Ivan lara 

Professor Matias

FIQWIS 10013

11/23/20

    Lion Kings’ Cultural and Racial Aspects

 

         Theatre productions that make it to Broadway are critiqued in order to provide theatre goers an assessed review of a play or musical. The success of the production is determined by several factors, but when there is a misuse in choreography, lyrics and musical score piece this will negatively convey the story line. The previously mentioned factors of communication must be in harmony, on the contrary, an culturally inspired musical could misrepresent a group or culture.  However, The Lion King musical does a phenomenal job encapsulating the audience with its choreography and lyrics, such is the case that the audience is transported into the African landscape and culture. That is why it is crucial for us to understand the importance of choreography, lyrics and the different styles of dance used to represent African Culture. 

 

          In the book, “Agnes De Mille telling stories through broadway dance”, published in 2016, author Kara Anne Gardner, a writer and critic about musicals, asserts that dance and choreography had a major correlation with the success of the 1943 musical Oklahoma. She asserts that the technique can majorly impact the musical’s choreography which ultimately influences the cultural aspects of the musical. She backs up her claim by doing an in-depth analysis of the choreographers and musical score producers. She further explains how Agnes De Mille (the choreographer for Oklahoma) uses a modern ballet style and borrowed dancing styles such as “flappers’ ‘ to communicate story, setting and cultural aspects, “Although De Mille Accepted the idea that her dances contributed to a collective work, she viewed them as equal in importance to Oklahoma songs, lyrics and dialogue. In addition, she felt she added things to Oklahoma’s plot, charter development and overall meaning that represented her own vision” (Kara Anne Gardner pp. 22). Gardener’s purpose is to make clear the correlation between the success of Oklahoma ideas and techniques used in the choreography. She adopts an informative tone for her audience. The readers of, “Anges De mille telling stories through broadway dance” and others interested in the topic are most likely dance enthusiasts who are interested in dance technique, who additionally want to broaden their knowledge of Modern ballet.

          A theater critic, author and an assistant professor of music at the Baruch college in New York City, Elizabeth Wollman, in her book The Theater Will Rock published by the University of Michigan Press, addresses the topic of the successful yet controversial 1971 musical Aint Supposed To Die A Natural Death. She argues that the musical score and lyrics had a major impact on the racial/cultural aspects which ultimately made this musical unique and successful while at the sametime frowned upon because of the explicit and honest portrayal of African-American culture. She supports this claim by breaking down the history of rock and roll, blues and jazz and its correlation with African-American culture. She then gets into the techniques of rock and roll used in the musical Ain’t Supposed To Die A Natural Death that captured the African American rock and roll movement. Elizabeth Wollman states that “with its amplified band churning out drivings, solid baselines, imporvisonary riffs and rhythmic punctuation on brass, ain’t supposed to die a natural death can easily be categorized as a rock musical” (pp113). She also incorporates interviews from Van Peebles (the director/ creator of ain’t supposed to die a natural death and composer of the musical score) to strengthen her viewpoints over the musical score. Wollmans adopts an informative and a criticism tone in her article. The readers of “the theater will rock” are interested in the African American theater culture and history in action to African-American music genres.

           Although Wollman and Gardner express their thoughts on two different musicals they very much concur with each other. These two musicals were both incredibly responsible in respectfully representing the culture through choreography, and musical techniques. For example, Van Peebles (director and musical score composer) was very careful with selecting the musical techniques that would encompass black rock and roll culture. Similarly, Kara Anne Gardner was careful with selecting her dancing techniques and movements that resemble flappers and translated that to ballet to appropriately resemble the culture of Americans in the nineteenth century. Although both musicals received criticism for being controversial in their own ways, I believe both musicals share a commonality of appropriately representing cultural aspects just like the Lion King did. 

 

           In agreement with Cox Gordan, a journalist and theater writer for over 20 years, and a respectable theater critic, in her book, “How ‘The Lion King’ Changed Broadway.” published by Penske Business Media, LLC, Cox addresses the topic of the success of the Lion King and argues how this musical production changed and shaped the way  Broadway functions in the present day. He supports this claim by bringing up statistics from the revenue Lion King made in under a month and discusses how the production had a positive influence over its setting, such as New York City’s Broadway because of its PG rating and magnificently prepared musical. Finally Cox discusses disney’s strategic decisions to strategically locate the Lion King in different parts of the country to grab the attention of the appropriate audience. While supporting his ideas with evidence Cox appears to write in hopes of explaining the influences lion king had economically and socially in order to understand how the lion king was a successful musical(Gordan Cox). Cox adopts an informative and passionate tone for his audience; it seems like he’s writing for an audience who is interested in revenue, statistics and theater enthusiasts.

 

            In the article How the Lion King: Effected How a Broadway Smash Changed South African lives, Nov 2015, author Micheal Pualson, a journalist for the New york Times for over a decade and a winner of the pulitzer prize for public service, asserts that Lion king has changed the lives of 263 South Africans that were dispatched all over the planet to perform and suggest that disney’s decision to go this route was successful because of the of their desire to have authenticity in the performers and in the musical score. He backs up this claim by doing the following, first he explains how Disney approved the idea of using South African people as performers, next he explains the musical score aspect that incorporated South African languages and dialects so the performers could utilize them, finally he than concludes how these performers were dispersed on different parts of the world yet still collaborating together to bring the African savannah to life on stage (Effected how a broadway Smash Changed South African lives). Paulson appears to write in hopes of explaining how to us the influence this musical has had on a group of people in order to avoid cultural appropriation, hence making The Lion King a racially and culturally appropriate musical to watch, due of the author’s investigative tone, it seems as if he writes for a newspaper and theater audience.

