Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Musical "The Phantom of the Opera" Korean cast
  Recently, performing art's market in flourishing in Korea. The number of people who go to watch plays and concerts is increasing. However, more than anything, the popularity of the musical significantly increasing. Until less than a decade ago, there were not so many musicals performing, and most of those were Broadway musicals. People in the musical market tended to translate some of the world-wide popular musicals and perform that. On the other hand, there are more number of musicals created in Korea these days. Most of the time, the Broadway musicals performed in Korea is in large scales, and the actors and actresses are widely famous. On the contrary, the musicals created in Korea are performed in smaller theaters with fewer people, and most of time those actors and actresses are less famous.


"Spring Awakening" Korean cast


                       I love musicals, and I've watched number of musicals played in Korea. I've watched many of the Broadway musicals in Korea, including Hedwig, Dream girls, Grease, Chicago, Spring Awakening, and Broadway 42nd st.. Their stage is huge and I could say that they put a huge amount of money for the shows. On the other hand, the musicals with smaller scale usually doesn't have much of stage setting or famous actors or actresses. However, in some reasons, I liked those smaller scaled musicals more than the Broadway ones. When I watched the Broadway musicals in Korea, I felt somewhat awkward about the lyrics, since they are just translated from other languages, usually from English. Also, I cannot feel the communication between the actors and actresses and the audiences, which I could find from the musicals in smaller scales. Maybe these are the reasons why Korean musicals are so flourishing without fancy stage, large theater, or famous cast.

1 comment:

  1. This is awesome. I just saw the Heritage Hall production of Phantom of the Opera, so it was cool to see your photo on this blog and read about the performing arts in Korea.

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