The kid takes a big step forward

Why didn't somebody tell me about this! I just found the BMI Workshop Songbook Podcast, featuring Broadway notables singing songs from musicals in development. (Okay, maybe somebody did tell me and I forgot.)

I definitely have to go to iTunes and download the entire series even though I already have about 200 podcasts I haven't listened to yet.

I found the podcasts because I was looking for information about the new musical The Kid, based on the book by Dan Savage about his effort to adopt a child with his partner, Terry Miller. While I was following Sarah's tweets Saturday from Wall to Wall Broadway, and wishing I were there, I noticed that she mentioned hearing songs from The Kid, so I did some research.

It turns out the musical, with a book by Michael Zam and music and lyrics by Andy Monroe and Jack Lechner, is going to be presented next spring as part of the 2009-2010 season by The New Group, a New York theatre company that's new to me.

I have to admit I've never heard of any of the people involved with this project. But they won the 2009 BMI Foundation Jerry Bock Award for Best New Musical. That's promising, right?

On the BMI blog, you can listen to an interview with Monroe and hear Cheyenne Jackson sing the title song. Just scroll down to March 14, 2008, and click on the link.

The song is funny in a self-deprecating kind of way and the lyrics definitely embody Savage's wit. It's also interesting to see how passages from the book - Savage's tongue-in-cheek rationale for wanting a child - are turned into song lyrics. Some lines, I think, are pretty much word for word.

As I mentioned before, I was a little skeptical that The Kid would work as a musical. I really liked the book - it's a very heartwarming story and Savage is a terrific writer. But I wondered how some of it, especially the more tension-filled parts, would translate into song.

The more I think about it though, the story is so inherently dramatic. Whether you're gay or straight, the adoption process seems like a journey riddled with frustration and anxiety, marked by moments of great hope and excitement contrasted with sadness and despair.

Savage definitely brings home those contrasting emotions and he handles them with a great deal of humor, compassion and poignancy. Hopefully the musical will do the same.

Can the kid carry a tune?

When I threw some love Dan Savage's way on Monday, there was one item I missed. Apparently a musical version of his book The Kid is in the works. It was reported by Michael Musto in The Village voice last fall. Musto said that Scott Elliott, who directed the Roundabout Theatre Company's 2006 revival of The Threepenny Opera, was involved with the project.

Now, after a year of regular theatergoing, I'm no longer a complete neophyte, but I'm still starry-eyed. And I still get excited when there's talk of turning a book or movie that I love into a musical. I'm excited even if it's something I never would have thought of in a gazillion years. (And why doesn't anyone ever talk of turning a book or movie into a play? Why is it always a musical?)

I'd probably put The Kid into that far-fetched category. I loved the story, about the attempt by Savage and his partner, Terry Miller, to adopt a baby. Savage is a terrific writer and The Kid is funny and poignant. There's a lot of drama as you follow them through the adoption process, not knowing until the very end how things will turn out.

But while there's a lot of humor, there are also some very serious elements to The Kid. For example, the mother of the baby Savage and Miller are adopting is a street punk who drank and used drugs during part of her pregnancy. One chapter deals with Savage's research into fetal alcohol syndrome. Not the stuff of light pop tunes.

On the other hand, I can't carry a tune, so what do I know? And the story of Dan and Terry's journey to fatherhood is very compelling. (Although turning the story into a musical is kind of ironic, since Dan and Terry don't quite share each other's tastes in tunes. Terry loves dance music and Dan can't stand it.)

I haven't read anything about the project except for that one short item, so who knows, it might already have been abandoned. But I hope not. No matter how far-fetched some of these proposed musicals seem, I'm always curious to see how they turn out. And if it's a book or movie I loved, I always keep my fingers crossed and hope for the best.