When I hear that my very favourite Disney movie was made into a Broadway show, I'll probably be either delighted or slightly wary. As it happened, I wasn't sure about the idea when I first heard of it, not at all sure the story needed another version or that I would like what they changed or added. The soundtrack changed my mind, though. The new songs were beautiful, the old songs were done really well, and I was fascinated by all the new ideas the soundtrack presented to bring into the storyline. So then, of course, I simply had to see what the actual show was like, preferably with the original cast so that I could see the show in all its original glory. And now I have seen it, you know what's coming – one of my speciality reviews, in what seems to be a continuing series of Aladdin-related ones.
As you can probably tell, I love the new songs added by the Broadway show. Jasmine finally gets her own princess song, which is just exactly what I always felt her princess song should be, all about freedom and flying away and her decision to finally leave the palace. I actually wanted to write Jasmine a princess song at one point, but it wasn't coming out very well, and then wouldn't you know it, the Broadway show gives her one which just happens to use the exact same ideas I had been thinking of. (Thanks, Broadway show, now I don't have to write it!) Jafar gets his own villain song with the cleverest, most brilliant lyrics, all about convincing Aladdin to go into the Cave of Wonders for him. Aladdin and Jasmine get not one but two beautiful duets now, the first connecting to the second as Aladdin and Jasmine plan to run away together in their first duet, and then Aladdin suggests at the beginning of A Whole New World that he and Jasmine head out to see the world they never got to run away to the first time. You might be able to guess, if you're familiar with the show, that These Palace Walls, Diamond In the Rough, and A Million Miles Away are my absolute favourite additions to the soundtrack. But really, all the new songs were great. And they didn't do a bad job at all on the old ones, which is saying a lot since I'm really fond of the familiar versions from the movie soundtrack and wasn't at all sure I would take kindly to any new renditions. Actually, I really like how they turned Arabian Nights into this whole six-minute introduction song. I always felt the version we get in the movie was a bit unfinished – here's a verse and the first chorus, now where's the rest of the song?? With the Broadway show, it's like I finally got to hear it. Prince Ali and Friend Like Me have been expanded too, and with Friend Like Me this was almost definitely so that Genie could make a whole big show out of it. I'm not sure what the reason was for the extra verses in Prince Ali, but I don't mind them at all, they fit so well into the song. And I really like the idea of the Sultan getting a reprise of Prince Ali before Jafar gets his, and Prince Ali becoming an overarching theme song for everyone's perceptions of Aladdin in his prince persona. Actually, Jafar's reprise of Prince Ali may be the only part of the soundtrack that disappointed me, because here it sounds a lot less threatening – we don't even get an evil laugh at the end! More on that in a bit.
The play brought back a few elements from the original Arabian Nights Aladdin tale, which I think is just perfect because – where else would you go for inspiration if you want to round out Aladdin's story?? One particular fun nod to the original story was this brief moment when Jafar pretends to be Aladdin's uncle – in this case just long enough to convince the guards not to arrest his Diamond in the Rough, and in this case with Aladdin just as aware as Jafar is that they aren't related. In the original the sorcerer has this whole scheme to fool Aladdin into thinking he's his uncle, so that Aladdin will trust him enough to go into the Cave of Wonders and bring the lamp back for him, and I just loved the addition of this little Easter egg.
