From classics to new favorites, here are some options when you're in the mood for watching a good musical from home.
While Disney hasn’t said how many people have watched Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Founding Father musical, most experts think it’s a lot. More than 500,000 new users downloaded the Disney+ app the weekend the Mouse House released Hamilton, and it set many social network feeds ablaze.
But you can only watch Hamilton so many times. And with the real theaters of Broadway still closed because of the coronavirus (and with most of us living nowhere near ‘em, anyway), it’s only natural that fledging Broadway musical lover start to ask, “What other musicals can I stream?”
The short answer: A lot.
We’ll unpack a few options for you, from all-time classics to new favorites to some made especially for the kiddos. And we’ve got to begin with an online streaming service that’s dedicated to all things Broadway.
Broadway HD
I know, I know. You’re probably already subscribing to what feels like far too many streaming services already. Can you really afford another $8.99 a month (or $99.99 a year) for something dedicated solely to stuff on stage?
It’s a legitimate question. But for those who watched Hamilton and will never be satisfied until they get more Broadway musicals into their lives, Broadway HD offers plenty to scratch that itch. The service’s musical roster includes:
Cats
Cats is a 1998 made-for-video stage production of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s outrageously long-running musical. (Its original run on Broadway lasted 18 years.) The play is loosely based on T.S. Eliot’s 1939 poem Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats, and I do mean loosely. Filmed in London without an audience and with some significant cuts (the film runs just two hours, significantly shorter than the 2-hour, 40-minute stage musical), the film still gives you as much song, dance and fuzzy costumes as you can squeeze on screen.