Because the creation of synchronized sound, the film musical had been a cornerstone of the Hollywood filmmaking machine. From “The Jazz Singer” to “The Sound of Music,” the shape had 40 years of cinematic ubiquity. Throughout the transition to the New Hollywood within the late Nineteen Sixties led to by movies corresponding to “Bonnie and Clyde,” “The Graduate,” and “Straightforward Rider,” the ultra-earnest, glamorous film musical was not in vogue. Individuals wished realism, and an more and more political technology of younger individuals was on the lookout for artwork that handled the difficult points that each one boiled over within the Nineteen Sixties. Sequins, faucet dancing, and toe-tapping songs weren’t coping with these subjects. When one thing has proved to be a tried and true success for that lengthy, it’s typically tough for it to evolve with the occasions.

In the meantime, Broadway was evolving. Exhibits had been coping with darker and extra subtle topic issues. You had Stephen Sondheim rising as a composer, upending the hummable melodies and poetic lyrics of his predecessors and mentors into melodically advanced and linguistically intricate puzzles. You had “Hair” bringing rock and roll music to the theatre, and it, together with “Oh! Calcutta!,” placing nudity on stage. Musical theatre was progressing simply because the New Hollywood was, however film musicals had been nonetheless a few decade or so behind. If Hollywood nonetheless wished film musicals to be viable, they wanted an replace in type, subject material, and tone. Enter: Bob Fosse.