Can someone help me with this one -- Yo, Cohalen, I bet you know the answer to this!

'Oklahoma' is always referred to as the first 'modern musical', i.e. the first musical in which everything (dialogue, music, dancing, lyrics, etc.) were plot related and, as such, changed the face of musicals forever more.

Why is 'Show Boat' overlooked in this regard? It preceeded 'Oklahoma' by about 20 years and, from what I can ascertain, it meets the criteria of 'modern musical', i.e. everything plot related.

Any ideas?

Sorry, vendome. I'm the wrong guy to be asking about musicals. To me a "modern" musical would be something like: Greese; Little Shop of Horrors; Rocky Horror Picture Show; Tommy; Jesus Christ Superstar or Streets of Fire (as a movie musical).
Showboat, South Pacific, Oklahoma, West Side Story and the like were the old traditional musicals that had all made the transition from stage to movie and from Broadway to High Schoools before I was born. I can't even think of any musicals before those.

COHALEN...ya wild kid, ya. And watch your phrasology! I'm gonna call the police...they'll come and put you in a sack...take you to the bad boy's home...and you'll never eat ice cream again!

Waddaya think of that? "Before I was born"..."Can't tink of any musicals before that" Bullpoop.

Was Rodgers & Hart's "Pal Joey" the first modern musical?

Was my answer correct? Do I win a prize??

hi all
GREECE:
aeschylus and sophocles in 5th c. bc in the greek amphitheaters;
ROME:
Plautus in 3rd c comedies;
MIDDLE AGES:
The Play of Daniel
RENAISSANCE:
commedia dell'arte
lully/moliere in court of louis xiv in late 16th c.
ballad operas eg, gay the beggar's opera 1728:
British music halls;
US minstrel shows,
no no nanette 1925
jolson
30s noel coward and cole porter
other than the above,

oklahoma in the 1943
was probably the main "modern musical." of course, one could also think about opera buffa, comic opera, burlesque, burletta=musical farce, musical comedy, extravanganza, vaudeville (have a good friend who took that name legally)
hope some of that helps?

Although earlier musicals, such as Showboat, integrated plot with the singing and dancing, I think Oklahoma is regarded as not the first, but revolutionary in that it did not begin with a big song-and-dance number with scantily clad showgirls, but rather began with a woman on a porch churning butter and a cowboy offstage singing "Oh what a beautiful morning."