbeth MacKay (5:18pm). JeanColumbia (talk) 22:18, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

I will next work on Stephen Bogardus (6:52pm).JeanColumbia (talk) 23:52, 25 January 2010 (UTC)

Bogardus is done, no more tonight. JeanColumbia (talk) 00:45, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I will begin work on Barbara Parkins now (5:04am).JeanColumbia (talk) 10:04, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Parkins is done.JeanColumbia (talk) 11:09, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Beginning work on Martin Gottfried now (6:12am).JeanColumbia (talk) 11:12, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I am finished with Martin Gottfried, but if anyone can find references for his specific dates of work @ the papers or the "conversations", they would be useful.JeanColumbia (talk) 12:29, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Started working on Mike Poulton.JeanColumbia (talk) 13:26, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

I am finished with Mike Poulton.JeanColumbia (talk) 14:00, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Starting on Jim Jacobs now (9:08am).JeanColumbia (talk) 14:09, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Finished with Jim Jacobs.JeanColumbia (talk) 14:50, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

Nice work, as always, Jean. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:13, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

First Night Records

While looking for a vaguely reliable source to stop my recently created article Peter Brewis being put in the firing line of a certain deletion drive, I cam across this site [2]. I wonder whether this specialist recording company is something your project may want to develop an article about. --Peter cohen (talk) 01:07, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Dempsey and Rowe at AfD

I've nominated Dempsey and Rowe for deletion, because I think that it may be redundant with the individual articles John Dempsey (lyricist) and Dana P. Rowe. If you're interested in the discussion, please comment at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dempsey and Rowe. Thanks. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 20:28, 28 January 2010 (UTC)

Elton John

It is a concern that such a high profile article on a living person is so poorly sourced. It is a matter of priority that statements are sourced. See Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons. Quotations from Elton John or any other person must be closely cited, as per Wikipedia:Quotations. If reliable sources cannot be found then all contentious material should be removed - [3]. It is better for us to have no material at all than to have incorrect, misleading or potentially libelous material. I am posting here because your project has a tag on the article. If this is incorrect, please remove your project's tag from the article. SilkTork *^YES! 10:50, 2 February 2010 (UTC)

Show Boat

Several days ago while I was on a wikibreak, an editor made very significant changes to the article on Show Boat. MM reverted all the changes. On the discussion page, the editor then discussed several of his proposed changes. He made some good points, and I made a few changes to the article in response. Can anyone spend the time on this article to improve it? It is an important topic for us. Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:33, 7 February 2010 (UTC)

Musicals losing primary topic status

Hi all, don't know if this is an issue, but someone is converting lots of musical articles to disambigs, since many of the musicals were also made into notable films. For instance, if you link to West Side Story, you no longer are directed to the musical article; you now have to go to West Side Story (musical) to do that. The same for Dreamgirls, Guys and Dolls, Brigadoon, and Bye Bye Birdie. In this user's defense, these musicals have indeed led to notable, usually award-winning films (I'd support the disambig status for Dreamgirls, for instance). But still, I'd say for most of the articles above, the musical is a primary topic. And there has been no discussion or consensus to these moves that I've seen. -- JaGa^talk 12:04, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Hi. I noticed this too, and I agree that it was rude (at least) to do it without any discussion. But I don't know what to do about it. MusicMaker, Cirt or other experienced types - should we do anything about this? Any opinion Jean? -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:29, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

I started requested move discussions at Talk:Bye Bye Birdie (musical)#Requested move, Talk:Dreamgirls (musical)#Requested move, Talk:Brigadoon (musical)#Requested move and Talk:Guys and Dolls (musical)#Requested move so feel free to comment on each of those pages. Aspects (talk) 21:41, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

I really don't agree with this! The musical is obviously the primary purpose of the title and the film just one adaptation or "production" as it were.Mark E (talk) 22:31, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for asking; oh I always have an opinion. Since there are no objective criteria here, I think that the earliest vehicle gets to be the primary topic. I note that "The Sound of Music"--the musical--is primary, regardless of the enormous success of the film: a good precedent I think. We simply cannot say "I like the [film] [stage] better, so that's what I'll make primary." There are surely exceptions to this, but it's what I'll advocate, although not set-in-stone.JeanColumbia (talk) 22:36, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, then, folks, go to the links posted above by User:Aspects and support the request. Aspects: What about West Side Story? -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:18, 28 February 2010 (UTC)

Please also go to the Fiddler on the Roof talk page. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:32, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Sorry to rain on the parade here, while I realize I seem to be in the minority on the issue, I believe if the movie is significantly notable in it's own right, that it should be titled under the musical. For example, I think Dreamgirls because more famous as a result of the movie.--Levineps (talk) 03:40, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

I ran into West Side Story and a couple of these other moves and strongly disagree with them. The stage musical is definitely the primary topic – the film wouldn't exist if the musical hadn't been developed, and the musicals typically continue to have a long active artistic life with new productions, revivals, local productions, etc., while the movie is done just once. Wasted Time R (talk) 04:18, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

I think there is a clear consensus here. -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:47, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Let me play devil's advocate, should all the articles with (musical) in their title be retitled if they were before the film?--Levineps (talk) 15:59, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

For Hello Dolly!, On the Town, and Annie Get Your Gun (off the top of my head), I'd say yes. For Rent, Grease, and Hair, well, just can't be done (obviously) as the links clearly show. It would take me a few days/weeks to analyze all of the musical articles to come up with anything more, and to possibly refine my criteria.JeanColumbia (talk) 16:36, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Right. Levineps, where only a show and a subsequent movie adaptation are involved, the answer is yes. Where the word is also the subject of unrelated important concepts, like Hairspray, Chicago, Wicked, Hair, Grease, etc., or where there was a pre-existing famous book or movie, like Little Women (musical) or Billy Elliot (musical), then (musical) needs to be in the title. I don't think we need to systematically look for trouble, but when we think of one, like the ones Jean has already thought of, we can fix them. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:17, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

I think with concepts and/or common words, it would be a bit tough!--Levineps (talk) 17:30, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

Charles Wood (singer and actor)

Does anyone want to try to clean up this article and its references? Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:02, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Sondheim is 80 today

Happy birthday, Stephen. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:56, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Havana (2010 musical)

This musical has never been produced, and now it has been cancelled. I suggest that the article be deleted. Should we nominate it for deletion? -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:37, 10 March 2010 (UTC)

I agree. There is no need for an article about a musical that was never preformed.--JDDJS (talk) 02:08, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Daniel Breaker

I think Daniel Breaker should be added to the to-do list. Despite being a Tony Award nominated actor his article is only a stub. It needs to be expanded.--JDDJS (talk) 02:06, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Cats_musical Help please?

The "international productions" table is overwhelming and very confusing - what productions are notable enough for mention? Various stops of the Asia/Australia tour are listed as separate productions, a lot of the older but notable productions aren't listed... short of deleting the whole thing, what criteria can be established for if a production of Cats is notable enough to be included? Or, is there a better form of presenting this information? Belle pullman (talk) 16:34, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

I have pulled some of the fancruft out of this article and shortened the table to include only the productions that listed notable actors in their casts (and also to exclude the productions already listed above it). I added a list of international productions to the Productions section. The Productions section should describe all the major productions, giving them a short paragraph each with WP:Reliable sources for each. I'm de-watching the page soon, so Belle, if you care about this article, please delete crufty insertions and feel free to come back here with any other requests. I bet you can find WP:Reliable sources to substantiate the major productions on the internet. -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:18, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Most Valuable Players (film) AFD

Just wanted to bring this AFD discussion regarding the film Most Valuable Players, a documentary about an award ceremony for high school musical theater. Seeking input. Thanks! — Hunter Kahn 19:52, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

AfD: Belgians in Heaven

Members' input would be appreciated at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Belgians in Heaven. – Voceditenore (talk) 06:51, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

The Passing Show

I started an article for this show. It was the first major revue on Broadway. Can anyone expand it and add more WP:Reliable sources? Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:20, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

While I'm at it, I note that these shows that ran at the Casino Theatre (New York, New York) have no articles: 1918: Oh, Lady! Lady!; 1921: Tangerine (musical); 1923: Wildflower (musical). -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:50, 30 April 2010 (UTC)

Fiddler on the Roof

Are Avram and Mendel really principal characters, or are they basically chorus? How about Reb Mordcha? -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:20, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

They're not principal. I say get rid of Avram, Mendel, Reb Mordcha, Rabbi, Constable, Fruma Sara, and Grandmother Tzeitel. I would suggest the Principal Characters list be limited to the following:

Tevye

Golde

Tzeitel

Hodel

Chava

Model

Perchick

And maybe:

Fyedka (He doesn't actually do very much onstage, but he does marry Chava, which causes a major family schism, so I guess we have to include him)

Yente and Lazar--they do help advance the plot, but they don't sing as much and the story isn't really about them.

I'm not sure about the two youngest daughters, Shprintze and Bielke. They are played by children and probably have 10 lines between the two of them. They're important for establishing that Tevye has five daughters, but aside from that, they don't do very much and do not significantly affect the plot. I would not include them as principals. MarianKroy (talk) 00:20, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Thanks. I would definitely list Fruma Sara and Grandma Tzeitel in the list of roles. They have important singing lines. The constable and the rabbi each have important spoken lines. Fyedka has a substantial number of lines. I decided to keep Mordcha, since he's mentioned in the plot description. I'll combine the youngest daughters. Thanks for the discussion. We just want to get rid of chorus, swings, etc. I think we've agreed that we should list minor characters that are of interest in the play. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:34, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Havana (2010 musical)

Please vote on this deletion nomination: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Havana (2010 musical). Thanks. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:14, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Cast list for Legally Blonde

A new cast list for LB was just created. As some of you may recall, a previous cast list article was deleted in August 2009. What to do with the new one? Here is the Talk page of the new list that shows my comments today and the links to the prior action on the old deleted list: Talk:Legally_Blonde_Musical_Cast. JeanColumbia (talk) 12:43, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Later: looks like this list article might fall under the criteria for speedy deletion, G4, Recreation of a page that was deleted per a deletion discussion WP:SD.JeanColumbia (talk) 16:43, 30 May 2010 (UTC)

Article for deletion?

Should The Lion King 2005 Expanded Score be put up for deletion? It is completely unreferenced, and apparently this album was never released. -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:05, 13 July 2010 (UTC)

Replacement Cast Lists

Im really wanting to get involved with quite alot of editing on some articles, But I would like some advice from some other editors before I start to do so, as I don't want to be seen as going along with my own opinions on what an article should be like when a majority would disagree. As it currently stands, the guidelines for replacement casting information in articles states "For the original Broadway or West End production, there may be a cast list, with notable actors bluelinked, or the casting may be described in prose. Please do not delete such lists. However, there should not be full lists of replacement casts. Notable replacement actors can be named either next to the original cast list or in prose in the description of the production."
My questions - 1) In the article In the Heights would it be seen bad of me to delete the entire Broadway cast replacements section? Sure, quite afew of the people have blue-linked articles and are notable, but the section is completely unsourced and goes on forever.
2) For the article Next to Normal, there are 4 cast lists. Two are practically identical in the case of the off-broadway/broadway casts had the same people apart from one cast member. I personally would remove the original off-broadway cast list as the casting for Dan is already listed in the off-broadway production section. Also, someone keeps adding the uncompleted touring cast back in. It lists two cast members, one of which is Ripley who originated the role in New York. Again, should this be deleted without question? Thirdly, for the Norwegian production, all the casting information is listed in the production section. Should this production (which doesn't even begin until September) have a section in the casting part, or as this is an English language wiki, just list productions where the show was performed in English in the main casting section.

I deleted the duplicate Norwegian cast list since the cast is already shown in prose in the body of the article; I deleted the Tour cast list, it is premature, and, as I said in my edit summary, just a "placeholder". I have no other comments about NTN right now, gotta run.JeanColumbia (talk) 15:03, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I agree that the Off-Broadway cast list doesn't need to be there, as long as the differences between Off-B'way and B'way casts are described above in the narrative description of the off-Broadway production.

3) Should the casting section allow for the original touring casts, or should it be limited to Broadway/West End productions. My query with this one comes from the Spring Awakening article. It lists full B'way original cast, and a separate final cast list. There is a then a tour cast, a tour cast replacements, and a final tour casts, and then a 2nd tour cast listing. I don't want to be seen as just deleting a load of information without consensus, but I think there should be the full original B'way/West End listings, and then of course if there are high profile revivals then listings for those aswell. For touring productions, should the blue linked actors just be mentioned in that productions section along with the role they played?
Sorry for boring you!!Mark E (talk) 12:55, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Only a few comments at this time

For the In the Heights replacements, most if not all are referenced at IBDB, replacement casts (sorry but I can't link to that page). The rest probably can be referenced by playbill, broadwayworld, or other sources. In other words, there are sources, they are just not specified (although I think the IBDB is understod).JeanColumbia (talk) 13:12, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Going strictly by the guidelines, most if not all of the touring casts should be deleted, but I disagree with that, as most (many?) touring casts have notables. Although I would like to follow a conservatve approach with the tour cast, say original and notable replacements (same, essentially, as with the Broadway or West End.JeanColumbia (talk) 13:12, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I see what you mean about IBDB being a source for the replacements, but instead of having such a long list full of non-bluelinked, would it not be better to have something which says "Notable replacements for the Broadway production include Marcy Harriell, Justina Machado, Corbin Bleu, David Del Rio, Bianca Marroquin, Marcy Harriell and Jordin Sparks".(source=ibdb), and in external links, list to ibdb where people can look further for full replacement casting information.Mark E (talk) 13:35, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Mark, I think you are exactly right. In general, yes, I would delete bullet point lists of touring casts, and instead just name the notable (i.e. bluelinked) principal cast members in prose in the "productions" section. Sometimes there is a table that gives the full casts of the most notable productions. I don't mind that, as long as the table sticks to really notable productions. But if the table has a list in which most of the actors are not notable, it really shouldn't be in the table. In the case of In the Heights, I think the table is silly, since you should not have a "current" B'way cast list, and the touring cast has no notable actors. I just weeded out the non-notable replacements. Re: Spring Awakening: I say, yes, hack and slash away all non-notable cast info. Wikipedia is not IBDB. Lists of non-notable names do not help encyclopedia readers understand the show. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:03, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Awards Tables - Yes or No

Can I ask for peoples opinions of organising rewards into a table format. I did it for Legally Blonde (musical) and want to do it for more musicals (for example Spring Awakening/In the Heights) as I think it displays the information in a much better way. Obviously, I dont want to start doing this if people disagree that it is the wrong thing to, but I am very keen to get a sort of standard format for MT articles.Mark E (talk) 13:01, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I'm conflicted about this, but basically have no objection. In late 2007 a user made a beautiful awards table for Gypsy, but I found it a bit hard to read and also questioned whether it could be easily updated by a non-techie person such as myself. (see the reformatting discussion here: [4]. If you decide to make a table, I urge you to make one that is easy to edit and, obviously, easy to read. I have not looked into this, but what does the film project do? JeanColumbia (talk) 13:19, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Doniago. Based on the discussion at WP:TABLE I would say that there probably would be no benefit for a table in many if not most musicals, except for perhaps those musicals that have multiple awards nominations/wins--so, Spring might be ok. If you do decide to make one, I like the example that Doniago gave, which I think is probably close to what you used for LB. (I am oh so wishy-washy on this.)JeanColumbia (talk) 13:44, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I would generally discourage the use of tables unless there's a substantial number of awards involved and organizing them in a table will offer clear benefits. See WP:TABLE for pertinent information. If you do want to pursue tables for awards, the one used for Milk may be a good starting point. Doniago (talk) 13:27, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I have always thought that we list too many awards. I would only list Tony's, Drama Desk and Olivier, and if the production has never been on Broadway or West End, then the most prestigious awards for which the show was eligible. I don't think it adds much to the reader's understanding of a musical to know that it won or was nominated for some Outer Critics' Circle awards. I'd much rather see a section analyzing the book or music of a show based on discussions in theatre references or discussions by critics and scholars. If you look at the Hair article, for instance, we have an actual referenced prose discussion of why the show did not win many Tonys. That seems much more interesting to me than a long list of awards from various award groups. These articles tend to be too listy. As for the tabular format, I have no objection to it, but it seems like a lot of work without much benefit. I do agree that the Milk format is much more compact and, IMO, preferable to our big fat lists and tables. All the best, -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:21, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

I agree with you Ssilvers in Tony/Drama Desk/Oliviers are the most notable awards. For these, I would list all nominations along with wins. I do think awards for Outer Critics/Drama League/Evening Standard/Whatsonstage.com awards are important to mention as well (For Example, the musical Priscilla has big posters proclaiming it's wins at the whatsonstage awards). I must say though, I absolutely love the way Milk has the awards section, in that it has the brief information on awards, and then for further reading the user would have the choice to view the awards table if they wanted that information. This would mean you wouldn't need to limit which awards to include. I will try and do it for Spring Awakening in the next few days, and see what it ends up like.Mark E (talk) 15:31, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

OK, Mark. I would just say that if your poster says you won the What'sOnStage award, what we should be doing, as an encyclopedia, is explaining that that is just marketing, and what it really means is that it did NOT win the Olivier. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:36, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Precisely! And I completely agree with you. It didn't win the Olivier, but won the Whatsonstage award which is the next best thing. However, because this show and Sister Act very actively campaigning for the Whatsonstage award using social media, it is a notable award. I remember in the run up constant tweets/facebook notices saying VOTE FOR US, and even flyers being handed out at the shows encouraging people to log on and vote for them (this was at Priscilla when I went). I wouldn't know where to start on how to source this kind of information though. It reminds me of the year Wicked/Avenue Q competed for the Tony, and Avenue Q's very aggressive (and successful) Tony campaign. I remember a poster, I think it listed afew awards it had won at the top, and in big writing underneath the logo said "Did we mention we won the TONY!". I have the Big Avenue Q coffee table book, and Im wanting to try and get the articles of some of my favourite shows to a good standard (I love Legally Blonde and check all edits done to that page now to make sure it is not being filled with fandom).Mark E (talk) 16:08, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Deletion of Character Lists from play articles

The highbrows that seem to own the Shakespeare pages are attempting to remove the character list from Romeo and Juliet because it muddies up their beautiful "prose". I am astounded that they don't understand that plays and musicals share an essential element - the Character list! Please comment here: [[5]]

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Plot Length Guideline?

