Seriously?! Prom: The Musical?!
So, in the midst of our technical problems a couple of weeks back, reader Cori suggested that we check out a musical prom storyline that's happening on One Life to Live. And intrigued though I was by the idea (Grease is among my top five favorite movies ever, and I've always thought the one thing missing from my prom was a preppies-vs.-stoners musical duel), we got consumed with Emmy week madness. But SoapNet and ABC Daytime insist on peppering our inboxes with pimping of said prom musical, so we simply could not ignore it any longer. Let's let Cori introduce the whole shebang:
Completely unrelated, it's a shame that neither of you guys watch OLTL because this coming week they're doing...I kid you not...a musical. "Prom: The Musical." Featuring silly dancing and romance between the son of a rape victim and the daughter of the rapist. There's a music video promo on the ABC website which is more than snarkworthy, even if you've never seen OLTL.
Cori said there was a video. But I thought, how could I possibly enjoy an excerpt from a show I've never seen? Well, live and learn, dear readers, because this is The Video.
'Fess up, that was at the very least more hilarious than all 57 seasons of Everybody Loves Raymond and Two and a Half Men combined, right?
And there's more!
If you're just in the mood for a summary, here's the promo. Or, if you need to really immerse yourself in all the scenes to fully experience this phenomenon, here you go! You're welcome.
"A musical event like no other"! I'm just so thankful that it turns out there is fresh and original storytelling somewhere on ABC Daytime. We had lost hope, what with General Hospital and All My Children stinking up the joint. But this is just genius. A musical set at a prom. In a high school. A High School Musical. So original!
I do love that at least OLTL is up front about the whole "hey, it's summertime, let's break out the toddlers" soap cliché. This description from ABC is hilarious:
Starr Manning is the daughter of two of Llanview's most masterful manipulators, Todd and Blair, and the apple doesn't fall far from the tree. She's met her match in alpha bitch cheerleader Britney Jennings. Britney wants Cole Thornhart, Starr's ex but Cole wants Starr back. Only problem is, their parents hate each other (dad tried to strangle Cole), so dating isn't exactly easy. Starr's best friend Langston Wilde knows Starr and Cole are the real deal, but remains a cynic about love herself. She thinks Markko Rivera is a egotistical jock wannabe, while he thinks she's trying a little too work the hipster/goth look. Their arguments are a little too passionate. Hey, they say enemies can make the best lovers.
I think your ability to process those sentences disappears when you reach the legal drinking age. (Also, "hipster/goth"? Really? That has to have been dreamed up by a 50-year-old.)
What it all comes down to is I have to know how this thing goes down, but I have had to impose a limit on my YouTube time. So, any OLTL viewers out there who can update the rest of us poor musical-prom-deprived souls in the comments?
Oh...ooohhhmyyygaaawwwd, please make it stop. Those poor things.
Just...no.
Posted by: ElementaryDays | June 18, 2007 at 11:24 PM
Well, I watch OLTL, but (sadly? thankfully for my sanity?) I've been dodging scenes from the musical event like none other as though they were bullets. Actually, I've been doing that with pretty much any scene involving the current teen crop, whose adventures often come across like Archie comics with a little more bitchiness and a lot less characterization.
I do know that the Starr-Cole storyline is being presented by the ads as yet another "teen lovers kept apart because of their parents' pasts" storyline. Hilariously, there's a bit more to it than that. You'd think Starr's father being the guy that led the gang rape on Cole's mother and sort-of-but-not-really served a jail sentence for it years ago would be enough, but the writers added a "twist" that Cole, in a steroid-induced rage, practically assaulted Starr after they started dating.
And, yes, now the storyline is basically that Starr and Cole are really in luv, that it wasn't his fault because of the evil, nasty drugs (and he was taking them just so he could get a football scholarship, so that makes it totally okay!), and that it isn't creepy at all that Starr is lusting after the guy that could have injured or raped her or that her best friend and their teacher/mentor Marcy thinks they belong together. Any actual ambiguity or potential real soapy drama in the whole thing lasted about five seconds.
So on top of it being an audial atrocity, we have the fact that it's the romantic saga of a teenage girl and her drug-crazed attacker finding each other again. Dear God.
Posted by: Chad | June 18, 2007 at 11:40 PM
Darn and I have both tried to work up a post on these Prom Night episodes but I really don't know where to begin. It's just too much.
