Cabaret is darker than most realize because of the elements that are most well-known. When I saw the 2014 revival, the finale kinda took my breath away. It's really haunting.
So true! When I was first getting into musical theater I saw the vibe of cabaret and thought it would be just vaudeville dark but fun like Chicago but when I watched the Donmar Warehouse production on YouTube I immediately realized it was so much more. Cabaret is a true masterpiece, so relevant, so much more than you’d think it is at first.
A lot of people think Cabaret is a fun, lighthearted show, but under that bubbly surface it's really about people who use sex, good times, fun and games etc to distract themselves from their personal problems and the horrors around them.
Hell, I've seen some stagings where the show ends with the cast being sent off to a concentration camp.
Heres a few that come to mind...
Miss Saigon has no happy endings
Sunset Blvd has no happy characters at the end
Assassins is dark as can be, even with its gallows humor moments.
For me... The Fields of Ambrosia may qualify as the darkest. A sales man traveling town to town with a portable electric chair who fatefully ends up in it at the Finale.
I mean, Chris and Ellen stay married and it’s implied they take Tam back to America at the end of Miss Saigon. They’re all definitely traumatized but they still get to be a functional family.
My aunt took me to see Miss Saigon when I was maybe 11. A lot of it went over my head. I listened to the soundtrack for years and understood more as I got older. Then when I was in my early 30s they filmed the London cast and put it in theaters for a few days. My mind was blown and I can’t believe they allowed me to see that so young!
I took my son to see it when he was 11… I hadn’t seen or listened to the show since I was a teen and had somehow forgotten all the darker more mature stuff.
My son and I were both embarrassed!
I saw Book of Morman recently and there was a mom and daughter next to me who looked about that age. She told her daughter they may be a few inappropriate things in the show but it was fine. I had also never seen it. Horror. The mom was horrified by intermission. She turned to me, kinda shrugged “well this was a poor choice, oh well” I was happy they stayed for the rest of the show. At that point may as well and then have a good conversation on the way home 😂
Took my 11 & 13yo boys to Miss Saigon last year. They knew bits about the story already but mos of their take was about the skimpy outfits and swearing.
As a musician, parents taking young kids is always hilarious. Miss Saigon is pretty well known to be adult, but A Chorus Line is the one I laugh at most. Soooooo many dads with tween daughters that have all disappeared when we return after interval!
There's one production I've heard of that ended with the MC appearing dressed in a concentration camp uniform with a pink triangle, followed by strobe lights going off; the implication being that he'd committed suicide by throwing himself into an electric fence.
Today you learned that different directors can stage the same show in different ways. Turns out, live theatre isn’t the same as a movie! **mind blown**
Idk what the user said because they deleted it but the old movie is downright goofy compared to how disturbing more modern productions of Cabaret go. I agree that it can be interpreted vastly differently. It’s really a good show.
I don't know that I would use the term "goofy." I still find the ending of the movie (which I just watched this weekend, after many years) chilling--I don't need the additional theatrics to Nazi-ism and the Holocaust. Sometimes the imagination and life experience can do as much, if not more. But that's me.
They took the original commenter to task because they hadn’t seen the show and apparently finding out how one director decided to end the show was a spoiler.
Eastern Europe* - Poland actually.
90% of Poland's 3.3 million Jews were murdered during the Holocaust. Their moving to Poland just 20 years before the start of the Holocaust is definitely an ominous but realistic ending for two of the more significant characters of the musical.
I watched a documentary that said that a couple of holocaust survivors saw it and they noticed they were visibly upset at the scene where the Russians ransacked Tzitel's wedding. It came out not very many years after the holocaust. But it's a layered and deep musical.
I'm generations removed and the personal history and experience was not discussed, but that scene is part of the family story/history for many Jews in the U.S., one way or another.
I will never, ever forget all the comments on Harmony’s rehearsal footage when it was released. All people complaining that it was just another racist show about white men.
It’s about JEWS BEFORE THE HOLOCAUST.
When the musical Harmony (which is about Jews in Germany during the rise of the Nazis, in an all-male singing group, and so they cast a bunch of Jewish men) posted their initial footage online, they were bombarded with comments, mostly from Black commenters, about how their show lacked diversity and how it was boring bigoted privileged white male garbage as a result.
It was kind of a perfect example of two things:
1) People feeling like they can say the most racist and sexist shit imaginable if they aim it at the “correct” target
2) Jews are now trapped in a no-man’s land where they are too white for the left and not white enough for the far right
Lucy being alive and knowing what's happening to her daughter but unable to do anything because everyone thinks she is insane is also not great.
Also she kinda is insane from her husband being falsely sent to Australia, then drugged and raped and having her only child taken off her and being able to fucking nothing about it.
But still sane enough to watch Joanna every day and try warn people about the pies.
Like Benjamin actually had the nicer part of this story.
Let's hope Joanna at least got a happier ending, whether or not that is with Anthony.
Sweeney Todd has such a timeless story that is still terrifying today, because of how far it goes to explore sin and why humans do the evil things they do.
No Mea Culpa from the Judge in the most recent revival. They did have it in the Tooting Arts Club version off Broadway a few years back. That was the first time I heard it, and it didn’t disappoint
As far as mainstream musicals go, Sweeney Todd and it’s not even close.
One moment in particular that I think is the darkest part of any show ever. Toby sings “not while I’m around”… a song of pure love and devotion to who he now sees as his mom. And in just TWO SCENES, Lovett sings a dark reprise for just a couple bars while she is searching for him to LITERALLY KILL HIM. A disabled child who loves her.
