Naked Boys Singing!

I'm writing this as I watch the DVD. I grabbed for the laptop and went to IMDb during the first song. I didn't know anything about the movie except that a friend said that the show was supposed to be good. It has a decent Netflix rating too, so here I am.

Maybe on the stage this worked. But I have to say that the sight of chorus boys dancing and singing completely naked just seems silly. And the lip syncing to a prerecorded score adds to the strangeness.

Most of the songs and routines are about aspects of male nudity. This is my idea of nothing, sorry. The score, so far, is generic show tune music. Nothing memorable, or particularly melodic. Everything is to serve the lyrics. Which, I have to say, sound like they were written by a committee. Each song is essentially one extended joke. If the jokes were ten seconds, they might work. These single several-minute-long jokes don't.

I'm now watching the movie by chapters--a few minutes until I get the gist. Kind of in the hopes that one of them will be different, or entertaining enough to keep me from going on to the next scene. Nope.

Okay. I'm finished. So here's what I think. If you have any experience or long-standing appreciation of musical theater, avoid this--it's just not quality. If, however, you're a gay twenty-something and have never seen or heard a musical comedy, you might be entertained. Or maybe this would hold your interest if you've never seen a lot of attractive naked men. I have.

I don't understand how a reviewer can complain that a show has show tunes. With a name like "Naked Boys Singing" did he expect a Western? I suppose it could be called "Naked Boys Singing and Dancing". For what it was, which is exactly what it purports to be, I thought it was terrific. Some of the songs and situations were quite moving to me, having experienced some of the situations myself. It was very touching to have a chorus of "I feel so alone" - the fact of the chorus indicates that perhaps we weren't as alone as we felt.

I found the Perky Little Porn Star to be adorable. I suppose I did object the tiniest bit to the ode to "regular guys" who were not so totally buffed out from the gym sung by these totally buffed out guys, but they gave it their best shot. Dancer's bodies, what're you gonna do?

All in all a lot of fun.

This show has been performed live around the country with a wide variety of casts. I saw it first in the Provincetown production the first summer it was in P-town (2001)--before it was, curiously enough, banned in that overwhelmingly gay resort (the codes which resulted in its closing have since been amended). I saw it again later in the off-Broadway, long-running production in New York. Oddly enough, the P-town production was far better than the New York one--fresher, cuter, more spirited and funnier--but that was only in the 2001 showing; subsequent attempts to clone the production ("Bare Naked Lads" in 2007) were definitely third-rate. This filmed production features a Los Angelos production cast, and it is, as other comments have suggested, not the best. I would rate it somewhere in between the top-notch 2001 P-town production and the third-rate "Bare Naked Lads" P-town show from last summer.

If you haven't seen the stage version of Naked Boys Singing! (NBS), then what more can you do but see this film. The film's fun, campy, well-acted, well-sung and has lots of inspired choreography. However, compared to the live stage version, the film misfires conceptually, has truly cheesy "just graduated from film-school editing" and doesn't do justice to the essential intimacy of the material -- it neither delivers a good film nor a piece of theater-on-film. // Before writing this review, I watched the "making of" segment (titled "Nuts and Bolts") to find out how the producer/director could have gone astray with excellent material and a stage production that literally sells itself. Biggest problem: They tried to reimagine NBS as a film, making the same sad mistake foisted upon A Chorus Line -- both shows are perfect as-is and were designed to be seen in a theater from a center row in the Orchestra (and in the case of NBS, the second row): Why add all the superfluous cut-aways, back stories, reverse angles (again, an audience isn't supposed to see what the actors see), cutesy effects (slo-mo, sepia tones, dissolves, multiple-image shots, etc.)? This screams "I'm trying everything they taught me in film school." Moreover, introducing the numbers by showing the musical scores gives a documentary feel to what should be a live production. Why incorporate techniques from an dissonant genre? Hasn't anyone seen the excellent Sondheim recordings of his stage productions? They record the performance. Period. That said, there is the issue of how to record the actors...no body mics. But somehow, when I saw NBS in New York in that intimate little theater in the Village, no one needed a mic. So, I reject the rationale that they had to lip-sync everything to get the recording. No, they had to lip-sync in order to support all the cheesy/cutesy editing techniques! So much time and effort could have been saved had they simply filmed the show in a, er, straight-forward fashion. Simple, direct, intimate...that's what drives the NBS source material -- and the film introduces too much schlock and unnecessary distractions.

What surprised me the most about this filmed stage production was the splendid variety in the musical numbers. The dancing is professional. Each dance is well choreographed. The vocals are entertaining, and pleasant to listen to. All numbers are done with heart and humor. This was truly a unique experience. I'm surprised at the arrogant remarks posted in other IMDb reviews. I found Naked Boys Singing highly enjoyable and fresh. Just look at the expression on the audiences faces. These talented guys offer a good sock in the jaw to convention. Intelligence and humor are the threads that hold this production together. Cheers and applause to all involved.