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57: Finian's Rainbow
Manage episode 462554770 series 3558447
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In 1947, a musical premiered in which a conservative US senator is transformed into a woman by a farming commune of "rainbow people" in order to teach him a lesson. Brimming with queer and trans subtext, Finian's Rainbow is a difficult and exhausting watch today but it remains fascinating as an artefact of proto-feminism and postwar LGBTIQA+ history. Sinatra was originally slated to appear in an animated version in the 1950s and even worked on a soundtrack with Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald, but the project never eventuated - though he did go on to record "Old Devil Moon" on Songs for Swingin' Lovers!
Frustrated by the infamous 1968 Coppola film adaptation, Rabia went in search of any random stage version off YouTube to watch instead - and found a gem in the form of the 2017 Usdan summer camp adaptation with a brilliant young cast, which we spend this episode dissecting. Modern feminists call Finian's Rainbow a whitewashed version of 1940s gender politics, but how does it really hold up today and do its "good intentions" matter? Also, we talk about Robbie Williams, his new biopic Better Man, Sinatra's influence on his work and the US/Commonwealth cultural divide as to whether or not he is famous.
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