Talk:Rodgers + Hammerstein's Cinderella (Beane musical)

Plot summary

Can anyone add a more detailed plot summary? -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:25, 19 May 2013 (UTC)

Thank you! -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:22, 2 June 2013 (UTC)

Brantley review

Frankly, the review's a bit of a mess: first he says it wants to be all these contrasting (or opposing) things, and then he uses their t-shirt to say the show doesn't know what it wants to be. Which is true?

Just because Brantley makes both statements doesn't mean the Wikipedia article has to repeat them. I thought "glittery patchwork of a show" was not exactly praise, and the explanation of that patchwork also not so great. However, if removing the rest—from the parallel to the Academy Awards show—seems to be whitewashing, adding the comment about the 10-minute-too-long second act (later echoed in the Financial Times review, which shows this is a problem seen by more than one reviewer) would seem to address the issue. BlueMoonset (talk) 15:16, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Hi. I compromised with you on Brantley to remove some repetition; I disagree that it is "opposing". You can't omit mateiral because you personally disagree with it.

As for the other names, we do not include the names of non-notable reviewers in our high-quality articles about musicals. See our FA articles, including The King and I, Carousel (musical) and Flower Drum Song. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:16, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

As you can see, I wasn't happy with the compromise, and feel it should have been discussed here first before you decided on what it should be.

I didn't start with this because I personally disagree with the material, it's because it's poorly written and he's effectively contradicting himself. First he says Cinderella wants to be all these opposing things, then he says it doesn't know what it wants to be. If Cinderella wants to be those opposing things, then it does: this may not be wise or sensible, but to then turn around and say it doesn't (unlike the t-shirt) know what it wants to be is a flaw in the review, and not one Wikipedia should be highlighting by repeating it. I personally feel that the first quote, about all the opposing things it wants to be, is more effective than the latter, but two "wants to be" quotes from the same person simply doesn't work.

As for the reviewer names, I'll bow to local practice, though my view is if you're going to quote someone, you should give their name as well as the source. Some other performance reviews on Wikipedia do include reviewer names: whether they may be notable, it is still their opinion, not the paper's. BlueMoonset (talk) 15:36, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

BlueMoonset has removed this material, which quotes critics Ben Brantley. Brantley felt that the show "doesn't seem to know quite what" it wants to be. I believe that this critique is important for the article. What BlueMoonset thinks about the show or Brantley's review is not a reason to omit important criticisms from the article. On the other issue, please note that the non-notable reviewers' names are given in the footnotes. Can others please comment? -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:59, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Ssilvers, can you please address the point, which is that Brantley says two contradictory things about what the show wants to be? How do you propose reconciling these? Another idea would be to contrast the "knotty problem" with the final t-shirt message that the show itself doesn't reflect, which you characterize as "important criticism", and eliminate the "wants to be" laundry list of contrasts. Whatever is ultimately done, it's our responsibility as article writers to try to produce an article that makes sense. (PS: I did see the reviewer names in the footnotes; it's where I got them for the now-reverted article addition.) BlueMoonset (talk) 16:29, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

It is surely not for WP editors to attempt to reconcile contradictory statements (if such they be) within relevant quotations. Where two possibly contradictory statements are made in a relevant source it is, I think, dishonest to remove one of them so as to present a slanted view of what the source says. Tim riley (talk) 16:43, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Does it present a slanted view? I'm quite serious here: it's not up to us to attempt to reconcile contradictory statements, but that doesn't mean we have to slavishly print either of them in that case. If it had been one continuous quote, I can see letting Brantley stand and fall on his own words, but it wasn't. If the review quote included the entire final sentence of the paragraph after the "all at once", it would accurately attribute the "wants to be" and "want to be", which is surely important. I'll give that a try to see what people think. (The parenthetical remark about the Hammerstein lyric could probably be omitted via ellipsis, though I think it's a telling point.) BlueMoonset (talk) 17:12, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Tim riley. Nevertheless, there is nothing self-contradictory in Brantley's comment - first he says that the show tries to be too many things at once, then he says that it doesn't know what it wants to be. Focusing on Brantley's humorous use of the show's t-shirts (quoting "In my own little corner", where Cinderella says "I can be whatever I want to be") is just adding unnecessary text, and seems to be a wikipedian trying to make a WP:POINT. Brantley is cleverly using the quote of the lyric to say that the show does not know what it wants to be, just as I noted in the Reception section. -- Ssilvers (talk) 17:24, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

