DR John G, I've read the novel PRETTYBELLE and the pre-production libretto, and it's one offensive show. Some of the moments in the novel are sanitized (the rapes she sets up in the novel seem more like consensual sex in the libretto). I'm still puzzled that anyone thought there was a musical in it, very similar to my reading "The Son of the Grand Eunuch" and wondering how Rodgers & Hart thought a musical based on it, CHEE-CHEE, could ever work. I remember being shocked that in the PRETTYBELLE libretto there is a song called "New Orleans Poon" for the redneck husband and his racist friends. And they opened in Boston? And Lansbury agreed to do it? And they thought it could be a hit?
I'm glad I didn't invest in it, or in Chee-Chee. But Chee-Chee has "Moon of My Delight," which is quite lovely. I even have a vinyl recording of Comden and Green singing songs from that show. So, you never know.
The other great song in "Chee-Chee" is "I Must Love you," which either was, or became, "Just Send For Me." The score for "Chee-Chee" is one of Rodgers & Hart's best and deserves a complete recording, but the book is a mess. The novel is about the son of the grand eunuch, who's a fool, and his beautiful wife Chti escaping Peking to avoid his castration to become the next Grand Eunuch. Like Candide, everywhere they go, the son is beaten, enslaved, forced into manual labor, while, to protect them, Chti has sex with every person in power at each locale. When they are captured by the Grand Eunuch, Chti is beheaded and the son castrated. The musical cut a lot of this but it's still rather offensive.
