#Rivals to lovers is a great trope!!! I love it!! but it is so distinctly different from enemies to lovers

[lostlavenderer]

Not to be a trope purist but we're calling everything enemies to lovers these days. Like I'll see a book labelled enemies to lovers in some ya section and then it's like a dancers setting or an office romance. Like babes unless there are evil plots, genuine hatred and at least a slight intention to kill, then those are RIVALS to lovers at best. Which is a fine trope in and of itself but pls get it right I'm begging you I can't stand to see another bland and knife-to-the-throat-less romance be labelled as enemies to lovers I just can't

[mal-urameshi]

Hearts Under Pressure

A/N: Hey hey everyone! So in my dusty Asks, I remember I had asked about what trope you wanted and a good few of you mentioned Academic Rivals/Enemies to lovers! Now here's the kicker. I distinctly remember, IIRC, @roseamongroses put in a detailed request, however, tumblr at the time deleted it? Because I never touched it. But it had been on my mind ever since and I was like yo! When I have time I must make it a reality! So in my comeback, I'm doing my best to give you guys some decent literature while dusting off my rust! Let's goo!

Pushing, shoving, crowding, loud murmurs and squeaking of shoes against tile and or hard-wood floors. All tell-tale signs of students who are eager, desperate, essentially feral to find out about their academic standing.

Sighs of relief, woeful groans and the occasional hiccup leading to wails of horror wafted through Shuri's ears.

This was not new to her, nor did the reactions of her colleagues phase her. Shuri staggered forward as another worried student fought and shoved their way to the front of the crowd in hopes to find their name at a decent rank.

Shuri had no need to fight her way to the front row, however. Her eyes automatically zoned in on the name at the top of the list.

'Shuri Udaku.' stared back at her in bold font.

That was all she needed to know. Turning away, she manoeuvred herself out of the classroom and headed down the hallway. And just like that the first semester of her second year had concluded.

The courses weren't particularly hard, yet her colleagues never posed much of a challenge to her. Their efforts were decent at best, but they were a far cry from being able to intellectually stimulate her.

For the entirety of her academic tenure thus far, she topped every class she'd been in. The lecturers praised her and certain students envied her performance. That was to be expected.

Don't get her wrong, she wasn't bragging or being boastful, nothing of the sort. She was simply unmatched.

Glancing at her watch, she decided to go get something to eat to kick off her week-long break.

Monday came quickly which meant classes had resumed. Shuri adjusted her shades as she walked through campus. Her first class was in the next five minutes so she hurried along the parking lot.

The revving of an engine caught her ears, and right as she turned around her heart nearly leaped out of her chest.

Luckily, the car braked in the nick of time, else she would have been road kill.

The driver's side of the car opened and a short girl with cornrows stepped out, "Yo! I'm so sorry! I coulda killed you just now. Thank God I didn't, right?" The girl tried to laugh it off, "I thought I fixed the braking issue but I should take a look at it later."

Shuri took a step back from the...she gave the car a once over. It was a red Ford Mustang. It looked to be in great condition. Save for the questionable mechanics.

"I'm just grateful you didn't kill me. I'd love to stay and chat, but I have a class to get to and I'd hate to be late." And with that, Shuri turned on her heel and walked off to class.

Not before looking back at the girl one last time. She was cute.

It seemed Bast herself was looking out for Shuri as she somehow made it to class with time to spare. She took out her notebook and began scribbling some notes as the teacher broke down the syllabus for the semester.

Twenty minutes later the door to the classroom opened, drawing the attention of the class.

"Sorry Teach! I was looking for a parking space but I couldn't find one. I had to improvise."

Shuri recognized the girl as her almost-murderer from earlier.

"I don't need excuses. Just find a seat so I may continue with my class."

The girl nodded and looked for the closest vacant seat. Once seeing one she made her way to it. In her short trek, she recognized Shuri and waved to her before she sat down.

Shuri gave the lecturer her utmost attention after that and once it was time to leave she packed up her things and began her departure. However, something, or rather someone still seated at one of the desks caught her eye. It was the girl who almost killed her from this morning.

