MUSICALS ARE FOR LESBIANS NOW.

i google "musicals with lesbian protagonists". most of the results are like "musicals with lesbian CHARACTERS", which there are several of, but i want a lesbian PROTAGONIST. there's a forum question, where someone asks - there's so many gay male protags in theater, is there anything for the Ls? the Bs or Ts? top comments are "fun home is the only broadway musical with a lesbian protagonist, unfortunately." there's some other delightful suggestions - someone says "chicago, if you want to read it that way", "elsa from frozen" someone else boldly asserts - but fun home still has a monopoly on musicals with lesbian protagonists, or at least well known ones.

well i get it. writing is hard. original #content is hard. and reboots, recastings, and revivals are a bit easier to pull off. so here's my notes for lesbian revivals of popular musicals (or at least musicals i like). i'm using "lesbian" to mean "at least one of the characters is a lesbian", as i'm not really opposed to lesbian x bi pairings (i don't think we have many bi women protags in musicals either? like... rose red ghost quartet? is that it?). "musicals centering sapphic women", i guess. "musicals centering romantic relationships between women". or, you know, "lesbian musicals".
(note: i discuss reinterpreting some male characters as transfem in this, but typically use the pronouns typically associated with the character being discussed for clarity's sake.)

  • audrey and seymour are transfem/transmasc lesbians
  • seymour is a meek butch and audrey is going thru the WORST comphet
  • "i'd meet a man and i'd follow him blindly/ he'd snap his fingers / me, i'd say 'sure!'"
  • ^DOES THIS SOUND LIKE A WOMAN WHO HAS AN ACTIVE INTEREST IN MEN
  • suddenly seymour as a moment of comphet realization - she's been trying so hard to date men but seymour's been there the whole time
    • straightness as synonymous with womanhood, to be a "real woman" you have to be straight which is why she's so blind to her feelings for seymour
    • there's something about putting a lesbian lens on "seymour's your man" that is SO good to me. i got drafted into the #gayagenda when i was in middle school and first heard tori "i would be bisexual except i don't eat pussy" amos sing "everybody knows i'm her friend/everybody knows i'm her man", so a woman, esp a butch woman, calling herself her lover's man is always really endearing to me.
    • it's not too hard to shift "audrey feels like she's not good enough for seymour" to "audrey feels like she's not good enough for seymour... AND audreys totally straight anyways teehee"
  • alternatively, i do like egg seymour readings. i don't know if that's something you could do on stage but i do like egg seymour she's cute
  • something something butch masculinity vs traditional masculinity - i feel like there's a recurring thread in these reads of ur butch lover vs ur toxic cishet bf lol
    • i do think there's something in both reads for the scene where orin talks to seymour because he shows way more respect for this masc person he's just met than he does for his literal girlfriend
      • seymour is afab butch read: you know when straight guys think you being a dyke means that you experience attraction to and objectification of women in the same way
  • simultaneously keeping in mind that "having a shithead boyfriend because you think thats what you deserve" is a common transfem experience but also not the ONLY transfem experience - i want to acknowledge that mj rodriguez, the first trans woman to play audrey, said that she understood where the read came from but it wasn't actually representative of her experience
  • basically just because audrey's story is tragic does not make transness the same as tragedy, and tbh i like this read better in the movie where audrey and seymour get a happy ending
  • EVERGREEN ARTICLE INCREDIBLE ARTICLE BEST ARTICLE IN THE WORLD
  • natasha baby your comphet is so bad
  • ALL THROUGHOUT HER NARRATION she is stressing how anatole does things to her so it MUST be alright, they MUST be in love
    • "he kissed me so we're in love" "he sent me letters so we're in love"
    • cannot process her sexual assault at the ball so she retcons it into romance
    • she likes flirting with anatole because he makes her feel wanted and hot, but the second he looks to be getting serious she suddenly panics and tries to flee - attraction to men as long as they're unattainable. her first love interest is defined by being NOT THERE
    • self sabotaging her happy stable hetero relationship for a relationship that is clearly and actively doomed
  • PIERRE HAS EVERY GENDER ON EARTH
    • "if i were not myself... but the best, brightest, handsomest man" oh so you're not a man? oh so you're not a man, pierre?
    • his revelation at the end not just that he has fallen in love, but ALSO that he's realized something about himself gender-wise - transfem realization?
    • his stagnancy and melancholy about his current marriage, where he barely seems to care that his wife is cheating (PIERRE THE CUCKOLD SITS AT HOME - "no i am enjoying myself at home this evening!")
    • imo he only challenges dolokhov to the duel because he's drunk and wants to die
    • callously tells anatole to fuck his sister, which is a SUPER FUCKED UP THING TO SAY ABOUT YOUR WIFE?
    • stagnancy to me implies he feels there's a barrier between them, perhaps because he's being expected to perform in the marriage as a man - depression at forced gender expectations
    • could also imply he gets into the duel because he thinks he ought to *as a man*
  • i want an all female production of great comet and i will not lie its because i want to see anatole as the dumbest lesbian on the planet earth