Hi there...an editor recently removed the "plot" template from Love Never Dies claiming that for a musical the synopsis was not overly-long. It's currently 1,107 words, which based on other MOS'es I'm familiar with would qualify it for a plot template and subsequent trimming. I did some searching for an applicable guideline for musicals but was unsuccessful. Is there such a guideline, and if not, is there any reason the template shouldn't be included as long as the synopsis remains overly-long? Thank you for your feedback! Doniago (talk) 12:45, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

I actually don't think it is overly long. For a musical, it is more complicated to write a plot as it needs to be written in a way that song titles can be worked around it. For Love Never Dies, which has a fairly complicated plot line, I think 1107 is near enough. Im not sure what others think but I think a plot summary of around 1000 words for a musical theatre article should be a guideline, with some leeway. It should be noted that for Wicked (musical), which is a GA, has a plot summary of more than 3000 words. That plot summary needs some serious trimming! Also Hair (musical) which is a GA has 1400 words.Mark E (talk) 14:16, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your feedback Mark. In a vacuum I'd tend to trim any summary (regardless of the media) that was 1000 words or over, but I'll leave this alone pending feedback from other editors. Doniago (talk) 14:34, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Feel free to try cut down the Wicked one, although beware the fan girls who will hate you for it!Mark E (talk) 14:37, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

I'll have to stock up on buckets of water then...hm, cheap shot? (grin) Doniago (talk) 14:38, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Right, Mark. I really think that 1,000 words for a musical is generally not too long, as long as it is tightly written. Obviously, plot summaries should be well written, without repetition and flabby language. As for the "Hair" plot summary, several experienced WP editors worked on it, and that was as short as we could get it, while still describing all the events of the book. Of course, when you collaborate on something, different people think different things are important, so it may be that each of us had language that we were reluctant to part with. Feel free to try to streamline it further. I agree that the plot summary for Wicked is ridiculously long. My rule of thumb: the summary for each act should definitely fit on one screen or normal print size. Doniago, if you see a plot that seems a little long, see if you can tighten it up it a little bit instead of slapping a tag on it. Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:39, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

I wasn't meaning to say the Hair summary was too long, as it is indeed very well written and has a rather complicated plot to summarise and has a lot of songs that need context. I was merely using it to try and show how the LND summary wasn't overly long. For Wicked, I went back into the archives and re-inserted the summary that was present when the article was passed for GA. it is less than half the amount of words than the other version had. Ideally all the MT plot summaries would be well written and 800+ words long. I think as long as they remain under 1500 words (and it is a well written 1500 words, not just a load of fan flubb like the Wicked article had became) then it is fine. On that note I did some cuts to the Avenue Q article summary earlier in the week as I thought there was far too many minor details in place that made it seem badly written.Mark E (talk) 14:54, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Just to clarify, I only ended up looking at LND because I try to clean up plot summaries in my spare time at work and my attention was drawn over thataway because the article had been tagged previously. I'm a Phan-atic (ha!) as well, which didn't hurt. I did some trimming to the LND article, not sure how much (if any) of it is still there...my only concern at this point was what's generally considered a reasonable word-count for a musical synopsis, since I wasn't seeing any guidelines about that. A max. of 1500 seems a bit high to me (significantly higher than MOS'es for other media...movies recommend 700 max I believe), but I'm not going to argue if there's a consensus...might recommend putting that info somewhere that will be fairly easy to refer back to, though. Provided time and inclination allow for it, I'll try to look over the LND and Wicked articles to see what opportunities there might be for further trimming. Always nice to brush off my Writing degree! Doniago (talk) 15:16, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Mark. Doniago, I have always found the film project's 700-word maximum too restrictive (I doubt that the FA film articles adhere to it), and as Mark says, in musicals, we need to give the songs some context throughout the plot summary. Mark, you may find an earlier Avenue Q summary that was shorter too. Doniago, the articles on popular musicals tend to accumulate fancruft, and so we periodically need to review and "weed them out". I just looked again at the plot summary for Love Never Dies and tried to tighten it up a bit. Without a more intimate knowledge of the script, I don't see a way to reduce it any more. However, the critical reception section near the bottom seems very bloated to me. I think it could probably be tightened up a lot! Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:28, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Hi, I've been following this discusion with great interest, having wrestled with an overly long/detailed plot a time or two (both in reading for my own interest, writing, or responding to problematic edits). I think this section could, no should, be re-written to include some of this discussion:Article Structure, Synopsis. Also, probably it would be wise to ask for comments on any proposed number count. I have no clear number in mind, but I do know that sometimes it takes a sentence or so just for the lead-in of a very important song or dance piece, and then there is the title of the song, so the arguments for a 1000 or thereabouts word count seem really sensible to me. I would also argue for some leeway, as some musicals are really involved and complex (just as are some movies, of course!). JeanColumbia (talk) 15:25, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Jean, I agree with adding some discussion there. I have been leery of specifying a word count, but if we say that there should be some leeway, etc. that would do the trick. Why don't you suggest some proposed language, and we can ask for comments, get a consensus and "make it so", as Capt. Picard would say? Best regards! -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:28, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

draft language

Here is draft language for a re-written section on the Synopsis. Note that I've left room, should anyone want, to actually cite the Wicked or Hair word count. This is not the consensus language, it is for discussion purposes at the moment. Review/edit away (I spent many years having my work reviewed in another life). (Back much later today.)JeanColumbia (talk) 16:43, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

DRAFT

As one of the most important sections in the article, it is a description of the story-line of the musical. Divided by acts, the synopsis should be long enough to accurately convey the story-line, the main characters, and the principal musical numbers. The synopsis need not be overwhelmingly long or detailed and does not need to have a scene-by-scene description.

A synopsis in the range of 1000 words at most is suggested, with leeway for an extremely complicted plot or musical features. While the film project suggests a 400-700 word plot for films, the longer synopsis may be needed for a musical theatre work. Because of a complex plot, or the lead-in to a song or dance number and the song title itself, musicals articles for full-length works often are longer. (For example, the synopsis for the musical ?, when it was given GA status, was about ? words.) The essay on "How to write a plot summary" WP:PLOTSUM may also be instructive.

END DRAFT

There is only one problem I see with the bit that says "1000 words at most is suggested, with leeway for an extremely complicted plot or musical features". The question is, where do you draw the line at what is a complicated plot? For example I consider the musical Sister Act) to have a relatively simple plot as far as musicals go, but as it stands the synopsis is currently around 1350 words. The Producers (musical) is the same at almost 1500 words. And whilst I agree that Hair (musical) is complicated in that it has loads of characters and songs, does it warrant an extra 400 words of plot summary? To different people, a show may be complicated/simple.Mark E (talk) 17:34, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, JeanColumbia, this is great! Here are a few ALT suggestions, mostly to shorten it, with new information shown in *asterisks*, and suggested deletions lined through:

AsOne of the most important sections in the article, it is a description of the story-line *describes the plot* of the musical. Divided by acts, the synopsis should be long enough to accurately *and succinctly* convey the story-line, identify the main characters and name the principal musical numbers. The synopsis need *It should* not be overwhelmingly *overly* long or detailed and does not need to *nor* have a scene-by-scene description.

A synopsis in the range of 1000 words at most is suggested, with leeway for an extremely *unusually* complicted plot. or musical features. While the film project suggests a 400-700 word plot for films, the *A* longer synopsis may be needed for a musical theatre work *than other media* because of a complex plot, or the lead-in to provide context for the a song or dance numbers and the song titles. itself, musicals articles for full-length works often are longer. (For example, the synopsis for the musical ?, when it was given GA status, was about ? words.) The essay on "How to write a plot summary" may also be instructive.

I don't know if we need the example or not. Mark, perhaps we can slim down Sister Act and The Producers (but lets discuss that under a different heading)? While it's true that one person may write a longer summary than another, other editors should come along and tighten it up. If a disagreement arises, you can discuss on the talk page why you think a detail is unnecessary, and, if necessary, alert the editors who watch this page to come and comment to achieve a consensus.

What does everyone think? -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:41, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Removing the "at most" works. I'll create another heading on some comments over synopsis trimmings. However I would suggest that if that is the suggested amount, that there should be an upper limit (Im no master in this thing but for my uni essays it is a 10%-15% leeway which is usually given) which would mean that the maximum should be maybe 1200 words. If there isn't this upper limit, its just going to be out of control, especially some articles where the fans will insist more is needed and refer to this saying it is only "suggested", or that "Wicked" has the most complicated plot EVER so requires 2000 words (I wouldn't put it past the fangirls). In short, a definite - "This is the maximum ammount the summary should have, cut it/tag it to get it under this limit" Mark E (talk) 17:52, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Hi, Mark. I would say that if we have a target of 1,000, then we don't need a firm upper limit: this will give people guidance, which is what is sought, and anyone will be within their rights to try to trim down something that is significantly more. At the same time, well-written synopses that exceed the limit will not be absolutely verboten. I added the word "succinctly" to my version above. I hate slapping tags on things. Really, the person who sees that a synopsis is out of control should take the bull by the horns and try to slim it down. Or leave a note on the talk page. I don't know of very many instances where the ugly "plot" tag actually did any good. -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:27, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

I see where you are coming from, but For example when I was editing the Avenue Q article I was fussed at for removing important plot points. I didn't see them to be important, and was trying to cut it down in good faith. Without an upper limit, the fans will have their way and it will be against the best interests of trying to "standardise" musical theatre articles as it were. It is a case of where do you draw the line on how much detail needs to go into anything. Im sure most people on here could summarise a very brief plot for any show in 100 words, and im sure if they were told they had to write a thorough synopsis with 1000 words going to a maximum of 1200, there would be a way. It might mean removing some minor elements, but id rather have a concise plot summary than a one that goes on to tell every minor plot detail. Mark E (talk) 18:50, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Wow, look what I did...I'm such an instigator...(smile)

Anywho, WP:FILMPLOT which discussed the word-count guidelines for...film plots, oddly enough...uses the phrasing "between x and y" words. I think this might be better than "around x words" where there's no specified range tolerance. Currently the maximum for films is 700 per the guideline...for myself I don't usually start making trims or tagging for trimming unless it's at 1000+. Other editors are more conservative than I am, but I can start having difficulties figuring out what's suitable for removal at that point.

My suggested draft text, since all the cool kids are doing it (grin)-

One of the most important sections in the article, it describes the plot of the musical. Divided by acts, the synopsis should be long enough to succinctly convey the story-line, identify the primary characters and name the principal musical numbers. It should not be overly long or detailed nor include a scene-by-scene description.

A synopsis should be between 1000 and 1200 words, with leeway for an unusually complicated plot. The essay on "How to write a plot summary" may also be instructive.

Just my two cents! I didn't see the need to provide examples or explain why the word counts are higher in comparison to other works...it felt like an unnecessary divergence. Feel free to ask if you have questions/concerns! Doniago (talk) 18:52, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

The only thing I am concerned about still is the leeway for an unusually complicated plot, as it is ambiguous. Anything could be made to sound more complicated than it actually is, and there would be no way of deciding "this one is complicated so needs more words". I think the word amount is fine, just without an upper limit which suggests a summary should be cut if it goes over a certain number of words.Mark E (talk) 19:01, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

To borrow from WP:FILMPLOT again, the guideline there is that the maximum number shouldn't be exceeded without an actual consensus. "Discuss with other editors to determine if a summary cannot be contained within the proper range." I think we could probably just add that verbatim, though maybe with a "Please". Doniago (talk) 19:28, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

I like Doniago's language above, except that I would say "between 800 and 1100 words, with leeway for an unusually simple or complicated plot." I would also add back in: "A longer synopsis may be needed for a musical theatre work than for other media, to provide context for the songs and to name the principal musical numbers." I think it's necessary to explain why our target is higher than, e.g., film's. How about something a little simpler than the consensus mechanism. "If your plot summary exceeds 1100 words, please explain why on the talk page under an appropriate heading". -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:24, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Draft language, final

This is what I think reflects the comments:

FINAL DRAFT

Synopsis

One of the most important sections in the article, it describes the plot of the musical. Divided by acts, the synopsis should be long enough to concisely convey the story-line, identify the primary characters and name the principal musical numbers. It should not be overly long or detailed nor include a scene-by-scene description. A two-act musical's synopsis should be between 800 and 1100 words, with leeway for an unusually complicated plot. A longer synopsis may be needed for a musical theatre work than for other media to provide context for the songs and to name the principal musical numbers. If you change the plot summary to exceed 1100 words, please explain why on the Talk page under an appropriate heading. The essay on "How to write a plot summary" (WP:PLOTSUM) may also be instructive.

END DRAFT Any more thoughts, tweaks, etc?JeanColumbia (talk) 20:10, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

• Support per the above. -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:15, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
• Support but would replace the word "succinctly" as without looking it up I don't know what it means. Have never come across that word before. Mark E (talk) 20:19, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

I replaced it with "concisely", OK? -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:22, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

• Support per the above. -- Broadwaygal (talk)
• Conditional Support. Please correct the spelling of complicated. (grin). I still don't think the explanation for why musicals have longer summaries is needed, but I won't oppose its inclusion. I might also rephrase (yeah, yeah, groan...) the one sentence to something like "If changes made to the plot summary cause it to exceed 1100 words, a justification for the extended length should be provided on the Talk page under an appropriate heading." Just my two cents. Doniago (talk) 20:24, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

I tweaked the sentence to make it more like yours but kept it a little more "plain English". -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:32, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

 Looks good! Doniago (talk) 20:46, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

• Support per the above comments Jack1956 (talk) 20:28, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
• Support Concisely is better :)Mark E (talk) 20:51, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
• Support To the point and clear. - 79.66.157.34 (talk) 14:56, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

DONE: Since there is no opposition and no new discussion, I went ahead and added the language to the Article Structure guidelines, slightly tweaking the first sentence for clarity: "One of the most important parts of the article, this section describes the plot of the musical." All the best. -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:53, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Articles For Deletion

I have nominated 2008 in theatre and 2009 in theatre for deletion, as I feel the "years in theatre" thing is going nowhere, and hasn't been active for awhile. These are the only two articles in the scope and I can't see any work being done to create the other years. There are more comments in the AFD page at why I think they should be deleted. Please comment Here -Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2008 in theatreMark E (talk) 10:01, 24 July 2010 (UTC)

Cast List for American Idiot

My question is for American Idiot. Why would only the principals be listed, especially for a small cast? I feel that the ensemble and the swings should also be listed. Especially since it is such an ensemble cast; many have solos within the show itself. In fact, the full cast has not been on since previews and they have had replacements since then. I believe that they should all be listed as well as their understudies because they are all working hard enough for them to be recognized even if it's on their Wikipedia page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sorano916 (talk • contribs) 01:30, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for your inquiry, glad to explain (I am the editor who deleted the ensemble, etc in the American Idiot article). I deleted those items based on this guideline in the Article Structure, Productions section:

"The names of non-notable (i.e., non-bluelinked) ensemble and chorus members, understudies and non-notable production team members (other than directors and choreographers) should be deleted. Only the actors playing principal (significant speaking and singing) roles should be mentioned. For the original Broadway or West End production, there may be a cast list, with notable actors bluelinked, or the casting may be described in prose. Please do not delete such lists. However, there should not be full lists of replacement casts. Notable replacement actors can be named either next to the original cast list or in prose in the description of the production. Other productions should merely name the notable actors and production team members who have Wikipedia articles and can be blue-linked, unless their names are important to an understanding of the musical and its history. A citation to the full cast lists can be given so that the information is easily accessible to anyone who needs this information."