She was fast asleep. Was she even paying attention after she came in? She'll miss her next class if she kept that up. Not that it was any of Shuri's business how this girl chose to spend her time.

"Hello? Excuse me?" Shuri poked the girl which caused her to rouse.

"Class is over. You should vacate the room. Unless you have another class scheduled here?"

The girl sharply inhaled and rubbed her eyes, "Oh shit. I didn't realize I knocked out. That lecturer was so boring, talking in Times New Roman font and all that." She chuckled to herself.

Shuri didn't humor her with a laugh. Clearly she doesn't have her priorities in check if she willfully fell asleep in classes as she does.

Having enough chit-chat, Shuri walked out of the room and headed to her next class, but she heard hurried footsteps following behind her.

"My name is Riri by the way! And sorry again about this morning. Is there anything I can do to make it up to you?"

Shuri looked down at the girl, "No. I'm not dead, so we can put that whole thing behind us."

"Oh, okay. By the way, I like your accent, where is it from?"

"I'm from Wakanda." Shuri simply stated.

"That's cool! But I still feel bad about this morning. Here's what, if you have trouble with any of your school work, I can tutor you, no charge."

Shuri nearly faltered at the proposition and couldn't help the smirk that formed on her face.

'She wants to tutor me? Someone who is unable to stay conscious during a class session.'

What a laughable proposition.

"I have not seen you here before. Are you new?"

Riri haughtily rubbed her pointer finger under her nose, "Yea. I just transferred here on scholarship."

"Congratulations."

"Thanks!"

Shuri stopped at the door to her next class, "This is where we part ways. I'll see you around."

"What a coincidence!" Riri pointed at the door, "This is where my next class is!"

Shuri pushed open the door, "After you."

Riri found herself a seat and Shuri opted to find one higher up the rows. She preferred a more secluded space for optimal performance.

However, as class went on, she couldn't help but stare at Riri during the duration of the class.

She didn't take notes, she looked bored and at times she had her head on the desk, which gave the impression that she was sleeping.

Was Riri just here for attendance?

It's such a shame that a scholarship was wasted on her. Granted, she didn't know her that long but just off her disposition in class, Shuri had all she needed to know about the girl.

As the weeks progressed Riri made quite the name for herself. One, she was quite loud and rowdy. Getting into it with entitled white boys. Something about them not paying their dues.

Shuri was fairly certain it was perhaps an issue with scamming. As far as she knew, Riri charges for doing other people's assignments. But as far as she's observed the girl learns nothing in class. Having not seen her take a single note since she came here.

Hm. Well, she doesn't have to be good at the work if you think about it. She is charging them to do the assignment, it doesn't have to be correct. Shuri respected the hustle. Taking advantage of lazy students to make ends meet is one way to do things.

Hopefully Riri knew what she was doing. She had everything to lose with that scholarship and everything.

Not that Shuri particularly cared. Exams will chew the poor girl up and spit her out in due time.

Midterms rolled around soon enough and a tale as old as time, Shuri was ready for them. It just so happened that Riri and her shared almost every class she was enrolled in this semester. So they saw each other quite frequently but with very little interaction.

It wasn't that Shuri was avoiding the girl but they definitely wouldn't have anything in common so it made no sense trying to interact further. Saving herself the trouble made the most logical sense.

To Shuri's surprise, though it shouldn't, Riri was the first person to leave the room after submitting her paper. That was to be expected of someone who barely paid attention in class. She gave a mental clap for her not staying and wasting her time.

It went on like that for the rest of exams as well. Within the first hour or less, she was the first out of the room. Pity.

And yet, Riri didn't look like she had a care in the world. She joked around and carried herself with that same laid-back air about herself.

It befuddled Shuri, but as the Americans say, if Riri liked it, then she loved it.

The next week rolled around as results were finally posted from midterms.

Pushing, shoving, crowding,loud murmurs and squeaking of shoes against tile and or hard-wood floors. All tell-tale signs of students who are eager, desperate, essentially feral to find out about their academic standing.