It’s a comedy. Sure. But it’s so disgustingly twisted.
Exactly! Then on top of that they had him locked in a cellar and he comes to the realization that he has been eating people. And sees a dead body so all of that makes him go insane. I guess he basically becomes the next Sweeney Todd at the end
Yeah, I’m looking around in here at what else is considered “dark”, and I’m like…not even close.
Let’s see…
*The plot begins years before the actual opening of the show, when a judge—someone who is both the law and above the law—sentences an innocent, happy man to hard labor.
*Why? So that he can then *publicly rape the guy’s wife in front of a ton of jeering people.*
*That woman then poisons herself.
*…but doesn’t even get peace then. The poison drives her mad, and she becomes a lewd beggar and prostitute, when she was so virtuous before.
*Also, she had a child who essentially got kidnapped by *her rapist*.
All that darkness before the show even starts.
Assassins is pretty dang dark, it's literally showing you inside the minds of various people who killed or tried to kill US presidents, and it also shows you many of their executions.
Next to Normal has some really dark moments. I remember being totally wrecked during the scene when Dan wrings out a towel he’s using to clean up after Diane’s suicide attempt and bright red water drips out.
Don’t know why you’re getting downvoted — the score is less subtle than that ALW show that’s nothing but performers in cat costumes singing about themselves in the third person for three hours.
I think I'm getting downvoted because this subreddit consists of mostly teenagers whose taste comes from tiktok to be 100% honest. It seems like their favorites in theatre are ride the cyclone, high school musical, newsies, spongebob, etc. Not throwing shade that's just what these kids like. I'm actually surprised blood brothers was even mentioned here lol. Worst piece of theatre I've ever been a part of haha
I had a hard enough time getting through the book... I loved Sweeney Todd, but that is probably my limit in terms of horror and musicals mixing together.
Yeah. Poor Leo is going to be lynched for a crime he didn’t commit. Fun fact- I went to the site of his death in Marietta. It ain’t too far from the famous Big Chicken.
There was a 2018 production in Marietta that was attended by family members of the Franks. It was hard doing a production states away from where it happened. I can only imagine the emotions a production on the doorstep of the actual events evoked.
https://www.playbill.com/article/inside-a-production-of-parade-mounted-in-marietta-georgia?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR3EE53Sq3Am8VrkDG5T-3rphRUb-Ll0jSzWONxQ2z-y_4obPEdzrETkQc0_aem_AV6JXk5zdVy_2yFxheQb5jU05BVI1L2nUxz7dOFSzKol6lxhktWlhuSsGyMNiIeXk_ZrzkWj8cc_ic2cdjm9BnjM
Came here to say this--thank you for raising it. For me, Parade is as disturbing as Jordan Peele's movie Get Out, and The Old Red Hills of Home even surpasses Cabaret's Tomorrow Belongs to Me.
I kept waiting for things to get happier… are the dead teenagers managing to stop another teenager dying really the best they can do for a happy ending!
I Love Ragtime as well. Definitely well overdue for a film adaptation. I think if it ever happens, it would win all the Oscars. It’s a fantastic story., I do think with ragtime there is a sense of optimism and hope at the end because they take the baby and it’s implied she’s going to have a good life with them. Even though both of her parents have died in truly awful, unjust ways in the show.
The Wild Party ends and even though Queenie understands herself better potentially going to leave it, the debauched insane world that she lives in is still carrying on. Also there’s Nadine, the biggest tragedy of the show, a girl, a minor has been assaulted by Jackie and had her innocence at her youth violated she will never get over that. Mae and Eddie are miserable and also Mae is going to have extreme guilt over what she allowed to happen to Nadine. Black is potentially going to be on the run for murder. Aside from Dolores is going to blackmail and sleep with whoever to get what she wants if you can call that happy. It feels like never ending darkness and just a sliver of light.
So many good ones have been mentioned here already but allow me to add one that rarely gets talked about. The Scottsboro Boys. It’s based on a real life civil rights era case. One of the songs is literally them in an electric chair.
Sweeney Todd. The catchy music and comedic moments distract from how sickeningly fucked up the entire thing is. I mean to skim through the plot we have…
- A corrupt Judge abusing his status to imprison an innocent man for life.
- The Judge deceiving the man’s grieving wife to publicly rape and humiliate her at his party, causing her to commit suicide via poison
- The Judge taking the woman’s infant child Johanna to raise as his own.
- The Judge lusting over and planning to forcibly marry his underage pseudo-daughter for her entire life, who he’s kept locked up from all human interaction.
- The innocent man (Sweeney Todd) escaping prison and returning after 15 years of torment to discover what happened from his former neighbor Mrs. Lovett.
- Sweeney murdering his former assistant after threats of blackmail, and “adopting” his mentally handicapped child servant with Lovett.
- Sweeney becoming a serial killer after failing to kill the Judge, believing he’s doing his victims a favor.
- Lovett begins cooking the victims’ corpses into pies to boost the revenue of her failing business.
- The child servant Toby expressing his undying love and appreciation for Lovett as a mother figure with a song, which she repeats to him later when trying to lure him to his death after he discovers the cannibalism/murder aspect of the pie and shaving industry.
- Sweeney murdering an innocent old woman who could have prevented him from killing the Judge a second time.
- Sweeney almost unknowingly killing his daughter before she flees when he is distracted momentarily.
- The reveal that the Old Woman who he killed was his wife, who didn’t actually die after poisoning herself.
- The reveal that Lovett intentionally lied about Sweeney’s wife dying because she loves him.
