The Music ManMovies like The Music Man
- Key Features:
- Con artist, Small town life, Musical, Romance, Redemption, Band, Community, 1920s, Iowa, Charismatic protagonist, Transformation, Showmanship
- Tone:
- humorous, earnest
- Target Audience:
- Musical lovers, Families, Fans of classic cinema, Those who enjoy feel-good stories
- Emotional Arc:
- Skepticism → Belief
The Music Man

Traveling con artist Harold Hill targets the naïve residents of a small town in 1910s Iowa by posing as a boys' bandleader to raise money before he can skip town.
The Music Man
During the Great Depression, a young boy leaves his family's Oklahoma farm to travel with his country musician uncle who is trying out for the Grand Ole Opry.

A charismatic charlatan begins a business — and eventually romantic — relationship with a roadside evangelist to sell religion to 1920s America. Based on Sinclair Lewis' novel of the same name.

A stranger in a Western cattle-town behaves with remarkable self-assurance, establishing himself as a man to be reckoned with. The reason appears with his stock: a herd of sheep, which he intends to graze on the range. The horrified inhabitants decide to run him out at all costs.

Taken in by the musical world as a young orphan, Rick Martin grows up with a desire to play pure jazz instead of the commercial gigs he lands, whilst also coping with the problems caused by his tempestuous marriage to an aloof heiress.

During the Great Depression, a sheet music salesman seeks to escape his dreary life through popular music and a love affair with an innocent school teacher.

A hapless carnival performer masquerades as the court jester as part of a plot against a usurper who has overthrown the rightful king of England.

In 1850 Oregon, when a backwoodsman brings a wife home to his farm, his six brothers decide that they want to get married too.

An actor on the skids is given one more chance to regain his stardom, as well as his self-respect, yet his alcoholism may prevent that from happening.

Eccentric bellhop Stanley Belt is recruited unexpectedly by the comedy team of a recently deceased entertainer. Stanley struggles to become a song-and-dance man as the team grooms him to become a star. But as the date of a high-stakes appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show grows near, they begin to fear that the only astonishing thing about Stanley is his utter lack of talent.

Millie Dillmount, a fearless young lady fresh from Salina, Kansas, determined to experience Life, sets out to see the world in the rip-roaring Twenties. With high spirits and wearing one of those new high hemlines, she arrives in New York to test the "modern" ideas she had been reading about back in Kansas: "I've taken the girl out of Kansas. Now I have to take Kansas out of the girl!"

A dashing Mississippi river gambler wins the affections of the daughter of the owner of the Show Boat.

A con artist arrives in a mining town controlled by two competing companies. Both companies think he's a famous gunfighter and try to hire him to drive the other out of town.

A Pennsylvania band scores a hit in 1964 and rides the star-making machinery as long as it can, with lots of help from its manager. But behind the scenes, the group’s sudden fame tests their strength, their maturity and responsibility, and their ability to resist the temptations that money and notoriety always make possible.

A Broadway artiste turns a faded film star's comeback vehicle into an artsy flop.

After his girl leaves him for someone else, Herbert gets really depressed and starts searching for a job. He finally finds one in a big house which is inhabited by many, many women. Can he live in the same home with all these females?

Deke Rivers is a delivery man who is discovered by publicist Glenda Markle and country-western musician Tex Warner who want to promote the talented newcomer to fame and fortune, giving him every break he deserves. Romantic complications arise as Susan, another singer in the group, offers him devoted admiration as Glenda leads him on with promises of a golden future.

A novice con man teams up with an acknowledged master to avenge the murder of a mutual friend by pulling off the ultimate big con and swindling a fortune from a big-time mobster.

An Iowa pajama factory worker falls in love with an affable superintendent who had been hired by the factory's boss to help oppose the workers' demand for a pay raise.

Aspiring singer-songwriter Jed King struggles to catch a break and escape the long shadow of his father, a country music legend. After reluctantly accepting a gig at a local vineyard harvest festival, Jed is love-struck by the vineyard owner’s daughter, Rose, and a romance quickly blooms. Soon after their wedding, Jed writes Rose “The Song,” which becomes a breakout hit. Thrust into a life of stardom and a world of temptation in the form of fellow performer Shelby Bale, Jed’s life and marriage begin to fall apart.

Dorothy Gale, a shy kindergarten teacher, is swept away to the magic land of Oz where she embarks on a quest to return home.

Charley Pearl, wealthy heir and gadabout, is slated to marry Adele, the daughter of a Hollywood tycoon. But, during a wild bachelor party in Las Vegas, Charley strikes up a flirtation with nightclub crooner Vicki Anderson that soon leads to her bedroom. When the couple are discovered by Vicki's beau, infamous gangster Bugsy Siegel, he makes a surprising pronouncement -- they'd better marry, or Charley is a dead man.

Local Pennsylvania polka legend Jan Lewan develops a plan to get rich that shocks his fans and lands him in jail.

A Michigan farmer and a prospector form a partnership in the California gold country. Their adventures include buying and sharing a wife, hijacking a stage, kidnapping six prostitutes, and turning their mining camp into a boom town. Along the way there is plenty of drinking, gambling, and singing. They even find time to do some creative gold mining.

A musical biopic of the Four Seasons—the rise, the tough times and personal clashes, and the ultimate triumph of a group of friends whose music became symbolic of a generation. Far from a mere tribute concert, it gets to the heart of the relationships at the centre of the group, with a special focus on frontman Frankie Valli, the small kid with the big falsetto.

