Warner Archive Collection brings us Broadway on the Big Screen Collection, which includes six musical favorites that weren’t featured in previous sets. We get 1954’s Brigadoon, 1955’s Guys and Dolls, 1957’s The Pajama Game, 1958’s Damn Yankees, 1962’s Gypsy, and 1971’s The Boyfriend. This is a pretty solid collection of musicals spanning over the years and includes all the great including Cyd Charisse, Doris Day, Frank Sinatra, Gene Kelly.
Synopsis: 6 big stage musical favorites are brought together for this dazzling collection of musical favorites. Frank Loesser’s GUYS AND DOLLS starring Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra, Rosalind Russell and Natalie Wood star in GYPSY, the dynamic choreography of Bob Fosse adds zing to Doris Day in THE PAJAMA GAME and Gwen Verdon in DAMN YANKEES, Gene Kelly and Cyd Charisse shine in Lerner and Loewe’s BRIGADOON, and Ken Russell’s wild imagination creates an homage to the genre as Twiggy stars in THE BOY FRIEND.
The technical specs vary on each of these releases but generally I would give them a pretty solid 4/5 score. The 1080p transfer are crisp and captures the musicals colors very well. It would have been nice to have seen a bump in the audio tracks but we are still given a decent DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono track for each film. In terms of special features, there is some but not much included from previous releases of these films.
Brigadoon includes some deleted scenes and trailer included. Guys and Dolls features a bit more including a few featurettes including, From Stage to Screen and focused individual Musical Performances. The Pajama Game goes back to deleted scene and trailer. Damn Yankees includes two trailers. Gypsy includes two deleted scenes and trailer and The Boyfriend features a Vintage Featurette called All Talking . . . All Singing . . . All Dancing.