That makes sense to me. Tim riley (talk) 17:42, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

You've lost the referent, however. The way you've written it, "what that is" seems to refer back to the laundry list (which had been at the end of the previous paragraph in the review), when it isn't doing any such thing; this strikes me as misleading. However, as the consensus seems to be that it is both fine and perfectly accurate, and that I've been both dishonest and pointy in my attempts to fix what I've honestly seen as a problem, I'm not going to pursue it any further. There is a difference between "tries to be" and "wants to be", and Brantley uses "wants" in both places. It looks to me like he was a little too clever for his own good. BlueMoonset (talk) 06:25, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

Oops! Of course, I meant to return the language to "what it wants to be". Fixed now. Sorry for the confusion. -- Ssilvers (talk) 13:22, 11 June 2013 (UTC)

I reverted before I saw the discussion here. I did so as I agree entirely with the comments made by Ssilvers above. Jack1956 (talk) 18:45, 10 June 2013 (UTC)

Cinderella (2013 cast album)

I moved the cast album info to a separate article, leaving summary information here. -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:17, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

Is it notable enough to have its own article, personally i am against these individual articles just don't see the notability outside the main page.Blethering Scot 14:34, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

You will also need to change the fair use rationale for the image as its not valid for that page.Blethering Scot 14:36, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. I fixed the image fair use rationale. The track listing and cast album infobox do not belong in the musical's article, so I moved it instead of deleting it. There are other cast albums that have an article, but I don't feel strongly if you want to afd it. -- Ssilvers (talk) 14:51, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

I think it does belong in the article its strongly associated with the show, and then there are equal pages with it in to those who have went down the road of a separate. I don't have a stong enough feeling to AFD it but have a very strong opinion that it would be very wrong to remove this altogether.Blethering Scot 16:35, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

A second infobox about the cast album and a track listing that simply repeats the list of musical numbers from the show are redundant and do not belong in articles about musicals. I have reviewed most of the articles for musicals on Wikipedia, and we uniformly (as far as I know), do not do it throughout the WP:MUSICALS project. The reason that we do not do it is because it is redundant, and anything that is not redundant is tangential, because it is not about the musical, but rather about the cast album. Instead, we just give a brief summary of the most important information about the album(s). For examples of the best articles about musicals on Wikipedia, see The King and I, Carousel (musical) and Flower Drum Song, all of which are WP:Featured Articles. There, you can see brief discussions of the cast albums (with no track listing or separate infobox), just like I have done it here. -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:48, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

I did not say they were uniformly on all articles i said there are equal numbers and there are. I don't have much support for the WP:MUSICALS project as i think its a total waste of time and focuses on a few high profile articles leaving the majority in an extremely poor state, focuses on bureaucracy and petty issues without the drive for widespread improvement which is why a lot of the projects articles are in the state they are. Unfortunately this is just another example of that.Blethering Scot 17:25, 22 June 2013 (UTC)

Article title

This article should be moved from Cinderella (2013 Broadway production) to Cinderella (2013 musical), as no Broadway musical articles, that I'm aware of, reflect the former in its title, only the latter being so. Much appreciation if this is done. Best, --Discographer (talk) 19:23, 11 August 2013 (UTC)

I don't think that works. This is not a 2013 musical. It is an adaptation of Rodgers and Hammerstein's 1957 musical of Cinderella prepared specifically for a Broadway production that opened in 2013. It could be called something like Cinderella (Beane, R&H musical). -- Ssilvers (talk) 19:30, 12 August 2013 (UTC)