thank you! it's been quite tricky trying to find anything about this play.
but i DO have big news! this play is not really that 'lost' anymore! just, misplaced? there is a bootleg of the Nederland Theater show floating around the internet, with reasonably good quality from what i've heard. sadly, i don't have a copy of it, but a handful of people seem to. i don't know how exactly to get a hold of this bootleg, i've only really emailed on of the current owners of this bootleg and am hoping for a reply as soon as possible. i suggest others to do the same if they find anyone who claims to have a copy of the bootleg, not to hound them with questions, but just to ask to have the copy or where to find a copy.
if i get the bootleg i'll make it public & post it on youtube (hopefully it won't get copyright striked). i don't know if its a video bootleg or just an audio bootleg, and i don't know if this is the rewritten/censored version of the play either. but it is something, and something is better than nothing!
i'll be searching for more folks who have the copy and email them to see if they still have it/are willing to share. i suggest yall do the same to, if you feel up to it!
thank you! it's been quite tricky trying to find anything about this play.
but i DO have big news! this play is not really that 'lost' anymore! just, misplaced? there is a bootleg of the Nederland Theater show floating around the internet, with reasonably good quality from what i've heard. sadly, i don't have a copy of it, but a handful of people seem to. i don't know how exactly to get a hold of this bootleg, i've only really emailed on of the current owners of this bootleg and am hoping for a reply as soon as possible. i suggest others to do the same if they find anyone who claims to have a copy of the bootleg, not to hound them with questions, but just to ask to have the copy or where to find a copy.
if i get the bootleg i'll make it public & post it on youtube (hopefully it won't get copyright striked). i don't know if its a video bootleg or just an audio bootleg, and i don't know if this is the rewritten/censored version of the play either. but it is something, and something is better than nothing!
i'll be searching for more folks who have the copy and email them to see if they still have it/are willing to share. i suggest yall do the same to, if you feel up to it!
Did you find it?
Is this the same thing as Rag Dolly? We had a post about that.
"Weekend? It's Monday already."
LMWF God: (noun) a person who posts a lot on this forum
thank you! it's been quite tricky trying to find anything about this play.
but i DO have big news! this play is not really that 'lost' anymore! just, misplaced? there is a bootleg of the Nederland Theater show floating around the internet, with reasonably good quality from what i've heard. sadly, i don't have a copy of it, but a handful of people seem to. i don't know how exactly to get a hold of this bootleg, i've only really emailed on of the current owners of this bootleg and am hoping for a reply as soon as possible. i suggest others to do the same if they find anyone who claims to have a copy of the bootleg, not to hound them with questions, but just to ask to have the copy or where to find a copy.
if i get the bootleg i'll make it public & post it on youtube (hopefully it won't get copyright striked). i don't know if its a video bootleg or just an audio bootleg, and i don't know if this is the rewritten/censored version of the play either. but it is something, and something is better than nothing!
i'll be searching for more folks who have the copy and email them to see if they still have it/are willing to share. i suggest yall do the same to, if you feel up to it!
Did you find it?
Is this the same thing as Rag Dolly? We had a post about that.
the bootleg is the same thing as rag dolly! it is one of the Broadway performances in 1986, unsure of whether its one of the preview performances or if its actually one of the 5 official Broadway performances, which basically could mean the surviving bootleg could possibly be the uncensored version or the censored version. either way its a find.
i dont have this bootleg yet, but a handful of people Do, so i'm contacting as many of those people as i can in the hopes i can get ahold of this bootleg.
i dont know if i can post it to youtube once i have it since it is apparently copyrighted material (which is a confusing topic on its own, since no one really knows who owns this musical atm) but i could possibly post it onto google drive and share the link for folks interested in listening to it.
theres a raggedy ann and andy forum on orangecow.com , and the moderator for that seems to have a bootleg of the broadway performance. he's pretty active on the website, so i asked him for a link since the one link he posted has been taken down. hopefully i'll get a reply soon in the hopes that this play could probably be a little less lost and more just. obscure. if anyone interested wants to make an account to ask as well, then u should! squeaky wheel gets the grease!
On the Wikipedia page, there's an unsourced claim that the Moscow documentary was first presented by the "State University of New York" in 1986. Not sure which of their 64 campuses it's referring to, but I'll look into and see if that leads anywhere. (I attend at SUNY school, so it caught my attention)
I think I might have found a lead, if it hasn't been looked into already. I didn't really get anywhere with the SUNY thing, but I looked into the writer/director of the Moscow documentary, Tom Gliserman (in a few places he is actually credited as an alumni of "State University of New York", and SUNY was listed as the production company on IMDB, so maybe that's where it came from?). Anyway, he might have the footage, or knows where we could go to find the footage and get it released officially/legally. I wanted to check here first, though, since I didn't want to bug him if someone already talked to him. Here's his website contact page if someone else wanted to ask: gliserman.com/contact-form/index.php The website doesn't specifically list the documentary, but there's some overlap in credits from his IMDB page on the website.
As said above, I have found the audio bootleg for the October 1986 Broadway performance, put them all into one video and posted it onto YouTube! This is, sadly, the rewritten version, so a lot of things are different from the original ESIPA production, and the music differs greatly from the Demo Recording thats also on YouTube. If any of you guys are interested I posted the differences on my Tumblr here.
