{"id":45560,"date":"2016-04-07T13:00:44","date_gmt":"2016-04-07T17:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/?p=45560"},"modified":"2022-05-04T21:11:38","modified_gmt":"2022-05-05T01:11:38","slug":"disney-on-broadway-why-we-love-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/disney-on-broadway-why-we-love-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Disney on Broadway – Why We Love It"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Disney<\/p>\n

When we visited Walt Disney World in 2010, two of our girls who had just turned 2 and 1, fell in just as much love with the Festival of the Lion King<\/a> show in Animal Kingdom, as I already had.\u00a0 They soaked up every minute of the music, dancing, and costuming.\u00a0 Because they enjoyed it so much, it led us to the decision to take them to see Disney\u2019s Lion King on Tour that winter.\u00a0 They were young so it was a gamble, but they surprised even me and rocked out during the \u2018Be Prepared\u2019 number, when older children were even a little afraid.\u00a0 We realized then that Disney had found yet another way into our hearts \u2013 through the theater.<\/p>\n

If you have ever wondered what the Lion King on Broadway is like \u2013 the Festival of the Lion King sets the stage \u2013 and while they\u2019re very different, the underlying message and musical score is evident in both.\u00a0 The music from this movie, moves me every time I hear it, and on stage \u2013 well, it\u2019s nothing short of amazing.<\/p>\n

While it doesn\u2019t take much to get me to a musical, whether it be on Broadway or off, making it a Disney production seals the deal.\u00a0 The Lion King is considered one of the most successful musicals on Broadway, still going strong after debuting almost twenty years ago in 1997.\u00a0 It currently plays in the Minskoff Theater in Times Square, and is touring in six countries across the globe.\u00a0 I think seeing a show in any theater is a magical experience, but being in Times Square adds something special to it.<\/p>\n

Where we live, we are fortunate that New York City is only 3.5 hours away by train \u2013 a little longer by car, Boston is only one hour away, and Providence is less than 40 minutes away.\u00a0 That\u2019s a lot of theaters that we have access to!<\/p>\n

We are huge Mary Poppins fans in our house, so we jumped at the chance to see the show in New York city a few years ago.\u00a0 At the time, Mary Poppins was playing the New Amsterdam Theater \u2013 the Lion King\u2019s original home.\u00a0 We traveled to the city to see the show and were mesmerized by the inclusion of some new songs written for the Broadway adaptation.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019ve ever read the Mary Poppins books by P.L. Travers, you\u2019ll know that Walt Disney\u2019s movie differed from the books, as does the musical.\u00a0 This is important to note as I\u2019ve heard many people say they were either surprised, or disappointed, that the musical was not \u201clike the movie.\u201d\u00a0 Personally, we really enjoy the musical version.\u00a0 If you manage your own expectation that its different, you\u2019ll find yourself very pleasantly surprised by some of the songs but even more so by the creative take on the classics such as \u201cSupercalifragilisticexpialidocious\u201d and \u201cChim Chim Cher-ee.\u201d You\u2019ll so delighted by the production.\u00a0 We enjoyed this musical so much, that after seeing it in Times Square, we saw it again when it began its North American tour and came to Providence, RI.<\/p>\n

\"Mary<\/p>\n

The girls in their Mary Poppins outfits<\/em><\/p>\n

\"MP\"<\/p>\n

Another show that we were desperate to see upon its Broadway debut, was Aladdin.\u00a0 Aladdin opened on Broadway, also in the New Amsterdam Theater, in the spring of 2014.\u00a0 We saw it just a few months later and the first word that always comes to mind is \u2013 phenomenal!\u00a0 Unbelievable, amazing, and awesomeness also come to mind.\u00a0 Although I loved the movie Aladdin (I saw it seven times in the theater as it came out in while I was in high school), I was still absolutely amazed at how much I simply loved this musical production.\u00a0 There was not a moment of the show that wasn\u2019t fabulous.\u00a0 My youngest was a little over two years old for this show and while it runs close to three hours, I don\u2019t think she peeled her eyes from the stage for a second.<\/p>\n

\"Aladdin<\/p>\n

This was a show where not one scene felt as if it shouldn\u2019t be there.\u00a0 Think of the world of Agrabah, the colors, the sparkle, the lights.\u00a0 The sets for this performance were right out of the animated feature, only better.\u00a0 The costumes \u2013 they were the costumes you dream about playing dress up in \u2013 they look majestic, colorful, glittery, soft, sparkly, dazzling! There were stage effects that left us in awe.<\/p>\n

The role of Genie is played by James Monroe Iglehart who won a Tony for his performance.\u00a0 He does the late Robin Williams every bit of justice he deserves in this role.\u00a0 He blows it out of the water.\u00a0 Another treat is that the role of Jafar, is played by Jonathan Freeman, the voice of Jafar in the animated film.<\/p>\n

This show is the one that everything else will always be compared to, the one I can\u2019t wait to see again.\u00a0 Of course we had to buy the soundtrack and the songs take you right back into the New Amsterdam Theater.\u00a0 What always surprises me is how small the theaters in New York are \u2013 well the few I\u2019ve been to.\u00a0 I know that Radio City Music Hall is so big I will probably need my binoculars when we finally get there, but the New Amsterdam Theater is cozy!\u00a0 We have sat in the front row of the first mezzanine each time we\u2019ve been there and I couldn\u2019t be happier with these seats.\u00a0\u00a0 I also love that the theater offers small booster seats for children\u2013 it is a Disney theater after all.<\/p>\n

\"Aladdin\"<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The next Disney musical I knew we had to see, was Newsies.\u00a0 Newsies was one of my favorite movies as a kid, and we all know that Disney fans loved Christian Bale long before he was cast as The Dark Knight.\u00a0 While we planned on seeing Newsies on Broadway as well, it never worked out, but it started touring and we were able to see it in Boston in 2015.\u00a0 I was beyond excited for my girls to see the show and truthfully, they hadn\u2019t seen the movie yet.\u00a0 Many of the songs we know and love from the movie, \u201cSeize the Day\u201d and \u201cKing of New York\u201d are part of the musical and don\u2019t disappoint.<\/p>\n

Like Mary Poppins though, the storyline differs from the 1992 Disney film and although I should have, I wasn\u2019t expecting that.\u00a0 I thought the musical lacked the story the movie told of Jack\u2019s connection to David\u2019s family and while there was a love story, it was also very different from the movie.<\/p>\n

What was pretty great about this musical was the sets.\u00a0 They were very basic and didn\u2019t change very often, but there was one complex structure used for many of the dance numbers, that was simple at the same time and it worked well.<\/p>\n

\"Newsies<\/p>\n

I know there have been other Disney productions in the theater, and I\u2019m sure there will be more (Frozen!), and I would give each one a shot.\u00a0 My children have loved each show we\u2019ve seen and I think it\u2019s great that they have fallen in love with these stories, these characters, and most of all the music, on the stage.\u00a0 I know I\u2019m crossing my fingers for Tangled to hit Broadway!<\/p>\n

What Disney on Broadway show have you seen? Which is your favorite? What would you like to see? <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When we visited Walt Disney World in 2010, two of our girls who had just turned 2 and 1, fell in just as much love with the Festival of the Lion King show in Animal Kingdom, as I already had.\u00a0 They soaked up every minute of the music, dancing, and costuming.\u00a0 Because they enjoyed it…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":118,"featured_media":45568,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wprm-recipe-roundup-name":"","wprm-recipe-roundup-description":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4705],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general-disney-fun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/118"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45560"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84878,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45560\/revisions\/84878"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.themouseforless.com\/blog_world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}