JeanColumbia (talk) 11:26, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing out the guideline. I understand the reasons for the guideline, but it still seems like there should be an exception to the rule for this particular show. Theo Stockman has solos in three songs and Alysha Umphress has a solo in one. Original cast member Joshua Henry and now his replacement Wallace Smith have an entire song. Ensemble member Gerard Canonico is bluelinked; shouldn't he be listed, based on the guideline, and if he is, how is that fair to Theo, Alysha, and Wallace who have larger solo roles that him? Honestly, though, the ensemble and understudies should be listed, even if it was just list of names. For example, Mary Faber, who is listed as a principal and rightfully so, has been out for a least a month now and her understudies, Libby Winters and Leslie McDonel, have been filling in. If someone came to the show and then went to Wikipedia to see how played Heather, they're going to get the wrong information because it doesn't mention anywhere who Mary's understudy is. Please reconsider and make an exception and at least put the ensemble and understudies in. Sorano916 (talk)

Hi. Wikipedia is WP:NOT the IBDB. We need to include encyclopedic information and avoid fancruft. "Fairness" to actors is not one of the purposes of an encyclopedia. The question is, what will someone reading about this show, 20 years after it closes, find of interest. I agree that the guideline indicates that Canonico should be mentioned. All the best, -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:04, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Article titles

This conversation may cause changes for this project so I thought I'd give you a heads up: Wikipedia talk:Article titles#Wikipedia:Requests for comment:Use of italics in article titles. Cheers.4meter4 (talk) 18:27, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

Im so confused. I can't think of any articles in this project that would require a title in italics?Mark E (talk) 18:36, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

The suggestion being advocated by many editors is that if it is italicized in written paragraph form it should be italicized in the title as well. Hence every article on wikipedia about a musical, play, opera, painting, etc. would have an italicized title.4meter4 (talk) 21:17, 25 July 2010 (UTC)

I disagree with the suggestion. Italics are useful to set off a title inside a paragraph, but they are not needed when the title of the work is the same as the title of a Wikipedia article. --Thomprod (talk) 21:25, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

There does not appear to be any consensus for changing the existing policy (no italics for musicals titles), which is, imo, fine as is. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:56, 2 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't see the point in Italic titles. It does nothing to enhance anything, and is just a waste of time. Keep it as is please Mark E (talk) 14:28, 10 August 2010 (UTC)

Scope of Musicals Project: Books

I think that books about musicals, for example, You've Got to Have a Dream, are within the scope of this project and should be tagged with our project tag. I would also suggest that articles primarily relating to musicals in any way, not just the shows and related bio articles, should generally be tagged, since we are the editors most interested in these books and other such articles - the books project has not, in the past, actively worked on such articles. This suggestion excludes, of course, those things that are specifically excluded from our Scope list on our project page. Other examples I can think of that ought to be tagged with our tag would be periodicals (if any) specifically about musicals, articles about theatre companies that specialize in musicals, and articles (if any) about websites that particularly deal with musicals. I would also add these and, any other examples we can think of, to our scope page for the sake of clarity. What does everyone think? -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:10, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Hello, can people please weigh in on the above? BTW, I think we are only talking about a few articles, since not very many articles about musical theatre books exist on wikipedia. -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:05, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

I agree that they should be included. However, i'd also think if we were to expand it to books about musicals/websites with musicals then films based off musical theatre works should also be included. The fact that some of the musical films are not tagged with a WP:MT tag is not good considering some musical theatre articles are tagged from projects that arn't the sole basis. For instance, why should Chicago (2002 film) be tagged by WP Chicago, WP Illinois and WP Toronto, and not WP MT? SOrry for going off topic, yes, books primarily relating to music theatre should be part of the project.Mark E (talk) 19:15, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Hi. Just to clarify: I don't think it's a question of "expanding" our scope to Books. Our scope description says that we cover "Any and all articles pertaining to Musical theatre" except for those subjects specifically excluded. We specifically exclude films (see "Scope" on our main project page), because the films project covers them, and the films project is a very active project with extensive project guidelines that differ from ours. This has been the case since at least 2006 and has worked very well. You missed the long and stupid discussion about WP:Chicago tagging certain musicals articles. Let other projects do what they want (it doesn't hurt us!), but we should only tag articles that we work on; that way we focus our limited resources. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:08, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Good idea, Ssilvers. I agree and would work to add such project tags if accepted by consensus. --Thomprod (talk) 21:22, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

I re-tagged You've Got to Have a Dream. Do we know of any other books on musical theatre that have articles? All the best, -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:29, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Lupino Lane

This article and some related ones (regarding the Lupino family) were edited today by an anon. user in a way that does not conform to the MOS (e.g. by adding hyphens instead of ndashes). If anyone is interested, kindly add them to your watch list. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:29, 11 August 2010 (UTC)

Reorganization of Musical theatre article

An editor attempted a reorganization of some early sections of our flagship article, and I just reverted the edits here. I don't think the re-org was an improvement, because (i) the editor did not do any new research or add any references, which is what this section really needs; (ii) he/she added bullets, whereas WP:MOS preferes narrative paragraphs to bulleted lists; (iii) I think that some of what he/she did is just wrong; (iv) the language was looser and less concise, whereas it needs to be tighter and more concise; and (v) I don't think he/she improved the way the language or argument flowed. However, his/her suggestion of a new subheading might be a good idea. What do other people think? If most people disagree with me, we can put it back the way the editor suggested. Best regards, -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:58, 25 August 2010 (UTC)

Rodgers and Hammerstein

Is this change either WP:UNDUE or inappropriate under COI or similar?: [6] Please give your opinion. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:22, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Template:Stephen Sondheim

For Sondheim watchers:

A user continues to add the designation "opera" to this template. He also has added "operetta" to A Little Night Music. I have reverted, but am close to WP:3R myself and so will need to stop editing. I have asked for discussion. (Here are the diffs: [template]; [ALNM]JeanColumbia (talk) 13:02, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

There is no reason why operetta or opera should appear in this template. A Little Night Music is not an operetta. I have reverted to Jean's version. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:10, 1 September 2010 (UTC)

Musical Theatre articles have been selected for the Wikipedia 0.8 release

Version 0.8 is a collection of Wikipedia articles selected by the Wikipedia 1.0 team for offline release on USB key, DVD and mobile phone. Articles were selected based on their assessed importance and quality, then article versions (revisionIDs) were chosen for trustworthiness (freedom from vandalism) using an adaptation of the WikiTrust algorithm.

We would like to ask you to review the Musical Theatre articles and revisionIDs we have chosen. Selected articles are marked with a diamond symbol (♦) to the right of each article, and this symbol links to the selected version of each article. If you believe we have included or excluded articles inappropriately, please contact us at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8 with the details. You may wish to look at your WikiProject's articles with cleanup tags and try to improve any that need work; if you do, please give us the new revisionID at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8. We would like to complete this consultation period by midnight UTC on Monday, October 11th.

We have greatly streamlined the process since the Version 0.7 release, so we aim to have the collection ready for distribution by the end of October, 2010. As a result, we are planning to distribute the collection much more widely, while continuing to work with groups such as One Laptop per Child and Wikipedia for Schools to extend the reach of Wikipedia worldwide. Please help us, with your WikiProject's feedback!

For the Wikipedia 1.0 editorial team, SelectionBot 23:22, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Million Dollar Quartet

I have started a page for the musical at User:JDDJS/Sandbox. Pleas help me create it. JDDJS (talk) 23:29, 2 October 2010 (UTC)

Billy Elliot the Musical casts

Sorry for bringing this article up again, some anon IP user keeps adding a list full of understudies, totally un-notable, and edited my user page (and the article in question) basically telling me to get lost and stop deleting it. This I won't do, because I don't want the article to become over-run again with endless lists of un-notable lists, and the way all the information is currently displayed is far to complex when compared to every other sort of casting article. Is there anyway it could be simplified? I hate this sort of clutter and trivial information all over the place.Mark E (talk) 22:03, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

I left an explanation and a warning on the editor's talk page. If you reformat Billy Elliot the Musical casts in a better format, and anons are troublesome, post here again and we will revert them, or feel free to post to my talk page, and I'll try to help -- I'm useless at table formatting, but I know how to revert! Don't get upset with anons, as it just sends your bloodpressure skyrocketing. One of the purposes of this project is to support editors who are following the guidelines. Best regards! -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:26, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Songs from musicals: naming conventions

I am not sure if this has been addressed in the past; I've briefly looked through only a few of the archives and couldn't find anything, but I can't seem to find anything specific about guidelines for songs from musicals. First of all I think is naming conventions. For songs whose titles have to be more specific than "NameofSong (song)", I have seen both "NameofSong (NameofMusical song)", "NameofSong (Year song)", and also "NameofSong (Composer song)". Examples: "America" (West Side Story song), "Tonight" (1956 song), and "Cool" (Leonard Bernstein song). This is not only for songs from West Side Story, but also in articles like "Tomorrow" (1977 song), "Ohio" (1953 song), "Maria" (1959 song), "Maria" (1956 song), "Home" (The Wiz song), "Superstar" (Jesus Christ Superstar song), "I'm Going Home" (Rocky Horror song), "Make Believe" (Jerome Kern song). There is even "I Am What I Am" (Broadway musical song), "The Joker" (musical song), "Light at the End of the Tunnel" (musical number), "Stiff Upper Lip" (Gershwin song), "Summer Nights" (John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John song), "Kansas City" (Oklahoma!) and "Beauty and the Beast" (Disney song), which seem to follow their own naming conventions. Wikipedia:Naming conventions (music) says,

“ Disambiguate albums and songs by artist and not by year unless the artist releases multiple albums with the same name. ”

Which means the disambiguation by year is incorrect, but there is no real "artist": do we use the original Broadway performers? The ones who first sang it on the show, or the ones who sang it on the cast recording? What about West End or off-Broadway? There are so many uncertainties and ambiguities that make it difficult to really determine the "original artist" is. In my opinion, the way of having "NameofSong (NameofMusical song)" seems to be the easiest. There may be many singers for one song, especially if there are many solos or the entire ensemble is singing, for example The Sound of Music's "Maria" (1959 song). For composer, there also may be too many to have in the title: Les Misérables, for example has three (incl. translator), making a song possibly have to include "(Claude-Michel Schönberg, Alain Boublil, and Herbert Kretzmer song)" at the end. Thoughts? Yves (talk) 23:00, 31 October 2010 (UTC)

Summer Nights definitely has to change immediately. It is not Travolta's or Newton-John's song. They weren't the first to preform it. As for the others, I feel that the name of the show should be use so that it is "NameofSong (NameofMusical song)". JDDJS (talk) 02:26, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

I would think composers are definitely the way to go.Mark E (talk) 20:47, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

Yves stated that when shows have multiple composers it might get too complicated. Also, the name of the composers are often unknown to many people. People are more likely to recognize the song from the show title then from the composer. JDDJS (talk) 21:20, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

So you're saying a song like "Ohio" from Wonderful Town should be located at Ohio (Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden, and Adolph Green song) and "More Than You Know" from Great Day at More Than You Know (Vincent Youmans, Billy Rose, and Edward Eliscu song)? Yves (talk) 21:37, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

This seems to be a time for WP:Ignore all rules. If it makes sense to use the year, go ahead. If it makes sense to use the composer name, then go ahead. It doesn't strike me as incredibly helpful to use the name of the show, and certainly not the name of the performer, unless they became famous for singing that song. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:41, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

I don't think year is a good idea at all because one a lot of people don't know the years and two it can get confusing with off-b'way productions what is the correct year. If we use title, almost everyone who looking up the song would be able to recognize it. JDDJS (talk) 21:50, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

What year to use, though? The year it was composed (which may be largely unknown)? The year it was first published? The year it was first performed (Broadway, off-Broadway, off-off-Broadway, or even a local theatre group, if it originated there)? The year it was first recorded? And I'm thinking it would be difficult for readers to distinguish between "Maria" (1956 song) and "Maria" (1959 song) for readers without a solid knowledge of musical theatre in the '50s. With musical films providing the most exposure of songs from musicals, one might think those years would be used ("Maria" (1961 song) and "Maria" (1965 song) respectively). On the contrary: Maria (West Side Story song) and Maria (The Sound of Music song) seem a lot more helpful than the years, which is why I think naming conventions tell us not to use years. As for composers, many readers may be unfamiliar with many of them. For example, it might not be very well known that The Wiz's "Home" was written by Charlie Smalls—readers might associate the song more with Stephanie Mills, whose original version reached number one on the Billboard Hot Black Singles Chart, or with Diana Ross, who performed it in the film adaptation, which is more likely to be more well-known. I believe the usage of the name of the show is extremely helpful and could clear up much ambiguity. Yves (talk) 22:15, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

OK, I'm convinced. Say "Maria" (West Side Story song). This could still become confusing occasionally, though, as in the case where a song is reused in another musical and becomes better known there. In that case, perhaps the composer name could be used? -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:21, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

I can agree with that, but can you bring a specific instance in which it implies? JDDJS (talk) 01:09, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

There are many. The one that comes to mind immediately is Crazy for You. In those instances, though, the original is still to be used, the way it is done for songs: Johnny Cash's "Hurt" is at "Hurt" (Nine Inch Nails song), Bananarama's "Venus" (Shocking Blue song), Three Dog Night's "One" (Harry Nilsson song), Natalie Imbruglia's "Torn" (Ednaswap song), etc. Yves (talk) 01:31, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

I think you misunderstood my question. I was asking for an example that fit into the category Ssilvers was talking about when "...as in the case where a song is reused in another musical and becomes better known there." JDDJS (talk) 01:55, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Yeah: many if not most songs in Crazy for You. Yves (talk) 01:59, 2 November 2010 (UTC)

Many thanks for your invite at WP:Songs.

This is quite a problematic question and has been debated, without resolution before. The nub of the arguments against each suggestion were :-

1. By artist – in many instances (in fact, most in musical theatre) the artist performs a version of the song and disambiguation by performer suggests “ownership” which is misleading.
2. By songwriter –this is pedantically correct but, as already pointed out, some songs are written by committee.
3. By year - this was reasonably supported, but fell down when we discovered several examples of notable songs with the same name from the same year!
4. By musical – never suggested before as we were looking at the wider implications.

For what it’s worth I have supported by year as the least offensive method of disambiguation, although my heart tells me it should be songwriter. By artist is actually the least satisfactory. Imagine a song written by songwriter(s), recorded by a performer, then re-recorded more successfully by other artists... for example Fever (Little Willie John song). The problem was solved with Walk On By (Bacharach and David song).

I don’t have much problem with songs from musicals being named after the musical they come from – however there are numerous songs that have survived the existence of the musical they came from and would be misleading to many readers.

Therefore I don’t think there is a simple solution to this problem, the “best” solution can vary from song to song, certainly on older songs, by date is appropriate, where performer and songwriter are the same or similar there can’t be too many objections. Where the songwriter is notable then that’s also a good way to disambiguate.

Perhaps the real solution is where there are two or more songs with the same name we should be creating a disambiguation page which lays out the bare bones of the song with the same title for instance “Maria (song)” which would contain

Maria, a 1956 song written by Leonard Bernstein and Stephen Sondheim for the musical, West Side Story.

"Maria", sometimes known as "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?" is a show tune from the 1959 Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, The Sound of Music.

Having created the disambiguation page the reader can choose which song they might be interested in and the actual title of the song article can be left for individual editors to select.

Hatnotes (which don’t exist on the above two articles) can also be put in place directing readers to the disambig. Page.

For what it’s worth, the songs by year categories state that each category contains songs written or first produced in that year, so whether it is on or off-Broadway doesn’t actually come into the equation.

I am sure others will find good reasons why my suggestions wouldn’t work, but I do feel that a solution should be found and agreed. Cheers.--Richhoncho (talk) 20:17, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

Music Hall Guild

The Music Hall Guild of Great Britain and America is a terrible article. Does anyone want to tackle it? The editors who have worked on it obviously have some kind of COI. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:46, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

Songs from musicals: context

Another query. When writing about songs, does the context and situation they appeared in require citation? For example, the few sentences at the beginning of songs like "I Dreamed a Dream", "Don't Cry for Me Argentina", or "The Surrey with the Fringe on Top". I know when writing about films or television episodes, sources are not required for plot summaries, since the work itself is the source. Since this is kind of similar, I was wondering if there is a parallel here. Yves (talk) 06:21, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Yer i'd say it was the same in that the work itself is the source.Mark E (talk) 09:57, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

Wizard of Oz

I'm a bit confused myself here. Basically Andrew Lloyd Webber is opening a new production of Wizard of Oz next year. It is based on the film, and will use all the music from the film (it was first staged as a musical in 1987 - The Wizard of Oz (1987 musical). The new production by ALW will incorporate new numbers by him and Tim Rice and have a rewritten book. Now there is a separate for this production - The Wizard of Oz (2011 musical). Now are these two different productions of the same show, therefore should be contained to one article, or if ALW's new production is classed as a new SHOW, which would remove the need for two articles. Also how do we distinguish between the two in either way. The 2011 production is going to be quite a big deal I would imagine, so how do we make sure the article can be easily accessed, as the 1987 version is the one always linked to. Mark E (talk) 20:22, 14 November 2010 (UTC)

First of all, these are two entirely different musicals, written by different writers, notwithstanding that both of them seem to have been licensed to use material from the film. So, it seems clear to me that they each need their own separate articles. I'm not exactly sure what the rest of your question is? They are already distinguished, and there is a disambiguation page here. Are you asking whether we need ANOTHER disambiguation page called The Wizard of Oz (musical)? I'm not sure. Also note that there is an article about the1902 musical which is mis-named The Wizard of Oz (1902 stage play). See also The Wizard of Oz (adaptations) -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:14, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Sheila Kay Davis

Non-notable, IMO. If anyone wants to AfD this, I'll support. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:56, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sheila Kay Davis. --JDDJS (talk) 22:21, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Musical Articles

I'm working on a few articles about these musicals:

"Easter Rising"

"The Best of Both Worlds"

"The Remains of the Day"

Can any one help add references, a synopsis, pictures/promotional posters, or expand these articles? I would appreciate the help!