Sighs of relief, woeful groans and the occasional hiccup leading to wails of horror wafted through Shuri's ears.

This was not new to her, nor did the reactions of her colleagues phase her. Shuri staggered sideways as a worried student fought and shoved their way to the front of the crowd in hopes of finding their name at a decent rank.

Shuri had no need to fight her way to the front row, however. Her eyes automatically zoned in on the name at the top of the list.

However, her mouth hung in shock at the name in bold font.

'Riri Williams.'

Her eyes dropped to the second rank where her name was placed, 'Shuri Udaku.'

"Impossible." Shuri licked her lips in disbelief.

"Holy crap! I'm number one here too! That's 5 outta 7. " Someone said beside her.

Shuri looked to her side and regarded Riri who had a satisfied smirk on her face.

"You were this close, huh?" She looked up at Shuri, "You're a decent rival."

Shuri's eyebrow twitched behind her shades.

This...this girl who never pays attention in class, who blusters and boasts around campus like she owns the place. Never takes notes. She bested her in academics.

Clearly the lecturers were off mentally because there was no way she topped her 5 out of 7 times.

Shuri shoved her hands into the pockets of her tracksuit and walked out of the classroom. Much to her surprise and slight annoyance, Riri was by her side.

"Bet you wished you took me up on my offer in tutoring you now." Riri boasted.

Shuri scoffed, "I don't need help with tutoring."

"Says the girl that's second to me." Riri sing-songed.

Shuri stopped and turned to Riri. She raised her sunglasses to look at her properly, "I suggest you don't get too comfortable. Luck was at your side this time around."

She didn't know why she was so agitated. Yes, actually she did know. It was because Riri beat her.

"Nah, I don't believe in luck." Riri crossed her arms, "It's all skill and brains. My offer still stands, I'll tutor you free of charge. My dorm's always open."

Shuri gave her a once over before replacing her sunglasses, "You'd love that, wouldn't you?"

She has an attitude, beauty and brains. A trifecta.

Riri shrugged, not trusting herself to answer.

A few days later, after their papers were returned, Shuri sought Riri out. Luckily it didn't take long as she was munching on a sandwich under a tree.

"I want to compare grades." Shuri demanded as she plopped herself down opposite Riri.

"Well hello to you too." Riri eyed Shuri.

"Yes hello, now let me see your papers. Quickly."

Riri rolled her eyes but did as was told. Shuri removed her shades and went over each question. Her frown deepened with each paper she compared.

Riri bested her by varying percentages. Ranging between two or point five.

Shuri threw the papers on the grass and rubbed her forehead, "And here I was thinking you were an idiot and would eventually drop out."

"Excuse me?" Riri narrowed her eyes. She really didn't want to get into it with this girl.

"I want to extend my deepest apologies for judging a book by its cover. Because you never showed an interest in class up until this point, I was under the impression you would have flunked out. But your grades say otherwise."

"Uh. Thanks. It's light work for a genius, you know?"

"So I assume you knew all the material before hand?"

Riri nodded, "Yea, I went over the syllabus before each class and brushed up on what I needed to know and just show up for attendance. It's not that hard."

"At least I was right about one thing." She stretched herself out on the grass and cradled her head in her palm.

"Don't get comfortable though. That was only a one-time thing. I had gotten complacent is all."

"If you hadn't gotten complacent then you wouldn't be so tight about me pulling the rug out from under you. That sounds like a you problem."

Shuri exhaled through her nose. She was right. She shouldn't take out her frustrations on her. Clearly she was intelligent. Riri had more depth to her than Shuri gave her credit for, so it was indeed a 'her' problem.

"You look good without your shades. I mean you look good with them on too, it's just that you look better with them off."

Shuri laughed, "Thank you. I love your straightbacks."

"Thanks." She took a bite out of her sandwich, "You know I assumed you had social anxiety or something."

"Why is that?"

"You always sat to the back of the class and with your shades on too so I assumed you don't like to make eye contact. And you don't talk to anyone. Only time you did was when I initiated a conversation with you."