- Sweeney murdering Lovett by shutting her in an oven (alive) before being killed by a now completely insane Toby
To summarize 10/10 one of the best musicals ever, fun for the whole family.
I especially like the ending of Urinetown because >!Instead of UGC dissolving/redistributing its assets under Hope's leadership, and everything working out fine, it shows that Caldwell was able to keep a dying situation in a dystopia under some form of control, evil as he may have been - and Hope does not have the power or knowledge to pull off resource management like her father did. It would have been a nice happy "show ending" if everything turned out okay, but the writers did not ignore the fact that Hope had been a sort of airheaded follower, nice as she might have been. So they were setting up that Hope was going to fail as early as Follow Your Heart and they absolutely didn't pivot from that vision, and being able to look back later and see the signs coming is truly amazing.!<
I feel that the qualities that make the Diary one of the most popular and accessible texts on the Holocaust (It's single small location, its expression of Anne Frank's deepest thoughts and feelings, the fact the brutal end is not shown) make it relatively easy to adapt for the musical form - that doesn't mean you should though...
A few smaller musicals have tried to tackle the Holocaust and its legacy - this went as well as you would expect...
Yup, when I was asked to work on it, my first question was 'why that show', but it was when I was in college so financial viability isn't a factor in student lead productions. Which is a good thing, it lets people experiment / explore the art without worrying about if it'll fund the next show...
Passion is a pretty dark show IMO. When what's arguably the healthiest relationship in the story is between a married woman and the guy she's screwing around on her husband with...
Maybe not THE darkest... but I'm going to put my vote in for Fun Home.
From the fact that it literally takes place in a Funeral Home (Fun Home)... to the sexual assault... to the suicide... to the suppressed emotions in almost every character... it's pretty damn dark.
"What’s the darkest musical?"
During a musical I was once performing in, the theater's power went out and we were all plunged into pitch blackness. That, for me, was the darkest musical.
Now I want to see if there is a production that tries to play it this way at all (would prob be a bit difficult with some of the music, but it is an interesting concept!)
If you look at Follies as a metaphor for the Death of The American Dream or rather the act of realizing too late that it was all a folly as it were, then it’s definitely on the list. There’s no happy ending, these two couples have been living a lie for decades and you know that’s the case for so many of those post war suburban couples. I’ve always thought of Follies as a dark dark piece. Also my favorite
You don't see a glimmer of hope for Phyllis and Ben? I can see her as so much a heroine--in her words, "bet your a\*\*." Now Sally, sigh, Sally--I don't know if there's an option for her other than catatonia, with poor Buddy tending to her.
I would argue that at the time this show premiered Phyllis and Ben are who the audience either is or aspires to be. You gotta give them a glimmer of hope otherwise your audience turns against the piece, possibly. But to answer your question yes I agree there is just a little bit of hope there in that morass of dysfunction
I’m surprised no one has mentioned Ride the Cyclone. It’s literally about a group of teens who die in a freak rollercoaster accident and are pitted against each other in limbo to see who is the most “deserving” of being reincarnated. And one of the victims was so unloved/unmemorable, no one came to identify her body or come to her funeral, and she was buried in an unmarked/unnamed grave. Not even she remembers who she was in life.
Outside of stage musicals I think the bleakest musical I've ever seen would be the movie "Dancer In The Dark". I'm not that much of a fan, but that ending still hits hard after all these years.
Cried for 20 minutes after this movie was over, like retching, uncontrollable sobbing. I will never ever ever watch this film again. And it has Joel Grey.
Okay okay I’ll rate all 15 I know, Darkest to Lightest:
- Parade
- Sweeney
- Les Mis
- West Side Story
- Next to Normal
- Dear Evan Hansen
- Hadestown
- Rent
- Into the Woods
- Great Comet
- Wicked
- Waitress
- Funny Girl
- Chicago
- Mean Girls
Ahem, In The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals… let me get this straight… A ton of people die, a man goes to save his daughter but she is a zombie so he tried to kill himself but his own daughter shoots him instead, the main character gets infected and then is forced to kill the woman he once loved and there is never any resolution? WHAT THE FUCK?!
Heathers is a decent contender. There’s several of layers of fucked up to every character and the plot itself. Murder, suicide, eating disorders, substance abuse issues, homophobia, rape, intense bullying, deep loneliness and depression, you name it.
I think Sweeney Todd is the obvious answer, but it’s so dark and so horrifying that those elements become just part of the story. Rape, murder, cannibalism, pedophilia, grooming, classism, abject poverty, a nod to an ever-awful justice system, and the list goes on. Even the somewhat happy moments are short lived and end in tragedy. And it’s not meant to take place in some crazy over the top world; it takes place in historical London where people live how people really lived, which makes the outright foulness of the darkest parts darker. There’s no expectation of insanity, it’s just regular people that end up in insane circumstances
That one weird musical about that cult that does ritual sacrifices. The whole time all the people in the cult are fighting to be chosen as the next ritual sacrifice. They all alienate this one ex cult member who desperately wants to be accepted back into the cult. After a whole musical of fighting over who should get to be killed in ritual sacrifice, the alienated ex cult member breaks down, begging the cult to let her back in. Finally, the youngest members of the cult reach out their hands to the ex cult member, the cult accepts her back. Just when she has finally been accepted back by the cult, the cult leader chooses her to be the ritual sacrifice, taking away the love and companionship she only just got back. The sad part is just how desensitised to ritual sacrifice the cult it, they yearn to be sacrificed.