 

           In his article, Inside the mind of The Lion Kings Choreographer, april 23 2015, a Novelist Author and professional musician, Michael Morian asserts that Lion King’s success originates from the enthralling choreography dance techniques, styles and inspiration from the Afro-Caribbean roots used by Garth Fagan (lead choreographer). By supplying the reader with information about the thought process behind each choreography scene and explaining visual inspirations for each dance movement related to each animal found in the savannah, Fagan builds his claim about Lion kings extravagant choreography and the importance it served as representing the African savannah and African culture. Morian wishes to convey to readers the importance of each performer up on stage in order to exemplify how their roles as performers and influencers correlated to the Lion king’s cultural aspects. The author’s audience likely consists of choreographers and musical theater goers, as is evident through his reference to dancing techniques and costume designs. Morian addresses readers with a tone that is educative and entertaining to the audience. 

 

           An American 10 year journalist and correspondent for national public radio, Michel Martin, in her interview, Bold Experiment Turned Broadway Hit, Lion Kings Continuous to Thrill -And Heal, published in 2021 New England Public Media, addresses the topic of racial aspects of the lion king and how it is a successful musical because of its bold use of racial aspects. She supports this claim by interviewing Julie Taymor (head of production team for lion king), who explains  how lion king became a celebratory musical for black and white audiences because of the representation of Afro- Jamaican roots and “African pride”, and finally referencences how picking the cast members and choreography links up with the african savannah theme (How ‘The Lion King’ Changed Broadway). Martin’s purpose is to educate the audience about why lion king took a bold and decisive move to represent African culture in order to understand the significance of the choreography and costume design that was elected as the final product. She adopts an informative and engaging tone with her audience, the readers of How ‘The Lion King’ Changed Broadway and others are interested in the topic of Broadway production.

 

         Morian and Martin both share a common interest in investigating the Lion King’s success and production process. From the information we have gathered from both interviews, Lion king stresses the importance of excellence of the performers and musical score as well as the representation of the African savannah. Additionally, both articles educate us on the choreography movements and inspiration of animal use for story telling. Thus, giving the audience the theme for the musical. On the contrary, some people may believe the choreography does not match the culture and completely disregards the racial aspects, however this is false because as seen in the article, How The Lion King: Effected how a broadway Smash Changed South African lives, each performer that is on stage is from South Africa proudly representing their culture and the African savannah landscape. 

 

         The Lion king did an excellent job in representing the cultural and racial aspects of the African savannah through choreography and musical score. We have seen successful musicals that appropriately represented each culture such as Oklahoma and Aint Supposed to Die a Natural Death using these two factors. Lion king uses methods and techniques in their choreography that resembles each movement with a particular animal of the savannah, thus strengthening the African savannah scene for this musical. In addition, the performers who are up on stage are all South African utilizing different South African languages in their performances. Lion king is the perfect example for an appropriate representation for culture and race as seen through the choreography and musical score. However, some musicals present their pieces with the misuse of racial and cultural aspects. In most cases instead of having the choreography and musical score harmonize with the characters cultural and racial backgrounds, there are two different parallels that can come out as offensive. The question isn’t if we can appropriately represent culture and race in theater but in other sources of media, such as movies, ads, political ads, music videos, ect. If we take the time to do our research and make the correct decisions to find the appropriate cast members or skilled professionals to represent said culture, then there won’t be a complication to be dealt with. 

 

 Photograph: Brinkhoff and Mogenburg       Photograph:  Joan Marcus

 

Work cited page 

 

Scholarly sources

 

Gardner, Kara Anne. Agnes de Mille: Telling Stories in Broadway Dance (Broadway Legacies). 1st ed., Oxford University Press, 2016.

 

Wollman, Elizabeth. The Theater Will Rock. Amsterdam, Netherlands, Amsterdam University Press, 2009.

 

Martin, Michel. “Bold Experiment Turned Broadway Hit, ‘Lion King’ Continues To Thrill — And Heal.” BPR, 29 Oct. 2017, www.bpr.org/post/bold-experiment-turned-broadway-hit-lion-king-continues-thrill-and-heal#stream/0.

 

Non-scholarly sources 

 

Paulson, Michael. “The ‘Lion King’ Effect: How a Broadway Smash Changed South African Lives.” The New York Times, 15 Nov. 2017, www.nytimes.com/2017/11/15/theater/the-lion-king-south-africa.html.

 

Morain, Michael Des Moines Register. “Des Moines Register.” Inside the Mind of the Lion Kings Choreographer, 23 Apr. 2015.

Inside the mind of The Lion King’s choreographer (desmoinesregister.com)

 

Cox, Gordon. “How ‘The Lion King’ Changed Broadway.” Variety, vol. 338, no. 2,        2017, p. 24.  How Musical ‘The Lion King’ Changed Broadway – Variety