you know now that I think about it we give andrew lloyd webber a lot of shit for cats but no one EVER mentions starlight express?? and I’m starting to think you guys don’t know what it is so here we go
I mean this art alone…..no I don’t have the time let’s just start
this is a musical about toy trains
it was, inexplicably, hugely popular on the west end, and equally explicably not at all popular on broadway but still ran for like…..two years???
it’s basically cats. but with trains. instead of cats. they’re trains. everyone is a toy train. in this musical. I don’t know how to go on from there. look at this.
I cannot express this thoroughly enough it is LITERALLY cats with trains. it’s this little kid dreaming about his trains coming to life and there is no plot and all of the trains have their own musical number and there’s a weird love story…..and naturally all of the actors are on roller skates. because why not, right? Why NOT, Andrew Lloyd Webber? Just throw some unfortunate actors looking for a break into giant foam costumes and skates and make them sing about adultery and how difficult it is to quit smoking AS ANY GOOD CHILDREN’S TOY SHOULD. WHY. NOT.
I don’t even want to try and explain the premise to you basically there’s like a huge race between all the country’s trains and I need you to watch this clip because this musical ruined my life and not in the way I like for them to. there are FIFTY ONE SONGS in this garbage pail of a musical. they wrote a rap for it. this entire show is a crime and richard stilgoe is a willing accomplice.
So, it was definitely more successful in Germany than in London or New York, because they built a special theatre for it.
It was built in 1988 – it predates the fall of the Berlin Wall.
They have multiple racetracks going around the hall that the actors skate on.
And it’s still going. It’s the longest running musical in Germany.