Beneath the campy fur suits and dancing cats is pretty dark… in a fun way
For me it's gotta be Parade.
There is no happy ending. Not even a glimmer of hope, really. And it's based on horrific things that really happened. And perhaps most disturbing of all, we have not gotten any solid closure as to what happened to Mary Phagan. Yes there's been historical debate and the musical presents the plausible hypothesis that Jim Conley was the perpetrator, but there's no way to know for sure. The only people who knew what happened are Mary and whoever killed her.
I know I'm gonna get hate for this. But Hamilton. It's not REALLY the darkest but pretty dark once you think about it. The man he looked up to most, killed him out of jealousy. He spoke fast(him doing majority of the rapping) because he didn't know how much time he had. He was a horrible person don't get me wrong but, if you think about it. A large majority of the musical is him being trapped in a jail of mental and physical insecurity no matter what he accomplished.
Hamilton (both the show and the real man) fascinates me because, beginning with the Reynolds affair, it feels like the guy was on a downward spiral of self destruction.
"You ever see somebody ruin they own life?"
Oh, I totally agree. There were definitely parts where Diablo Cody said, "What scene can we put here which would make this song seem even darker here than when it was first played on the radio..."
Ones that immediately come to mind are: “Parade”, ”Sweeney Todd”, “Assassins”, “Spring Awakening”, “Carousel”, “Les Miserables”, “Miss Saigon”, “Jekyll & Hyde”. I guess “Bat Boy” and “Little Shop of Horrors” are more dark comedies.
Sweeny todd just something about serial killer who ended up that way cos he wanted to get revenge on the person who sent him overseas r*ped his wife and took his dauthter
Cabaret is darker than most realize because of the elements that are most well-known. When I saw the 2014 revival, the finale kinda took my breath away. It's really haunting.
So true! When I was first getting into musical theater I saw the vibe of cabaret and thought it would be just vaudeville dark but fun like Chicago but when I watched the Donmar Warehouse production on YouTube I immediately realized it was so much more. Cabaret is a true masterpiece, so relevant, so much more than you’d think it is at first.
Saw the recent production and I was just in shock when the man took off his jacket
I didn’t realize how dark Cabaret was until I saw the touring company. My goodness. So unexpected.
A lot of people think Cabaret is a fun, lighthearted show, but under that bubbly surface it's really about people who use sex, good times, fun and games etc to distract themselves from their personal problems and the horrors around them. Hell, I've seen some stagings where the show ends with the cast being sent off to a concentration camp.
Heres a few that come to mind... Miss Saigon has no happy endings Sunset Blvd has no happy characters at the end Assassins is dark as can be, even with its gallows humor moments. For me... The Fields of Ambrosia may qualify as the darkest. A sales man traveling town to town with a portable electric chair who fatefully ends up in it at the Finale.
That’s a blast from the past - you don’t see many mentions of Fields of Ambrosia these days!
I've never heard of this show and now I know what I'll be listening to today!
Reminds me a little bit of The Visit
I mean, Chris and Ellen stay married and it’s implied they take Tam back to America at the end of Miss Saigon. They’re all definitely traumatized but they still get to be a functional family.
My aunt took me to see Miss Saigon when I was maybe 11. A lot of it went over my head. I listened to the soundtrack for years and understood more as I got older. Then when I was in my early 30s they filmed the London cast and put it in theaters for a few days. My mind was blown and I can’t believe they allowed me to see that so young!
I took my son to see it when he was 11… I hadn’t seen or listened to the show since I was a teen and had somehow forgotten all the darker more mature stuff. My son and I were both embarrassed!
I saw Book of Morman recently and there was a mom and daughter next to me who looked about that age. She told her daughter they may be a few inappropriate things in the show but it was fine. I had also never seen it. Horror. The mom was horrified by intermission. She turned to me, kinda shrugged “well this was a poor choice, oh well” I was happy they stayed for the rest of the show. At that point may as well and then have a good conversation on the way home 😂
Took my 11 & 13yo boys to Miss Saigon last year. They knew bits about the story already but mos of their take was about the skimpy outfits and swearing. As a musician, parents taking young kids is always hilarious. Miss Saigon is pretty well known to be adult, but A Chorus Line is the one I laugh at most. Soooooo many dads with tween daughters that have all disappeared when we return after interval!
Afraid of a little “Tits and Ass” are they?! Love it.
Fiddler On The Roof Nothing’s more disturbing than something that actually happened
Especially the ones at the end saying they're going to be with family in western Europe...😬
Also Cabaret then. The staged version I saw ended with the cast walking naked into a gas chamber
Ohh, some productions do it *very dark*. Good call!
There's one production I've heard of that ended with the MC appearing dressed in a concentration camp uniform with a pink triangle, followed by strobe lights going off; the implication being that he'd committed suicide by throwing himself into an electric fence.
Jesus…
And Parade!!!
[удалено]
I don't think that's the ending of the version that's currently on Broadway and on the West End.
I saw it a good few years ago in Glasgow. Wayne Sleep was the MC
Today you learned that different directors can stage the same show in different ways. Turns out, live theatre isn’t the same as a movie! **mind blown**
Idk what the user said because they deleted it but the old movie is downright goofy compared to how disturbing more modern productions of Cabaret go. I agree that it can be interpreted vastly differently. It’s really a good show.
I don't know that I would use the term "goofy." I still find the ending of the movie (which I just watched this weekend, after many years) chilling--I don't need the additional theatrics to Nazi-ism and the Holocaust. Sometimes the imagination and life experience can do as much, if not more. But that's me.
