#the bootlegs i linked could get taken down and i'd hate that

[riddlerosehearts]

I was wondering if you had a particular place where you watched musicals at and if you could recommend me some musicals to watch if so? O: The ones you've been reblogging look so good!

okay, so it can honestly be really hard to find a way to watch a lot of broadway muscials because there often aren’t professional recordings or movie versions so you either have to go searching for a bootleg or just settle for the soundtrack. people unfortunately often have to use clips that are available on youtube or sharpen up low quality bootlegs to make gifsets, and i basically just search “(show name) bootleg” on youtube or here on tumblr and see what i can find tbh dfgkfs. most bootlegs aren’t exactly great quality either but we take what we can get. broadway sadly isn’t the most accessible thing to get into.

but even though there’s not 1 easy place to watch them all, i can still recommend some of my favorite musicals!! i really really love musical theater so i’ll try to stick to just 5 skjgfhdf but here’s another post i made last time someone asked me about musical recs! this will get kinda long so i’ll stick it under a readmore! also, i’m gonna mostly list different ones from the other post i made, so if you’re curious about any of those or really any of the musicals you see me blog about feel free to ask!

1. one of my favorite musicals of all time is wicked, which is based on a book that’s basically a wizard of oz prequel about elphaba, the wicked witch of the west, and glinda the good witch, who become best friends in school! it’s about as cheesy as it sounds but i adore it and i have a youtube playlist of the soundtrack, and there’s also a bootleg with the original cast on youtube!

2. something that’s quickly becoming one of my favorites is hadestown, a musical that adapts the greek myth of orpheus and eurydice–where orpheus journeys into the underworld to save his wife and fails to rescue her at the last second–into a somewhat more modern retelling set to folk music! its official broadway cast album isn’t out yet and it’s gone through a looot of changes through each of its productions, but full audio of the broadway version is available here, i have a playlist of the original workshop version’s music here, and a (very low quality but it’s all that currently exists afaik) video of the london version is here.

3. newsies is based on a 1992 movie musical of the same name, and is about a group of underpaid newsboys from 19th century new york rising up to go on strike, which probably sounds very boring but i like the characters a lot and the music is a ton of fun. and it stars jeremy jordan, who also plays varian in tangled the series! there’s actually a professionally filmed version of it that can be watched here, and i also have a youtube playlist of the soundtrack.

4. the prom is about a lesbian student named emma whose school prom gets canceled so that she won’t be allowed to bring her girlfriend alyssa, and four broadway actors who try to help her because they see it as an opportunity to get good press. it has really fun music and an adorable canon lesbian couple! here’s a playlist of the broadway soundtrack, but the only bootleg i’ve been able to find is from pre-broadway so it will have different lyrics and a slightly different cast, though you can still watch it here. (edit because i forgot to say this the first time: the playlist i linked includes 2 different versions of the song “you happened” and that’s because the song was changed drastically when the musical moved to broadway but i prefer the old version adkjfsgs, so i put the broadway version on there first and the old one second because i wanted them both in my playlist)

5. rent is a rock musical that follows the life of a group of friends, most of whom are broke and/or performance artists, living during the aids crisis in the late 1980s-early 1990s, and most of whom are also lgbt and/or poc! i’m very bad at explaining rent’s story but it’s really uplifting and a little sad, the cast is extremely diverse, and every song is awesome. here’s a youtube playlist of the songs, and a professionally recorded version of the musical itself is here, although it will have a different cast than the songs in the playlist. there’s also a movie which is a bit different but still good, though i’m not sure of a free place to watch it.

you can also check out the website stagedork and see what bootlegs people have uploaded to it!! for example i can see that aladdin, frozen, and the lion king are on it right now, and they’re all based on the popular disney movies of the same name and are all pretty good imo!