usical genre evolved it sacrificed plausibility for internal narrative logic, steadily expanding its range of narrative, visual and musical expression (Hodsdon, 1996).
The Hollywood musical conventions include issues of form, content, and the way the two are integrated. The narrative form is most often romantic comedy, and indeed it is unusual for a Hollywood musical to be anything but a romance and a comedy. It was considered daring when Lady in the Dark (Mitchell Leisen, 1942) expanded the form with psychological insight and a somewhat darker tone than normal. It was more common for the individual music to be differentiated by setting, whether a backstage musical, a college musical, a military musical, or even a different sort of setting such as the world of baseball, filmmaking, or some other professional background. Within each setting, though, the romantic comedy remained the narrative form.
The narrative was shaped by and in turn hel
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