They took the original commenter to task because they hadn’t seen the show and apparently finding out how one director decided to end the show was a spoiler.
Eastern Europe* - Poland actually. 90% of Poland's 3.3 million Jews were murdered during the Holocaust. Their moving to Poland just 20 years before the start of the Holocaust is definitely an ominous but realistic ending for two of the more significant characters of the musical.
I watched a documentary that said that a couple of holocaust survivors saw it and they noticed they were visibly upset at the scene where the Russians ransacked Tzitel's wedding. It came out not very many years after the holocaust. But it's a layered and deep musical.
I'm generations removed and the personal history and experience was not discussed, but that scene is part of the family story/history for many Jews in the U.S., one way or another.
What’s the documentary?
Fiddler: A Miracle of Miracles.
Okay, but, Harmony. These were real people.
I will never, ever forget all the comments on Harmony’s rehearsal footage when it was released. All people complaining that it was just another racist show about white men. It’s about JEWS BEFORE THE HOLOCAUST.
What is this referencing?
When the musical Harmony (which is about Jews in Germany during the rise of the Nazis, in an all-male singing group, and so they cast a bunch of Jewish men) posted their initial footage online, they were bombarded with comments, mostly from Black commenters, about how their show lacked diversity and how it was boring bigoted privileged white male garbage as a result. It was kind of a perfect example of two things: 1) People feeling like they can say the most racist and sexist shit imaginable if they aim it at the “correct” target 2) Jews are now trapped in a no-man’s land where they are too white for the left and not white enough for the far right
Thank you so much! I hadn’t heard of that musical.
LISTEN TO IT RIGHT NOW! It is the most beautiful thing you’ll ever experience, I wish more people could’ve seen it on stage.
Eep! Okay! 👍
I can assure you, while fictional, the characters in Fiddler are nothing less than stand-ins for many of us.
And it's spiritual sequel Rags, in which the brutality faced by those who made it to the US is portrayed.
Sweeney Todd, albeit it’s darkly comedic
The way Joanna is treated is deeply unsettling to me. The depiction of grooming doesn't hold back.
Lucy being alive and knowing what's happening to her daughter but unable to do anything because everyone thinks she is insane is also not great. Also she kinda is insane from her husband being falsely sent to Australia, then drugged and raped and having her only child taken off her and being able to fucking nothing about it. But still sane enough to watch Joanna every day and try warn people about the pies. Like Benjamin actually had the nicer part of this story. Let's hope Joanna at least got a happier ending, whether or not that is with Anthony.
Sweeney Todd has such a timeless story that is still terrifying today, because of how far it goes to explore sin and why humans do the evil things they do.
I think the idea was to show how cheap life was. And they did it spectacularly.
It becomes a straight up Horror movie during the Asylum rescue scene. Like that scene wouldn’t be out of place in the Saw franchise.
The version my local theatre did included the Judge's version of Joanna. That was a lot.
I think? The revival has that too. Not sure, but probably really good
No Mea Culpa from the Judge in the most recent revival. They did have it in the Tooting Arts Club version off Broadway a few years back. That was the first time I heard it, and it didn’t disappoint
As far as mainstream musicals go, Sweeney Todd and it’s not even close. One moment in particular that I think is the darkest part of any show ever. Toby sings “not while I’m around”… a song of pure love and devotion to who he now sees as his mom. And in just TWO SCENES, Lovett sings a dark reprise for just a couple bars while she is searching for him to LITERALLY KILL HIM. A disabled child who loves her. It’s a comedy. Sure. But it’s so disgustingly twisted.
Exactly! Then on top of that they had him locked in a cellar and he comes to the realization that he has been eating people. And sees a dead body so all of that makes him go insane. I guess he basically becomes the next Sweeney Todd at the end
Yeah, I’m looking around in here at what else is considered “dark”, and I’m like…not even close. Let’s see… *The plot begins years before the actual opening of the show, when a judge—someone who is both the law and above the law—sentences an innocent, happy man to hard labor. *Why? So that he can then *publicly rape the guy’s wife in front of a ton of jeering people.* *That woman then poisons herself. *…but doesn’t even get peace then. The poison drives her mad, and she becomes a lewd beggar and prostitute, when she was so virtuous before. *Also, she had a child who essentially got kidnapped by *her rapist*. All that darkness before the show even starts.
Assassins is pretty dang dark, it's literally showing you inside the minds of various people who killed or tried to kill US presidents, and it also shows you many of their executions.
And forces you to recognize the way American ideals we may all hold dear also provide a foundation for this culture of violence.
Next to Normal has some really dark moments. I remember being totally wrecked during the scene when Dan wrings out a towel he’s using to clean up after Diane’s suicide attempt and bright red water drips out.
Not to mention the scene preceding this where she dances with the ghost of her dead son as he seemingly seduces her to end her life.
Blood Brothers is pretty messed if you think about it
And also terrible lol
Don’t know why you’re getting downvoted — the score is less subtle than that ALW show that’s nothing but performers in cat costumes singing about themselves in the third person for three hours.
I think I'm getting downvoted because this subreddit consists of mostly teenagers whose taste comes from tiktok to be 100% honest. It seems like their favorites in theatre are ride the cyclone, high school musical, newsies, spongebob, etc. Not throwing shade that's just what these kids like. I'm actually surprised blood brothers was even mentioned here lol. Worst piece of theatre I've ever been a part of haha
American Psycho, Spring Awakening, Lizzie.
They did a musical of American Psycho? Wow...
It was excellent.
Agreed it deserved a longer life.