I was delighted to find the show confirms certain things I had been wondering about the story, which in the movie were never touched on. Yes, the people of Agrabah have noticed that Princess Jasmine has rejected every single one of her suitors, it is common knowledge and something people would bring up when the subject arises – I always figured word of that must have gotten onto the street, and wondered what the general opinion on it was! Yes, Jafar is getting worried that Jasmine might actually get married and then there will be another man in the court blocking his way to becoming Sultan. I always wondered in the movie whether Jafar wasn't getting worried about that, since he only has three days to go until Jasmine has to marry someone, and her new husband may very well not be as easy to hypnotize or manipulate as the Sultan is. My thought was usually that he was worried about it at first, but then realized Jasmine wasn't about to choose any suitor, and by the time the movie starts he's so close to finding the Cave of Wonders and getting the lamp that he's fairly confident he can achieve his goal and take over before his time is up. The show has Aladdin be wary of Jafar when he asks him to go into the Cave of Wonders – I always thought in the movie Aladdin was way too trusting of the creepy old man. (Although the fact that his other option was staying in the dungeon probably had a lot to do with it!) Jasmine in the show has a line about not knowing that Magic Carpets were real, adding in a nice bit of worldbuilding – I always wondered whether Magic Carpets were a rare but known item in the world of Aladdin, or if they were more the stuff of legends. And we see that yes, Jasmine does live in a harem. I loved getting to see her in an actual harem setting, complete with handmaids – such a nice addition to the worldbuilding and the cultural accuracy. Now if we could just see some hint of the Sultan having multiple wives in this harem....
And at the end, when they're all celebrating and Jasmine is wearing something that is quite unmistakably a wedding dress – yes. Just yes. Please show us beyond a doubt that Aladdin and Jasmine got married right away, so that no one can decide later that they would have waited for years to finally be together! I would say I wish the movie had thought of that, but it isn't their fault – no one had any thoughts of a straight-to-DVD sequel at the time. Really, it's the people who made the sequel who should have realized there was every indication Aladdin and Jasmine are getting married right now at the end of the movie... but I digress.
By far my favourite character performance in the musical was Genie. James Monroe Iglehart has just the right sort of over-the-top stage presence to make the character work even when he's being played by someone other than Robin Williams. Making Genie a combination narrator and character in the story works really well too, and this Genie's brand of humour is a similar style to what movie Genie has without feeling like they're trying too hard or copying him. I also think what really makes him work is that Genie is already first and foremost a performer. Everything is a show with him, and he is always delivering lines as though he knows he has a huge audience beyond Aladdin, Abu, and the Carpet. It's almost like his character was made to be adapted to Broadway, and he fits his new role just wonderfully.
I was a little concerned about how the Sultan was going to turn out, since I didn't think they could make him the same exaggerated, comical character he is in the animation. But the play doesn't try to do that, nor do they ignore the personality he had in the movie and try to turn him into someone entirely different. I thought they were quite good at keeping all the Sultan's personality traits that would work for a real-life person: his desire to stay in charge even while he seems unable to influence those around him, his way of being stuck in habits and tradition without ever questioning why these things are done, and his soft spot for Jasmine even as he tries to be strict with her. The sort of humour they gave him, while it obviously couldn't be exactly the type we get from the Sultan in the movie, worked very well for a more realistic version of the character too. In fact the only trait of the Sultan's they didn't keep, which I would have liked to see, was his playful side. I think the end result worked out great, and I am impressed with whoever adapted the story for Broadway for realizing there is more to the Sultan's character than just being round and bouncy and comical. If the Sultan were a real person and not an exaggerated animated character, he probably would end up being very similar to Clifton Davis's portrayal in the Broadway show. Not exactly the same, but very similar.
I missed Abu and Rajah. I guess I understand there's no point trying to dress people up as a convincing tiger and monkey if they won't even have speaking roles, but it still makes me sad to think that they don't even exist in this version. I would probably have at least tried giving Aladdin a stuffed monkey to carry around on his shoulder, and Jasmine a large stuffed tiger which could sit on the stage during the scenes taking place in her quarters. But they did keep Iago, in this wonderfully weird parrot-like costume that seems to blur the line between whether he's a human or a bird, which probably wouldn't work anywhere else but in the world of a stage play. (I believe at the beginning Iago is referred to as a parrot, but then at the end the Sultan orders him thrown in the dungeon, which if we really are meant to be thinking of him as a parrot is hilarious.) Anyway, I'm really happy that they kept him because it would have been just criminal to get rid of that wonderful dynamic between Jafar and Iago, even though Iago did seem a little different here than he does in the movie. Like his remarks more often spring from unawareness of what's going on, or how to interpret it, that from witty observations. But I still thought his portrayal was great, and that he made the perfect sidekick for Jafar.