--S.S. Miami (talk) 21:43, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Flower Drum Song

Hi. Wehwalt and I have been working on Flower Drum Song (Rodgers and Hammerstein) and are planning to nominate it for FA soon. You can comment on it at the article's talk page. Thanks for any comments. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:22, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

I'd appreciate it if Musicals project members would kindly review Flower Drum Song and give us any comments you can come up with, at the article's talk page. All the best! -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:47, 2 December 2010 (UTC)

Once Upon a Mattress

An IP has now added a middle school production to this article 3 times; I deleted twice. Per WP:EDITWAR and WP:3RR I am unable to continue to revert this. Anyone? JeanColumbia (talk) 13:46, 4 December 2010 (UTC)

Spring Awakening

Would a few people please add this musical to your watchlists to help keep the fancruft down? See the talk page there for details of recent issues. Thanks for any help! -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:27, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

Wicked (musical)

Attention is needed by some very experienced editors, and possibly an administrator. IP 71.81.54.217 changed the recent edits to the info box to return future productions and many international productions (after they had been removed/streamlined per the MT guidelines). This IP also changed the perfectly good headings (again, meant to streamline the article). What worries me is this statement by the IP:"do not try to change this page, because I WILL continue to change it back until you stop doing", here:[[7]]. Clearly someone who is violating various Wikipedia guidelines, especially the threat, not willing to work with a consensus, etc. Anyone?JeanColumbia (talk) 15:33, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

On my Watchlist Jean, will revert as I can. Also I know it probably in the interest of the group but does anyone think that the article no longer stands as a Good Article?? Looking at the Hair (musical) article, the Wicked article could do with one section for international productions as the Hair article does. I know these international productions are notable, but in an English Language Wiki surely the English productions are the most important, and a separate section for international productions would be sufficient. Let the German folk have all their information in the German Wiki etc (do you get my drift? Not sure if this is what other people would think, im quite a casual editor).

Mark E (talk) 17:22, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Mark E. I'm still concerned about the threat and apparent WP:OWN issues that the IP has exhibited, but let's see how this plays out. I have no comments right now about the rest of your post, will give it some thought.JeanColumbia (talk) 17:59, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Hi, Mark. Don't worry about the Good article ranking. The Good article folks review periodically. As to the structure, the most important productions should get the most ink. After this production has had dozens of foreign productions, like Hair, I imagine that the foreign productions will be grouped together, as in Hair, but I wouldn't worry about that too much. The key thing is to delete cruft for the next few years until the article calms down. Shows like Phantom of the Opera and Les Miserables have much the same problem. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:06, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

First Broadway musical at FA

Flower Drum Song has been promoted to Featured Article class, the first Broadway musical article promoted! (There is only one other FA-class musical, A Very Merry Unauthorized Children's Scientology Pageant). Thanks to everyone who assisted us or commented! -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:05, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

Many Congrats! We definitely need more FA MT Articles!! Fabulous work.Mark E (talk) 20:44, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

More news: The article will appear on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on December 19, 2010. -- Ssilvers (talk) 02:10, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

"Fancruft"/International Productions

Further to some thing I posted this week about international productions and the ongoing problems with "Fancruft" would like some opinions. I always tend to look at Hair (musical) as being a good example of an article of a show which has had a lot of productions. When do the endless lists of productions as seen in Legally Blonde (musical) and Wicked (musical) start to become overload. On Legally Blonde at the moment for example there are what I consider the 3 major productions listed (Broadway, West End, US Tour), then 5 foreign language international productions (is a big section on these productions needed with casting information/production companies and the likes needed on the English Language Wikipedia), and then two regional productions which will run less than two weeks each (I was just going to delete these as non-notable but thought I would ask) and then an Aus production which isn't due to open for another 2 years. The article's as they currently stand are good for the fans and current information but wouldn't really stand as an encyclopdia article. I remember reading somewhere on here that what is included should be useful if you are looking back in 10 years it should be more so about the SHOW and not every current production under the sun. What will be worthy to read in 10 years time? The Hair article and recently promoted Flower Drum Song do this wonderfully. There are so many problem musical theatre articles. I just don't want to come across as someone who is deleting a lot of information for the sake of it. -- [Posted by Mark E]

Hi, Mark. What can I say. This is an encyclopedia. If we want to increase the quality, we must cut out the fancruft. The very popular musicals accumulate lots of it, especially while the original productions are still running. Afterwards it gets easier. So, just be patient and keep cutting. My opinion is that it is not encyclopedic to tell me who is playing Nessarose right now, unless she is a notable actress. I would take out ALL the "current" cast information, and just leave in original cast information (major roles only) and notable (bluelinked) replacements. It is easy to cut cruft, and if the crufters object, just leave me and/or Jean a note, and we will help you cut cruft. I like the encyclopedic concept of "what will be of the most interest about this topic in 10 years. It helps us avoid WP:Recentism. See also WP:NOT. All the best! -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:54, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Agree with both of you. Yes, I am relatively free until the end of February (and with the snow & cold setting in, even more likely to be looking for something inside to do). JeanColumbia (talk) 17:01, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

Great! Any more thoughts on what do do with the international productions though? Still confused :( Mark E (talk) 19:23, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

The Wizard of Oz (2011 musical)

Help, please! An editor keeps deleting the name of a leading cast member who is one of the Dorothys. Can anyone please comment on the talk page and watchlist the article? Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:24, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

On my watch list. I also added a note to the talk page, so that other editors may see documentation and reason for listing Evans.JeanColumbia (talk) 18:09, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:58, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Please double-check my work in cleaning up after vandalism

Hi all, it seems that 71.183.180.164 added several hoaxes and unconfirmed rumours related to musicals in June 2010. I discovered this editor while fixing links to disambiguation pages; he/she had added details about an alleged musical version of the Australian children's TV show Bananas in Pyjamas that is almost certainly a hoax. I've gone through the editor's contributions, and most of them seem to have been cleaned up already. However I'd appreciate it if someone could double-check this anon's contribs, since I know almost nothing about musical theatre. Thanks. Graham87 04:32, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it seems like a hoax. The only hits on Google seem to be mirror sites of Wikipedia. -- Ssilvers (talk) 05:44, 17 January 2011 (UTC)

Carousel (musical)

I disagree with this change to the Lead, which gives WP:UNDUE weight to Enoch's "large fishing fleet" but doesn't even mention Billy's death and the second act story line concerning Billy and his daughter. If anyone else agrees, please put a note on the Carousel talk page. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:38, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

Please compare with Flower Drum Song, on which Ssilvers was given credit, which contains no specific plot element mentions at all, and as the only FA of a Broadway musical, is our point of comparison. I do not believe the second act should be given away to readers in the lede, rather it should be reserved for the plot summary and other portions of the article which analyze the play. Ssilvers and I have had a disagreement, and his insistence on having his own way on this point, judging by his lack of objection to Flower Drum Song, seem motivated by pique rather than policy.--Wehwalt (talk) 16:17, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

This accusation is, I must protest, utterly false. I only edit to the best of my ability. Please see WP:AGF. Let's discuss the issue at hand, please. -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:22, 24 January 2011 (UTC)

RfC of interest to this project

Although it's framed in terms of books and films, the question in this RfC will naturally be of interest to those writing articles about musicals which are made out of books, films made out of musicals, or musicals made out of films. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:40, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Off Broadway or Off-Broadway?

An editor has been changing articles by deleting the hyphen. But these two refs both show it with a hyphen: Internet Off-Broadway Database and The League of Off-Broadway Theatres and Producers. Also, Actors Equity uses the hyphen (see this), as does Playbill. Would people kindly comment at the talk page for Off Broadway? Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:21, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I've worked in theatre in New York since 1976, and started off-off-Broadway. My personal experience is that it's almost always hyphenated. When I get a chance, I'll check the NY Times style book, that should be authoritative for this question. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:40, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

Not in this case. See Talk: Off Broadway. the Times disagrees with nearly every other important source. -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:27, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

New articles about Hair albums

Someone has created these articles:

1. Hair The Original Soundtrack Recording
2. Hair The Original Broadway Recording ‎
3. Hair (The Original Cast Recording)

Aside from the copyright violation issues and possible misnaming, should these articles all exist? If so, can anyone help this new editor? I have put a copyvio tag on the third one, and the editor him/herself deleted all the copyvio text from another one. See also: Special:Contributions/Miracle69. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:24, 2 February 2011 (UTC)

Images in Infobox

So, Carousel (musical) is an FA article--with an image of the Original Cast recording in the info box. But...Me and Juliet, just receiving its GA status (congrats!) had to have the image of the Original Cast recording deleted from the infobox to receive the GA. That certainly is confusing, but I do not expect anyne to now remove all such images from all the MT articles that have them, except that another FA candidate, Pipe Dream (musical) also has the now-banned image. (And now I am really on a Spring Wikibreak).JeanColumbia (talk) 20:21, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

This seems obviously to be the wrong result. The album art is the same art as on the theatre poster, so it is the same fair use with respect to the same copyright holder (we are better off, though, as you see from that discussion, if we use poster art). The artwork used on the album is the only artwork available for many musicals and assists the reader's understanding of the show. That is why the producers used it! As you said, we have had musicals articles go through FAC with album artwork in the infobox. See Flower Drum Song and Carousel (musical). Feel free to restore it to the article. The people who want to remove these are people who essentially believe that there should not be any fair use content on Wikipedia and hang out at those boards to try to kill fair use images. If this happens again, please notify me so I can join in the discussion. Best regards. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:59, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Revival and revival performer notability

See discussion at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Theatre#Notability.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 18:20, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Template:Off-Broadway theatres

I have created Template:Off-Broadway theatres from Category:Off-Broadway theaters. I am not an expert, but anyone is free to format it to look a bit more like Template:Broadway theatres.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 19:59, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

External links at our flagship article

An editor suggests deleting all of the External links from our flagship article. Please join the discussion at Talk:Musical_theatre#External_links. -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:48, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Finale (disambiguation)

There were several pages on works or composers that linked to the page Finale. That page is a disambiguation page. It currently includes definitions of finale in classical music, opera, and musical theatre, but none of the linked pages describe or define finale. As such, MOS:DAB suggests that they should not be included on the page.

Is there a better page for the DAB to point to? Should incoming links to the page be redirected to Wiktionary:finale? Or should they simply be removed? I have opted for the last, removing internal links from La romanzesca e l'uomo nero, Matilde di Shabran, Ivan Susanin, The Scottsboro Boys (musical), and Taualuga, as well as non-music-related pages Rozen Maiden and It's Tough to Be a Bug!. I would welcome a better solution, though. Cnilep (talk) 02:46, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree with the Wiktionary solution. Seems like the perfect solution for this Finale problem. --The Wing Dude, Musical Extraordinaire (talk) 03:45, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Further discussion is at Talk:Finale#Definitions. Cnilep (talk) 22:28, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

Continuing EL dispute Musical Theatre

User:Ronz has removed the entire EL section. I believe that this is disruptive editing. Please join the discussion there. -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:04, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

No, I moved the section to the talk page for continued discussion there, following WP:ELBURDEN.

The links have been restored to the article, but are still under dispute. --Ronz (talk) 19:30, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Somehow, I doubt that http://playbill.com/ is really under dispute as to whether it belongs in a Musical theater article. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:33, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

Please comment at Talk:Musical theatre - ELs again

An editor has attempted to remove these External Links from the article again. Please comment at Talk:Musical theatre as to whether and why you think these links should remain in the article or whether you think they should be deleted, as the editor suggests. We have culled the list of ELs very substantially over the past week or so, and I believe that these links should all remain, as I think they are each helpful resources for at least a segment of our readers. Please comment either way. Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:05, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

Stats on music projects

See Table showing productivity/size of the 48 music projects for information about this project and other music groups. --Kleinzach 07:52, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Frankenstein

Frankenstein – A New Musical needs a lot of work. There are no references, I've noticed some spelling issues, and there are a bunch of red links. Does anyone have time to help me re-organize the article into the proper format, with sources and referenced information? All help is appreciated! --Bialytock&Bloom (talk) 22:40, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

Here are some sources: ([8] [9] [10] [11]) Happy editing! --Bialytock&Bloom (talk) 22:46, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

CHURCHILL - The Musical

This is going through an AFD debate at present at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/CHURCHILL - The Musical. Please could those with more experience at editing articles on musical theatre please comment on this production's notability? Thanks. Catfish Jim & the soapdish 18:02, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

R&H organization website now reorganized

If you used the R&H Organization website as a source before last week, or as an EL, you are likely looking at a deadlink now, as they've totally changed their website (note that the organization licenses many plays they did not write). I have checked over the five FAs on their works, others may wish to check other articles.--Wehwalt (talk) 14:42, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the info, I'll update the other Rodgers & Hammerstein articles.JeanColumbia (talk) 14:49, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads' up, Wehwalt, and thanks Jean. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:08, 10 April 2011 (UTC)

Dame Nellie Melba

She turned 150 years old yesterday. Her article is rather a mess, so I wondered if anyone might be interested in working on it. All the best! -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:57, 20 May 2011 (UTC)

Cassette girl? Casquette girl?

An article has been renamed Cassette girl. I don't think this is right. I think it should say Casquette girl. See the term used here: http://www.guidetomusicaltheatre.com/shows_n/naughty_marietta.htm and the synopsis here: http://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/341/Naughty-Marietta/ (you have to click on synopsis). And here: http://new.music.yahoo.com/victor-herbert/tracks/naughty-marietta-act-one-finale-tis-she-the-casquette-girl--184002325 I think we need to fix this everywhere, no? -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:58, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Two Little Girls in Blue

I've started a rough stub of the article. There's more information from the sources already listed.--StryoFome (talk) 21:30, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (musical)

Is this article notable? It appears to be a musical written, and only performed, for an amateur theatre company. The only substantial reference seems to be to the company's website. Should it go to AfD? -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:02, 25 May 2011 (UTC)

Book of Mormon

Please weigh in opinions over making it easier to find the musicals article. Opinion is split and would be interesting to have opinions from other musical theatre contributors Talk:Book_of_Mormon. Mark E (talk) 10:10, 26 May 2011 (UTC)

Sandra Church

It needs a "personal life" section (if she has had any relationships) and I've only found career information up to the 1960s, so I'm not sure what's happened after that (I can't find an obituary if she's dead). Happy editing!--StryoFome (talk) 15:27, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

New article - The Kid (musical)

• The Kid (musical)

New article, The Kid (musical). Feedback and suggestions for additional secondary sources would be appreciated, at the article's talk page. Thank you for your time, -- Cirt (talk) 07:10, 5 June 2011 (UTC)

Zip Goes a Million

I started a very crude version (refs are there) but I would appreciate it if some editors could help me build it until it becomes good enough to become an actual article.--Mamma Rose (Sing out, Louise!) 15:22, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

UPDATE I've expanded it but the refs need to be formatted.--Mamma Rose (Sing out, Louise!) 16:39, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

UPDATE The article has now been created. Feel free to contribute!--Mamma Rose (Sing out, Louise!) 17:33, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

A disturbing vandal -- please help patrol and block

User:89.126.27.215 is a particularly disturbing vandal who is preying on Musical Theatre articles. He has removed references and blanked sections 11 times in the past, and is now using a more insidious form of vandalism in which he makes a lot of copyedits at once, the middle of which will include a gross vandalism. Such as this edit to Kelly Bishop: [12], where in the middle of his other changes he changed "Bishop's big break came when she was cast as the sexy, hard-edged Sheila in the Broadway production of A Chorus Line" to "Bishop's theatrical career began when she was cast as Sheila in the original Broadway production A Chorus Line, the 1976 stage musical based upon the hopes, dreams and realities of "making it" on the Broadway stage, as a chorus member" -- patently untrue since Bishop had been in four previous Broadway productions, not to mention her previous experience. Other insidious edits this vandal has made have been inventing Tony nominations, and so forth, all cloaked as genuine good-faith edits.

Please help watch and patrol and report this vandal, using the guidelines in WP:Vandalism and Wikipedia:Vandalism#See_also. His next incidences of vandalism will constitute cause for blocking, so please take that to the next level administratively. Thank you! Softlavender (talk) 01:26, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the warning (and, as you can see, I have already warned this IP once).JeanColumbia (talk) 12:04, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Boris Mitchell AFD

The discussion is at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Boris Mitchell. Voceditenore (talk) 16:57, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

IBDb external link templates

There are two closely related IBDb templates for creating external links:

• {{IBDB show}} for linking to shows on IBDb, and
• {{IBDB title}} for linking to specific productions of a show

From what I can gather, the latter (IBDB title) template is the more widely used, with 562 instances of transclusion, compared to 383 transclusions for IBDB show. Yet this seems counterintuitive, since WP articles are most likely to be about the show itself, and not about any specific production. Is a massive switch in order? The production_ID and show_ID from IBDb are not related in any way, so this would take a bit of manual labor, or else some very clever both work. — HipLibrarianship ^talk 16:58, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

A search through the WP:MT archives shows that this same issue was previously raised in August 2006, seemingly without any further discussion at that time. I'm hoping history doesn't repeat itself... — HipLibrarianship ^talk 17:31, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Why don't you link some examples where you think there is a problem? I don't understand what you are worried about here. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:48, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

While I'm not exactly "worried" about this, I do think it's problematic to link to a single production instead of all the show's productions. A reader might reasonably want, or expect, comprehensive scope from a specialized external resource. I also think it makes more sense to have a single link to IBDb instead of separate links for each production.

