How ‘Daisy Jones & the Six’ Became a Rare TV Musical to Get the Sound Just Right
variety.comMichael Schneider Variety Editor at Large We’ve all made the “Cop Rock” jokes. The Steven Bochco musical drama, which premiered in fall 1990, was a big swing: marrying original music with procedural storytelling.
It was a colossal flop that we still talk about three decades later, and a reminder that musicals are hard. Music has been a part of the TV landscape going back to the 1950s and shows like “Your Hit Parade.” But few series have successfully integrated regular music performances into their storytelling: “The Monkees” and “The Partridge Family” worked in the 1960s and ’70s. “Fame” did it in the early ’80s.
And then “Cop Rock” scared people off the concept. The 1990s animation boom incorporated music in shows like “The Simpsons” and “Animaniacs.” But not until the 21st century did scripted series really figure out how to make musical numbers work as part of the narrative. “Flight of the Conchords” did it with satiric tracks, while “American Dreams” relied on oldies nostalgia.
The late 2000s saw the gantlet of musical shows: “Glee” (a big hit), “Eli Stone” (not so much), then “Smash” (not a smash), “Nashville,” “Empire,” “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” and “Galavant” (should’ve been a hit).
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