Aladdin I thought was excellent. Adam Jacobs has this air about him, he positively embodies Aladdin and I feel like, if I were to meet Aladdin in real life, his whole vibe would be pretty much exactly like this. I was extremely happy they allowed Aladdin to be dressed in an open vest with no shirt underneath. I've seen other Aladdin actors, like the Disney Park Aladdins, wearing white shirts under their vests and I cannot understand this need to deviate from movie accuracy. On the subject of movie accuracy, I do wish his vest had been purple, and I can't figure out why it wasn't, but extra bonus points for Aladdin being allowed to keep his bare chest. Aladdin's backstory, meanwhile, has been rounded out with one of the biggest things the Broadway show brought back from the Arabian Nights story: Aladdin's mother. Or rather her memory, since the play establishes she recently died. Aladdin's mother is now just as much a driving force for him as his simple desire to get off the streets and be seen as more than just a worthless street rat. At first, I wasn't sure what to think about the Broadway show bringing back the mother and having Aladdin decide that he was the one in the wrong who needs to try and do better (as he says in the song Proud Of Your Boy). In the original story, after all, I think the mother is the one who needs to apologize to Aladdin! She openly blamed Aladdin for his father's death, and even told other people it was his fault right in front of him. (At the time of his father's death Aladdin was ten.) But the Broadway show, thankfully, does not bring back this part of Aladdin's backstory and then try to make out Aladdin was in the wrong – if they had brought it back, they would really have had to explore the damage you could cause by putting such thoughts in a young child's head. (You could definitely tie this into Aladdin believing others will see him as worthless.) Actually in the show, it's implied Aladdin's mother was trying to encourage and motivate him, telling him he could accomplish things if he only applied himself, not that he was good for nothing. I now really like the idea of having this extra layer to Aladdin's character motivation – especially as it enhances his motivation from the movie rather than distracting from it. Aladdin is a charming and incredibly likeable character even as he admits to having been lazy and unmotivated – another trait taken from the original story – and even as we see him as a mischievous thief. (It's hard to believe this loveable character could really have been as bad as his song says he is! But then it's very believable if Aladdin is being harder on himself than perhaps anyone else would be.) One of the changes the show made to weave in Aladdin's new backstory was at the beginning, where they alter the “You are a worthless street rat” scene so that the mean prince (who for some reason in this version is called Abdullah instead of Achmed) tells Aladdin he would be a disgrace to his family if he had one. Ouch. It's incredibly painful, incredibly effective, and it accomplishes exactly what this scene was supposed to: introducing us to Aladdin's misbelief he will have to overcome throughout the course of his story to reach his happy ending. The only thing was – I felt like Aladdin's new motivation of wanting to please his mother wasn't really explored any more after that. Except when a reprise of Proud Of Your Boy or certain moments of Diamond In the Rough were being sung, Aladdin's mother as his character motivation never seems to come up at all.
In this version, Aladdin has three friends named Babkak, Omar, and Kassim, who are his partners in crime, and whom I believe were originally going to be included in the movie. I love the whole idea of Aladdin having thief friends on the street, and of the show reviving elements of the movie's story that didn't ultimately fit into the final product. Although I do wish they didn't have to be included instead of Abu!! (I missed you, cute little monkey.) The character designs for the three friends would have worked really well in an animated setting too – each one has his own personal costume colour, with Babkak dressed entirely in green, Omar in blue, and Kassim in red. Then even though Aladdin in the Broadway show is not wearing purple (I don't understand why not!), he still stands out from the group as the main character, because he is the only one with white pants contrasting his vest. So that alone gives me a good sense of how Aladdin's friends might have fit into the world of the animated movie.
