Musical Adaptation
Although Brooks Atkinson, the noted New York Times theatre critic, proclaimed the musical adaptation as being "positively slavish" to the novel, Hammerstein made several changes in adapting it to the musical stage. All may have been made to make the plot, considered at the time to be unusually serious and realistic for a musical, palatable to a 1927 audience. (For instance, none of the characters die in the musical, Magnolia and Ravenal are reconciled and reunited at the end, and Ellie, who is not Julie's best friend as in the book, does not become hysterical when Julie's mixed racial heritage is revealed.) The novel's treatment of racism and its effects on the story's characters is largely retained in the musical, and perhaps strengthened by the show's most famous song, Ol' Man River.
Read more about this topic: Show Boat (novel)
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