Cole is the worst actor possible, esp for a child of Marty Saybrooke who I once adored, the real Marty, and it might be one thing if he just stood around mute and shirtless and greased up ( thank God that twink is 21) , but no, he speaks and moves and tries to act. All I do in scenes is stare at his ass or package, it's terrible.
I loved that hilarious video. I want to know who that twee little blonde boy is at the end who randomly starts grinding and twisting and bending with Marcie. I was like, "CJ?!"
Posted by: jase | June 18, 2007 at 11:57 PM
OMG, jase! Did you post that same comment about the twee little blonde boy "grinding, twisting and bending with Marcie" on the youtube page? Because that had me laughing to tears.
Isn't lusting after your attempted/rapist par for the course on soaps nowadays? I mean, I just don't know why these showrunners think they're Gloria freakin Monty and can pull off that kind of once-in-a-perfect-storm kind of shit.
Posted by: ElementaryDays | June 19, 2007 at 12:26 AM
Yes, that was me. TRANSPARENT!
Posted by: jase | June 19, 2007 at 12:30 AM
Isn't lusting after your attempted/rapist par for the course on soaps nowadays?
I've noticed it too. I guess they all want to create another Luke and Laura, without realizing (or, well, caring) that the rape angle of their relationship was ignored for over ten years, and then was finally handled with an awareness of the ways both characters evolved and how the culture and sensitivities have changed since the 1970s.
In OLTL's case, I was bowled over by how stupidly and insensitively they handled it. Not only did they just suddenly and unsubtly push the whole "OMG tru luv!!!11!!1" thing, but they just suddenly made Todd into the bad guy here for having the audacity to react strongly when his daughter tries to be with the guy who came close to raping her while under the influence of illegal drugs. And there were a few scenes where it was implied that he was somehow being "hypocritical" because he was once a rapist himself. Gah.
I swear, it had to have been one of the worst handlings of rape/sexual assault in fiction, much less in a soap, I've ever seen (and I was around for the whole "Sami drugged Austin and had sex with him but we won't treat it like rape because she's, like, a girl and stuff" thing too!).
Posted by: Chad | June 19, 2007 at 01:19 AM
I forgot to add how much I appreciated Frank Valentini outsourcing the roles of Markko's "freak" posse to all his old tricks. I literally cannot believe my eyes and ears when it turned into some retro electro breakdance thing. I have been mortified by my show's attempt at "hipness" before but that is by far the worst. If you can't do it right on daytime (and I think it can be done, but almost never) don't do it.
Posted by: jase | June 19, 2007 at 01:29 AM
The YouTube "ballin' remix" is awesome. If you watch only one YouTube clip mocking Prom Night: The Musical... well,this is the one.
Posted by: DeepSoap | June 19, 2007 at 03:28 AM
One little comment and I'm featured in post. Cool!
Too bad I don't watch OLTL regularly anymore. (Though the videos on youtube made my night).
Posted by: Cori | June 19, 2007 at 04:17 PM
I will sadly confess that I, too, am a long-time, regular viewer of OLTL - feel free to question my sanity and/or taste. However, in my own defense, the show wasn't always this bad. It was known for tackling sometimes unpopular, but relevant social issues and for its risk taking in terms of storylines.
In recent years, as with the other ABC soaps, the writing has been hideous (witness the recent firing of its Head Writer), finally culminating in this monstrosity of Prom: The Musical.
Another thing, Starr Manning used to be the most fascinating child on daytime (think young Robin Scorpio only evil) For goodness sakes, she once filled her mother's boyfriend's (or husband?) bathtub with piranahs!
Posted by: Beltane | June 19, 2007 at 05:33 PM
The best part of Prom: The Musical, in my opinion, is the commericials that say "One Life to Live proudly presents" - it's the 'proudly' gets me every time.
Posted by: Jess | June 19, 2007 at 05:37 PM
God I wish that was CJ! That would just be the icing on the cake of awesome gayness that is this horrendous musical.
Posted by: soapunk | June 19, 2007 at 11:39 PM
It is to weep. It truly is. It's bad enough that they inflict singing on us OLTLers on a regular basis (I heart Blair with all of my heart but she has seriously got to stop singing... Kassie DePaiva has a lovely voice as does Kathy Brier and Renee Goldsberry also... but they have all got to shut the hell up with the singing!) but to give us an over-dose of spirit fingers, jazz hands, fake-ass full moons, magic handkerchiefs, flasks of the demon liquor at prom and bad 80's fashion.
Why couldn't it have been about how the farmer and cowman should be friends? Why?!
Posted by: Dandesun | June 20, 2007 at 05:24 PM