unison-minded singers and dancers, so when in the second
act they all come down to the footlights and sing the number
“Oklahoma!” itself (I am recalling the downstage move of the
original production, which was a defining moment), the show
is likely to be stopped because the community philosophy
implicit in act 1 is now coming across to the audience as a full-
throated ode.^8
Carouselis the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical that comes
closest to declaring for an individualist ethic in the face of the
community ideology. Billy Bigelow likes to think that he is cast
in the mold of rugged individualism, as though he could hold
out against the community tendency of these New England-
ers.^9 We know before he does that he has the potential for
community himself when he comes upon Julie Jordan in the
bench scene and sings the same words and melody, “You’re a
Queer One, Julie Jordan,” which her friend Carrie sang a few
minutes before. This is the voice of the musical being heard
and Billy shares in it. This is the first book scene. We have al-
ready seen the power of ensemble design, for the overture to
this show involves most of the company in a pantomime en-
veloped by the orchestra’s splendid “Carousel Waltz,” but we
THE ENSEMBLE EFFECT 85
(^8) For the development of the song from solo to chorus, see Wilk, The Story
of Oklahoma!, pp. 200–3. The “forgetting” of the American Indians in this mo-
ment of community is discussed by Most, Making Americans, pp. 101–18.
Knapp, The American Musical, p. 124 notes that the nationalistic expropriation
of land to form the new state was being celebrated in 1943, “when America
had recently entered into a war against an enemy whose behavior was uncan-
nily resonant with the actual history of Oklahoma.” Rugg, “What It Used to
Be,” pp. 46–47, treats such cultural amnesia as a form of “nostalgia,” which is
especially evident in the showstopper, the number that lets the audience join
the performers in a moment of pure presence—as though the narrative could
be halted and the musical might never end. In my terms, this would be number
time taking over from book time as though the number might not end. There
are times when the showstopper response requires a spontaneous encore of the
number. Thus the number, built on repetitions in itself, is itself repeated. The
spirit of community in the musicals of the Rodgers and Hammerstein era is
discussed from a gay male perspective in D. A. Miller, Place for Us. For a femi-
nist lesbian response, see Wolf, A Problem Like Maria.
(^9) Swain, The Broadway Musical, pp. 99–127, has a good extended discussion
of individualism and community in Carousel.