  • take it like a man is a butch anthem i will not be taking questions at this time
    • "i look like warner" "ha, yeah" "... but it's still me" "that's the best part"
    • emmett having a moment of "oh. she's trying to make me into her cis dude ex" but elle specifying that she's interested in emmett
    • when your butch boyfriend doesn't know how to fucking dress himself
  • i think elle's openly bi, tho you could read a lesbian narrative into her going to college ~for a man~ and then realizing she just loves law anyways (AND, AGAIN, GETTING WITH A HOT BUTCH)
  • i'm making legally blonde gay as reparations for enid
  • im sorry enid i love you. i wish you were written by people who didn't view your sexuality as setup and punchline
  • i'm also a little eye emoji at transfem elle, specifically the way warner thinks of her as disposable fun and someone he can ditch as soon as he's ready to get "serious"
    • also her joyous femininity is very transfem to me but that might be because i have ~a special relationship with femininity~
    • my opposition is i think it places a weird subtext into the scenes where emmett lowkey mocks her for like, caring about her appearance, so i'm not 100% sold on transfem elle. i like her i like to think of her
    • (ALSO ENID COMES OFF A LOT WORSE IN THE TRANSFEM ELLE READINGS)
  • vivienne is also a dyke. elle has two hands and she's going to take harvard by storm with her lesbian polycule
  • anyways making legally blonde gay gives it a little but i'm a cheerleader flavor that is so good.
    • specifically, the whole "haha this girl has feminine interests and i'm a dyke with lowkey not like other girls disease" => "oh no i'm learning the value of feminine interests" => "i am head over heels for this femme"

  • i don't have strong analysis i just think the phantom would be fun as a #girl
  • ACTUALLY OKAY: CAN WE READ INTO RAOUL BEING LIKE "CHRISTINE I LOOOOOOVE YOU" AND CHRISTINE BEING LIKE "... HOW ABOUT THEM HORSES :)"
  • enough soft lesbians we need lesbians who threaten to murder your boyfriend but then fall apart after 1 kiss
  • ok but like, the ending of phantom feels a little hayes code compliant right? it feels a little bury your gays? ← a bitch who is reaching
  • we've had so many butches on this list who don't care about their appearance its time for the high fashion skull mask tailored suit representation
  • i could go for butch raoul (childhood friends to lovers is always cute) but i also kinda love raoul as a helpless childhood friend who doesn't understand that christine is a different person now. she's grown and changed and isn't the little girl he knew, and him holding on to a crush on her for years does not change that

  • do i even have to write anything here everyone knows this already
  • people who like wicked: 1. moms 2. lesbians who have already rewritten the show in their head and constantly forget fiyero exists
  • you could sell me butch fiyero but tbh i think the story is more compelling w bisexual glinda & elphaba displacing her feelings for glinda on to fiyero because she thinks glinda is straight and the actual reality of who she's crushing on is too painful for her, someone who has been rejected her whole life because of the things inherent to her body and mind
  • THEY EVEN HAVE A GAY ASS "RUN AWAY WITH ME" SCENE'

  • sweeney gets her lover stolen from her by a creepy rapist judge (who may or may not even realize they're in love), gets sent away to prison, and then comes back, crossdresses in order to deceive the judge, and begins her killing spree. bam there it is
  • the judge doesn't even need to really falsely imprison sweeney in this version he can just be like shes like, tempting lucy into sin or whatever. they're two unmarried women raising a child together so the judge sends one of them to prison and keeps the one he thinks is hot
  • like the previous two examples, i'm equally into mrs lovett as a man and as a woman
    • mr lovett - crush on oblivious, revenge-obsessed lesbian, i think in order to preserve og lovett's cheerful campy horror it's not an "i can make her straight" kind of thing, it's literally he doesn't realize she's not into men
      • as easy as it is for this version to wander into really uncomfortable territory, i think there's a lot of interesting stuff in how gender swapping sweeney and lovett changes perception of their characters - making lovett openly affectionate and pining, paternal, etc is expected as a woman and less so as a man
      • also yanno, nice guy behavior
      • sweeney, in drag, covered in blood, waltzing mr lovett into the incinerator as she sings about how she's finally come around to loving him so she can kill him - like, hell yeah
      • YO THE REVEAL THAT LOVETT DIDN'T TELL SWEENEY HER WIFE WAS STILL ALIVE THO? ‘COULD THAT THING HAVE CARED FOR YOU LIKE ME–'
    • mrs lovett - messy lesbian love triangle melodrama
      • avoids the lowkey subtext of lovett """""fixing"""""" sweeney
      • lesbian misa amane vibes (so normal misa amane)
      • (misa amane is bi she just should swear off men, like, for her health)
      • "pussy's good for six or seven at most… and i'm sure it can't compare as far as taste–" OKAY, LIKE, LOL, LMAO, OK
      • the fact sweeney IMMEDIATELY cuts her off is really funny also, she's like no this was better when you were talking about cannibalism and not oral
  • "in all of the whole human race mrs lovett there are two kinds of men and only two" reads VERY different with sweeney as a woman
  • johanna and anthony are also gay. i don't have reasons for this i just think it'd be fun
    • OKAY so like, sweeney dies but johanna and anthony have a shot of living long lives together, like one glimmer of hope there we go
    • maybe they even run away WITH toby and it's like, a parallel to sweeney, lucy, and johanna, like that's cute
    • himbo anthony is fun but butch himbo anthony is even more fun tbh
    • PRESERVE JOHANNA'S GIRLBOSS MOMENT IN THE ASYLUM AT ALL COSTS (< she is resentful that t*m b*rton cut johanna's girlboss moment in the asylum)
  • alternatively: transfem sweeney got sent away as b*njamin b*rker and then comes back as a different gender and everyones like huh weird well it cant be that disgraced former barber because he was a man so whos this new hot girl doing barber work
  • in both cis butch and transfem readings, sweeney winning the competition against pirelli is what gets everyone to overlook her gender in favor of her talent
  • i forgot that earlier i said sweeney was crossdressing. well. whatever. you could do this too if you wanted.

  • SIX THE MUSICAL: i actually don't have a lesbian read of six the musical because i feel weird about like, shipping historical monarchs. but i do think it would be really fun to do an all drag queen production of this and i don't know where else to share my truth.