Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark
I must admit, I really don’t understand any part of this. Don’t get me wrong, I mean, I suffer from nerd-rage as much as the next man, but I don’t really have the frothing at the mouth reaction that most comics/geek bloggers have at the mention of the idea. But then, I occupy a pretty rare niche, as some-one who is a real power geek and also a well read and educated theatre buff. I’ve not met many others whose interests coincide in quite the same way. You’d think that I would be the prime target audience for Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark, but instead of any form of enthusiasm, My main reaction is instead pure confusion.
I mean, what are Marvel hoping to achieve here? Well that is a pretty obvious one actually, Marvel are hoping to exploit what is essentially their most high profile IP in an new avenue. I think many people here will point to Disney, and with good reason, as they pulled off the same coup 13 years ago with the Lion king, which has been an astronomical success around the world. However, the influence of Disney’s new ownership of Marvel being far to recent to have influenced events, I can only assume that Marvel is trying to capture the same lightning in a bottle.
The trouble is that Spider-Man does not have the same cultural cache as The Lion King. Ok, so Spider-Man’s origin has entered into the public consciousness, and has some mythic resonance to it, but that just covers the beginning of the story. There have been several retellings of that story, and thousands of stories on what comes after. The mythos of comics characters is quite badly diluted already over several different media, in comparison to the archetypal story of the lion king (which is basically Hamlet on the savannah). Ask 10 people the story of Spider-Man and you;ll get 10 different answers, ask the same question about the lion king, and you’ll get one. So, no-one knows what to expect from this musical, and some might say that this is a good thing. I suppose, but theatre does not thrive on plot alone, it is the exploration of individual moments within a story that makes theatre special. People will happily go and see the same play performed by several different actors to se what they bring to the piece that they know and love. To my mind this is compounded in the popular musical, as people go knowing exactly what to expect, they will know the songs (at least some of them) and most likely the plot before they go. The traditional musical going audience (which is very different from the traditional audience for classical or modern plays) will be going into this blind. To attract this audience the production will have be able to pull out something spectacular to attract them away from seeing the Phantom of the Opera for the fifth or sixth time.
Using Julie Taymor, who achieved such success with her direction and design for the Lion King as director might help attract some of that attention. For theatre goers who know their stuff her name has a pretty major resonance. She is known as being one of the most provocative directors on both stage and screen, and her name should attract some of the more snobbish theatre aficionados that otherwise would be put off by the subject matter. But this is as much of a blessing as a curse, as the same innovations in Taymor’s design that have made her famous have done a rather though job of scaring off Spider-Man’s traditional fanbase, the comic book buying geek. I mean, just look up some of the reactions to the debut of the ‘Green Goblin’ costume on geek blogs online. Think of the reactions fans have had to the idea of changing the status quo of their favourite comics either in the original medium or in translation to film or similar. Also look out for the reaction of Wonder-Woman’s recent change of costume for another example. Theatre is all about change and re-invention, stories and characters being shown through different productions and performances, but this seems quite antithetical to the way comics fans expect their favourite characters to be treated. I suppose that some will buy tickets for the show so that they can complain about it online, but not many people will shell out for Broardway/West end tickets, just so they can bitch about it on the internet. This will probably be a barrier even those fans that are inclined to give the show a chance, how many comics geeks will be able to afford the £50 or so for a brand new show? Even outside of the hardcore geek crowd, the prime audience for Spider-Man and comics in general is males aged 13-25 or so, a group that is not particularly comfortable with the idea of going to the Theatre in general.
To make matters worse, the music is written by Bono from U2, who is, I am given to understand one of the prime movers behind the idea. Now, that is not to say that I don’t like U2, actually I’m pretty neutral to them, they are listenable, early stuff more so than their later stuff. It does seem however, that they are the one of the most unpopular popular bands. It’s fashionable to not like them and to be very clear on that fact. There are some good reasons for this, pretentiousness, a lack of originality and a host of other reasons that some-one like myself (with no understanding of what it takes to make music) will probably not understand. They do seem to fill stadiums though, so they might have that going for them.
What my confusion comes down to is the fact that there is moderate appeal here for a desperate number of target audience groups, but no more than that. Coupled with a production that seems to have been plagued by delays and accidents, it would not inspire much confidence. This production as allot of things working against it, and it will be interesting to see what levels of success it achieves. The media marketing machine is gearing up to try and sell the show, as we’ve seen, but if anything the sound it’s been making against the internet resembles nothing more that the squealing of metal against metal. If I were a marvel executive right now, I would be very worried about the upshot of this, but on the upside, if it doesn’t succeed, will anyone who doesn’t have a financial stake in the show even bat an eyelid?
