OUR MUSICAL CENTURY

The Top 20 Musical Numbers of the 21st Century

After the Oscar™ noms dropped, I was discussing with a friend that, while I was elated (and unsurprised) that Sinners¹’ “I Lied to You” was nominated for best original song², I still wish “Pale Pale Moon”³ had also pulled a nom.

While it’s not unprecedented for two songs from the same movie to be nominated⁴, it would have been a longshot for both of these songs, especially when “I Lied To You”’s Surreal Montage is so instantly an iconic piece of film⁵. But then a distinction occurred to me, and you are free to disagree if you like:

“Pale Pale Moon” is the better song; “I Lied to You” is the better musical number.⁶

This got me thinking that, for a culture that still seems squeamish about the conceptual run-and-jump of musicals, there’s been a ton of musicals in the past 25 years, and not only are some of them quite good (while others are quite not⁷), but they’ve given us some insane showpiece numbers that transcend the theatricality of the musical number and do things only cinematic tools can make happen.

Now, I’d like to present to you, in no particular order, are my top 20 musical numbers of the century, and to keep this from just being a listicle, here’s where you come in:

I’m gonna write one of my 5GM Shot-By-Shot Deep Dives™ on one of these scenes … and you’re gonna vote for which! Choose wisely!!

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• O BROTHER, WHERE ART THOU? (2000) - “Down to the River to Pray”

  

• MOULIN ROUGE (2001) - “Absinthe Montage (Children of the Revolution / Zidler’s Rap / Lady Marmalade / Smells Like Teen Spirit / Because We Can)”

  

• HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH (2001) - “Wig In A Box”

  

• DOWN WITH LOVE (2003) - “Here’s to Love”

  

• SCHOOL OF ROCK (2003) - “Smoke On The Water (First Lesson)”

  

• ONCE (2007) - “Falling Slowly”

  

• EX MACHINA (2015) - “Get Down Saturday Night”

  

• POPSTAR: NEVER STOP NEVER STOPPING (2016) - “Equal Rights”

  

• BABY DRIVER (2017) - “Bellbottoms”

  

• BLACkKkLANSMAN (2018) - “Too Late to Turn Back Now”

  

• ROCKETMAN (2019) - “Crocodile Rock”

  

• IN THE HEIGHTS (2021) - “Paciencia y Fé”

  

• TICK … TICK … BOOM (2021) - “Sunday”

  

• ENCANTO (2021) - “The Family Madrigal”

  

• WEST SIDE STORY (2021) - “Dance at the Gym”

  

• ELVIS (2022) - “Vegas Rehearsal”

  

• RRR (2022) - “Naatu Naatu”

  

• WICKED (2024) - “Dancing Through Life”

  

• BETTER MAN (2024) - “Rock DJ”

  

• SINNERS (2025) - “I Lied to You / Magic What We Do / Surreal Montage”

  

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DM or comment with your pick, and I’ll announce the winner next week!

xo,
A.

1. Sinners - W/D: Ryan Coogler; Prod: Ryan Coogler, Zinzi Coogler, Sev Ohanian; DP: Autumn Durald Arkapaw; Ed.: Michael P. Shawver; Music: Ludwig Göransson; WB/Proximity (2025).

2. Music & Lyrics by Raphael Saadiq & Ludwig Göransson; performed by Miles Caton

3. Music & Lyrics by Brittany Howard & Ludwig Göransson; performed by Jayme Lawson

4. I assume; it’s been a long day, I don’t feel like googling.

5. Truly, if Coogler, Göransson, Ruth E. Carter and Autumn Durald Arkapaw all win their respective awards, it will of course be for their work on the entire movie, but really, for this one scene.

6. Not that “PPM” isn’t a good number, paralleling the post-coital Pearline with the post-carnal Mary; intercutting between Lawson’s showstopping onstage stomp with the violence of the gambling scene, Caton’s growing unease working for the Twins, and Stack’s doomed seduction.

7. Phantom, Cats and Les Mis all left their potential on the stage, in the 80s; Chicago tries and fails to do Fosse; Dreamgirls tries and fails to do Chicago.