Shuri nodded, "I get why you may assume that. I just tend to be in my own world and nobody approaches me. I've been told I am intimidating and that I stare a lot so I wear my shades. But it's mostly because I think I look cool with them on. Don't you think? I look mysterious and all that."

Riri braced herself against the tree and wheezed in laughter, "Because you look mysterious?!"

"And cool." She clicked her tongue, winked and waved finger guns.

"You're corny as hell, Shuri."

Shuri's mouth gaped while holding a hand over her chest, "I am not!"

Riri smiled and shrugged as Shuri gathered the papers and neated them.

"Well, I'm glad you came along, you'll make things more interesting for me, seeing that I met my match and all."

Riri gave Shuri a look, "Are we still talking about academics here?"

Shuri smoothed a hand over her undercut in contemplation, "Do you want me to be talking about something else?"

"If you wanna say something, you should say it with your chest. I don't care for beating around the bush." Riri said matter-of factly.

"Okay. Seeing that I clearly don't need your tutoring I'd like an alternative offer in you making it up to me. Since my family could have been mourning my death and all that."

"Go on." Riri encouraged.

"We should go out on a date together." Shuri looked at Riri and waited on her reaction.

"Okay, sure. We can do that." RIri grinned.

Shuri fist pumped in glee, "Good how's tomorrow after our last class?"

"Sounds good."

[gyuphorias]

SVT &&. ROMANCE TROPES

PAIRING — ot13 svt / reader

WORD COUNT — 0.8k+

GENRE &&. WARNINGS — romance, fluff &&. no warnings

FROM THE AUTHOR — as a connoisseur of books, especially contemporary romance, i feel that it is my duty to assign seventeen some of my favorite tropes. (also sorry for being away so long this summer has been ... less than great but we're powering through)

— seungcheol &&. billionaire / ceo

choi seungcheol is the heir to some company or another. you're an emotional companion, a secretary, maybe just a college student with big dreams. maybe he's got conditions to fulfill before he receives his dues: grow up, hold down a steady relationship, prove that he's mature enough to head up a multi billion dollar company.

— jeonghan &&. forced proximity

for as long as you've known yoon jeonghan, you've found him a pain to be around, argumentative and sharp at the edges. even since day one, you longed for the life that was distinctly before jeonghan. you've made a point of keeping your distance until you're forced into a position where you have to spend time with the only man on earth who has ever compelled you to commit a violent crime against another human being.

— joshua &&. best friend's brother

when you were younger, you never really gave a fuck about your best friend's older brother. he was just some guy lurking on the outermost parts of your peripheral, a ghost of your childhood memories. just a few years older than you, he was always expressly off-limits, per the best friend law. after he graduated and left for college, you never thought much of him... until you reconnect later in life.

— jun &&. will they, won't they

maybe you're best friends, just acquaintances, playful rivals. any way you cut it, you and moon junhui are playing circles around each other. you've both got feelings for the other, but due to incompetency, nervousness, both, or something else entirely, you won't admit it. the onlookers have a bet going on.

— hoshi &&. love at first sight

kwon soonyoung loves loud and he loves hard, and the first time he sees you, he knows he has to make you his. you're wary and quarrelsome about his feelings, truly putting him on the ropes to prove it to you that he loves you the way he says he does. he's over the top and annoying, but at some point, it becomes endearing instead of irritating.

— wonwoo &&. strangers to lovers

he's a student circulation assistant at your campus library, you're a frequent patron to use the nice macbooks and editing software provided to you through your college tuition, always booking your study rooms and equipment for you. alternatively, you're the sweet barista who gives him extra whipped cream on all of his cold drinks or slips him a fudge brownie every once in a while, free of charge. they're small kindnesses, but sweet.

— woozi &&. i hate everyone but you

you and lee jihoon are an unlikely pairing; a chemistry-biology double major and a music major just don't come together so well in some people's minds. he's quiet and closed off, content to be with someone in complete silence, with an air of "everyone in the world sucks." that's the jihoon everyone else sees, but you get a different version of him, a special version that's reserved just for you.

