Oh, This Rhymes! - The Official Bad Lyrics Post

Welcome back, suckers. In my many years as a Broadwayphile, I have discovered the three most common pitfalls a show can fall into:

1. Bad lyrics. (Wicked)

2. All the songs sound the same. (Sunday in the Park With George)

3. No character development. (SIDE SHOW. They're Siamese twins. We get it.)

You all should pretty much know by now how ridiculously hard to please I am. I think I first fully accepted this when an extremely dissatisfied version of myself walked out of Wicked and saw a sign that said, "IF IT DOESN'T PLEASE YOU, YOU'RE TOO HARD TO PLEASE!" Of course, most of my discontent stemmed from the fact that I was yearning to be at Spring Awakening, but that is entirely beside the point. Anyway. The fact remains: I am the Simon Cowell of musical theatre. Oh, and shoes. I'm picky about shoes. In fact, people have used this LOLCat in describing me.

But I digress. In my extensive theeyater-goin' history, I have heard some real gems. (And by 'gems' I mean lyrics that make me want to suck my own eyeballs out.) Here they are for you tonight: The List of the Most Wonderfully Awful Lyrics in Theatre History!

1. "To kill outside St. Paul's/requires a lot of balls." - Jekyll and Hyde (Whoever thought putting that line in was a good idea should be locked in a room with Sarah Palin.)

2. "How do you light a fire/When you've got something stuck in your flue?" - Rent

3. "And I was so young and so dumb/and now I am old." - Next to Normal

4. "Omigod, omigd you guys." - Legally Blonde (I think I lost five IQ points sitting through that show.)

5. "When the day is filled with shadows that stretch into the night/I am filled with your sweet comfort like morning fills with light. - SIDE SHOW (Oh, SIDE SHOW. I love it, and I love this song, but that line needs to die.)

6. "Turn around, go back to Concord/Leave New York behind unconquered." - Little Women

7. "Enough with all your celebrated loves./You had two hands, you could have modeled gloves." - Grey Gardens (I am not going to begin to describing the meowing monstrosity that was the song "Entering Grey Gardens." All I'm gonna say is that it involved people crawling around like cats and a woman eating cat food. Youtube it if you don't believe me.)

8. "Goodbyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyye to blueberry pie." - Gypsy (I love this line, but it just doesn't make sense.)

And two that are not from Broadway, but are equally sub-par:

1. "And when I touch you I feel happy inside." - 'I Wanna Hold Your Hand' by the Beatles (Am I the only one that's creeped out by this? Seriously, am I old enough to be listening to this song?!)

And, preeeesenting, in person, the worst lyrics of all time:

"Boy bands/and another one/and another one/and another one." - 'Year 3000' by the Jonas Brothers (I really hope the guy that wrote that was drunk.)

Okay, I do actually realize how bitter this post made me sound. In some last-ditch effort to support my "I actually don't hate everything" theory, here's a picture of something I actually love very much - the Don't Tell Mama costume from the '98 revival of Cabaret. It's probably my favorite costume of all time, even though saying that makes me feel like the biggest loser in the history of everything. I just love how cutesy and pink it is. I'm compelled to say that the bow is my favorite part. For the record, it was prettier when she took the giant fluffy coat off. In fact, I pretty much love this whole scene - the choreography, the lyrics, how incredibly cracked out Sally is supposed to be.

Well, that was fun. Before I go, I promised Lenora I would quote her. We were chatting about my wonderfully horrible favorite show. She said, "It's like getting your tongue stuck to dry ice. It looks good before you go through with it, but once you do it's really painful to get away." Oh, Lord. Just one of the many reasons why Lenora is fantabulous.