But while I loved the addition of Babkak, Omar, and Kassim, I did feel I wanted to see more of them than what we got in the play. They were a bit lacking in individual characterization, character development, and even in rounding out Aladdin's backstory. For one thing, when I first heard the soundtrack, I noticed the line in One Jump Ahead is changed from “You're my only friend, Abu” to “I could use a friend or two”. (This change was used first in a show called Aladdin: A Musical Spectacular, in which neither Abu nor Aladdin's three street friends appear.) I thought this meant Aladdin would only meet his three thief friends later on, since we've just established he has no friends at this point in the story. (The song Babkak, Omar, Aladdin, Kassim sounds like an introduction song too, making me wonder if it was originally meant to be that when it was first written for the movie.) But then when I watched the actual show, Aladdin knew Kassim, Omar, and Babkak right from the very first scene. When I was listening to the soundtrack I was especially interested in the song High Adventure, which hints at the individual characters of Aladdin's three friends, and eagerly looked forward to finding out for sure what they were all like once I had seen the show. But after I had watched it, I still couldn't tell you much more than what I had already figured out from the soundtrack. Omar is the sensitive one and perhaps the nicest, the most willing to accept and support Aladdin's new ideas; Kassim and Babkak are both considerably tougher; Kassim has no problem calling out Aladdin when he thinks he's out of line; and Babkak likes food.
Actually, when all I had heard was the soundtrack, I had a pretty good sense of what character development Aladdin and his three friends might get throughout the show. Aladdin starts off with no friends at all (I presumed) and feels guilty about never having bothered applying himself, so that his mother never got to see him accomplish anything while she was alive. He is now driven by a desire to make her proud and honour her memory that way. He then (I presumed) meets these three other thieves who share his tendency to be lazy and are actually proud of it. Seduced by the promise of friends who will accept him just as he is, Aladdin forgets about his promise to his mother and joins the band of ragtag petty thieves who rejoice in their laziness. He has another wake-up call when he meets Jasmine and becomes motivated to win her heart, then when he meets Jafar and finds out he is the Diamond in the Rough. His line in the first Proud Of Your Boy reprise (in the Act 1 Finale) where he says: “I made a promise and I'm gonna keep it this time, I swear” suggested to me that he had briefly gotten off-track from his promise to make his mother proud, probably because he was distracted by the promise of three new friends who just wanted to be lazy. I also saw potential for Babkak, Omar, and Kassim to have character arcs during High Adventure, where they state that this adventure was what they had “collectively been needing”, giving me the sense that the adventure would provide some much-needed stimulation to these three characters who hadn't realized they were practically stagnating until they were pushed out of their comfort zones by the need to help their friend. In the finale song, Genie says “for them, no more crime” and of course he had to mean Omar, Kassim, and Babkak, so that would be where their character arcs ended up, when they decided they preferred a life they were actually doing something with, to one where they were just stealing because it was easier than trying to accomplish anything. I even wonder if that was the story the soundtrack was initially supposed to tell. But the play itself didn't really connect the dots between these songs to make me feel like this sort of character arc was happening. Aladdin is trying the whole time to break free of being a thief, and never really seems to slip back into the old ways. He tells his friends right from the very first scene that he'd decided once his mother died that he wouldn't steal anymore, and even though Babkak, Kassim, and Omar don't understand or approve of his decision to change, Aladdin is never influenced by their opinions. Actually, we never see any evidence that Aladdin was ever lazy, we just hear him singing about it, and I'm not sure it's the best story choice to start off with Aladdin's character arc already underway; how are we supposed to fully appreciate how far he's come if we never saw his starting point? And now I think on it Babkak, Omar, and Kassim also never show us any signs of being lazy beyond the lyrics of their song. Later on in the play I felt like the parts with Omar, Kassim, and Babkak became a little disjointed. They're there at the beginning of the Prince Ali sequence, dressed up as his royal announcers and helping him with his plan, but we never see Aladdin telling them about Genie or inviting them to help him, which seems rather an important scene to be just left to our imaginations. We also never really see how Omar found out that Aladdin is in trouble at the palace, much less how he knew Jasmine might be in trouble too. I do like the way Aladdin gives his three friends positions at the palace once he's allowed to marry Jasmine, though, and how it's hinted that Jasmine's three handmaids will pair off with them. Their ending was done really well; I just wish we had gotten to see more of their beginning and middle.