Examples

• Over at Pacific_Overtures#External_links, there are two links using IBDb_title (one for the 1976 production, one for 2004). Yet a single IBDb_show link would bring readers to an index page listing both productions, like this: ​Pacific Overtures​ at the Internet Broadway Database
• Same basic situation at Follies#External_links, where a more simple solution would be: ​Follies​ at the Internet Broadway Database
• At West_Side_Story#External_links, IBDb_title is used to link to the original Broadway production. Directly below it is a standard external link (not a template) to all the productions. This could be accomplished with IBDB_show, like this: ​West Side Story​ at the Internet Broadway Database
• At The Rose Tattoo, IBDb_title is used to link to the original Broadway production, and there are no other links to IBDb. This potentially obscures the fact that there have been multiple Broadway revivals, but IBDb_show brings the reader to the show index page, like this: ​Rose Tattoo​ at the Internet Broadway Database

Preferring the IBDb_show template ultimately requires less updating of pages on WP, since revival productions are always sprouting up. — HipLibrarianship ^talk 22:18, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I agree that in the External Links section, it makes more sense to use the "show" link for IBDB. I have fixed the ones that you mention above. Thanks. BTW, thanks also for putting the new links in The Black Crook. I hope someone goes through them and uses them to expand the article. Happy editing! -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:54, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

So, does it make sense to have this as a WP:MT Project-wide effort? — HipLibrarianship ^talk 03:51, 29 June 2011 (UTC)

Sock puppet

I don't know if this belongs here, (and feel free to tell me to delete this note), but you should be aware of this situation:

The user S.S. Miami is a proven sockpuppet, see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/S.S. Miami; his other usernames include, most recently User talk:StryoFome, User:Mamma Rose and User talk:LeonardSondheim. He has added his name to the list of participants of this project in several of his user names. I am not suggesting that anyone do anything, but when (if?) this person writes on this discussion page again, just be aware of this situation. (You can easily identify the socker: by what articles he edits; he will be a new user as of June 22 or later but be very knowledgeable about wiki markup; will probably have a user name having to do with theater.) JeanColumbia (talk) 12:04, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the heads up. This definitely belongs here. Another sock was User:Bialytock&Bloom. Too bad. I have tried to help this editor under several of these names. -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:38, 22 June 2011 (UTC)

FYI, Stan000 has been blocked for "block evasion", no further note whether this is the same user as listed above. The same warnings apply as above. (But, he may read this talk page, as he did NOT pick a theatre-related username!)JeanColumbia (talk) 14:25, 24 June 2011 (UTC)

Note, see blocked IP[13]]; I do not know if this is the person described above and I am not accusing anyone of anything. I do know, however, that an innocent user, who made an edit for the IP, was told : "I am sure that you made the edit in good faith, but editing on behalf of a blocked user, thereby helping them to evade their block, is not acceptable. In fact it is in itself a blockable offence. I am not suggesting that you should be blocked, since, as I said, I am sure you did it in good faith, but I am letting you know so you can avoid making the same mistake again." [14]. Based on this, I personally will be very careful in the future about editing articles that S.S. Miami (and his others) are interested in. This situation is a shame, really.JeanColumbia (talk) 19:58, 30 June 2011 (UTC)

Big fat Awards sections

Many musicals have a huge "Awards" section. Today, an editor made these sections in dozens of articles even bigger and fatter by changing the format to a tabular format. I suggest moving these big fat sections to a separate article, like this one: List of awards and nominations for the musical South Pacific, which I just created. Then, you can leave just a paragraph or two in the article itself, describing the major awards, with a cross-reference to the new list article, like this: Fiddler on the Roof#Awards. Does anyone have time to do some of them? You can see the ones I am referring to here. Best regards! -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:07, 21 July 2011 (UTC)

Template:Scott Rudin

I have created {{Scott Rudin}}. I have never seen a movie producer who also does plays or at least, I don't recall seeing templates indicating such. However, his theatre work has been so successful, I wanted to make sure it is not a problem to have included it. So that discussion from members of all four projects that I am notifying is all in one place on this topic, comment at Template talk:Scott Rudin if you have any commentary.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:12, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

Categories and Templates - oh my!

I know that Wikipedia is concerned that there is much less current editing activity than there have been in the past few years (as articulated by Sue Gardner in a speech at the American Library Association on June 26, 2011). I believe this tendency is beginning to affect this group in that people think they are making "valuable" contributions by creating templates and categories. I would like to state my belief that this is not particularly creative, and it is much more valuable for people to research and edit articles. I wonder if the group might consider some kind of statement to all those who want to create categories and templates for everything under the sun. -- kosboot (talk) 10:47, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

I agree that the proliferation of categories and templates is not helpful; in fact it adds distraction to the articles. I would support a project guideline that we will remove listed templates and cats from musicals articles. -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:43, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

File:13 cover.jpg -- Headsup

Hey, all! Just stopping by real quick to ask someone to keep their eye on this file. A new editor had uploaded a freaky lookin' cover for a band called HLAH over the cover of 13 (which I saw last night and LOVED!). I reverted it back to the old version and let the editor know why, but I'm not sure if he'll try to revert back. Just something to keep an eye on. (I'm not really "here", so I can't...). Thanks! — MusicMaker5376 00:02, 1 August 2011 (UTC)

Three New Pages

Just to let everyone know, I created three new pages, Elizabeth Parkinson, Brooks Ashmanskas and Manoel Felciano, all of whom have been nominated for a Tony. The pages are just stubs and could use a lot of expanding. JDDJS (talk) 19:43, 11 August 2011 (UTC)

Category question: Musicals by?

I'm a bit confused as to how to categorize articles using "musicals by"--I'm not sure what Category:Musicals by author refers to: I'd think it was for the author of the book, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Is it duplicating Category:Musicals by composer and/or Category:Musicals by lyricist (or even Category:Musicals by librettist)? Help! Aristophanes68 (talk) 00:53, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

Well, it seems to be trying to catch writing teams as well as book writers. Librettist doesn't help, because lyrics are part of the libretto. I'd leave it alone. Also, I don't think you should add any "play" categories to musicals. I saw you added "plays set in London" to one, but that would only confuse the musical and play cats. -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:02, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

I think some overcategorization is happening here. Why did you put Rodgers and Hart, for instance, and Kander and Ebb in all three categories? Shouldn't it just be Rodgers in 'Musicals by composer'? Please stop categorizing musicals until we can get some input here. -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:16, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

I was originally going to put them simply by Composer and Lyricist, which is where I think both teams belong (double-categorized as pairs instead of splitting them up -- see the Rodgers/Hammerstein category for example). But in trying to find Cole Porter, I discovered the "author" category, which looks a lot like "composer". (E.g.: how is Harold Arlen the author instead of the composer? Even Hammerstein didn't write the books to all those musicals.) My assumption would be that the musicals in "author" should be moved to "composer" and/or "lyricist", and leave the "author" category for the book-writers. So I placed K/E and R/H in the author category as well just to be safe until I had clarified with the project what's going on. I'll happily remove those from the "authors" category if it turns out the author cat is just for the book authors. Maybe there should be a descriptive tag at the top of the category page clarifying its scope? Like I said, I put those cats there only because I saw Arlen, Porter and Rodgers/Hamm. already there. Cheers, Aristophanes68 (talk) 02:19, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

P.S.: I'm currently going through Category:American plays and creating new "plays by Author X" categories, which is why the musicals by Kaufman and Hart showed up on your list. I'm having the same issue with Alfred Uhry, who wrote several musical librettos. How should I categorize their work in musicals so that all of these authors' produced works are categorized under their names? Should I create a "librettos by X" category and then categorize it under the author's name and under "Musicals by librettist"? Or I could simply make a category "Plays and librettos by X" and categorize it under both plays and musicals. What's the best solution? Aristophanes68 (talk) 04:18, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

The word libretto means "book and lyrics" together. So I'm not sure the word works for musicals, since the writer may only have written the book OR the lyrics but not both. Isn't this the same issue as above - Musicals by author? I wish some people from the Musicals project would weigh in here. -- Ssilvers (talk) 06:33, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

I thought that use of the term libretto didn't sound familiar. But the article Libretto doesn't satisfactorily explain the relationship, so I posted a comment at Talk:Libretto#Musicals: libretti or books?. Maybe we'll get a useful answer there. In the meantime, we could add an RfC tag to this discussion to see if we can get more responses. Or do you want to wait for more project folks to respond first? Aristophanes68 (talk) 23:40, 9 July 2011 (UTC)

(1) I would perhaps try to avoid if possible using the words libretto and librettist for musical theatre, simply because they are not generally used (since the 1960s) and when they are there are varying meanings attributed to them depending on who is using the word. Unlike in opera and operetta, where unsung and sung text are written by a single person (the librettist), this is generally not the case in musical theatre. Therefore, the three distinct words Book, Lyrics, and Music are used for the three parts of a musical. In musical theatre, the word "Libretto" is so rarely used its meaning has become blurred. On the internet I see it used to mean: Book only (probably the most common usage) [15], [16], [17], [18], [19]; Lyrics only [20] (type in the term, and it will read "The non-sung text of a musical is known as the Book. The sung text is called the Libretto"; An undefined blurring of all of the terms [21] (see Britannica listing at the end); Both the book and the lyrics [22], [23]. So I'd try to skip that term in the categories. Which is kind of hard since the word "Book" does not lend itself to occupation-naming.

Also of interest is the fact that an opera-lover will immediately assume that anyone called a librettist will have written the lyrics, which is not the case in the most common usage of the term in musical theatre.

PS: If we do keep the category of "by librettist", we should definitely edit the articles on Book (musical theatre)#Definitions and Libretto (in regards to musical theatre) for accuracy and parallelism.

(2) I agree that the categories as they exist are jumbled and inaccurate, and overlap, and some articles are listed in the wrong categories (such as they are).

Hope that helps some. Softlavender (talk) 10:24, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

I would prefer not to categorize musicals "by author". What would the advantage be? The names of the writers of the music, lyrics and book are stated and linked at least twice and usually at least three times in each article. -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:29, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Categories serve a different purpose than articles -- they compile the various accomplishments of each author into an easily accessed list; and they provide InterWiki connections. Softlavender (talk) 03:11, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

But there's no category for the book's author, is there, as there is for composer and lyricist?. If I want to add the musicals with books by George S. Kaufman or Joseph Stein into their respective categories, how would I do that? I'm working with the Plays by X category, and there a lot of playwrights who have written the books for musicals, but you don't want us using Plays by X for those, so how else can we categorize them? It seems odd that their plays should be categorized under their name but not their musicals. The problem isn't adding Musicals by (author/playwright) to the musicals page; it's how to categorize those entries within Category:Musicals. (Check out Category:Works by N. Richard Nash for an example.) Aristophanes68 (talk) 18:42, 10 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes, the category is Category:Musicals by librettist. ~~ Softlavender (talk) 03:11, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

But that's the confusion: Besides the fact that (as you admit), librettist isn't good for musical theatre, there is the problem of (1) how to define it (is it the book AND the lyrics, and how do categorize musicals when those are written by different people?) and (2) the problem of how it differs from the category "Musicals by author". My inclination is to jettison librettist and categorize musicals by composer, lyricist and author (Book), double-categorizing for folks who write the book and the lyrics. This approach would be simple, applicable to all musicals, and easy to learn and use. Thoughts? Aristophanes68 (talk) 03:50, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Since you seem determined to categorize musicals "by author" (though I still don't understand why this is necessary), I have a suggestion: combine the three categories into one category: "Category: musicals by writer(s) and/or composer(s)". Then you can put in all the subcategories, like Cole Porter, Noel Coward, Rogers and Hammerstein and Lerner and Lowe without worrying about whether the person or team sometimes did lyrics and/or book and/or music. -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:02, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Quick comment: I want the author category because I'm working my way through Category:American plays and I want to be able to include all the theatrical contributions of playwrights, not just their straight plays. But there's no clear way to add the musical-scripts to the playwright's category right now. So from my end, it's not about the musicals but about getting a comprehensive category for each author, including plays, musicals and screenplays. Cheers, Aristophanes68 (talk) 19:52, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

(1) Upon further thought, I think the existing "by librettist" category is OK, providing we define the term upfront at the top of the category, and correct the two articles on Book and Libretto to indicate that in musical theatre, the term most commonly refers to the book author (which I've already demonstrated). The other option is to RENAME the category "by book writer".

(2) The "by author" category needs to stay, because it comprises cases where one person or one famous team wrote two or more of the following: Book, Lyrics, or Music. There needs to be a category that comprises this, and that's what the "by author" category does. It's probably as good a name as can be created for that category, although the nature of the category should be stated at the top of the category page. By the way, since Rogers & Hammerstein musicals are in there, Rogers & Hart and Lerner & Lowe musicals should also be in there. Like all of the categories we are talking about, it needs to be populated. Softlavender (talk) 04:31, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

I thought you were mistaken about Category:Musicals by author based on Capote and Goldman being in there, but I checked and sure enough, Truman Capote wrote both the books and the lyrics! But William Goldman and Ben Elton apparently did not both, so they'll have to be moved elsewhere. But I was thinking we were defining libretto as book+lyrics; how did I get confused on that? My take would be to use libretto for "book+lyrics" and to change author to "book author". I wouldn't put music into either of those categories, although I suppose with people like Porter and Sondheim, it would be useful to have a "music+lyrics" category. But I don't think the "by author" category makes sense for that either, since songwriters are more likely to be called composers than authors. I also like making one big category for all musicals that would include book, lyrics and music, and would avoid the headache of having different categories for when Rodgers was with Hammerstein and with Hart and by himself, etc. What do you all think? Aristophanes68 (talk) 19:33, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

It seems to me that the obvious solution would be to get rid of Category:Musicals by librettist and to create a cat Category:Musical book writers. Libretto as pointed out is not often used in reference to musical theatre, and where it is used it is not used consistantly. There will be some people that will be in multiple cats (ie lyricist and book writer cats), but I don't see that as an issue.4meter4 (talk) 11:08, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Category:Musical book writers is just too "kludgy" - what are book writers - "authors". :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 15:38, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Reducing to one cat?

This is even worse than I feared. Now you've got FOUR categories:

• Category:Musicals by composer
• Category:Musicals by lyricist
• Category:Musicals by librettist
• Category:Musicals by author

Can't we just merge all four into the last category? Otherwise, there will be lots of overlap, since some composers also wrote/write lyrics, etc. Why not just indicate that a person is a creative person writing some aspect of musicals, and let his/her article give the details, whether simple or complex. BTW, I still think it is wrong/confusing to say that libretto=book, and, as shown above, at least some dictionaries define it as book+lyrics. -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:24, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

I can understand why there might be a need to have particular teams as a category, but I don't understand why there needs to be categories by individuals. Has anyone noticed that on the left panel, Wikipedia has a "search" button? Maybe it's more useful to search than to have categories. If not, then maybe there should be a categories for women composers, librettists, lyricists and authors? And all four if they are African Americans (male and female - so that's 8 additional categories)? And Asian? And Icelandic? If you're going to create a category, please think of the implication of what you're doing. If one librettist is going to have it, then all librettists should have it. -- kosboot (talk) 20:56, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

Also, from the UX perspective - is a person going to first go for a category? Or will they go to the article on the lyricist/librettist, etc.? Why not just have links in the main article on the person? -- kosboot (talk) 18:23, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't think the cats are going to be used by your average college student, but they are more useful than the search box for certain kinds of searches, such as for works by an author, in which the normal search box will return lots of articles that simply reference the author and not simply articles about the works themselves. It's probably easier to find all of Neil Simon's plays by going to Category:Plays by Neil Simon than trying to use the search box. This situation is especially true if the person is known more for being a novelist or screenwriter. It's especially helpful for people editing WP (as opposed to simply reading it), especially when looking for topics like "African American plays", which will have very spotty search results. If I want to see what different contributions George S. Kaufman made, I can quickly see the division between his plays, musicals and screenplays.

I like the idea of merging all the musical-makers under one category: Musicals by X. That would keep the cat list on the page down, and then within the category pages, we could add additional categories as needed. The contributions of people in musical theater vary so much from show to show that it may be too complicated to set up different categories for every time an author has a different type of contribution. Then if you want to know which shows someone worked on, you wouldn't have to check the lyrics, author AND libretti categories: they'd all be in one place. Should we go with a "Musicals by X" category and ignore the distinctions between book author, lyricist and composer? Aristophanes68 (talk) 20:11, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

That is a reasonable compromise. I would call it: "Musicals written or composed by X". Then, the category itself should explain at the top that the category is used for all creators, whether they wrote book, lyrics or music or some combination of those. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:02, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Lyricists are not necessarily librettists, and vice verse, and of those who do both, some may write the lyrics for another writer's book — or vice verse. Some composers are also lyricists and a few are book writers as well. I created the categories, but do with them as you will. — Robert Greer (talk) 23:39, 12 July 2011 (UTC)

Would it be enough simply to say "Musicals by X"? And then the parent subcat would be "Musicals by creator" or something like that. Some of these shows will have three or four people involved, so the shorter the cat name, the better. We can always add a description on the cat page itself. Meanwhile, I am dying to get categories set up for the works of George S. Kaufman, Joseph Stein and Arthur Laurents, among others. There are so many playwrights who've done both straight plays and musicals, and I'm worried I'm going to forget which ones still need to be done! Aristophanes68 (talk) 03:08, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

You already suggested that, and I counter-suggested "Musicals written or composed by X". I had previously objected to the shorter name because it strongly implies that there is only one creator, which is usually not the case. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:51, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

There is another fallacy with using a Category in this manner. What about older creators? I just recently created an article on Harold R. Atteridge. He was very prolific - in fact, probably more prolific than most post-war lyricsts. But there are very few articles in which he is featured because they've not been created. So what is the point of having a category unless it is reasonably filled out? Having a category devoted to individuals who are covered elsewhere is not a help or useful thing. I think we should call in some non-Music Theatre editors and Wikipedians to mediate this discussion. -- 12:58, 13 July 2011 (UTC) [This was posted by User:Kosboot.

