Lyrics to Live By
By Mr. Koppinger
Before I go any further, I apologize for not getting a column ready for March. I was ready to get one out, but March was…March.
For Show Boat, there was the Edna Ferber’s 1926 novel of the same name. For Oklahoma!, there was Lynn Riggs’ play Green Grow the Lilacs. For West Side Story, there was Romeo and Juliet. For Sweeny Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, there was a penny dreadful called The String of Pearls. Dear Evan Hansen is based on an event from the author’s real life. Even 2020 Tony nominee Jagged Little Pill is inspired by Alanis Morissette’s album of the same name and features her music.
The point, of course, is that Broadway’s best musicals very rarely come straight out of the minds of the libretto writers and composers. Inspiration for what would be a great stage show can come from anywhere, and it usually does. Starting at some point in the 1950’s (no one can really pinpoint an exact show), that meant taking inspiration from the silver screen as well. One of those shows, Disney’s The Lion King, is actually the 3rd-longest running show in all of Broadway’s history, behind only Phantom of the Opera and the 1996 revival of Chicago.
What does all of that have to do with the “lyrics to live by” for April 2021? Well, for the first time, I want to spread a message from a show that was a film first:
“[R]aise your right finger and solemly swear
‘whatever they say about me, I don’t care!’
I won’t twist in knots to join your game. I will say ‘you make me mad.’
And if you treat me bad, I’ll say ‘you’re bad.’
And if I eat alone from this moment on, that’s just what I’ll do.
‘cause I’d rather be me…I’d rather be me…
I’d rather be me than be with you.”
--“I’d Rather be Me,” Mean Girls, lyrics by Nell Benjamin
According to the synopsis for this show, this song takes place close to the end of Act II, right before the scene from both film and stage where the character of Regina is run over by a bus. Janis, the main singer, and all of the girls at school have been dragged to an assembly to apologize to one another over comments and rumors from a “Burn Book” that Regina helped to write and then distributed to everyone. Janis uses the moment to tell Janis and everyone who has ever bullied her how she really feels, and how she’s going to address her life moving forward.
Just about everyone has felt the pressure to “fit in” and be a part of the “it crowd.” Mean Girls isn’t the first piece of media to address how trying to fit in can turn you into a terrible person and it won’t be the last. With these words, Janis reveals the coolest thing that anyone can do—being true to yourself. Nothing is cooler than that. As another great line says, “why fit in when you were born to stand out?”