KJCKorea
Journal Central

This study examines the aesthetic potential of the jukebox musical through MJ the Musical (MJ) and argues that nostalgia and the use of pre-existing songs—often regarded as the genre’s primary limitations in previous scholarship —should instead be understood as constitutive aesthetic conditions. To this end, the study analyzes the musical’s temporal structure and narrative strategy through Walter Benjamin’s concept of Jetztzeit (“Now-Time”) and Susan Buck-Morss’s theory of montage, critically engages with Theodor W. Adorno’s critique of mediation, and employs G. W. F. Hegel’s concept of Aufhebung (sublation) to explain how MJ moves beyond nostalgic consumption. Rather than reconstructing Michael Jackson’s life in a chronological biographical narrative, MJ repeatedly summons fragments of the past into the theatrical present, thereby presenting Jackson as a figure continually constituted in the present rather than restoring him as a completed historical subject. Likewise, pre-existing songs are repositioned not as the products of lived experience but as mediating agents through which life itself is reconfigured. As the performer’s embodiment intersects with the audience’s prior memories, the meanings of familiar songs are continually renegotiated within new theatrical contexts. Via this process, sublation occurs not through narrative events but through the repeated performance and recontextualization of already familiar songs, while the convergence of the performer’s embodiment and the audience’s collective memory reconstitutes subjectivity. Accordingly, this study argues that nostalgia and pre-existing songs need not be regarded merely as inherent deficiencies of the jukebox musical; rather, MJ demonstrates that these genre-specific conditions can serve as the aesthetic basis for such dialectical work, provided the production adopts a corresponding dramaturgical strategy—i.e., a narrative structure that reverses the conventional relationship between life and song, positioning the song as the dramaturgical origin rather than the product of a biographical life. In doing so, this study positions MJ not as proof of a general law governing the jukebox musical as a genre but as a case that reveals a possibility latent within its formal conditions.

This paper demonstrates through an analysis of the musical film On the Town (1949) that the inherent contradiction of the musical film is not a flaw to be overcome, but rather a key characteristic that defines the genre. The musical film is contradictory in that it must simultaneously accommodate the sense of realism generated by cinema and the non-realistic mode of expression characteristic of musical theater, in which characters abruptly stop speaking to sing and dance. On the Town maintains this contradiction by juxtaposing strategies of concealing and revealing dance. The opening number “New York, New York” combines location shooting and editing techniques with Bernstein’s music, concealing dance by presenting it as an ordinary act of walking. In contrast, in the later choreographic sequence “A Day in New York: A Comedy in Three Acts,” the dance that had previously been concealed suddenly comes to the forefront. “A Day in New York” adopts the form of the dream ballet, a convention of the Golden Age musical, thereby providing a context in which dance can be incorporated into the film, while deliberately refraining from fulfilling the dream ballet’s conventional function of integrating dance with the plot. As a result, dance, separated from the plot, becomes an object of appreciation in itself. Ultimately, On the Town allows different modes of expression to coexist within a single work by preserving the expressive conventions of cinema without eliminating those of the performing arts.

David Lindsay-Abaire’s Rabbit Hole (2006) explores the emotional and relational consequences of losing a child through the experiences of Becca and Howie, a married couple whose four-year-old son, Danny, dies in a car accident. This study examines the significance of the home as a spatial representation of loss and memory and traces the transformation of its meaning throughout the play. Following Danny’s death, their home, once associated with familial intimacy, happiness and well-being, becomes a painful reminder of his absence and loss. Becca and Howie respond to the loss in markedly different ways: Becca attempts to distance herself from Danny’s memory by removing his belongings and considering selling the house, whereas Howie seeks to preserve his connection with his son by keeping Danny’s possessions and repeatedly watching recordings of him. Their divergent responses to loss intensify their emotional distance and turn the home into a space of conflict and isolation. The meaning of the home, however, begins to change when Becca encounters Jason, the teenager responsible for Danny’s death. Through Jason’s story of parallel universes, Becca develops a different perspective on Danny’s absence and gradually becomes able to acknowledge his memory without being overwhelmed by the pain it evokes. This shift also contributes to a renewed understanding of her relationship with Howie. The home consequently moves beyond its earlier function as a site of grief and conflict and becomes a space in which memory and the possibility of continuing life can coexist. By examining these spatial transformations, Rabbit Hole presents the home not merely as a physical setting but as a dynamic space in which loss is remembered and gradually incorporated into the lives of those who remain.