By the end of Jasmine's introduction scene, I thought her portrayal was great. Well, except that I did not like the addition of Jasmine asking why a woman can't rule Agrabah. I think I was turned off any idea of Jasmine wanting to rule Agrabah by the live-action remake, which we do not speak of here. But I really do feel it's unnecessary to make Jasmine want to rule her kingdom; she's already strong and forward-thinking without having this feminist agenda pushed on her. Jasmine wants to be free, not to spend her days sitting on a throne dealing with all the obligations and responsibilities that come with taking care of an entire kingdom of people. Still, apart from that, I thought she was being handled really well. They show us Jasmine standing up to her father's rules and questioning all the things he never questions, and we see her innocent excitement at the thought of getting outside and exploring the marketplace. And did I mention These Palace Walls is just the perfect Princess song for Jasmine?? Courtney Reed did continue to make a great Jasmine as the show went on. I just – wish the script had shown us more sides to her character, I suppose. Like the sexy temptress side which she's supposed to use on Jafar, taking her power back after he's been treating her like she isn't a valid human being, and which in the movie was one of her greatest strengths. (And of course she's the main Disney Princess who proves to us that you can be a sexy princess, that you don't have to be modest and demure before you can qualify!) But mostly I just wanted to see more of Jasmine's sweet and romantic side, especially with Aladdin. When Jasmine meets and talks with Aladdin in the marketplace, the show has the two of them talk for quite a while before the angry merchant incident, which isn't a bad thing on its own as it ensures that Aladdin and Jasmine have enough screen time together so we can see their dynamic and believe they're a good couple. But I felt like most of Jasmine's dialogue towards Aladdin, both before and after the angry merchant incident, was far more sassy and guarded than the openhearted, charmed air she presents to Aladdin in the movie. Jasmine of the movie has this wonderful duality of being sweet and innocent and romantic, and also being strong and tough and fiery, and somehow the two sides blend together beautifully and never feel like she's being inconsistent with her own character. It's kind of odd how so many times when I see Jasmine portrayed elsewhere, whether in a stage play or at a Disney park or in a fan-made skit, they often seem to play up on just one of these sides and neglect the other. And I absolutely love, one of the things that makes Jasmine my favourite Disney Princess, is the way she is able, even with that strong and tough and fiery side, to be so open to Aladdin's advances. She trusts Aladdin right from the beginning, and I cannot tell you how pleasantly surprised I was when I first watched the movie and Jasmine did not say to Aladdin “I had everything under control until you showed up!” or similar after he rescues her from the angry merchant. (“I want to thank you for stopping that man” is probably one of my favourite Jasmine lines for this reason.) I was positively starved for a romance where the woman can actually treat the man kindly right from the start, where we get to see both members of the couple decide they want someone and then actually get to build a relationship with that exact same person. A romance that lets us know that yes, you can build a strong bond with someone without any tension, a romance that assures us that yes, we can know our own hearts. Aladdin is one of the first examples I ever found of this. I think in Aladdin and Jasmine's case, their first meeting is definitely better off without any tension, in terms of story (by the end of their first meeting, their feelings towards each other must be overwhelmingly positive if Aladdin knows his greatest wish is to marry Jasmine and Jasmine is devastated by Aladdin's apparent death), Jasmine's character (I think it's extremely important to show audiences that always knowing your own mind is just as much about being open and knowing who you want to let into your life), and theme (Jasmine liking everything about Aladdin as himself makes for a great contrast when she dislikes his persona of Prince Ali later on). So you can imagine how seeing any of that dynamic changed for the Broadway show, knowing that somebody looked at this beautiful relationship development and said, “Hmm, not quite good enough as it is, let's put some doubt and some sassy guarded feelings in on Jasmine's side”... Well, let's just say it did not sit well with me.
