I Can Do Better Than That

I want to start by thanking everyone for reading thus far. When I started writing I really didn't think about who would read. Like I have said...this is for ME. Not YOU. But I am overwhelmed. And I HATE to be that guy. But I find it all very encouraging.

Now yesterday's post was A LOT...so how about some lighter fare today?

Music is possibly the greatest joy in my life. And has been for as long as I can remember. I was always that kid that was singing to himself. My family has significant video footage to testify to this. Singing in the shower is one of my very favorite things.

I had always been a huge musical fan as a kid. Annie, The Sound of Music, My Fair Lady, Meet Me in St. Louis, etc.

The summer after my freshman year of high school (after I had been in my first musical) I really started to lose myself in a world of musical cast recordings. The library is a beautiful thing.

Today I am going to focus on one specific show and one specific song. At least that is the goal.

My junior year a dear friend (I seem to have a lot of those...) burned me a copy of The Last Five Years. Up to this point I only really knew older stuff and the really knew Broadway stuff. This whole Off-Broadway thing sort of mystified me. But I put it in the cd player in my car and took a listen. And I really had experienced nothing like. There is no other musical recording I know as intimately as that one. Norbert and Sherie hold so much for me. Jason Robert Brown is truly a genius in the way he writes those two characters and the lyrics tell us so much.

This fall the revival cast recording came out. I was skeptical at first. I know a lot of us were. The original was all so many of us had to get anywhere near the production and the piece. Now I didn't see the revival with Betsy Wolfe and Adam Kantor, much to my chagrin. At first I thought they were both working too hard to not sound like Sherie and Norbert. But then I kept listening. And I felt like this recording gave us so much more context. I felt like I knew exactly who these people were, what their world looked like and specifically each moment in which they were singing a song. When Adam Kantor starts singing The Next Ten Minutes I truly believe that they are just words that are a part of his proposal to Cathy...not just a beautiful conceit. I had talked to a friend at length about this new recording and we bonded over the show and how intimately we know it and love it. I finally gave it to him right before Christmas and one of his responses is going to take me into the specific song.

I Can Do Better Than That

He started by saying he loved the change of "met a guy in a class I was taking who you might say looked like Tom Cruise," to "some very well placed tattoos." He said he liked the idea that it made it timeless. Because Tom Cruise certainly isn't the relevant actor for that reference anymore. I thought it was perfectly valid.

Then a few days later or a week later or something I was listening to it and the line about Duran Duran stuck out to me. Why change Tom Cruise, but keep Duran Duran. Assuming Cathy was around twenty-five when she is singing this particular song it would mean she was born in 1988. Duran Duran wouldn't have really been part of her existence in a ubiquitous way to use it as a lyric. I thought that was a flaw on JRB's part, but maybe I was wrong. Again, another week later or so, I was heading home from work and had had some whiskey and my mind was going places and it came on again. And the line about prosciutto stuck out to me. It's a Jewish thing. That's why she says it. The Last Five Years was my Midwestern intro to prosciutto. And I thought JRB was just being clever, but there is a reason for everything. So I clued my friend in on this discovery and he was then asking me about the rest of the list and it's significance. So I was going to put thought into it. So the next day when I was walking the streets of New York I listened to it on repeat; both versions.

Here are the lyrics in question:

You don't have to get a haircut
You don't have to change your shoes
You don't have to like Duran Duran
Just love me
You don't have to put the seat down
You don't have to watch the news
You dont' have to learn to tango
You don't have to eat prosciutto
You don't have to change a thing
Just stay with me

As I was walking it hit me like a ton of bricks. Chills broke out on my arms and tears sprang to my eyes. Not because it was so beautiful, because it is, but because it is so real. Such context! And who even knows if this is what JRB's intention was. This is what I imagine.

So the context of the song is that they are driving to her hometown for him to meet her parents for the first time. The song starts out with her singing about her best friend Carolanne who got pregnant. You know casually telling a story about someone he will meet. But that leads to her thinking more about why she left and why Carolanne stayed. She then goes on to talk about her first year in the city and her first romantic relationship. I imagine Jamie sitting next to her or a conversation that had earlier before getting in the car. He is a little self-conscious. Should he get a haircut, should he change his shoes? Cathy says her dad LOVES Duran Duran. And now she is telling him you don't have to do any of those three things that you were worried about. Just love me and my parents will love you. MY GOD THAT GETS ME.

And the second part of the list I would like to believe goes to the heart of Cathy and Jamie's relationship. They aren't a perfect fit. She quibbles with him about putting the seat down and the fact that he doesn't watch the news, and the rest of the second part of the list. But she loves him. She just wants him to stay. And together they will do the absolute best they can!

This is exactly what I LOVE about musical theatre. And I don't know what I am doing with my life and what is going to happen. But I know that the visceral reaction I had on 35th street between Madison and Fifth Avenue is something I could spend the rest of my life chasing.

I now leave you with the last section of the song.

I will never go back
Never look back anymore
And it feels like my life led right to your side
And will keep me there from now on
Think about what you wanted
Think about what could be
Think about how I love you
Say you'll move in with me
Think of what's great about me and you
Think of the bullshit we've both been through
Think of what's past because we can do better!
We can do better!
We can do better than that!
We can do better than that!