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My Favorite Show Tune

If I had to choose a favorite work of non-fiction, I might go with The Ladies who Punch: A History of Barbara Walters and THE VIEW (more on that later), or I might go with The Secret Life of the American Musical.

It's possible no other book haunts my thoughts the way American Musical does.

Jack Viertel argues, in American Musical, that, although each successful show has "its own magic," there is also a standard blueprint that a show sort-of-needs to follow. An opening number should set the tone and establish the kind of humor you're going to encounter: "Little Shop of Horrors," "Alexander Hamilton," "Comedy Tonight."

This leads to one--or several--"I Want" songs. In an "I Want" song, our heroes will present their urges in straightforward terms. The wishes should be larger-than-life; we're not here to see someone dreaming of a new book from the library. "I Want" songs include: "My Shot," "The Wizard and I," "Skid Row," and "Some People."

This bring me to my favorite "I Want," and my favorite show tune. It's "Put on Your Sunday Clothes," from "Hello, Dolly!"

This is a moment early in Act One in which Cornelius, one of our main characters, dreams of leaving (briefly) his hum-drum job. He is going to depart Yonkers, at least for a day; he is going to find "the world outside," in New York City:

Put on your Sunday clothes--
There's lots of world out there...
Get out the brilliantine and dime cigars....
We're gonna find adventure in the evening air...
Girls in white, in a perfumed night,
Where the lights are bright as the stars!

We cut to our diva, Dolly, who also has reasons to enter the big city, and who dreams of a kind of personal renaissance:

Put on your Sunday clothes when you feel down and out...
Strut down the street and have your picture took....
Dressed like a dream....Your spirits seem to turn about....

This is light and airy--but, also, Dolly is recently widowed and lonely, and it's not hard to find some emotional depth underneath the words she is singing.

I very much like how Cornelius has an adventure, and Dolly has an adventure, and the two journeys intersect in an easy way, in this number. I also like the allusions to "beads and buckles and bows," "Blue Monday," "one of those new horse-drawn open cars...."

I would listen to this song in childhood, and my hair would stand on end, and this still happens. The recent revival has the ideal Cornelius--Gavin Creel--and his basically-peerless voice is in fine form. There's also Bette Midler, being Bette Midler, and that's OK.

I think it's impossible to hear this song without feeling a bit cheerier.

My two cents. Enjoy!
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-1-d&q=put+on+your+sunday+gavin
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