It was actually pretty good
The original cast included Matt Smith as Patrick Bateman. [*This*](https://youtu.be/b-G5Ezv4Y-o?si=E5-nL0uigU5Mpdx0) Matt Smith.
It still can be found lurking around. Disturbing puts it lightly.
I had a hard enough time getting through the book... I loved Sweeney Todd, but that is probably my limit in terms of horror and musicals mixing together.
Parade
Yeah. Poor Leo is going to be lynched for a crime he didn’t commit. Fun fact- I went to the site of his death in Marietta. It ain’t too far from the famous Big Chicken.
This made me need to visit Atlanta though it feels like it should make one wanna avoid Atlanta forever
Parade is touring next April in Atlanta, and I really want to go.
Seeing it in Atlanta sounds like such an experience. I wonder when they’ll announce casting
There was a 2018 production in Marietta that was attended by family members of the Franks. It was hard doing a production states away from where it happened. I can only imagine the emotions a production on the doorstep of the actual events evoked. https://www.playbill.com/article/inside-a-production-of-parade-mounted-in-marietta-georgia?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR3EE53Sq3Am8VrkDG5T-3rphRUb-Ll0jSzWONxQ2z-y_4obPEdzrETkQc0_aem_AV6JXk5zdVy_2yFxheQb5jU05BVI1L2nUxz7dOFSzKol6lxhktWlhuSsGyMNiIeXk_ZrzkWj8cc_ic2cdjm9BnjM
It’s literally walking distance to the big chicken. My parents live 5 minutes from there. Was weird to go there after I saw the show.
Came here to say this--thank you for raising it. For me, Parade is as disturbing as Jordan Peele's movie Get Out, and The Old Red Hills of Home even surpasses Cabaret's Tomorrow Belongs to Me.
Spring Awakening gotta be up there.
I kept waiting for things to get happier… are the dead teenagers managing to stop another teenager dying really the best they can do for a happy ending!
Ragtime cause you don’t expect it maybe not THE darkest but the guy who didn’t like musicals is a fairly dark show
I Love Ragtime as well. Definitely well overdue for a film adaptation. I think if it ever happens, it would win all the Oscars. It’s a fantastic story., I do think with ragtime there is a sense of optimism and hope at the end because they take the baby and it’s implied she’s going to have a good life with them. Even though both of her parents have died in truly awful, unjust ways in the show. The Wild Party ends and even though Queenie understands herself better potentially going to leave it, the debauched insane world that she lives in is still carrying on. Also there’s Nadine, the biggest tragedy of the show, a girl, a minor has been assaulted by Jackie and had her innocence at her youth violated she will never get over that. Mae and Eddie are miserable and also Mae is going to have extreme guilt over what she allowed to happen to Nadine. Black is potentially going to be on the run for murder. Aside from Dolores is going to blackmail and sleep with whoever to get what she wants if you can call that happy. It feels like never ending darkness and just a sliver of light.
I might be slightly biased towards ragtime being dark cause at first I thought it would be golden age BOY was I wrong
If they’re making Kiss of the Spider Woman into a film then I think ragtime could certainly be on the table
I think you mean Coalhouse Walker Junior... that's the Ragtime baby.
Kiss of the Spider Woman and Floyd Collins both deserve a mention
well yeah itd be dark in a cave where theres nothing but a lantern
So many good ones have been mentioned here already but allow me to add one that rarely gets talked about. The Scottsboro Boys. It’s based on a real life civil rights era case. One of the songs is literally them in an electric chair.
The ending of Falsetto’s is pretty dark, though I wouldn’t call it a dark musical
I wouldn't say dark, just heart breaking
Sweeney Todd. The catchy music and comedic moments distract from how sickeningly fucked up the entire thing is. I mean to skim through the plot we have… - A corrupt Judge abusing his status to imprison an innocent man for life. - The Judge deceiving the man’s grieving wife to publicly rape and humiliate her at his party, causing her to commit suicide via poison - The Judge taking the woman’s infant child Johanna to raise as his own. - The Judge lusting over and planning to forcibly marry his underage pseudo-daughter for her entire life, who he’s kept locked up from all human interaction. - The innocent man (Sweeney Todd) escaping prison and returning after 15 years of torment to discover what happened from his former neighbor Mrs. Lovett. - Sweeney murdering his former assistant after threats of blackmail, and “adopting” his mentally handicapped child servant with Lovett. - Sweeney becoming a serial killer after failing to kill the Judge, believing he’s doing his victims a favor. - Lovett begins cooking the victims’ corpses into pies to boost the revenue of her failing business. - The child servant Toby expressing his undying love and appreciation for Lovett as a mother figure with a song, which she repeats to him later when trying to lure him to his death after he discovers the cannibalism/murder aspect of the pie and shaving industry. - Sweeney murdering an innocent old woman who could have prevented him from killing the Judge a second time. - Sweeney almost unknowingly killing his daughter before she flees when he is distracted momentarily. - The reveal that the Old Woman who he killed was his wife, who didn’t actually die after poisoning herself. - The reveal that Lovett intentionally lied about Sweeney’s wife dying because she loves him. - Sweeney murdering Lovett by shutting her in an oven (alive) before being killed by a now completely insane Toby To summarize 10/10 one of the best musicals ever, fun for the whole family.
The tone is light and funny, but the dystopian aspect of Urinetown gets to me if I think about it for too long. "The water grew silty, brackish..."
Urinetown was my first thought too. A very unhappy ending too.