I personally don't like the one all inclusive cat because it would no longer fit into higher category schemes. For example, Category:Musicals by composer is a sub-cat of Category:Compositions by composer. I prefer the suggestion I made above.4meter4 (talk) 18:34, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't think there's a consensus here yet. But I think we can agree on at least changing the librettist category to "Musicals by book writer". At least that would be clearer. -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:40, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Putting in my oar (per request), if I may: I think Ssilvers' suggestion of "Category:Musicals written or composed by X" works best here. I don't agree that it can't fit into higher category schemes, because I don't know of a rule that says that a category can't be slotted into multiple categories higher up the chain. And it keeps the category clutter down to a minimum, which is key. I do think that having a category of some sort is more valuable than using the search engine - the latter really isn't narrow enough in scope to be useful for anything more than a cursory search, in my experience. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 20:28, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

I'm good with both "Musicals by book author" and "Musicals written or composed by X." Would we use both cats or just one? It sounds like "by book author" would cause the least amount of disturbance to other current cats (per 4meter4's comment above). Aristophanes68 (talk) 23:57, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

The parent cat would be "Musicals by writer and/or composer". Each subcategory would each be called "Musicals written and/or composed by X", where X is the name of a person or team responsible for any combination of book, lyrics and music. A note at the top would say something like "The sub-categories below indicate that the person(s) named wrote the book and/or lyrics and/or music of the musicals collected within the subcategory". Sounds ok? If so, there are three votes in favor so far: you, me, Ser Amantio; one vote against: 4meter4; and two that we need to get a yea or nay from: Kosboot (who wanted 0 cats) and Robertgreer (who designed the four cats but said he didn't feel strongly). Plus, if we make a clear proposal, we will probably get more editors to weigh in. -- Ssilvers (talk) 02:31, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

I still think it's unnecessary, unless you're talking about teams. It's like making categories of Tony Award winners, or those trifectas/4-fecta Tony winners. So I vote no, but an umbrella no against the whole idea. Think of the time you could be spending making new needed articles. -- kosboot (talk) 03:15, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Kosboot, you and I agree in principle, but to be practical here, we must recognize that there are currently four confusing and overlapping cats and that Aristophanes68 wants to populate each of them with numerous subcats according to author, composer, etc. This proposal reduces it to one cat with all the subcats in one place and avoids the overlap. It appears that voting against this proposal will actually result in greater confusion and proliferation of cats, with, for example, Rodgers and Hammerstein being broken up into "Lyrics by R&H", "Books by R&H", "Music by R&H", etc. Under this proposal, all R&H musicals would go into one cat. So, that's why I recommend for it. -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:23, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Ssilvers, you're an expert in diplomacy. Ok, I vote for your proposal. -- kosboot (talk) 11:10, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

Coming rather late to the party, I too support Ssilver's proposal. Tim riley (talk) 16:14, 15 July 2011 (UTC)

[Left]. Cool. Now we have to figure out the logistics of the change, and whether we will need to use the "Speedy rename" feature or will be able to do it all manually. So let me make sure I understand the proposal as it currently stands. We have the parent cat "Musicals by writer and/or composer", which then contains the categories "Musicals written and/or composed by X"--which is also the category that goes directly onto the article itself?? Am I understanding that correctly? Conceivably, there will still be up to three of those cat tags on an article: one for the composer, one for the lyricist, and one for the book author, assuming none of these are part of a well-known team. Again, am I understanding that correctly? (I think there's even a choreographer category, so that makes four.) Is that how everyone else here understands the current proposal? Aristophanes68 (talk) 18:30, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

Sigh. Yes, I guess that's right. This brings me back to wondering why all of this is necessary. There are already navboxes for the most important musicals creators. The choreography cat is particularly stupid (the choreographer is less important than the writers, composer, director and maybe the producer). But I digress. I don't think you should make a category for creators who have created fewer than 5 blue-linked musicals. That should limit the number of cats somewhat. As I suggested before, why don't you do just a few and alert us to review it to see if it is working before doing anything massive. -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:37, 17 July 2011 (UTC)

I guess if we're still going to have up to three cats per musical: composer, lyricist, book author, the easiest thing to do would be to rename "author" to "book author" and merge the "libretti" entries into that category. Then we'd have three easily-defined and east-to-use categories——all with concise names—to use on the article page. That would involve the least amount of change and still accomplish the main goals of (a) resolving the author/librettist confusion and (b) allowing authors who worked on both musicals and straight plays to have their musical contributions included in their own categories. Aristophanes68 (talk) 22:11, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

Category:Musicals by composer

Category:Musicals by lyricist

Category:Musicals by librettist

Category:Musicals by author

- the middle two should merge (no preference as to which continues. The other two are clearly different, the composer is clearly 'of the music', the other 'author' is of the narrative, story, novel, etc. which should be explained in a comment in category header group. the problem with merging the lot is that Gilbert didn't write any muosical and Sullivan wrote little if any lyric and narrative content. Simplification would become the servant of inaccuracy if we are not too careful. :: Kevinalewis : ^{(Talk Page)}/_(Desk) 15:45, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

Problematic article

Can anyone do anything about this article full of unreferenced trivia and non-notable names: The Music Hall Guild of Great Britain and America? Any help would be much appreciated. -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:13, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:33, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Heads up: Wikipedia edithathon at NYPLPA in late Oct.

Editathon at NYPL on Oct. 22

On Saturday Oct. 22 there will be a Wikipedia editathon at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, generally devoted to music theatre - as part of the Wikipedia Loves Libraries campaign (that you see at the top of the page). If you're like me, you like to plan things weeks in advance, so I'm providing early warning. The date should be finalized probably in a week or two. I'm sure there will be an announcement. -- kosboot (talk) 02:50, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Woo hoo! Please let us know when plans are finalized! -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:34, 8 September 2011 (UTC)

Date is set: Sat. Oct. 22, 12-6 pm. More info to come soon. -- kosboot (talk) 22:41, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

I understand that this is the relevant meeup page: Wikipedia:Meetup/NYC/WLL. If the date is certain, can you please update it? -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:51, 16 September 2011 (UTC)

(<-- outdent) Since I've never attended a Meetup, I'm deferring to the person who's generally the main organizer. But since I am a member of this group, I can give some some info:

• It's best to bring your own laptop ;
• The 3rd floor of NYPLPA has 4 laptops that are avaliable for day-long loans on the floor. You must have a current library card to get one one of these machines. You can not reserve them in advance, but must be at the Print Delivery Desk at opening (12 noon) to get one.
• There will be a presentation on how to make the best use of library resources, plus an explanation and handout outlining those materials which are not found in the online catalog (many millions of items).
• The Library is going to slightly relax their rules concerning reproduction of photographs for which they own the rights - bring a digital camera (though you won't be able to use a tripod/stand or flash). (This will be a new policy which Wikipedians get to try out first.)
• It's best if you come prepared with a list of articles/topics you want to research or create
• Beware if you want to examine an item or collection that is stored offsite, you will need to arrange for its delivery earlier in the week (deliveries are made only Monday-Friday)

Questions? Ask and I'll try to answer.

• Even if you do not have a laptop computer and can not be at NYPLPA at 12 noon to borrow one, you can still be on hand to help other Wikipedians (especially those less-experienced), and to do your own research and obtain photocopies and/or pics of materials that interest you.

Sung-through

In this article there is a section titled "List of sung-through musicals with scattered lines". I have two problems with that. One is that they're not really sung-through. Two is that seems to be very subjective. Out of the musicals I've seen on the list, the only one I'm confident that it belongs there is Tommy. What should we do? Remove all of them? Remove some of them? Or just leave it as is? JDDJS (talk) 01:22, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

This is an OR list with no refs. I put it in the category of the many silly lists on Wikipedia that exist to keep newbies happy who want to edit but haven't yet understood how to add research to articles. Feel free to remove the examples that are clearly wrong. -- Ssilvers (talk) 05:32, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

New Stephen Schwartz Musical Article

Hey all, I'm a really inexperienced Wiki-user, but I recently added a new article of a musical from Steven Schwartz's works which hasn't gotten much exposure. I'd appreciate some of you musical-theater/Wiki buffs helping to clean it up any way you can. It's at Disney's My Son Pinocchio: Geppetto's Musical Tale. Thanks much. Creed90952 (talk) 21:27, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Musical of the Month

Check out this treasure trove of info about important historical musicals!: Musical of the month at the NYPL. -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:49, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Reliability of IBDB

A user asked "Is the IBDB- the Internet Broadway Database- reliable to use as a source for an actor's roles in a play? I'm referencing Paul Sand in Paul Sills' Story Theatre if that matters."

The response:"Reliable per their editorial policy: http://www.ibdb.com/policies.php Fifelfoo (talk) 01:17, 19 December 2011 (UTC)"

See this link:[Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard]

Good to know! Flami72 (talk) 16:52, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Having used IBDB a lot, I find Ken Bloom's "American Song" (2nd ed.) to be much better and contains a lot more information. Even though it's not online, that should not be a deterrent to consulting it. -- kosboot (talk) 20:10, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

My intent in posting this was just to clarify and make known that IBDB is considered to be a reliable source (this question has arisen over the years). My intent was NOT to dissuade editors from using other equally as good, and even better sources. I myself use a few on-line book sources, I also have a few books stacked at my computer. I also have used newspaper articles as sources. So, no, I never meant that only this--IBDB-- should be used. I never meant to imply that this is the best source, nor did I ever mean that there are not a great many other reliable sources that could, should, and indeed are, used. I will not attempt to claify further, (getting a bit wordy and repetitive here, I guess) but if there is any confusion as to my meaning or my intent, please let me know.Flami72 (talk) 20:39, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, Flami, it is very good to have that link handy. Kosboot, it is essential to this project that the IBDB be regarded as a reliable source, unless you personally wish to replace the thousands of references to it before the articles referencing it are deleted. Plus, the fact that it is online is, in fact, very important, as anyone can easily look it up and use it. But, for the holidays, feel free to send all of the members of this project a copy of Bloom.  ;-) -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:07, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

Oh gosh - I didn't mean to say that IBDB is not reliable -- just reminding people that there are better sources if they want to find them. -- kosboot (talk) 22:19, 19 December 2011 (UTC)

[Update]: See this and this and this. See IBDB's methodology here and policies here.

Jesus Christ Superstar

Hilarious! It looks like the British public will vote for Broadway's new Messiah! -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:34, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

WikiWomen's History Month

Hi everyone. March is Women's History Month and I'm hoping a few folks here at WP:Musical Theatre will have interest in putting on events related to women's roles in musicals - as performers, characters, directors, etc. I also pinged people at WP:Theatre! We've created an event page on English Wikipedia (please translate!) and I hope you'll find the inspiration to participate. Please visit the page here: WikiWomen's History Month. Thanks for your consideration and I look forward to seeing events take place! SarahStierch (talk) 19:05, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Let me just note that in the Victorian era, well-known actresses were often theatre managers. Many of these are listed here: Category:Actor-managers. -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:26, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Dan Leno

Dan Leno, the well-known Victorian actor and comedian and star of British music hall and musical comedy of the 1890s, has recently been expanded and is headed for WP:FA consideration. As a result, I am seeking comments in this Peer Review and I would be most grateful for any comments received. Thanks! -- Cassianto (talk) 01:00, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

The article on Dan Leno has been promoted to GA and has now been nominated for Featured Article consideration here. As noted above, Leno was a leading star of music hall, Victorian burlesque and pantomime. If anyone wishes to comment on the FAC, we would welcome your comments. Happy editing! -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:31, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

I Dreamed a Dream (musical)

Ive created this as a stub and will expand, but would like more experienced users to have a look and help out. This is my first attempt at a musical article and would like advice. Edinburgh Wanderer 20:51, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

I gave you some help over there and made suggestions on the talk page. Good luck, and happy editing! -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:49, 28 March 2012 (UTC)

African American musical theater

I was working on Carmen Jones and I happened to discover a link to this page. It doesn't have a WP Musical Theatre talk page banner (though it is in Category:Musical theatre for whatever that is worth). I'm not really sure what to do with it. Should I add the banner and consider it part of the project, or is the information already found within other articles? MarianWilde (talk) 01:29, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Yes, indeed, good catch. Unfortunately, that article relies almost entirely on a single source. And it ends in 1943, without mentioning things like Purlie, The Wiz, The Color Purple and Caroline, or Change, just to name four. (See Category:All-Black cast Broadway shows) -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:44, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

All right, I'll put up a talk page banner and see what I can add to it. -- MarianWilde (talk) 22:44, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Super, thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:34, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

Move discussion

Hello just to let everyone know, I requested a move at Talk:Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Musical, to move Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Musical to "Tony Award for Best Actor in a Musical" and move Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical to "Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical". Feel free to contribute in the conversation. JDDJS (talk) 21:53, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Joel Blum

I started an article on this two time Tony nominee. Feel free to contribute to it. JDDJS (talk) 15:37, 4 April 2012 (UTC)

I gave it a quick brush up. Everyone, try to remember to add the musicals project banner to the talk page when you start a new article. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:31, 5 April 2012 (UTC)

Category:Great Depression musicals

I stumbled upon the page Category:Great Depression musicals while editing The Cradle Will Rock. It only contains two musicals, Chicago (musical) and The Cradle Will Rock. Chicago was written in the 1970s and set in the 1920s, so I don't think it's connected to the Great Depression. Moreover, the category is rather vague (does it mean all musicals set during the Great Depression? Written during it? Taking a political stance on it?), so I think the category should probably should be deleted. MarianWilde (talk) 12:15, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Agreed. More specificity is needed. Perhaps "(Nationality) musicals set during the Great Depression". Doniago (talk) 13:25, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I disagree. This is a much smaller project than the film project. The 1930s was a slow era for musicals, and the number of musicals that will end up in this category is not large. I would include in the cat both musicals written *and* set in the period. Also, it would be difficult to identify which musicals were "American" vs. "British", as often the composer was American and the lyricist and/or book writer were British, or vice-versa. I don't think nationality is a useful distinction, particularly with respect to musicals in the 20s and 30s. -- Ssilvers (talk) 02:24, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

[left]I removed Chicago from the category as it was egregiously out of place. Maybe retitling it as you suggested would help, but I think it's then worth considering that if we keep this category, we're probably going to also have to have categories for musicals for other historical "eras". I just found Category:Musicals set in the Roaring Twenties when I was looking at Chicago. It only has two musicals in it, Chicago and Beautiful and Damned, though I know there are plenty of others. The title of this category is better since it specifically states that the musicals are "set in" the time period in question, but I don't know if I should add musicals to it because again, if we have categories for musicals set in the Great Depression and musicals set in the Roaring Twenties, it will also make sense to have categories for musicals set during the French Revolution, musicals set during the Civil War, musicals set in the Victorian era, etc. I can see that it might possibly be useful to be able to sort through musicals with a particular setting, but it also could lead to an incredible and unwieldy proliferation of categories. I'm sorry that I'm going back and forth on this. I don't have a firm opinion either way. MarianWilde (talk) 15:41, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Well, I believe film articles tend to be categorized by the decade if not the year of their release, so it may be worth looking into, but I'm not advocating for it. That would IMO be preferable to Great Depression/Roaring Twenties/French Revolution etc. Doniago (talk) 15:47, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Musicals are already categorized by year, so that's covered. Do you think that it's best not to create categories for musicals by setting, then? MarianWilde (talk) 16:01, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Hm. I don't think I have a strong opinion on the matter without hearing from other editors. Doniago (talk) 16:12, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I just added a description to the Great Depression cat that includes both musicals written during, and set in the GD. Feel free to modify it, but the '30s were a slow decade for musicals, so I think it I think it will work well. The other cat should be populated by adding the cat to the musicals that are set in the 1920s - I added a few, but I am sure you can think of lots more. Which cat does Guys and Dolls belong in? -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:58, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Guys and Dolls is an interesting quandary. When one watches the show, it seems like it's set around the 1930s, and the short stories on which it was based were published in the '30s (and it very closely retains their character, as multiple critics of the original production noted), though the Great Depression does not figure into the plot. However, there's a song lyric in which a character notes that she was given some shoes in "late '48, I recall". This seems to indicate that the show's creators thought of their show as being in the present day (it opened in 1950). MarianWilde (talk) 20:24, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

I asked because I understood that the stories on which it is based were written in the '20s and '30s? But if you're right about a later setting, then it doesn't need either cat. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:30, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Musicals set in the Roaring Twenties

This category is new to me - and seems somewhat redundant. Any comments? -- kosboot (talk) 16:02, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Mostly the same comments I made in the above discussion. (smile) Doniago (talk) 16:17, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Kosboot, did you read the above discussion? I don't think that it is redundant to any other cat, unless you mean the cats by year. I don't think it's essential, but I do think it is an interesting grouping that might be useful to someone because of the unique era: The Great Depression was a "retro" era for musicals, where new shows were old fashioned and did not offer much in the way of innovation - it was the musical theatre equivalent of comfort food. IMO, this cat ain't broke, and fixing it would be a make-work project. Also, personally, in general, I don't think we should change cats unless there is a clear consensus to do so, because it has historically been hard to get everyone to agree on the cat tree for this project, and what was finally agreed upon seems to be working; so unless there is a serious problem with it, I would leave it alone. -- Ssilvers (talk) 02:16, 27 April 2012 (UTC)

Theatre Awards - Change of this Project's guidelines proposed

A Proposal to change our Project guidelines has been made here regarding the listing of theatre awards at the bottom of musicals articles. Can anyone who works on musicals articles and has an opinion please weigh in there? Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:44, 1 May 2012 (UTC)

Does Here Lies Love qualify as a musical production?