Jafar was played for a long time on Broadway by Jonathan Freeman himself. You can't go wrong, can you, when it's the original voice of Jafar portraying him! And yet... even if the actor can't go wrong with the part, the material he's given to work with still can. No, none of Jafar's material was bad, all of it worked for him, and yet by the time the play was over, I realized that no matter how many times Iago calls Jafar evil at the beginning (tell-and-then-don't-show, I call it), he had barely done a single thing that would qualify as truly evil.
I really liked the way the show has Jafar getting worried that Jasmine will choose a suitor before he had a chance to take over Agrabah. The show changed things, though, so that if Jasmine didn't choose a husband to become the next Sultan, Jafar would become heir to the throne. Somehow I don't think that's how monarchies work... I also don't think, in the movie, that the Sultan trusted Jafar quite that much, or that he would leave Jasmine's future so uncertain as to have someone other than her father or husband be in charge of her home (the palace). But no matter what, if the movie's Jafar had been in that situation, he would have had no problem doing to any other suitor the same thing he does to Prince Ali – try his hardest to get the Sultan to mistrust him and not allow the match, and when that failed, murder him and pretend the ill-fated Prince had simply left. Jafar seems a little helpless in the show, like if Jasmine chooses a suitor he won't know what to do about it, and that implies he isn't ruthless enough to do whatever it takes to get rid of this suitor – like murdering him – which is an odd attitude to have in a villain, to say the least. Iago even asks a couple of times why they can't just murder someone, and complains that Jafar never kills anyone (!) I am convinced in the movie, if what happens to Gazeem and what he tried to do to Aladdin are any indicators, that Jafar has left a long trail of dead bodies in his wake on his quest to take over Agrabah, dead bodies which will never be properly linked back to him. (And possibly not just the bodies of his underlings, either – do you ever wonder why the Sultan doesn't seem to have any other advisors??)
Jafar, in the Broadway show, never hypnotizes the Sultan and in fact I don't recall seeing him do anything to imply his staff is magical and not just a status symbol/walking stick. He doesn't attempt to murder Aladdin at the Cave of Wonders, because the Cave collapses on Aladdin before he can get out of there – a change that works fine for condensing the plot, but doesn't work so well for establishing our villain's evil nature. (And since the show was two hours long while the movie was only one-and-a-half, it's not like they would need to condense the plot the same way they would if they were, say, adapting a movie from a book.) He won't attempt to murder Prince Ali when he comes and threatens to disrupt his plans of becoming Sultan. It was a pretty cool idea what they have him do instead, getting Prince Ali arrested for being in Jasmine's private chambers – because Aladdin would have been breaking quite a few societal rules by being alone and unchaperoned with Jasmine, as well as looking at, touching, and kissing her, and in the movie this was never touched upon! If only there had been some way to include a mention of this while still having Jafar perfectly willing to commit murder....
In this version, Jafar's entire big, evil plan is to make sure Jasmine never marries anyone so that he can inherit the throne. Kind of a passive plan for someone who is meant to be such a ruthless and ambitious person... He hasn't even been looking for the lamp for years – he only finds out about it during the show itself, from a big book of magic and a spooky voice which tells him everything he needs to know. (He gets his answers a little too easily if you ask me – if the movie's Jafar had had these tools at his disposal he would have seized the throne of Agrabah overnight!) But I didn't realize just how toned down Jafar was until the scene where Jasmine is upset about Aladdin's apparent death. The whole scene went by, I was eagerly anticipating Jafar's next plan which I knew from the movie was coming, and... nothing. Jafar never decides to marry Jasmine himself in order to become Sultan. It was all set up perfectly, and then it turns out Jafar's only happy because now he thinks there's no way Jasmine will ever get married and then Jafar will quite legally inherit the throne. We don't see Jafar lusting after Jasmine or wanting to possess her or plotting for her to end up married to someone she hates. It was such a huge blow of disappointment, finding out the Broadway show wasn't willing to “go there”.