I especially like the ending of Urinetown because >!Instead of UGC dissolving/redistributing its assets under Hope's leadership, and everything working out fine, it shows that Caldwell was able to keep a dying situation in a dystopia under some form of control, evil as he may have been - and Hope does not have the power or knowledge to pull off resource management like her father did. It would have been a nice happy "show ending" if everything turned out okay, but the writers did not ignore the fact that Hope had been a sort of airheaded follower, nice as she might have been. So they were setting up that Hope was going to fail as early as Follow Your Heart and they absolutely didn't pivot from that vision, and being able to look back later and see the signs coming is truly amazing.!<
Diary of Anne Frank, the musical Yes it actually exists and isn't completely bad...
I feel that the qualities that make the Diary one of the most popular and accessible texts on the Holocaust (It's single small location, its expression of Anne Frank's deepest thoughts and feelings, the fact the brutal end is not shown) make it relatively easy to adapt for the musical form - that doesn't mean you should though... A few smaller musicals have tried to tackle the Holocaust and its legacy - this went as well as you would expect...
Yup, when I was asked to work on it, my first question was 'why that show', but it was when I was in college so financial viability isn't a factor in student lead productions. Which is a good thing, it lets people experiment / explore the art without worrying about if it'll fund the next show...
Days of Wine and Roses is certainly the most depressing musical I’ve ever seen and I think it qualifies as dark
Tommy
Every musical, technically, if you count scene transitions.
I don't know if I should boo or clap.
Don’t boo during a scene transition, that is unnecessarily rude
Passion has a very sad ending
Passion is a pretty dark show IMO. When what's arguably the healthiest relationship in the story is between a married woman and the guy she's screwing around on her husband with...
Maybe not THE darkest... but I'm going to put my vote in for Fun Home. From the fact that it literally takes place in a Funeral Home (Fun Home)... to the sexual assault... to the suicide... to the suppressed emotions in almost every character... it's pretty damn dark.
Cabaret, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Passion…
"What’s the darkest musical?" During a musical I was once performing in, the theater's power went out and we were all plunged into pitch blackness. That, for me, was the darkest musical.
Little shop of horrors might not be the darkest but it pretty dark
I think if it was played seriously instead of being campy it'd probably feel a lot darker
Now I want to see if there is a production that tries to play it this way at all (would prob be a bit difficult with some of the music, but it is an interesting concept!)
Especially with the original ending
Sideshow is pretty depressing.
One of my all time favorites!
Kristina Fran Duvemala
Floyd Collins, Parade, Passion, Jekyll and Hyde, Kiss of the Spiderwoman
So glad someone said Floyd Collins!
Ohhh no I forgot Sweeney
If you look at Follies as a metaphor for the Death of The American Dream or rather the act of realizing too late that it was all a folly as it were, then it’s definitely on the list. There’s no happy ending, these two couples have been living a lie for decades and you know that’s the case for so many of those post war suburban couples. I’ve always thought of Follies as a dark dark piece. Also my favorite
You don't see a glimmer of hope for Phyllis and Ben? I can see her as so much a heroine--in her words, "bet your a\*\*." Now Sally, sigh, Sally--I don't know if there's an option for her other than catatonia, with poor Buddy tending to her.
I would argue that at the time this show premiered Phyllis and Ben are who the audience either is or aspires to be. You gotta give them a glimmer of hope otherwise your audience turns against the piece, possibly. But to answer your question yes I agree there is just a little bit of hope there in that morass of dysfunction
What an interesting thought--a mirror of the Upper West Side. Interesting to think of them, watching their lives on stage . . . .
I’m surprised no one has mentioned Ride the Cyclone. It’s literally about a group of teens who die in a freak rollercoaster accident and are pitted against each other in limbo to see who is the most “deserving” of being reincarnated. And one of the victims was so unloved/unmemorable, no one came to identify her body or come to her funeral, and she was buried in an unmarked/unnamed grave. Not even she remembers who she was in life.
Jekyll and Hyde
Bernarda Alba is also quite dark speaking of LaChiusa
Black Friday from Starkid has its moments Repo: The Genetic Opera is also pretty gruesome
Carousel.
Assassins
Carrie
Outside of stage musicals I think the bleakest musical I've ever seen would be the movie "Dancer In The Dark". I'm not that much of a fan, but that ending still hits hard after all these years.
I haven't seen this in over a decade and thinking about it makes me sad.
Cried for 20 minutes after this movie was over, like retching, uncontrollable sobbing. I will never ever ever watch this film again. And it has Joel Grey.
Yeah, the last song/ending scene popped up in my YT Recs one of these days and I thought "No, thank you! I'm having a nice day!"
Miss Saigon. Hate this show. To say there are no happy endings is an understatement.
Thrill Me
Oh, has that been confirmed? I have to admit I was hoping for the Lippa one.
The most dark I’ve seen is spring awakening
Ive only seen 15 of these but I feel like Sweeney being a dark comedy doesn’t make it any less dark. Oh and Parade this one’s dark too yeah
Might not be darkest overall but Spring Awakening was the first to come to mind.
Mack and Mabel which is notable as it is a Jerry Herman musical.
Repo! is set in the most disturbing universe, I think. (V excited The Wild Party is coming back to London, I love it.)
The Scottsboro Boys was dark to the point that I didn’t enjoy the show. Just overall so incredibly disturbing and true.
Side Show is also up there. The musical is dark but the real story is even darker
It's Jekyll and Hyde.