Would it qualify as a musical production if its album tracks were written like a musical? David Bryne, one of the album's artists, first presented the entire album in a song cycle at the Adelaide Bank Festival of Arts in 2006. Then the album was released on 2010. I just need a clarification that it is a soundtrack of a musical production that's all. Bleubeatle (talk) 08:23, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

No, the album is not a cast album. So far, I would say that this is a concept album that is planned to be adapted into a musical and has been given in concert as a song cycle. Once the musical is written and has gone into rehearsal at The Public Theatre, then we might need to split off a sister article about the rock musical. -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:19, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

Tom Eyen images

Hello everyone. I notice that someone has deleted some images from the Tom Eyen article and added others. Does anyone thing that either of the former, deleted, images should be saved, or that any of the new images are unnecessary or inappropriate? Thanks for any advice. Here is the diff: [24] -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:22, 15 June 2012 (UTC)

Article request: Theatre music

See also Talk:Musical_theatre#Theatre_music. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 23:27, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

How can we make Wikipedia better?

At Wikimania, someone had the creative idea to photograph attendees' suggestions for improving Wikipedia. Worth looking at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/fabola/sets/72157630578652390/with/7571390244/ -- kosboot (talk) 21:27, 15 July 2012 (UTC)

Template:PMTFfooter nominated for renaming

Template:PMTFfooter has been nominated for renaming to Portal:Musical Theatre/Selected content/footer. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. DH85868993 (talk) 05:01, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

Long-term abuse issue

Hello friends, I am not a member of this project, but it has come to my attention that your articles are being targeted by a long-term abuse vandal that I have identified as the Broadway Hoaxer. Please read the case file on this editor and be on the lookout for unsourced and unlikely "upcoming musicals" being inserted in articles about musicals or actresses. The hoaxer has recently hopped to some new IP addresses and renewed activity, so extra eyes would be appreciated. Thanks. Elizium23 (talk) 02:49, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 05:31, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Yes, many thanks for putting this all together; I've worked on this hoaxer for a while myself but never thought of a consolidated effort. One interesting fact--the latest IP geolocates to Maryland, City: Severna Park while most of the others (esp. the 71...& 96...) geolocate to New York, generally Brooklyn. I've put a few of the articles on my watch list since it is useless to try to follow the IP number, given the IP hopping.Flami72 (talk) 11:25, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Article title for the musical Chaplin

The musical Chaplin has opened on Broadway (on 9/10/12); the article is under the title of Limelight: The Story of Charlie Chaplin. I think the article title needs to be changed to reflect the current title of the musical, which is Chaplin. Please comment at the article's talk page (Talk:Limelight: The Story of Charlie Chaplin) should you wish. The naming problem arises because there is another article -- and musical -- with the title of Chaplin (musical). Flami72 (talk) 11:16, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

As of today, there are 2 suggested new titles, with one cautionary comment (and me, who originally had no opinion but am leaning towards combining the 2 suggested titles). Would the next step be to just go ahead and re-name, or should we submit to WP:RM for a possible broader response? (Will check back on Sept 22, am on a school wikibreak).Flami72 (talk) 11:31, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Why don't you go ahead and rename it as you think best, based on the discussion, leaving a note on the talk page. -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:44, 27 September 2012 (UTC)

British stage database help

I'm still trying to create the Willy Loman article. I'm still trying to create the Willy Loman article. If you know anything that might be analogous to www.IBDb.com for West End theatre please chime in at Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Theatre#West_End_theatre_database.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:53, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

Sherlock Holmes the Musical

My friends and I are working to improve the Sherlock Holmes: The Musical stub. If anyone has suggestions for sources, structure, etc, please let me know! Jnd1091 (talk) 15:17, 27 September 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia Goes To The Movies, Nov. 3 - Rescheduled: Saturday, December 1

It's not exactly stage musicals, but everyone in the NYC area is invited to Wikipedia Goes To The Movies, another edit-a-thon at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, done in collaboration with Wikimedia NYC. Modeled on last year's Wikipedia: The Musical, this is your chance to work on the movie versions of stage musicals, as well as those involved with them. -- kosboot (talk) 14:44, 18 October 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia Goes to the Movies has been rescheduled for Saturday, December 1, from 12noon -5 pm at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Signup at the signup page. -- kosboot (talk) 01:30, 19 November 2012 (UTC)

American pantomime

If anyone is interested in, or familiar with the supposed "American" version of British pantomime, would you please comment here?: Talk:American Panto. After reading the article and looking around online, I have come to the conclusion that there is no such genre. One might be able to write an article about pantomime in America, I suppose, but I am not sure it is notable. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:26, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

Lea Salonga

You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Lea Salonga#Infobox image. RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 20:02, 10 January 2013 (UTC)

Women's History Month is in March

Hi everyone at WikiProject Musical Theatre!

Women's history month is around the corner, in March, and we're planning the second WikiWomen's History Month.

This event, which is organized by volunteers from the WikiWomen's Collaborative, supports improving coverage about women's history during the month of March. Events take place both offline and online. We are encouraging WikiProjects to focus on women's history related to their subject for the month of March. Ideas include:

• Women as actors, directors, writers, dancers, producers and related figures in musical theatre
• Musicals and performances that have had a particular impact on women's history

We hope you'll participate! You can list your your project focus here, and also help improve our to-do list. Thank you for all you do for Wikipedia and stop by my talk page with any questions! SarahStierch (talk) 00:21, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

Aladdin

Hi... I'm wondering if I could have some guidance on Aladdin. It's originating in Toronto in 2013, then opening on Broadway in 2014. Should the article be Aladdin (2013 musical) or Aladdin (2014 musical). -- Zanimum (talk) 16:30, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

Niether. I would wait to start the article until it makes the Broadway transfer. Until then, it is just one of many stage adaptations of Aladdin that have played worldwide over the past 200 years. Indeed, if the musical is cancelled, or if it is a flop in Toronto and never comes to Broadway, it shouldn't get its own article at all. See WP:CRYSTAL, which is based on the idea that something shouldn't have an article until an event has happened that makes notability certain. The musical is not scheduled to begin performances in Toronto until at least November; and look what happened to Spider Man, not to mention Rebecca and lots of other musicals - dates tend to get pushed back and pushed back. It could end up being Aladdin 2016 musical, or the project get cancelled. Per WP:CRYSTAL, I think it is premature even if a Toronto production happens. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:32, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

In the meantime, you could write an article called Aladdin (musical), where you describe all of the musical theatre versions that have been presented since the first pantomime versions. For ideas, compare how we do the Cinderella (musical) article and the Adaptations of The Wizard of Oz article (which is too listy). You could basically expand and find references for the information already in the Aladdin article about various stage adaptations. Then, once the new Broadway production of Aladdin begins, you will have already done the work for a great "background" section. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:36, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

Kevin Gray (actor)

Kevin Gray just died at age 55. He created leading roles in two Broadway shows and was a replacement for leading roles in Phantom (both Raoul and the Phantom) and The Lion King (Scar). His extensive credits include national tours, lots of regional theatre and some voice, TV and film work. He was also a professor of theatre. I don't have time to write him up, but if anyone else does, this will get you started. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:57, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Pygmalion issues help wanted

I have been attempting to refine improper linking to Pygmalion (play) and Pygmalion (mythology), and I could use some assistance cleaning up {{Pygmalion}}, {{Pygmalion navbox}}, and {{My Fair Lady}} (the latter two which I have recently created). I have posted some particular issues at Talk:Pygmalion (play)#Template:Pygmalion. Please feel free to jump in and edit the templates or leave comments there.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:48, 23 February 2013 (UTC)

Theatre/Theater spelling again

The article about the Theatre District, New York was recently renamed Theater District, New York, and the move discussion failed to make the point that it has long been the consensus at WP:THEATRE and WP:MUSICALS to spell the word "theatre", in part because theatre professionals prefer this spelling throughout the English-speaking world, and because this spelling it is not wrong anywhere, while "theater" is wrong in many places,such as the UK. BTW, I am an American from New York City. Note that nearly all of the Broadway theatres are called "X Theatre". As you can see from the discussion at Theatre District, New York, one editor has been battling for a long time to name this page against that consensus, but he did not alert the Theatre or Musical theatre WikiProjects of the discussion, and those of us who write intensively about theatre, including New York theatre, should have been notified. Would editors here kindly weigh in (either way, of course), over at Theater District, New York? Thanks! -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:25, 5 March 2013 (UTC)

Indiscriminate cast lists

I know this has been discussed before in regards to other articles, however this one survived an AFD a few months back. I began a discussion just now on the article's talk page. Any input would be greatly appreciated. -Aaron Booth (talk) 03:29, 18 March 2013 (UTC)

[[Template Musical Infobox modification suggestion

Not listing the director and writer of the book of the original Broadway cast would be like NASCAR honoring the car and forgetting the driver. Perhaps someone might decide to include those categories into the infobox's programming for the sake of both historical accuracy and proper respect to the material being covered here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Theclevertwit (talk • contribs) 12:28, 12 April 2013 (UTC)

Vital articles

There is a discussion regarding which musician articles, if any, should be on Wikipedia's 10,000 Vital articles occuring here. Your input would be appreciated. pbp 21:55, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

Readings of a Musical

Dear musical theatre enthusiasts: I was reviewing an article Easter Rising (musical). It has several references to a "reading" of the musical. Not being a theatre expert myself, I haven't heard of such a thing. Is a musical notable if it has been "read"? There's nothing in the article about a musical performance. Can someone who knows about these things please take a look at this? Thanks. —Anne Delong (talk) 02:15, 20 March 2013 (UTC)

I do not regard a reading or even a "workshop" as notable. If Easter Rising was never produced after 2004, then I do not regard it as notable. However, once a musical becomes notable by, for example, opening on Broadway or having numerous long runs in the big regional theatres, you can then, in the "history" or "background" section, mention that the musical first had a reading. The purpose of readings, btw, is to help the creators hone the material, and sometimes to show investors that the piece is viable. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:58, 23 March 2013 (UTC)

Template:Faust navbox

I have been creating a lot of templates of late. One of my most recent is {{Faust navbox}}. I have been encouraged to invite all the relevant projects to participate in the two discussions going on about this template. Please come participate at Template talk:Faust navbox#Requested move and Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Opera#The_most_complicated_template_yet_.28Faust.29.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 02:39, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Tony Award hooks at DYK

Please join the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Did you know#Proposal for a day of 67th Tony Awards nominee DYK hooks.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 03:42, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Motown: The Musical

This article is pretty pathetic. It's only 2 sentences long. We really need to expand it. it; after all, it's nominated for 4 Tonys, and I believe it is the best selling new musical of the season. I will do what I can to improve it when I get the chance, but I'm busy right now, and I'm going to help with it anyway. JDDJS (talk) 20:40, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, JDDJS, for bringing this up. I started working on the article and will do some additional work later today. I think I can add a brief Synopsis, plus more to the musical numbers list. Although I am also busy and trying to take a wiki break, the awards season really is lots of fun! Oh, by the way, JDDJS, I have now removed the maintenance templates you added; I think they are reasonably addressed.Flami72 (talk) 09:28, 22 May 2013 (UTC)

Instrumentation

User:Snakeman5001 has been adding "Instrumentation" sections to articles on musicals. I do not think they should be there, especially where the musical is orchestrated for a standard pit orchestra. In addition, (1) none of these new sections has any reference, so at a minimum, he needs to add a cite; (2) the sections are bloated and list woodwind doublings, which is ultra-trivial for an encyclopedia article on a musical. These whole sections could simply be a brief note in the "music" or "musical numbers" section saying in what ways (if at all) the orchestration varies from a standard pit orchestra. I believe that these sections should be deleted. Opinions? -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:53, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

I agree - these sections are unnecessary and should be deleted. Jack1956 (talk) 21:34, 5 July 2013 (UTC)

They seem too specialized for the reader seeking a introduction to a topic, which is what Wikipedia does. I do not think they need to be included.--Wehwalt (talk) 02:42, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

I quite see why Snakeman finds the details of orchestration interesting (as do I, very much so), but I think Wehwalt hits the nail on the head. We can't, and shouldn't try to, say everything there is to be said about a subject. As editors we must act as a filter. Moreover, in this particular case, unlike, say, a Sullivan score, the orchestration of a musical is rarely by the composer, is liable to vary mightily from one revival to another, and cannot, I think, be regarded as an integral and sacrosanct part of the show. I think we must omit. Tim riley (talk) 18:29, 6 July 2013 (UTC)

I agree with the above comments; I especially agree with Wehwalt--too specialized. I also think that Tim Riley makes a good point, that the instrumentation (or orchestration) varies. Flami72 (talk) 11:55, 15 July 2013 (UTC)

Critical Reception

Im just wondering if there is anyone here who may be willing to expand the reception section on Charlie and the Chocolate Factory the Musical. Im not very good at it and would appreciate some help. In case someone is willing there are plenty of sources see:[25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33]Blethering Scot 21:43, 30 August 2013 (UTC)

Joseph Jefferson Award eligibility

Can someone explain to my why Kinky Boots, which opened at the Bank of America Theatre in October 2012, was not nominated for any 2012–13 Joseph Jefferson Awards. By my estimation, it should have either been nominated for the 2012-12 non-equity awards or the recently announced 2012-13 equity awards.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 04:34, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

What's the basis of your estimation? In any case, the Chicago production was not a local production of the kind the Jeffs are meant for, but instead a Broadway preview, so it may not have been considered for nomination. That's my theory. Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 04:55, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

My estimation is that since it was the best of the Broadway season, it must have been good enough to be among the best that Chicago theatre had to offer. How do I understand what is eligible.--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 05:53, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

No idea. The Chicago Tryout must have been an Equity production and seems eligible. Maybe the show improved a lot between the Tryout and Broadway. -- Ssilvers (talk) 04:50, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

Help expand The Pink Lady for a DYK !

A little tight on time here-- would someone like to expand The Pink Lady (musical) for a DYK? Djembayz (talk) 03:32, 13 September 2013 (UTC)

I expanded it a bit. Could use more. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:27, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Source spam?

Someone added this to the South Pacific article. There are also THREE Bauch books listed as Further Reading in the Musical Theatre article. Can anyone tell if they are of general interest and worth listing in either/both articles? Thanks for any help. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:27, 19 September 2013 (UTC)

Willie and Eugene Howard

I started this new article on this vaudeville team of brothers. Does anyone have time to take it any further? There is a lot of information about these guys on the internet. There is disagreement as to Willie's actual birthdate. I suspect that his birthdate was in 1883, and that he generally lied about his age to make himself seem younger, especially as a child as he was diminutive and amateur-night audiences were probably more impressed by him saying that he was, say, 8 years old instead of 11; however, his tombstone says 1886. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:34, 27 September 2013 (UTC)

I love the Howard brothers! I'll try to get to this sometime this week. -- kosboot (talk) 01:00, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Matilda the Musical

Eyes needed on the Reception section, which has been a long list of positive pull quotes that violated WP:PROMO and WP:QUOTEFARM. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:18, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

The reason Beyond My Ken needs eyes or as this stinks of Forum shopping is that rather than actually try and convert or tag so that a better editor could fix he thought it was clever to leave an unverified claim such as all received positive reviews from the press without any verification is not acceptable. Sorry but i suggest he gets of his own ass and converts or tags it. Blanking is taking the easy and not acceptable way out given how easy he could convert it. Edits such as these which leave unverifiable statements or content is what is wrong with this site.Blethering Scot 21:39, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

The material violates numerous policies as is, so needs to be removed. If you're offended by the single sentence summary I left in, then I'll remove that as well, and someone -- you, perhaps?, since you seems to want to take ownership of the article, judging from the discussion on the article's talk page -- can begin a reception section from scratch. I have no interest in doing so. Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:48, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

I Have tagged until an editor more capable than you (Which you clearly aren't) wishes to convert into prose which is what should be done. Forum shopping such as this, not properly using talk page, not tagging, leaving unverified statements when there is a far more suitable and correct way of doing it isnt great. Stop Forum shopping and work to improve rather than leaving worse off which has been done here.Blethering Scot 21:52, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Are you trying to give an impression of a knob or are am i getting the wrong impression of your lack of wanting to improve this site. The content there is easily converted and i suggest if you actually wish to have verifiable and proper content then you get of that ass you are sitting on and fix. Im not fixing stuff you cant be assed to and or tag which you should have done. Stop forum shopping, fix or expand content and improve this site, or maybe you can carry on as you do and do nothing at all.Blethering Scot 21:56, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

Why do you edit if you have no interest in doing so. That makes it clear to me you have taken easy way out and rather than discussing or tagging just blanked. Tagging as needing converted to prose and is promotional was in interim best solution as there are plenty of editors who as you say are interested in this site. Most quotes are more then appropriate, although some could be removed or different parts of quote used to give more balanced overview. Thats what should be done not blanking section. Let more qualified or interested users do so.Blethering Scot 22:02, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

My impression is that the Broadway production received some less glowing reviews than the West End production, which was, AFAIK, universally praised. If anyone can find any mixed or negative reviews, and leave the refs here, and no one else is willing to do it, I'll try to convert the section into narrative prose. I agree that deleting referenced material is not helpful. -- Ssilvers (talk) 23:54, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

The Broadway production received pretty good reviews but i didn't think as good as the London production which was all positive, although reading the likes of the New York Times article here i am not so sure as this says opened to ecstatic reviews. Part of the reasoning is the Broadway production is different especially the opening number which has a different focus and character and some sections which work in Britiain didn't in American and were removed. Ill look for other sources if you are willing to do this.Blethering Scot 16:56, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Sources

Broadway

Im not from America so unsure of what you would usually use but here are some: Chicago Tribune, NY Times,Hollywood reporter, Variety, Bloomberg, AM New York, NY Post, FT, The Telegraph, Time, Time Out, USA Today.Blethering Scot 19:30, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

References to rave reviews from Broadsheets & BBC Guardian and NY Times, BBC.Blethering Scot 19:30, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

London

These are reliable sources mostly broadsheet reviews: The Telegraph, Time Out, Guardian, NY Times, Daily Mail, Huffington Post, The Express, The Standard.Blethering Scot 19:39, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Overall source:[34].Blethering Scot 19:39, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Stratford

Sources mostly from article: Standard, The Independent, The Stage, The Guardian, The Arts Desk.Blethering Scot 19:45, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Overall source with quote about Stratford:The Telegraph.Blethering Scot 19:45, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

OK, thanks for these. I finished the Stratford production. I'll try to get to the other two tomorrow, or as soon as I can. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:34, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Done with all three. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:54, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Applause (song) and Billboard cast album chart

The proposed deletion of Applause (Bonnie Franklin song) is already picked up by Alerts on this Project's main page overleaf, but I wish to make a technical question about: "It never charted" - the song is proposed for deletion because "It never charted" - but the Google Books sources says it was the "most successful Broadway song of the season". I don't know when Billboard's http://www.broadwayworld.com/bwwmusic/article/PIPPIN-Tops-Billboards-Cast-Album-Chart-20130613 come into existance? (there is no footnote reference on the Billboard chart article for this chart, but as far as I know there is no specialist Broadway/musical cast song chart, unlike other genres. Is this understanding correct? In ictu oculi (talk) 01:15, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

I don't think that the article gives any interesting information. I would merge the information into the show's article. -- Ssilvers (talk) 03:56, 8 October 2013 (UTC)

Theatre image deletions at commons.

