Film's Second Century
While the 21st Century opened with a rebirth of musical comedy on Broadway, musical film remained in a state of near-limbo. The animated musical boom of the 1990's had petered out, and musical films once again became almost as rare as literate sitcoms. Those projects that did make it into production were unlike any film musicals that had come before.

No one could quite figure out why Oscar-winner Kenneth Branagh chose to reset Shakespeare's Loves Labour's Lost (2000) in 1930's Europe, speckling it with songs by Cole Porter, Irving Berlin and the Gershwins. Intended as a tribute to the musicals of Fred Astaire, the result was an unsatisfying mish-mosh that left audiences giggling with embarrassment. British director Mike Leigh had far greater success with Topsy Turvy (2000), a delicious look back at the birth of Gilbert and Sullivan's 1882 stage hit, The Mikado. Leigh's cast sang for themselves and helped to develop the final screenplay, sticking very close to the historic facts. The result was a cinematic love letter to the theater – a truly great film about the history of musical theatre.

With almost no stage musicals making it to the big screen, it was a pleasant surprise to see the unconventional Off-Broadway hit Hedwig and the Angry Inch (2001) succeed with original star (and co-creator) John Cameron Mitchell repeating his uncompromising performance in the title role. Effective despite a limited budget, Hedwig proved that offbeat musicals could find an appreciative commercial audience.

That same year, the even stranger Moulin Rouge (2001) captured the imagination of millions of filmgoers by presenting a pedestrian love story through a wild mixture of musical sequences and eye-catching images. Director Baz Luhrmann threw together a dizzy hodgepodge of old and new pop songs, and kept the screen whirling with MTV-style quick cut editing. Nicole Kidman and Ewan MacGregor looked and sounded sexy in musical sequences that flew by at such speed that their lack of musical talents hardly mattered. Most critics and film goers overlooked the often confusing pace and turned Moulin Rouge into the first real musical screen hit of the new century. It garnered numerous awards and – more importantly by Hollywood standards – earned millions at the box office.

Musical film took another turn into new territory with 8 Mile (2002), the first film to feature a hip-hop score that grew out of and played a part in the film's story line. Dark and angry, the film delighted teen audiences that might have steered clear of a traditional musical, and the soundtrack CD topped the pop charts. Controversial rap artist Eminem starred in this supposedly semi-autobiographical story of an ambitious white trash rapper struggling to make his name in Detroit's all-black rap music culture. No one seemed to mind that the rapster, born Marshall Bruce Mathers III and raised in suburban comfort, had never known such a struggle with poverty.

Chicago: Reclaiming the Oscar
And then, when everyone in show business assumed that traditional screen musicals were a lost cause, along came the knockout screen version of John Kander and Fred Ebb's long-running Broadway hit Chicago (2002). This project had been bouncing around for more than 25 years before making it to final production. Broadway director-choreographer Rob Marshall's first feature film blended theatrical know-how with a socko cinematic approach, placing most of the musical numbers in a leading character's imagination.

The result was that rarest of accomplishments, a film adaptation that improved on the original stage version. Catherine Zeta-Jones, Renee Zellweger and Richard Gere sang and danced the lead roles with genuine flair, and rap star Queen Latifa delivered a sizzling performance as the conniving prison matron. Critics raved, and musical lovers reveled in the kind of gleeful, shameless musical film few thought they would ever see again. Strong box office and six Academy Awards (including the first "Best Picture" award to go to a musical in 35 years) made it clear that quality musical films had commercial and artistic potential. The question was, would the decision makers in Hollywood get the message?