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Performance traditions and the terms used backstage.
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Shakespeare's company performed at which London theatre?
The Musical, From Broadway to the West End
Almost every major musical is an adaptation of something. These ten questions follow the sources and the partnerships.
About this topic
The stage musical is an adaptor's form. Show Boat came from a novel, My Fair Lady from a Shaw play, Les Misérables from Hugo, Cats from a book of light verse written for children. Even West Side Story, the most self-consciously modern of the mid-century shows, is Romeo and Juliet moved to Manhattan. Original stories exist, but the pattern is old and persistent, partly because a familiar plot leaves the audience free to concentrate on the songs. The other constant is the partnership. Musicals are written by pairs and trios far more often than by individuals: a composer, a lyricist and a writer of the spoken scenes, who are rarely the same person. The famous names in the form are usually two names joined by an ampersand, and the split between them is a large part of why the shows sound the way they do.
Questions & answers
The Musical, From Broadway to the West End: all 10 questions and answers
Every question in this quiz is listed below with its correct answer and the reasoning behind it. Play first if you would rather not see the answers — or read through as a study sheet.
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1Which musical is adapted from Bernard Shaw's play Pygmalion?
- A Carousel
- B My Fair Lady Correct
- C Kiss Me, Kate
- D Gigi
Answer: B. My Fair Lady
Why: Lerner and Loewe added a romantic ending that Shaw had explicitly refused to write. The stage version opened in 1956 and the film followed eight years later.
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2West Side Story moves which Shakespeare play to New York?
- A Romeo and Juliet Correct
- B Twelfth Night
- C The Comedy of Errors
- D Much Ado About Nothing
Answer: A. Romeo and Juliet
Why: Leonard Bernstein wrote the music and Stephen Sondheim, then still in his twenties, the lyrics. Jerome Robbins conceived and choreographed it.
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3Jesus Christ Superstar and Evita were written by which pair?
- A Rodgers and Hammerstein
- B Kander and Ebb
- C Boublil and Schönberg
- D Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice Correct
Answer: D. Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice
Why: Both began life as concept albums and reached the stage afterwards, which was unusual at the time. The pair had met while still students.
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4Les Misérables is adapted from a novel by whom?
- A Ãmile Zola
- B Gustave Flaubert
- C Victor Hugo Correct
- D Alexandre Dumas
Answer: C. Victor Hugo
Why: The musical opened in French in Paris in 1980. An English version, substantially reworked, followed in London five years later.
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5Hamilton tells the story of which figure?
- A A Caribbean shipping magnate
- B Alexander Hamilton, an American founding father Correct
- C A fictional Broadway impresario
- D The Marquis de Lafayette
Answer: B. Alexander Hamilton, an American founding father
Why: Lin-Manuel Miranda based it on Ron Chernow's biography, which he read on holiday. The founding generation is played largely by Black and Latino performers.
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6Which Rodgers and Hammerstein musical is set in Austria before the Second World War?
- A The Sound of Music Correct
- B Oklahoma!
- C South Pacific
- D The King and I
Answer: A. The Sound of Music
Why: It opened in 1959 and was the last show the pair wrote together. Hammerstein died the following year.
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7"Ol' Man River" comes from which 1927 musical?
- A Anything Goes
- B No, No, Nanette
- C The Desert Song
- D Show Boat Correct
Answer: D. Show Boat
Why: It is often treated as the first musical to bind songs to a serious plot rather than stringing numbers together. Jerome Kern wrote the music and Oscar Hammerstein II the lyrics.
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8The lyrics of Cats are taken almost entirely from what?
- A A collection of folk songs
- B A series of newspaper columns
- C A book of poems by T. S. Eliot Correct
- D A Victorian children's novel
Answer: C. A book of poems by T. S. Eliot
Why: The book is Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats, written for his godchildren. Eliot's widow gave permission and supplied unpublished material.
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9In a book musical, what holds the songs together?
- A A narrator speaking between numbers
- B A continuous story that the songs advance Correct
- C A single composer's style
- D One unchanging set
Answer: B. A continuous story that the songs advance
Why: The alternative form is the revue, which strings together unconnected numbers and sketches. The "book" is the spoken script, written separately from the songs.
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10Bertolt Brecht wrote The Threepenny Opera with which composer?
- A Kurt Weill Correct
- B Hanns Eisler
- C Paul Hindemith
- D Carl Orff
Answer: A. Kurt Weill
Why: It opened in Berlin in 1928 and drew on an English ballad opera of 1728. Its song "Mack the Knife" became a jazz standard decades later.
Frequently asked questions about The Musical, From Broadway to the West End
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The Musical, From Broadway to the West End has 10 questions and takes about 7 minutes to finish. It is rated Medium and sits in our Theatre & Dance category.
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Each of the 10 correct answers adds 10 XP, up to 100 XP for a clean run. Wrong answers cost you nothing, and your full question-by-question review is shown at the end.
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Yes. All 10 questions carry a written explanation of why the correct answer is right, so the quiz works as a study sheet as well as a test.
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Yes, as often as you like. The questions and the answer options are reshuffled on each run, and you can use Practice Mistakes afterwards to retry only the ones you missed. No account is needed to play.
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