If I have ever been unclear about my rabid obsession with all things musical theater, then I apologize for my lack of clarity.  Just so we can be sure we're on the same page, if Broadway were a person, I'd marry it, have its babies, and lock it in a tower so it could be all my own (after being sure its hair is cut short, of course).  I'd actually consider doing this even if it Broadway weren't a person...anyways!  My love for musical theater is so passionate that I am often caught off guard when people do not share similar passion.  For example, normal things in my everyday life will cause me to think of lyrics from Broadway musicals, which I will then sing.  After singing [what are always beautiful lyrics], I look around excitedly at whoever is with me, in hopes that they will laugh or at least give a nod of understanding.  This almost never happens.  What usually happens instead is I sing, look around, confusedly say "anyone?," and gain in response expressions of equal confusion or absolute disinterest.

What follows is usually a conversation about my love for musicals and the other person's hate for musicals.  I like to think I'm a fairly open person.  I try to learn things everyday, and especially try to learn about things that people like, dislike, believe in, when these likes, dislikes,and beliefs are different from my own.  Case in point, I always have a conversation with the Mormons who stop me on the street to evangelize. I certainty do not believe in the same things as these Mormon missionaries, but I do want to know about their beliefs.  So, just like I do with the Mormons, when someone tells me that they dislike musical theater, I stop to have a conversation about it.  Usually what it comes down to  is that people find musical theater unrealistic or silly. "Why would people just break out in song in the middle of the day?" they usually say.  At this point, I get a little confused, especially since I just finished breaking out into song in the middle of the day. In my mind, random outbreak of song is realistic.

What I don't understand is why realism is an important factor in deeming musical theater entertaining or worthy of our time and attention when there are so many things that we find entertaining that are not realistic.  The movies and television we watch, the books we read, none of those are exclusively grounded in realism.  In fact, some of the best movies, television shows, and books are based in worlds that are so far outside of realism that reality couldn't touch them with a ten foot pole.  Lord of the Rings (from what I understand) is based in a world that is certainly not ours, but most people agree that the Lord of the Rings books and movies are entertaining.  Now, they don't randomly break out in song in the Lord of the Rings, but they do a lot of other crazy things--rings of power, middle-earth, hobbits, wizards etc..

So, why is breaking into song so difficult to manage with musical theater when we embrace fantasy other forms of entertainment?  Perhaps it's the difference in the medium.  Specifically, in theater, an audience member or patron has a much closer proximity to the actual events being portrayed.  In theater, the audience is separated by a maximum of a couple hundred feet, and experience the portrayed events in live action, at the same time as they are being performed.  In movies and television, the audience is separated by, possibly, thousands of miles, and many many years.  A similar distance occurs in books, except this is even more distanced as there are not even human beings acting out the events when we read.  Everything that we experience in books is in our own minds.  So, because there is more realism built into the medium of musical theater (you are actually experiencing the events up-close-and-personal, perhaps the threshold for fantasy is lower.  Maybe because people's brains are in a "real gear" (if you will) it is harder to accept unrealistic things like breaking out randomly into song.
 
Further, perhaps the people who enjoy musical theater most are the people who are more flexible and open.  The people who more malleabley maneuver the fine line between realism and fantasy.  Who can more easily suspend reality for a few hours and just accept that the actor with painted green skin, in a black dress, elevated 20 feet above the stage is flying, and is actually a witch who is fighting for animal rights.  That the dancer with a head-dress and some paper-mached costume parts on them is actually an antelope bounding across the savanna.  

(The more I think about this, the more I think this would make  a really great psychological study...don't get any ideas scoopers.  It's mine!)

So, with the understanding that an appreciation for musical theater requires mental flexibility, I think I can let it go when people say they don't like musical theater.  I'll just re-frame the situation.  Instead of hearing "I don't like musical theater," I'll hear "I can't flexibly approach the line between fantasy and reality like you.  You're special because you can."  Really, it may as well be a compliment when people hate on musicals.

Fair enough.  They can consider it a compliment when I say I don't like sports because the rules are too complicated.  I'm probably just not rigid-minded enough to appreciate them.

Keep on thinking,
Josie