The fact that this is the 'censored' version of the show is pretty astounding, considering the show in the bootleg still has a lot of dark moments alluding to suicide (whenever the mother is mentioned, she or someone else talks about a "rope around her neck"), the father is still portrayed as an alcoholic, the entire "You'll Love It" segment is still there, the entire show still revolves around themes of death/mortality/etc. It's odd that this is considered the lighter version of the original script, which must have been a lot more dark considering the outcry it started, compared to the 1986 Broadway show, which seemed to have went off without stirring any controversy.
That being said, a bootleg of this version of the show has been found! The script for this show has also been found, possibly, but it resides in the New York Public Library, and this library only has the 1986 script. The script isn't available online, and so to view it we would need someone who is able to go to the public library. Even to just scan the pages or take pictures of them, just to have some copy of the script, even if the pictures are low quality, its better than nothing.
So, at the moment I'm currently trying to hunt down a copy of the original 1984 script, even if it's just to know its whereabouts, knowing the original content of the play and what actually caused all the controversy would be nice. Unused/Official footage from the documentary would be a plus, thank you vamp1597 for the lead! Maybe even extra pictures, which I'll probably be contacting the costume designer soon to talk about that. Even if its small stuff like music sheets or small factoids from actors about the show itself. Really anything to fill in the gaps in this already Very Messy Story about this Very Messy Musical.
As a note, it's very likely that we wouldn't be able to do a whole lot with the 1986 script, since it is housed at an archive. Sometimes documents are not allowed to be copied in any way, and publishing documents that are allowed to have copies made are, needless to say, a huge no-no (at least without permission through the proper channels). We'd probably want to go through a different route for publicizing it. Same goes with the 1984 script, if it's housed at a an archive or library, too. The Wiki's already publishing/promoting technically illegally posted materials, we probably should try not to provoke an archive/library in one of the largest cities in the US.
Big news! The New York Public Library's copy of the script is in fact in their archives, and I now have a digital copy of the script! The script seems to be an older copy, and comparing it to the audio bootleg shows that the script has a few small missing scenes/moments, and also seems to have the demo soundtrack still, rather than the updated version with the modified songs and the new song Make Believe. But, the script has the lyrics to the demo soundtrack songs, which I will be posting soon, once I have time to write everything down. This is a pretty big find, and while its possibly not the original script, and doesn't have the lyrics to the new/changed songs, its still an interesting read. I don't know if I can post it yet, but it can be purchased through NYPL, for a whopping $50 USD. I might not be able to post it, but I could possibly post an abridged transcript now, using the script as a general outline for what they are saying, since a lot of the dialogue doesn't match up.
I updated the LMW Article I wrote in like... early 2017, with some new information, added the audio bootleg video to the gallery, added a section for the list of songs and cast. I'm probably going to add some more information in the first paragraph, try to go into more detail with how William Gibson was inspired by Jungian Dream theory while writing the show. But for now, I just updated and added a few small things. Here's the link!!!
Another big thing that was mentioned in the comment section of the article, is that Ivy Austin is apparently trying to get a company interested in a licensing agreement with the script, due to the renewed interest in the show. Which, if all goes well, there is a possibility this musical might actually be revived. Of course, I dont know the details, but I am very happy that the article managed to gain some more traffic and attention directed toward this elusive little show. It definitely deserves the love it is getting.
I also managed to get my hands on two playbills from the show! They are pretty neat. No new or interesting info, just a nice collectors item.
I sincerely hope this is found. It has an interesting background story and I want to know how dark it's supposed to be. By the way, is there a chance this got released in other countries aside from the United States and Russia?
Okay, so, the director of Rag Dolly contacted me via email, which was a pretty big thing on its own, very exciting (and a little nerve wracking!). I asked her a few questions about the show, mainly stuff that remains unconfirmed about the show, and see if she knew about any leads to a video bootleg that is rumored to exist, etc etc. I'm now waiting for a reply, but i thought i'd give an update about the show!
Not much has been found that is new, however more rumors have surfaced, like the possible video bootleg said before. Vinnie Rattole, the dude that posted the Rag Dolly demo bootleg on YouTube years ago, commented on the Rag Dolly LMW Article with some information that is pretty interesting. They mentioned that while researching the musical, around the time they posted the video, they came across an article that mentioned that the Russian performance was recorded in its entirety, and is possibly being stored at the theater it performed in for posterity. That in itself is unconfirmed, unless the article mentioning that can be found. The concept of an official recording existing is pretty neat, however the chances of getting a hold of an official video recording that is probably being stored in some archive in Russia, are very very slim. Plus, when it comes to searching for anything in Russia, I am not sure where to start. Another thing Vinnie brought up is that this theater critic, Ken Mandelbaum mentioned the show in his book 'Not Since Carrie: Forty Years Of Broadway Musical Flops'. Apparently the dude was known for recording bootlegs, especially in the 80's, from what I've read, and he wouldn't really be stopped due to his Big Journalist Reputation. So, the chances of him having a recording of Rag Dolly is pretty high. Only issue is he's hard to contact. He's been MIA for years now, and can't be found on the internet, no one really knows what happened to him. And, even if he was still active on the internet, the chances of him giving up any of his rare bootlegs are also Very Very Slim. While he has the reputation of being a big theater journalist, he also has the reputation of being unapproachable and very, very rude. So getting a video bootleg from him would be very difficult to do.
However, on a positive note, the chances of a video bootleg existing are very high, its just a matter of getting a hold of it. I guess the best thing to do is to somehow manage to contact the theater that held the Rag Dolly performance in Russia. If any of y'all know how to speak Russian hit me up sfsfdgdfgh