— dk &&. slow burn

lee seokmin is every bit the hopeless romantic. he reads contemporary romance, loves romcoms, and fawns over relationship videos on tiktok. whether you start out as strangers or friends, your relationship with him takes a while to turn into full-out romance, but it's certainly worth the wait, especially for a man who gets all of his smooth lines and tricks from his romance novels.

— mingyu &&. second chance

your first romantic foray with kim mingyu really wasn't that bad: he loved you, took care of you, treated you the way you deserved to be treated. but you were at different points in your life, you wanted different things, so you broke up. when you cross paths again, you've got a lot more in common now than you used to.

— the8 &&. grumpy / sunshine

xu minghao has always had a bit of an... attitude problem, at least according to most of the people who have ever talked about him around you. at first glance, you'd believe it - he's prim, proper with an air of superiority that surrounds him. the more time you spend around him, though, the more he drops that guard around you.

— seungkwan &&. enemies / rivals to lovers

childhood slights or adult disagreements, academic rivals or professional competition. boo seungkwan has been your arch nemesis for as long as you care to remember. you long for the days you've deemed b.s., before seungkwan, which is fitting considering he's full of bullshit. your relationship is turblent, to say the least, but the people around you are tired of putting up with it.

— vernon &&. one of us is famous / celebrity

maybe vernon chwe is still a kpop idol, maybe a famous video game streamer, maybe something else. whatever his occupation may be, he's the famous one and you're seemingly the only person on the face of the earth who is both chronically online and completely unaware of who he is, despite his status. it doesn't irritate him, perse, but rather intrigued.

— dino &&. bad boy / good girl

lee chan is the town heathen, the boy with nothing to lose, no success in the foreseeable future. truthfully, he's an enigma who has always intrigued you, the town sweetheart, the one with everything to gain. your parents, of course, warned you to stay away from him when you were younger, but now that you're an adult, they can't stop you from unraveling the mystery of him.

© gyuphorias, 2022. please do not copy, repost, or translate my work without my permission.

[theconservativebrief]

Gettin’ the Band Together, now playing on Broadway at the Belasco Theatre, is an original musical about a down-and-out stockbroker who gets his high school band back together in time to face off against his old rival in his New Jersey hometown’s Battle of the Bands.

That’s it. That’s the whole show. On paper, it sounds pretty boring: a stockbroker? An all-dude rock band? From Jersey? Is this really what the world needs in 2018?

But I suspected there must have been some reason that in this age of high-glitz adaptations of movies and other blockbusters, this unassuming original rock musical had struggled its way from a small-town Jersey stage to Broadway, and so I set out for the Belasco hoping to find magic and wisdom and a reflection of the self, or at the very least a fun evening.

The onstage story of Gettin’ the Band Back Together is a basic battle of good and evil — of following dreams versus settling for mundanity — playing out in song and dance. As a fellow theatergoer who’d already seen the show described it, it’s basically the movie Dodgeball but with rock music. And that’s not a bad thing, unless you hate fun.

Gettin’ the Band Back Together is a warm, infectious delight. Yes, it’s true that the show has been prominently panned because its shamelessly tropey plot is packed with dorky, improv-style humor that constantly pelts you with silly jokes, visual gags, cheesy puns, physical comedy, and references to other rock musicals. But it works anyway, because it’s performed with deep joy, it’s extremely well-sung, and it’s delivered with charm by an ensemble having the time of their lives. If you let all of these things speak to you, as you should, then at some point during the performance, you will inevitably reach that wonderful moment where you are laughing purely because you are laughing.

It’s this feeling that illustrates what ultimately made a lasting impression on me as I alternately laughed and cringed my way through the show: not the onstage battle between bands, but an offstage one. The musical that Gettin’ the Band Back Together is trying to be is distinctly at odds with the current Broadway culture — embodied by an unmoved audience at the performance I attended — that unfairly expects it to be something more.