Towards the end, just like in the movie, Jafar steals Genie's lamp and takes over Agrabah. Aladdin doesn't expose Jafar first, by the way, probably because Jafar never did anything Aladdin could expose him for. But I really did like the touch during Jafar's takeover scene, where he brings Jasmine out in her wedding dress – with her hands chained behind her back. Finally, the kind of creepy behaviour I expect to see from Jafar! And it makes for excellent symbolism too, that Jafar has literally taken Aladdin's bride as though she were an object. The way she was obviously anticipating a happy wedding and is now in Jafar's power could have rivalled even the slave outfit for sheer impact – and in fact, if the show had played up on this factor, I would completely have forgiven them for leaving out the slave outfit, especially as I understand it being harder to do costume changes mid-scene on a stage. (I am still a little disappointed that Jafar never changes Aladdin's Prince Ali finery back into rags during his takeover scene, which in the movie has such great visual impact. But I do understand that might not have been doable in the middle of a scene they're performing live. Especially if Aladdin will have to change right back again anyway.)
But the creepy factor of the chains and wedding dress isn't played up on. Jafar never expresses any desire to marry Jasmine, either before or after his takeover. He never enslaves her or lets Iago torture the Sultan. Jasmine meanwhile never gets a chance to prove her own power and cleverness by seducing Jafar so that Aladdin would have a chance to get the lamp back. Jafar never even sends Aladdin to the ends of the earth, which is doubly weird because his Prince Ali reprise keeps the line about sending him there. The whole tense, dark, and dramatic final battle scene of the movie is stripped down to maybe one minute: as soon as Jafar takes over and exposes Aladdin, Aladdin tells Jafar that he isn't as powerful as the Genie and Jafar makes his third wish. He becomes a genie and vanishes into a lamp. He vanishes without having a chance to do anything except chain up Jasmine, order the guards to grab the Sultan, wish for more power and force everyone to bow, and expose Aladdin. I found myself thinking that getting trapped in a lamp forever was way too harsh a punishment for this character, who had never done anything to merit worse than banishment. Okay, he wasn't particularly nice, but nothing he did had nearly the same effect as all the evidence the movie gives us of Jafar being just that evil.
I suspect that some of this, at least, may have been because some people consider it “inappropriate” to show certain things in a story. Like the villain having any sexual attraction to the heroine or enslaving her, in case having the villain do that would somehow promote or romanticize female objectification or slavery. There almost seems to be an attitude, among some, that this sort of thing should never be shown at all, regardless of what lens they're being shown through, possibly because the very thought of such things is triggering to those people, and makes them feel uncomfortable. Well, the scene from the movie, the one where we see the results of Jafar's takeover, with all its slavery and torture – that scene does make me uncomfortable. There's always a small part of me that doesn't want to get to this point of the movie, that wants to look away so I don't have to witness this. And I love that it has this effect on me, because now I can really feel how horrible it is that Jafar has taken over and I can really see why we were right to root against him all this time. Can you imagine the effects on storytelling if we allow ourselves to restrict what the villains do, in case somebody gets the wrong idea and thinks these things are being promoted instead of just portrayed? If we didn't allow our villains to sink to the lowest depths of evil, the parts that do and absolutely should make us uncomfortable? We would neglect to let our heroes reach their full potential by defeating the greatest possible evil. We would deny our audiences the ability to face and unmask the darkest elements of the world from a safe setting. And we would neglect to spread the very important message which I like to see at the root of all the best stories – that evil can be faced and defeated.
So, all in all, I really liked the Broadway show. Perhaps it didn't live up to the movie quite as much as I was hoping, but my overall feeling was positive. And who knows, maybe other productions of the show took care of some of the issues I noticed? I can tell you, I would definitely be willing to watch one and find out – or just to rewatch the one I did see!
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