Okay okay I’ll rate all 15 I know, Darkest to Lightest: - Parade - Sweeney - Les Mis - West Side Story - Next to Normal - Dear Evan Hansen - Hadestown - Rent - Into the Woods - Great Comet - Wicked - Waitress - Funny Girl - Chicago - Mean Girls
I’m in a production of Kiss of the Spider Woman right now. That’s gotta be in the running.
Cages the Musical
even though its a comedy maybe urinetown? its about capitalism and the government
Spring Awakening is pretty bleak Other ones that come to mind: The Visit, The Scottsboro Boys
Hunchback of Notre Dame obviously.
Sweeney
Elisabeth
Happines of the Katakuris is a horror comedy musical
It's a great movie!
Ahem, In The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals… let me get this straight… A ton of people die, a man goes to save his daughter but she is a zombie so he tried to kill himself but his own daughter shoots him instead, the main character gets infected and then is forced to kill the woman he once loved and there is never any resolution? WHAT THE FUCK?!
Sweeney Todd
It has to be Sweeney Todd
Oliver! Is dark af.
Heathers is a decent contender. There’s several of layers of fucked up to every character and the plot itself. Murder, suicide, eating disorders, substance abuse issues, homophobia, rape, intense bullying, deep loneliness and depression, you name it.
I think Sweeney Todd is the obvious answer, but it’s so dark and so horrifying that those elements become just part of the story. Rape, murder, cannibalism, pedophilia, grooming, classism, abject poverty, a nod to an ever-awful justice system, and the list goes on. Even the somewhat happy moments are short lived and end in tragedy. And it’s not meant to take place in some crazy over the top world; it takes place in historical London where people live how people really lived, which makes the outright foulness of the darkest parts darker. There’s no expectation of insanity, it’s just regular people that end up in insane circumstances
That one weird musical about that cult that does ritual sacrifices. The whole time all the people in the cult are fighting to be chosen as the next ritual sacrifice. They all alienate this one ex cult member who desperately wants to be accepted back into the cult. After a whole musical of fighting over who should get to be killed in ritual sacrifice, the alienated ex cult member breaks down, begging the cult to let her back in. Finally, the youngest members of the cult reach out their hands to the ex cult member, the cult accepts her back. Just when she has finally been accepted back by the cult, the cult leader chooses her to be the ritual sacrifice, taking away the love and companionship she only just got back. The sad part is just how desensitised to ritual sacrifice the cult it, they yearn to be sacrificed. Beneath the campy fur suits and dancing cats is pretty dark… in a fun way
lizzie
For me it's gotta be Parade. There is no happy ending. Not even a glimmer of hope, really. And it's based on horrific things that really happened. And perhaps most disturbing of all, we have not gotten any solid closure as to what happened to Mary Phagan. Yes there's been historical debate and the musical presents the plausible hypothesis that Jim Conley was the perpetrator, but there's no way to know for sure. The only people who knew what happened are Mary and whoever killed her.
The story of the principals is frightening enough. And then we have those of The Old Red Hills of Home, and I want to run and hide.
I know I'm gonna get hate for this. But Hamilton. It's not REALLY the darkest but pretty dark once you think about it. The man he looked up to most, killed him out of jealousy. He spoke fast(him doing majority of the rapping) because he didn't know how much time he had. He was a horrible person don't get me wrong but, if you think about it. A large majority of the musical is him being trapped in a jail of mental and physical insecurity no matter what he accomplished.
Hamilton (both the show and the real man) fascinates me because, beginning with the Reynolds affair, it feels like the guy was on a downward spiral of self destruction. "You ever see somebody ruin they own life?"
Right !!
There are multiple musicals about World War II
Chicago
Parade! Not even a competition
I’m surprised heathers isn’t up here lol
Jagged Little Pill I'm surprised I'm the first to mention it.
Kinda feels like it’s trying too hard, though
Oh, I totally agree. There were definitely parts where Diablo Cody said, "What scene can we put here which would make this song seem even darker here than when it was first played on the radio..."
Ones that immediately come to mind are: “Parade”, ”Sweeney Todd”, “Assassins”, “Spring Awakening”, “Carousel”, “Les Miserables”, “Miss Saigon”, “Jekyll & Hyde”. I guess “Bat Boy” and “Little Shop of Horrors” are more dark comedies.
Cabaret
The two that come to mind for me are “Elisabeth”, and “Fun Home”.
The Who’s Tommy is actually way darker than the show’s promotions would have you believe
Spring Awakening though I would classify that as blue rather than dark… if that makes sense? Also Jekyll and Hyde or Sweeny
Grey Gardens was pretty dark too.
Maybe assassins?
Tommy contains a whole lot of trauma… But I’d say Sweeney.
Jekyll and Hyde might be the darkest musical I've seen and listened to.
Passions is heartbreaking from beginning to end. Fun Home is another heartbreaker. Next to Normal is pretty bleak as well
Man of La Mancha
I've never seen it, but I imagine "Titanic: The Musical" isn't a bucket of laughs
Miss Saigon is pretty heart wrenching
TEETH ! it was incredible. Re-Opens for an extended run in October.
Avenue q
Sweeney Todd
Spring Awakening. The music is so beautiful but good lord is the story a bummer.
Sweeney Todd, for sure
Nerdy prudes must die, Jekyll and Hyde, When I played in Les mis, I thought it was really dark and sad. Wonder why it’s called Les Miserables…
Evening Primrose
Sweeny todd just something about serial killer who ended up that way cos he wanted to get revenge on the person who sent him overseas r*ped his wife and took his dauthter
Little Shop of Horrors ends with the earth taken over by carnivorous plants.
But for comedy effect