When the OCR for Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
came out, it made some waves for including a track that warned listeners not to listen to the rest of the album if they hadn't seen the show, since the following tracks gave away the show's twist ending. Furthermore, the CD's booklet put in a dummy paragraph in the synopsis (which included a number of shout outs to other musicals) to similarly keep people from being spoiled. To this day, I really don't understand why they went to the trouble. You see, the twist they were protecting is exactly the same as the one in the movie it was based on
, which came out some twenty years before the musical. You'd think that most of the people interested in the musical would be familiar with the movie? Or would have checked out the movie when they heard about the musical coming out (as I did), at least.
1 comment:
You're absolutely right. If someone hadn't seen the show or movie it's unlikely that they'd buy it, and to give it as a gift to someone unfamiliar with the show seems odd. (And I'm someone who won't even watch "scenes from our next episode" for fear of spoilers.) Maybe they put the big spoilers in to entice people into seeing the movie or play, but even that sets up an expectation that could ruin the surprise.
I remember the movie very vividly (and loved every minute of it); I never knew it made it to Broadway, but if Spiderman can...
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