It is looking highly likely that images of theatres held at commons are going to be deleted as they hold a promotional element due to signage / banners for productions and as such may not be free. See [35]. Although the musical project isn't specifically about theatres I though best to notify as musical articles can include photos of theatres. These images if used may need to be uploaded to en:wiki. Blethering Scot 11:03, 30 November 2013 (UTC)

AfD for Noël Coward's first song

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Forbidden Fruit (Noël Coward song) In ictu oculi (talk) 07:50, 3 December 2013 (UTC)

Internet Broadway Database – Reliable source

Is Internet Broadway Database considered a WP:RS?--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 00:23, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

This has been discussed before, Tony, and you yourself have participated in the discussions. Here is a walk down memory lane from one of the discussions:

There's no particular reason IBDB can't be considered a reliable source for most non-controversial information in its scope. See this previous discussion of this at the Reliable Sources Noticeboard. --Xover (talk) 21:40, 18 February 2011 (UTC)

Per this, they appear to collect primary sources, and not accept direct user contributions like IMDB. I'd say they'd be ok for non-controversial BLP data like DOBs unless proven otherwise. Jclemens (talk) 23:01, 30 May 2009 (UTC)

Do others agree with Xover and Jclemens? I certainly do. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:27, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

I'd agree, IMDB should be good fro credits, DOB. -- Comment added 19 February 2011 by Jezhotwells (talk)

<snip>I agree that the IBDB should be considered a reliable source for cast, creatives, production information, and any other production items not specifically noted in my comment, and non-controversial BLP info. I base my decision on this statement in the "About" section of IBDB:[About]. <snip> JeanColumbia (talk) 13:16, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

It has been my understanding that although for Wikipedia, the IMBD (films) is not regarded as a reliable source, the IBDB (Broadway) has always been regarded as reliable. I have access to a reasonably extensive theatre library and have not yet found any cause to demur at any IBDB citation I have seen in Wikipedia. Tim riley (talk) 20:12, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Based on this page IBDB seems like a reliable source to me.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 23:49, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

[left] There are several other discussions that have concluded that IBDB is a reliable source. Some of them are at WP:RS, and some elsewhere. Here are some: [36], [37], and [38]. See also IBDB's Policy page and, as you referenced above, IBDB's Methodology page -- Ssilvers (talk) 01:57, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Is Ovrtur a WP:Reliable source?

And what do you all say about Ovrtur? (I ask because I plan to start submitting information which is not available on IBDB.com.) -- kosboot (talk) 04:22, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

I don't know. What are their editorial policies? How do they collect their information? Any other indicia of WP:RS, like an editorial board? Do other sources cite them with approval? How long have they been publishing? WP:RS says: "Each source must be carefully weighed to judge whether it is reliable for the statement being made in the Wikipedia article and is an appropriate source for that content. In general, the more people engaged in checking facts, analyzing legal issues, and scrutinizing the writing, the more reliable the publication." -- Ssilvers (talk) 05:32, 17 December 2013 (UTC)

Popular pages tool update

As of January, the popular pages tool has moved from the Toolserver to Wikimedia Tool Labs. The code has changed significantly from the Toolserver version, but users should notice few differences. Please take a moment to look over your project's list for any anomalies, such as pages that you expect to see that are missing or pages that seem to have more views than expected. Note that unlike other tools, this tool aggregates all views from redirects, which means it will typically have higher numbers. (For January 2014 specifically, 35 hours of data is missing from the WMF data, which was approximated from other dates. For most articles, this should yield a more accurate number. However, a few articles, like ones featured on the Main Page, may be off).

Web tools, to replace the ones at tools:~alexz/pop, will become available over the next few weeks at toollabs:popularpages. All of the historical data (back to July 2009 for some projects) has been copied over. The tool to view historical data is currently partially available (assessment data and a few projects may not be available at the moment). The tool to add new projects to the bot's list is also available now (editing the configuration of current projects coming soon). Unlike the previous tool, all changes will be effective immediately. OAuth is used to authenticate users, allowing only regular users to make changes to prevent abuse. A visible history of configuration additions and changes is coming soon. Once tools become fully available, their toolserver versions will redirect to Labs.

If you have any questions, want to report any bugs, or there are any features you would like to see that aren't currently available on the Toolserver tools, see the updated FAQ or contact me on my talk page. Mr.Z-bot (talk) (for Mr.Z-man) 05:17, 23 February 2014 (UTC)

Category for Deletion

Category:Tony Award winning musicals has been proposed for deletion here. The arguments so far given are that this is (1) a misleading category, because it is vague – you can't tell which Tony Award is meant, as many of the musicals gathered in the category did not win Best Musical; and (2) redundant, because it is already covered by the templates for the various Tony Awards. Please comment either way at the CfD. -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:53, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Deary, deary me. Another User:Ssilvers classic this one isn't it . A) you failed to notice the vandalism to the cat and you don't know the difference between a cat and a template's purpose. This cat should be renamed to the purpose it was always intended not deleted because one editor spent days vandalising and you never bothered to follow his edits.Blethering Scot 19:33, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Blethering Scot, would you kindly explain to us what this category (however named) might add that the Template does not already do? That is, how would it benefit our readers? See also WP:OC/AWARD. -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:35, 28 February 2014 (UTC)

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels

Just wondering how we usually handle musicals of which their musical numbers have changed over productions. Below is how it currently displayed on the page and features changes between the national tour and the Broadway Production. The reason I ask is in the new West End production they return back to using Give Them What They Want from the Broadway production rather than The Only Game in Town and they have removed Chimp in a Suit altogether. Thanks for any advice.Blethering Scot 20:30, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

Act I

• Overture
• Give Them What They Want (Broadway) - Lawrence, Andre, Ensemble
  • The Only Game in Town (National Tour)
• What Was a Woman to Do - Muriel, Women
• Great Big Stuff - Freddy, Ensemble
• Chimp in a Suit - Andre
• Oklahoma? - Jolene, Lawrence, Ensemble
• All About Ruprecht - Lawrence, Ruprecht, Jolene
• What Was a Woman to Do (Reprise) - Muriel
• Here I Am - Christine, Ensemble
• Nothing is Too Wonderful to Be True - Christine, Freddy
• The Miracle (Act I Finale) - Company

Act II

• Entr'acte
• Ruffhousin' Mit Shüffhausen - Lawrence, Freddy, Christine
• Like Zis/Like Zat - Andre, Muriel
• The More We Dance - Lawrence, Christine, Ensemble
• Love is My Legs - Freddy, Christine, Ensemble
• Love Sneaks In - Lawrence
• Like Zis/Like Zat (Reprise) - Muriel
• Son of Great Big Stuff - Freddy, Christine
• The Reckoning - Lawrence, Freddy, Andre (with spoken line by Christine)
• Dirty Rotten Number - Lawrence, Freddy
• Finale - Company

Notes

• For the first national tour of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, the number "Give Them What They Want" was replaced with (according to Yazbek) a more suitable opening number, "The Only Game in Town".
• The line in "Give Them What They Want" which mentions David Niven is a reference to Niven's starring role as Laurence Jameson in the original film Bedtime Story.

I would add a third "Note" as follows:

• In the West End production, "Give Them What They Want" is restored instead of "The Only Game in Town", and "Chimp in a Suit" has been cut. Also, cites should be given for the first two notes. -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:37, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

What about in the table itself, do i change or add anything like has been done for the national tour. I can cite the West End production easily enough but the original notes, I have no idea about.Blethering Scot 20:44, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

The table should show the original Broadway score, as listed in IBDb (unless other sources conflict with IBDb), and the notes below should explain the variations in subsequent productions. I fixed the table, but I'll let you add the note, since I haven't looked up the West End production. There are exceptions: For musicals where the score was substantially changed from one production to another, and the subsequent production was as famous as the original production, we sometimes present two separate lists. All the best. -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:12, 3 April 2014 (UTC)

Tony Award Improvement

Would anyone be interested in improving the musical articles currently nominated for any of this years Tony Awards. Just thought would be a good idea given heightened interest in these pages at the moment.

For instance:

• Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, currently just a redirect to Carole King
• A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, needs an expanded synopsis and critical reception section
• Aladdin (2011 musical), requires a synopsis
• Bullets Over Broadway (musical), currently just a redirect to Bullets Over Broadway
• Rocky the Musical, needs a synopsis and an expanded critical reception section

Its just an idea.Blethering Scot 19:46, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

I agree with you, Mr. Scot. I've been writing articles on plays recently in anticipation of the awards season, but the musicals you list certainly could use some love (Joke). I am in school now, but after May 8 (well, really May 11 for a reason I will not disclose, but...Happy...), I'll take a look and see what strikes my interest. The Carole King show is especially confusing to me, as I tried to write the article but it simply went back to "Carole King", so I'll need to think on this for a bit. (I have to admit that I am very poor at Plots, but I like to try anyway. I have also been reading commentary on an unrelated article about too much quoting and "fair use" guidelines, so I now have a somewhat better idea of how to handle the critical recep. section quotes, as an example.) Flami72 (talk) 20:39, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

I'm 'way behind on my Wikipedia stuff, but if you write up the Carole King musical, let me know, and I'll give it a second pair of eyes. I would suggest that Buddy – The Buddy Holly Story might be a model to get you started on it. Happy editing. Ditto Bullets Over Broadway, and in that case, The Producers (musical) might be a model. -- Ssilvers (talk) 20:50, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

I like to suggest articles that have gained GA or FA ratings for editors to use as examples. Non of those articles appear to have such a rating and there may be issues we don't want to repeat on newer articles. Just a thought.--Maleko Mela (talk) 20:58, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

So do I, but these two articles are more directly relevant to the two types of shows mentioned. I know that Flami is very well aware of our musical theatre FA articles, many of which she contributed to. -- Ssilvers (talk) 22:58, 29 April 2014 (UTC)

Bullets Over Broadway

I made a new article for Bullets, titled Bullets Over Broadway The Musical--titled that way because, as Mr. Scot noted, the standard (musical) titling just redirects back to the film article. I am done until the weekend, and even then I do not have much spare time. As always, I am not wedded to anything I write, so please have a look. (And thanks, Ss!!).Flami72 (talk) 14:36, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

Shouldn't Bullets Over Broadway (musical) point to Bullets Over Broadway The Musical?--TonyTheTiger (T / C / WP:FOUR / WP:CHICAGO / WP:WAWARD) 14:58, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

No, I think Bullets Over Broadway The Musical is the wrong title, and the article should be renamed Bullets Over Broadway (musical), that is, moved to replace the redirect; but I think you need an admin to do that. I made a request here. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:05, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

Flami made a good start on the article. Next, the article needs some background about how the show came to be adapted from the film. The plot and critical reception need to be expanded, and there eventually needs to be discussion of the play's text, themes and music. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:53, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

100% wrong title. When you click on a redirect it takes you to the relevant page and section, if you then scroll to the top of that page it says (Redirected from Bullets Over Broadway (musical)). If you click on that you can then overwrite the page.Blethering Scot 16:18, 30 April 2014 (UTC)

Carole King

Article started: Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. At a minimum, needs plot, more wikilinks, more reviews. (And many thanks to Mr. Scot for pointing out the path...)Flami72 (talk) 11:52, 1 May 2014 (UTC)

Odd page move

A new user has moved Are You With It? (musical) to Are You with It? (musical). I'm fairly certain the original title was an accurate reflection of the published sources and the page should not have been moved. Best.4meter4 (talk) 00:35, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

I agree that the page move was wrong for both the musical and the film, and I support reversing the move. -- Ssilvers (talk) 02:53, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

I agree as well. Unexplained move.--Maleko Mela (talk) 02:57, 28 April 2014 (UTC)

Sounds like we're all on the same page. I am not on here much anymore. Could one of you take this to Wikipedia:Requested move? Best.4meter4 (talk) 01:46, 2 May 2014 (UTC)

Infobox theatre nominated for deletion

{{Infobox theatre}} has been listed at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion for the past 6 days but I've only just noticed that the nominator has failed to notify this project. It is not too late to comment and the discussion may be found at Wikipedia:Templates for discussion/Log/2014 May 2#Template:Infobox theatre. --AussieLegend (✉) 05:35, 8 May 2014 (UTC)

Violation!

"To drastically improve" violates two of my fondest pet peeves. (1) It's (gasp!) a split infinitive, and (2) it uses "drastic" as a general intensive. You can improve something without invoking such a bone-jarring concept as "drastic", can't you? Whatever happened to plain, articulate speech? "Dramatic" isn't as bad as "drastic", but what's wrong with "great" or "much" or "good"? If a thing is worth doing, it's worth doing. Don't insist on it's being done immensely; it's counter-productive. Gosh! I'm from a family who have all been involved in musical theater, and all performed on Broadway, to great acclaim. I'd love to contribute, but not if I have to struggle against such inarticulacy. Most of our family have been songwriters, too. When we break a rule, it's with verve, not carelessness or ignorance. --Marshall ("Unfree") Price 172.56.27.166 (talk) 19:44, 24 May 2014 (UTC)

Can you give us a hint as to what article you are talking about? BTW, (1) the overuse of exclamation points is not persuasive, and (2) the entire family of everyone here has performed on Broadway to great acclaim, and each member of those families has earned Oscars, Oliviers, Emmys, Grammys, Pulitzers and Nobel prizes and has served as president of a major world power. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:32, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

Never won an award. No acclaim for the prop designer. LOL! We're actually lucky to even be listed in the credits. Funny when you think that props make up such a large stage presence.--Mark Miller (talk) 19:14, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

I believe it is in reference to this page:

This WikiProject seeks to drastically improve the quality of the articles pertaining to Musical theatre throughout Wikipedia. If you would like to participate in the project, please sign up below and see the to-do list. Also note the talk page.

BOVINEBOY2008 17:52, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

Ah, I see where you mean. Simple enough: deleted. -- Ssilvers (talk) 18:51, 25 May 2014 (UTC)

I cannot think of any reputable grammarian from the great Fowler onwards who doesn't agree that the superstition against splitting an infinitive is both illogical and silly, and should be ignored. Jespersen even suggests that it is technically impossible to split an infinitive: "To … is no more an essential part of an infinitive than the definite article is an essential part of a nominative". Tim riley talk 16:19, 26 May 2014 (UTC)

Leaflet For Wikiproject Musical Theatre At Wikimania 2014

Hi all,

My name is Adi Khajuria and I am helping out with Wikimania 2014 in London.

One of our initiatives is to create leaflets to increase the discoverability of various wikimedia projects, and showcase the breadth of activity within wikimedia. Any kind of project can have a physical paper leaflet designed - for free - as a tool to help recruit new contributors. These leaflets will be printed at Wikimania 2014, and the designs can be re-used in the future at other events and locations.

This is particularly aimed at highlighting less discoverable but successful projects, e.g:

• Active Wikiprojects: Wikiproject Medicine, WikiProject Video Games, Wikiproject Film

• Tech projects/Tools, which may be looking for either users or developers.

• Less known major projects: Wikinews, Wikidata, Wikivoyage, etc.

• Wiki Loves Parliaments, Wiki Loves Monuments, Wiki Loves ____

• Wikimedia thematic organisations, Wikiwomen’s Collaborative, The Signpost

For more information or to sign up for one for your project, go to:
Project leaflets
Adikhajuria (talk) 16:37, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

I started a listing for/description of the project over there. Everyone, feel free to edit it. I put down User:Wehwalt, User:TonyTheTiger (please delete yourselves if you don't want to be listed) and myself as contacts, but if you will be at Wikimania and are willing to be a contact, please add yourself. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:51, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

Draft:Kevin B. Winebold

Hello! Can you please take a look at this draft and see if the subject OB music director is notable? I think there is the right amount of coverage even though much of it focuses more directly on the plays he's worked on. See my disclosures: Frieda Beamy (talk) 22:17, 27 June 2014 (UTC)