The truth is that Gettin’ the Band Back Together is a delightful show. But even if it weren’t, I would be writing this review with my heart on my sleeve to tell you all to go see it, because it’s one of those musicals that earnestly strives to be exactly what it is: a good-hearted, shamelessly self-indulgent trope factory built on fun and silliness. And in this age of problematic faves and anxiety-laden media consumption, this show, practically wholesome in its throwback juvenilia, is the rare offering that isn’t going to make you feel bad for liking it — even though it’s inane.

In that spirit, it’s reminiscent of another recent tropey, heartwarming cultural offering: Netflix’s To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before. On some level, Gettin’ the Band Back Together is the movie’s Broadway equivalent — a sort of To All the Bands (or Least Rock Musicals) I’ve Loved Before. So what if its storyline is familiar? So what if it openly embraces every clichéd tale of down-and-out has-beens getting their groove back? Just like To All the Boys, its execution is solid, and its cast is charismatic. In essence, it’s a “cheesy cover band” equivalent of a rock musical. And that’s perfectly fine; after all, there’s a reason people love cheesy cover bands.

Put another way, Gettin’ the Band Back Together is one giant dad joke, if your dad were still a kid at heart, and that kid was a giant Nickelodeon fan who never got over Ren and Stimpy going downhill after season two, who secretly cried when My So-Called Life ended before Angela and Brian got together, who definitely got drunk at Bonnaroo and wrote “fuck Nickelback” on a fence while stoned; someone who, in adulthood, probably owns a Blu-ray of Drumline because he wants to be close to that movie in a physical way; someone who just wants his kid to be happy and kind and motivated by love rather than by a capitalist reading of the American dream.

The show sports a decently catchy, fun score by Mark Allen, making his Broadway debut. The cast — led by the charmingly winsome Mitchell Jarvis as Mitch, our stockbroker-cum-band reuniter, lover, dreamer, and Alex Brightman impersonator — performs it with loud conviction. But the real star of Gettin’ the Band Back Together is the book, which comes to us via veteran producer Ken Davenport and the improv comedy troupe Grundleshotz, in a literal “Hey, gang! Let’s put on a show!” process. (Among the Grundleshotz improv performers is Jay Klaitz, who doubles as Mitch’s MILF-obsessed, stoner best friend Bart.)

Grundleshotz, Davenport, and Allen have infused Gettin’ the Band Back Together with so much energy that it leaks out of the stage at random moments, punctuating an endless stream of jokes that succeed due to the sheer enthusiasm and dedication of the show’s cast, and to their own shameless silliness.

Writing down the jokes can’t translate their onstage effectiveness as a litany of Dadaist dork humor, but here are a few: There’s a dead cat. There’s a “nuns and roses” quip. There’s an R&B singer who turns love songs into domestic disputes. There’s a character whose only purpose in life is to take selfies. There’s a spray-tanned villain who drives a Pontiac Solstice and just wants to be loved. There’s a love ballad composed entirely of bad puns about police. There’s a running “your mom” gag. There’s every kind of New Jersey in-joke you can wedge into a two-hour running time. There’s a one-liner that’s such a cute, absurdist mix of juvenile humor and randomness that it literally stops the show.

I should repeat that: The songs are solid and fun, but it’s the jokes, not the songs, that you’ll remember.

Taken on their own, the jokes in Gettin’ the Band Back Together are nothing unique or exhilarating, but they work because the cast is so committed to selling them. In fact, I have rarely seen a more committed, joyous ensemble work so hard to win over a dead audience than I did during my Thursday night show. I’ve never seen a cast sing their hearts out with more glee and vibrance in the face of a crowd that clearly rejected the kind of show they were attending. Thank god for my seatmates Tyler and Bradley, who were there to see the show for the second time in a week, and who were living for Gettin’ the Band Back Together the way only we queer Broadway fans living through the homophobic cake years can.

“This is the kind of show I can take my Trump-voting brother to and we’ll bond over it,” Tyler told me before the show started.

“I cried,” Bradley added.

“It’s so dumb,” Tyler gushed to me at intermission. “It’s so dumb, isn’t it amazing?”