I mean, what are Marvel hoping to achieve here? Well that is a pretty obvious one actually, Marvel are hoping to exploit what is essentially their most high profile IP in an new avenue. I think many people here will point to Disney, and with good reason, as they pulled off the same coup 13 years ago with the Lion king, which has been an astronomical success around the world. However, the influence of Disney’s new ownership of Marvel being far to recent to have influenced events, I can only assume that Marvel is trying to capture the same lightning in a bottle.
The trouble is that Spider-Man does not have the same cultural cache as The Lion King. Ok, so Spider-Man’s origin has entered into the public consciousness, and has some mythic resonance to it, but that just covers the beginning of the story. There have been several retellings of that story, and thousands of stories on what comes after. The mythos of comics characters is quite badly diluted already over several different media, in comparison to the archetypal story of the lion king (which is basically Hamlet on the savannah). Ask 10 people the story of Spider-Man and you;ll get 10 different answers, ask the same question about the lion king, and you’ll get one. So, no-one knows what to expect from this musical, and some might say that this is a good thing. I suppose, but theatre does not thrive on plot alone, it is the exploration of individual moments within a story that makes theatre special. People will happily go and see the same play performed by several different actors to se what they bring to the piece that they know and love. To my mind this is compounded in the popular musical, as people go knowing exactly what to expect, they will know the songs (at least some of them) and most likely the plot before they go. The traditional musical going audience (which is very different from the traditional audience for classical or modern plays) will be going into this blind. To attract this audience the production will have be able to pull out something spectacular to attract them away from seeing the Phantom of the Opera for the fifth or sixth time.
Using Julie Taymor, who achieved such success with her direction and design for the Lion King as director might help attract some of that attention. For theatre goers who know their stuff her name has a pretty major resonance. She is known as being one of the most provocative directors on both stage and screen, and her name should attract some of the more snobbish theatre aficionados that otherwise would be put off by the subject matter. But this is as much of a blessing as a curse, as the same innovations in Taymor’s design that have made her famous have done a rather though job of scaring off Spider-Man’s traditional fanbase, the comic book buying geek. I mean, just look up some of the reactions to the debut of the ‘Green Goblin’ costume on geek blogs online. Think of the reactions fans have had to the idea of changing the status quo of their favourite comics either in the original medium or in translation to film or similar. Also look out for the reaction of Wonder-Woman’s recent change of costume for another example. Theatre is all about change and re-invention, stories and characters being shown through different productions and performances, but this seems quite antithetical to the way comics fans expect their favourite characters to be treated. I suppose that some will buy tickets for the show so that they can complain about it online, but not many people will shell out for Broardway/West end tickets, just so they can bitch about it on the internet. This will probably be a barrier even those fans that are inclined to give the show a chance, how many comics geeks will be able to afford the £50 or so for a brand new show? Even outside of the hardcore geek crowd, the prime audience for Spider-Man and comics in general is males aged 13-25 or so, a group that is not particularly comfortable with the idea of going to the Theatre in general.
To make matters worse, the music is written by Bono from U2, who is, I am given to understand one of the prime movers behind the idea. Now, that is not to say that I don’t like U2, actually I’m pretty neutral to them, they are listenable, early stuff more so than their later stuff. It does seem however, that they are the one of the most unpopular popular bands. It’s fashionable to not like them and to be very clear on that fact. There are some good reasons for this, pretentiousness, a lack of originality and a host of other reasons that some-one like myself (with no understanding of what it takes to make music) will probably not understand. They do seem to fill stadiums though, so they might have that going for them.
What my confusion comes down to is the fact that there is moderate appeal here for a desperate number of target audience groups, but no more than that. Coupled with a production that seems to have been plagued by delays and accidents, it would not inspire much confidence. This production as allot of things working against it, and it will be interesting to see what levels of success it achieves. The media marketing machine is gearing up to try and sell the show, as we’ve seen, but if anything the sound it’s been making against the internet resembles nothing more that the squealing of metal against metal. If I were a marvel executive right now, I would be very worried about the upshot of this, but on the upside, if it doesn’t succeed, will anyone who doesn’t have a financial stake in the show even bat an eyelid?