Mama Mia! New York
Mama Mia! is a popular and greatly successful Broadway musical that originally opened at the Winter Garden Theatre in October of 2001. Many of the guests staying in one of the top New York City hotels are in town for the specific reason of seeing this or one of the other popular Broadway offerings. And this has been one of the country’s long standing traditions. The musical provided an early example of the juke box musical genre. This is relatively new development in musical theatre, and audiences were generally not accustomed to it. Its success paved the way for future projects of this genre, and it definitely contributed to and is primarily responsible for the popularity of them. The book for the musical was written by Catherine Johnson, a British playwright. The musical is based on the songs of the iconic Swedish band ABBA, which is also the basis of its name.
Many of the group’s songs are incorporated into the musical including The Winner Takes it All, Knowing Me Knowing You, Dancing Queen, Super Trouper and Take a Chance on Me, among others. The stage musical was adapted for the screen and was released as a film in July of 2008. It starred Meryl Streep, Pierce Brosnan and Julie Waters and while it was also a success, it did not exceed the popularity and earnings of its Broadway counterpart.
ABBA is one of, if not the, biggest bands to storm the world that originated in Sweden. They formed in 1970 and were composed of a group of four. Between 1972 and 1982 the managed to top music charts around the world. In addition to being major talents, they were also innovative musicians. They would dub the female voices and loop them back into the music to create additional layers of harmonies. They were also the first European mainland pop group to achieve chart topping success in English speaking countries.
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