On Your Toes

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On Your Toes was a collaborative 1936 Broadway show with music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Lorenz Hart and book by Rodgers, Hart and George Abbott.

This landmark musical was directed by George Abbott and choreographed by George Balanchine, whose use of ballet in the show marked the first time in musical comedy that dance was a direct component of the plot.

1 Plot
- 1.1 Act I
- 1.2 Act II
2 Score
3 Film Version
4 External links

[edit] Plot

Synopsis

[edit] Act I

On a vaudeville stage, Phil Dolan II his wife Lili and his son Junior perform their nightly routine, - but afterwards in the dressing-room, Ma and Pa tell Junior he has to go to school. And fifteen years later, as predicted, Junior is a music teacher at Knickerbocker University. He has two talented students: Sidney Cohn and Frankie Frayne. Sidney has written a promising jazz ballet which Frankie catches Junior dancing to alone in the classroom (uncovering his 'secret past') and she trades an introduction to the Russian Ballet's manager in return for his listening to her song.

In the apartment of Vera Baranova, star of the Russian Ballet, Peggy, the manager, enthusiastically tells Sergei, the company's director, about the new jazz ballet. He is not interested in anything new - he doesn't even recognise that the Revolution has happened! Junior arrives as Vera and co-star/unfaithful lover Morrisone are having a Russian screaming match. The others leave, so that Vera and Junior can discuss the new ballet - but that's not at all how the scene ends…

Back in the classroom: Frankie is jealous of Junior's stories about Vera and the Russians (Peggy has promised him a chance to dance in the corps de ballet) and they both wish they were away from it all. At the opening of the ballet 'La Princesse Zenobia', Junior is told that one of the dancers is in jail and he has to take his place, but onstage he gets all his steps, rhythms and positions cock-eyed and makes a laughing-stock of the ballet. But the audience loves it!

[edit] Act II

Sergei, Peggy, Vera, Morrosine and Junior have listened to the jazz ballet. Opinions are mixed, and Vera and Morrosine are still bitching at each other, as he becomes increasingly jealous of Junior. Poor Junior has got love problems, too: he upsets Frankie by going to lunch with Vera (for business reasons) instead of her, but she is 'Glad to be Unhappy'.

Next: Peggy, Sergei and some of the company visit Junior's school: Sergei has come to break the bad news that he will not be doing the jazz ballet, but Peggy persuades him oh-so-gently by threatening to pull out the million dollars she has put into the company. After Sergei's announcement that the next production will be Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, the class put on the title number 'On Your Toes', in which the students' jazz and the company's classical routines are deftly combined.

At a rehearsal, Morrosine's jealousy of Junior gets out of control, there is a fight in which he is knocked out by Sergei, and suddenly Junior is the new star! The humiliated Morrosine plots with his gangster friend Louie to shoot Junior at the end of the performance, Joe, the stage doorman, overhears and warns Frankie. On-stage, Junior is tipped off. he signals to the conductor to avoid the final loud climax which would cover the shot, and two cops seize Louie as he is about to shoot. After the curtain call, Junior is embraced by Frankie, and is startled to see his Ma and Pa waiting to congratulate him! The music-teacher has made it back to his home-ground - the stage.

[edit] Score

Overture
Two a Day for Keith
Questions and Answers (The Three Bs)
It's Got to Be Love
Too Good for the Average Man
There's a Small Hotel
La Princesse Zenobia Ballet
The Heart Is Quicker Than the Eye
Glad to Be Unhappy Lyrics
Quiet Night Lyrics
On Your Toes Lyrics
Quiet Night Reprise
Slaughter on Tenth Avenue

[edit] Film Version

The 1939 film version of On Your Toes starred Eddie Albert and Vera Zorina (who was married to Balanchine at the time, as Tamara Geva had been during the run of the stage version), and was produced by Warner Bros. It was choreographed, like the show, by George Balanchine, and the plotline followed that of the stage version fairly closely, except that Frankie and Morrosine were omitted from the screenplay, Sergei became a phony composer who takes the credit for music written by Junior and who arranges for Junior to be shot during the ballet, and Vera became Junior's childhood sweetheart, with whom he has always been in love. The strange decision was made to omit all the songs and use them only as background music, while keeping the ballets. The highlight of the film was Zorina and Albert's dancing to Slaughter on Tenth Avenue.

[edit] External links

Musicals of Rodgers and Hart
The Garrick Gaieties • Dearest Enemy • The Girl Friend • A Connecticut Yankee • Present Arms • Jumbo • On Your Toes • Babes in Arms • I'd Rather Be Right • The Boys from Syracuse • I Married an Angel • Too Many Girls • Higher and Higher • Pal Joey • By Jupiter