“Thoroughly Modern Millie” at Sweet Home, Part 2

Listen to Roar with the web player or subscribe at any of the links at the Roar webpage. This transcript contains grammatical edits.

Josh: This year’s musical is Thoroughly Modern Millie. This episode, we take a look.

From The Panther Eye, this is Roar.

Rayhaan: Josh, what do you think about the music for Thoroughly Modern Millie?

Josh: I didn’t think it was really good for this time period. Like, the music doesn’t really fit anything that kids listen to today so I’m not sure how high schoolers would react to the old time music compared to, like more modern, like rap, music.

Rayhaan: I totally agree. The music was very classical or classy, jazzy style, and a lot of people might not tune into that or think it’s, you know, very fitting. I totally agree with you on that. While I was listening, I too realized how classical and jazzy it was and high schoolers today might not be as interested in that kind of music. I did notice that some of the content of the music might be offensive in today’s climate.

An example of this is, during the soundtrack, there are stereotypical voices of Chinese men that may be over-exaggerated and wouldn’t be fitting of a musical for high school today.

Josh: I definitely agree with what you said because another example of this is, in the movie, there’s a white woman and throughout the entire movie, she pretends to be a Chinese woman, which could be offensive to some people in high school and, like outside, so when community people come in to watch the play they might take some kind of offense to that.

Rayhaan: With the woman pretending to be Chinese, that’s a crucial plot for the movie so what I’m curious about is how the high school will adapt this into their musical and it may look very odd when it’s performed in front of a very diverse student body.

Josh: On that point, it’ll be interesting to see how the band can pull off the grand feeling of the music portrayed in the play.

Rayhaan: The Sweet Home Music Department has proven in the past that they can handle complex musical performances so there’s no doubt that they’ll be able to handle the complexities of the music within Thoroughly Modern Millie.

Josh: Although modern is in the name, a lot of the elements that are seen through the play can be categorized as regressive.

Luke: Although they seem regressive, at the time of the 20s, there was a lot of segregation going on, so this doesn’t seem far off from what would actually be considered normal at the time.

Mrs Ross: Although the musical isn’t produced often, it will be interesting to see how the Sweet Home theater group will be able to pull off an amazing performance.

Josh Seyse: This episode of Roar was made by Josh Seyse, Rayhaan Saaim, Chudy Ilozue, and Jacob Lymberopoulos. Music made by Universal Pictures.

Before this episode was published but after it was recorded, the Eye was notified that the music department intends to edit this musical before its production.