This show is so dumb, and it is amazing. It is so funny, so soft and joyous, that during intermission, I texted a friend who refused to come see it with me solely to upbraid her for her mistake. Meanwhile, my betrayer audience sat unmoved by the endless adorkable hilarity playing out in front of them. And every second that the sea of unenthused faces around me refused to be swept along by the ebullient hopes and dreams of a bunch of New Jersey ’90s kids who just wanted to have fun again, I resented not only them but the modern theater industry itself.

After all, only Broadway could build an American musical legacy out of exploiting camp for its cultural mileage, and yet somehow wind up increasingly abandoning ironic forms of entertainment — including “so bad it’s good” enjoyment.

In recent years, Broadway has conditioned audiences to expect either high-budget remakes with canned messages and blatant crowd-pandering (last season’s Spongebob comes to mind) or high-budget sophistication à la Dear Evan Hansen. Hell, even Gettin’ the Band Back Together, with its crop of references to aging rock artists, was designed to appeal to a certain crowd of baby boomers, to its detriment and their apathy.

But at heart, this isn’t a musical for boomers; instead, it represents and caters to the kind of media-savvy fan who fully embraces absurdity and silliness in their pop culture (the sillier, the better). As such, Gettin’ the Band Back Together desperately needs a younger audience, or at least a better older one.

Who were these people sitting around me who refused to show any enthusiasm for a stellar ensemble that served up some of the strongest group vocals I’ve heard since Evan Hansen? Who were these people who sat largely unmoved while our band of heroes rocked a bar mitzvah, reminisced about the roller coasters at Six Flags Great Adventure, and overcame numerous trials and obstacles to not only find love and happiness but receive a deus ex machina from none other than a fictional version of Aerosmith’s Joe Perry?

As it happened, a good portion of my fellow audience members had apparently come to see Gettin’ the Band Back Together because they’d received comped or discounted tickets as part of Broadway deal websites like Show Score. Through these kinds of watch-and-rate deals, some theatergoers — thanks to retirement, or sheer determination — are able to see upward of five shows a week.

That’s great for them, and ostensibly it should be good for shows that open in the summer, like this one. Late-summer Broadway openings tend to be rare for New York, because the tourist crowd doesn’t gravitate toward new releases that don’t already have strong buzz; you need New Yorkers to see those shows, and in August, they’re often away.

So these websites help fill seats during the offseason, which is a win. But it’s easy to see how they can hurt shows like this one, which wind up being viewed by an assembly line of people looking for deals first and feels second. It struck me that while teenage audiences were being encouraged, off-Broadway, to Be More Chill, on 44th Street, the cast of Gettin’ the Band Back Together was pleading with their older, middle-class audience to be less chill. And, miracle of miracles, eventually the audience at my show thawed out; gradually, more and more of them seemed to open their hearts to the silliness and sincerity of this show, its complete lack of irony and pretense, its sheer eagerness to make you laugh.

But they couldn’t have done it without my dudes Bradley and Tyler, whose constant laughter kept the orchestra section on life support all night. Late in the third act, veteran Marilu Henner, who plays Mitch’s mom with brassy warmth, came halfway up the aisle just to film the two of them — cast members breaking the fourth wall to film the audience is not an infrequent practice on Broadway these days, but rarely is it done with such specificity — as they lost their minds over the big finale number, when Mitch and the band finally play the Battle of the Bands. It’s exciting!

I was happy for them both, these pure-hearted theater lovers receiving a pure-hearted musical blessing, and feeding all their love and energy back to this hard-working, earnest cast. That is what we come to the theater for. That is Broadway at its core, stripped of size and massive budgets and pretension, until all that remains is love and communion.

At intermission, I’d overheard one of the comped five-show-a-week people say, with a shrug, “Maybe it’ll run for a few weeks.”

Fuck that.

Go see Gettin’ the Band Back Together. Enter with love and leave with laughter. May it, and all the other plucky, misunderstood musicals of its ilk, run forever.

Original Source -> Why critics are scorning new rock musical Gettin’ the Band Back Together — and why it deserves your love

via The Conservative Brief