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The Music Man (1962 film)

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Musicman1962

The Music Man.

This is about the 1962 film. For the later television film see The Music Man (2003 film). For the original stage musical see The Music Man (musical).

The Music Man is a 1962 musical film based on the stage musical of the same name.

Cast[]

Ensemble[]

  • John Collum as James
  • Lisa Janti as Lulu
  • Darbi Winters as Penny

Plot[]

In July 1912, a traveling salesman, "Professor" Harold Hill, arrives in River City, Iowa, intrigued by the challenge of swindling the famously stubborn natives of Iowa. Masquerading as a traveling band instructor, Professor Hill plans to con the citizens of River City into paying him to create a boys' marching band, including instruments, uniforms, and music instruction. Once he has collected the money and the instruments and uniforms have arrived, he will hop the next train out of town, leaving them without their money or a band.

With help from his associate Marcellus Washburn, who is now living in River City and is the only one who knows Hill's real name, "Gregory," Professor Hill deliberately incites mass concern among the parents of River City that their young boys are being seduced into a world of sin and vice by the new pool table in town. He convinces them that a boys' marching band is the only way to keep the boys of the town pure and out of trouble, and begins collecting their money. Hill anticipates that Marian, the town's librarian and piano instructor, will attempt to discredit him, so he sets out to seduce her into silence. Also in opposition to Hill is the town's Mayor Shinn, the owner of the billiard parlor where the new pool table has been installed, who orders the school board to obtain Hill's credentials. When they attempt to do so, Hill avoids their questions by teaching them to sing as a barbershop quartet via "sustained talking." They are thereafter easily tricked by Hill into breaking into song whenever they ask for his credentials.

Meanwhile, Hill attempts to win the heart of Marian the librarian, who has an extreme distrust of men. His charms have little effect upon Marian despite his winning the admiration of her mother and his attempts to draw out her unhappy younger brother Winthrop. When Marian discovers in the Indiana State Journal of Education 1890–1910 that Hill's claim to being "Gary Conservatory, Gold Medal, Class of '05" is a lie (Gary was founded in 1906), she attempts to present the evidence to Mayor Shinn and expose Hill as a fraud, but is momentarily interrupted by the arrival of the Wells Fargo wagon. When Winthrop, after years of moody withdrawal, joins in with the townspeople and speaks effusively with Marian due to the excitement at receiving his cornet, Marian begins to fall in love with Hill and subsequently hides the evidence she has uncovered from Mayor Shinn. Hill tells the boys to learn to play via the "Think System," in which they simply have to think of a tune over and over and will know how to play it without ever touching their instruments.

Meanwhile, Marian is falling more in love with Harold, and in a counterpart with The Buffalo Bills they sing "Lida Rose/Will I Ever Tell You". Hill's con is nearly complete; all he has to do is collect the rest of the instrument and uniform money, and he can disappear. During his meeting with Marian at the footbridge, the first time she has ever been there with a man, he learns that she knew of his deception but didn't tell because she is in love with him. He is about to leave town when Charlie Cowell, a disgruntled anvil salesman who had been run out of Brighton, Illinois because Hill had conned the townspeople there, comes to River City and exposes Hill and his plans. Sought by an angry mob and pressed to leave town by Marcellus and Marian, Hill realizes that he is in love with Marian and can't leave River City. He is captured by the mob and brought before a town meeting to be tarred and feathered. Marian defends Hill, and the townspeople, reminded of how he has brought so many of them together by his presence there, elect not to have him tarred and feathered. Mayor Shinn in response reminds the townspeople "standing there like a cote of Shropshire sheep" of how much money Hill has taken from them for instruments, uniforms, technical instruction books, and the promise of creating a boys' band. When he loudly demands to know "Where's the band?" Hill is saved by the town's boys who have learned to play Beethoven's Minuet in G on their instruments. Although their technical expertise leaves much to be desired, the boys' parents are enthralled. The somewhat ragged boys band marches out of the town hall. But as they begin to march, they are suddenly "transformed" on the screen, and now the viewer sees the band not as it really is (shabby, awkward and unskilled) but instead sees what the boys' parents and the townspeople see: a spectacular, precise and magnificent marching band dressed in resplendent uniforms, and playing and marching with perfection.

Musical numbers[]

  • "Main Title" - Harold, Charlie and Salesmen
  • "Ya Got Trouble" - Harold and Townspeople
  • "Piano Lesson/If You Don't Mind My Saying So" - Marian and Mrs. Paroo
  • "Goodnight, My Someone" - Marian
  • "76 Trombones" - Harold and Townspeople
  • "Sincere" - The Quartet
  • "Sadder But Wiser Girl For Me" - Harold
  • "Marian The Librarian" - Harold
  • "Gary, Indiana" - Harold
  • "Being in Love" - Marian
  • "Wells Fargo Wagon" - Winthrop and Townspeople
  • "Lida Rose"/"Will I Ever Tell You" - Marian and The Quartet
  • "Gary, Indiana" (reprise) - Mrs. Paroo and Winthrop
  • "Pick a Little, Talk a Little" - Townswomen and Quartet
  • "Goodnight, Ladies" - Harold and The Quartet
  • "Shipoopi" - Marcellus and Townspeople
  • "Till There Was You" - Harold and Marian
  • "Goodnight My Someone" (reprise) - Harold and Marian
  • "76 Trombones" (reprise) - Harold, Marian and Townspeople
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