Music : It's A Bird ... It's A Plane ... It's Superman (1966 Original Broadway Cast)

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Rating:

- It's A Bird! It's A Plane! It's Superman!!
I've loved this album for about 40 years now. Thrilled to have it on CD.

Rating:

- Complications, accusations, cheap sensations, foundations
I welcomed this score back into my life through the CD. This show was reissued by Columbia on vinyl in the 1970s. Listening to it, I couldn't believe it was a flop. (The overture is as good as All American.) My father suggested it opened just as the pop art fad was fading, and thus nobody wanted to see it just for the score, which is probably Strouse and Adams' best. The songs are almost insanely memorable, especially the ones written for Clark and Lois. The problem is that having two villians -- one of them Jack Cassidy -- threw the balance off, so the show isn't enough about Superman. This issue boasts some recordings of the writers singing songs deleted or slightly revised for the show, and thus it's a great gift for theater buffs.

Rating:

- A NICE AND RARE MUSICAL
Considered a "cult" music by some specialists, this album is quite a treat. Some songs are beautiful ("It's Superman") and, as a whole, you have a nice, funny moment listening to it. Highly recommended to musical collectors since it is quite a rare and unique musical. I wonder why it flopped in New York...

Rating:

- Good music,but doesn't play on all players
It's A Bird ... It's A Plane ... It's Superman (1966 Original Broadway Cast)
I like the CD, but it doesn't play on all CD players. Printed information in the CD case seems to be for the cassette version. People with older or fussier CD players may want to be aware of possible problems.

Rating:

- Broadway run NOT a Flop!!!
Some reviewers below have attributed the short run of this Broadway musical to the obvious conclusion that it was a [commercial] flop.
NOT SO! It was a huge sell-out success [with an unprecedented four matinees per week in addition to the standard 6 nightlies per week], and would have continued for many years were it not for the ongoing suit between Superman's creators, Mssrs Siegel & Shuster, and DC Comics. Siegel and Shuster's lawyers served notice on the producers of the show that the profits would be frozen as being in question due to DC not having the right to option the character, and the legal situation was though so expensive to fight from the producers end that they folded the show. A similar situation forced another critically and commercial Broadway hit to cease: A Day In Hollywood A Night In The Ukraine, a musical revue which featured three young and brilliant actors succesfully playing the roles of the Marx Bros [especially the woman mime who played a male Harpo], was sadly sued out of existence by the heirs of the brothers.
As librettist/lyricist Dick Vosburgh puts in his liner notes to the original Broadway cast album, few could have dreamed that he, "a Marx [Brothers] obsessed New Jersey-born comedy writer living in England, would adapt [Anton Chekhov's play] The Bear as a musical in the [Marx Brothers'] Night at the Opera style, find a man capable of both playing the 'Chico' [Marx] role, and of writing the music [Frank Lazarus], open in a tiny off West End theater..., see it transfer to the West End..., win a couple of awards..., and wind up a Broadway hit directed and choreographed by Tommy Tune...." (Opening at the Golden Theatre in New York on May 1, 1980, the show ran a healthy 588 performances.)

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