Ok, how in the hell is this even a thing? This has to be a rich person’s vanity project, right? Like, the person that wrote this had to have funded all of this entirely themselves, like Tommy Wiseau, correct?
Ben Platt's father would be that person, to be exact, who's a very influential producer in Hollywood and on Broadway.
I have never heard of this musical in my life
But I absolutely adored Ben Platt in Pitch Perfect
Reading reviews on the musical, it's very positive
The music is catchy so it distracts you from the fact Evan is taking advantage of someone committing suicide. This show should've been controversial, but since the music is so catchy, you overlook the flaws. Without the music, if this show was just shot for the basic plot that's there, you kinda almost have
13 Reasons Why, which, by the time that show finished, it not only had jumped the shark a few times, but was also VERY controversial for what happens in season one of this show, where the male lead someone turns himself into the victim of a suicide.
I mean everybody here is telling the truth but if this turns out to be a hit it won't be the first time a
hugely problematic musical becomes a global phenomenon off the strength of a Pasek and Paul score.
There's a few main differences and some similarities. The real key differences being that since it was a period piece, the questionable material that, if it had been a modern day film, would never have passed, they were able to get away with, and also, they were adapting PT Barnum's life-story. Granted he was a controversial person as time went on, but at least they were adapting and the awful part's had a reason for existing in that movie.
In Dear Evan Hanson, the music is fairly generic. Pasek & Paul do it on purpose - They give you the bubbly fun music to draw you in and then for no reason, that generic music is applied to a turd of a story. In this case, it's all applied to a fictional story of a kid who decides to pull one over on everyone CONCERNING A SUICIDE and makes himself out to be the victim. DEH is set modern-day too, which just adds to it's why it's so controversial.
Now of course, the main thing the two films/shows have in common is elitism, elitism, and more elitism.