A loose biography of seminal disco hit-makers The Village People and their composer Jacques Morali.

In the Oklahoma territory at the turn of the twentieth century, two young cowboys vie with a violent ranch hand and a traveling peddler for the hearts of the women they love.

Americans Jeff and Tommy, hunting in Scotland, stumble upon a village - Brigadoon. They soon learn that the town appears once every 100 years in order to preserve its peace and special beauty. The citizens go to bed at night and when they wake up, it's 100 years later. Tommy falls in love with a beautiful young woman, Fiona, and is torn between staying or going back to his hectic life in New York.

A small town band makes it big, but loses track of their roots, as they get caught up into the big-time machinations of the music biz. Now, they must thwart a plot to destroy their home town. Built around the music of The Beatles, this musical uses some big name groups like Peter Frampton and Aerosmith.

A gunhand named Lane is hired by a widow, Mrs. Lowe, to find gold stolen by her husband so that she may return it and start fresh.

Heading east to Fort Worth to hire a schoolteacher for his frontier town home, Link Jones is stranded with singer Billie Ellis and gambler Sam Beasley when their train is held up. For shelter, Jones leads them to his nearby former home, where he was brought up an outlaw. Finding the gang still living in the shack, Jones pretends to be ready to return to a life crime.

Set in Prohibition era Chicago, bootlegger Robbo and his cronies refuse to pay the greedy Guy Gisborne a cut of their profits after Guy shoots mob boss Big Jim and takes over. When Big Jim's daughter, Marian, gives Robbo a large sum, believing he has avenged her father's death, the gangster donates to an orphanage, cementing his reputation as a softhearted hood.

After a big-time country singer brags that she can turn anybody in to a country-singin' star, she's out to prove she can live up to her talk when she recruits a cab-driver as a country singer. He's scheduled to sing at a big-time NYC country night club and she puts her ample powers to work in preparing her protege.

Two talented song-and-dance men team up after the war to become one of the hottest acts in show business. In time they befriend and become romantically involved with the beautiful Haynes sisters who comprise a sister act.

A showman introduces a small coastal town to a unique movie experience and capitalizes on the Cuban Missile crisis hysteria with a kitschy horror extravaganza combining film effects, stage props and actors in rubber suits in this salute to the B-movie.

A group of newcomers to the country music business seek love and stardom.

In 1927 Hollywood, a silent film star falls for a chorus girl just as he and his paranoid screen partner struggle to make the difficult transition to talking pictures.

At the height of the Great Depression, the showman of a renowned circus leads his troupe through the devastated American landscape, lifting the spirits of audiences along the way. During their travels, they discover a man without limbs at a carnival sideshow. However, after an intriguing encounter with the showman, he becomes driven to hope against everything he has ever believed.

A stranger comes to town looking for his estranged wife. He finds her running the local girls. He also finds a town and sheriff afraid of their own shadow, scared of a landowner they never see who rules through his rowdy sidekicks. The stranger is a town tamer by trade, and he accepts a $500 commission to sort things out.

The intersecting stories of twenty-four characters—from country star to wannabe to reporter to waitress—connect to the music business in Nashville, Tennessee.

To Jane Falbury's New England farm comes a troup of actors to put up a show, invited by Jane's sister. At first reluctant she has them do farm chores in exchange for food. Her reluctance becomes attraction when she falls in love with the director, Joe, who happens to be her sister's fiance.

Two former backup soul singers, Louis and Floyd, have not spoken to each other in 20 years, and reluctantly agree to travel across the country together to a reunion concert to honor their recently-deceased lead singer. Cleo, a beautiful young woman who is believed to be Floyd's daughter, accompanies them as a new singer.

New York, early 1960s. Against the backdrop of a vibrant music scene and tumultuous cultural upheaval, an enigmatic 19-year-old from Minnesota arrives in the West Village with his guitar and revolutionary talent, destined to change the course of American music.

In the years before World War II, a tomboyish postulant at an Austrian abbey is hired as a governess in the home of a widowed naval captain with seven children, and brings a new love of life and music into the home.

Bill is a penniless drifter who scams strangers out of just enough money to feed himself and his partner in crime, an orphan girl known as Curly Sue. Bill and Curly Sue target Grey, a yuppie lawyer, but their con takes an unexpected turn when the successful woman begins to like the ramshackle duo. But there's one problem—Grey's jealous, conniving boyfriend, Walker.

A couple of bumbling 1920s hustlers attempt to obtain the fortune of an heiress. Nothing will stop them, not even murder.

A hapless inventor finally finds success with a flying car, which a dictator from a foreign government sets out to take for himself.

A struggling female soprano finds work playing a male female impersonator, but it complicates her personal life.

Upon receiving his draft notice and leaving his family ranch in Oklahoma, Claude heads to New York and befriends a tribe of long-haired hippies on his way to boot camp.

A young Jewish man is torn between tradition and individuality when his old-fashioned family objects to his career as a jazz singer.

New York, 1929, a war rages between two rival gangsters, Fat Sam and Dandy Dan. Dan is in possession of a new and deadly weapon, the dreaded "splurge gun". As the custard pies fly, Bugsy Malone, an all-round nice guy, falls for Blousey Brown, a singer at Fat Sam's speakeasy. His designs on her are disrupted by the seductive songstress Tallulah who wants Bugsy for herself.

Born of a flower and growing to only a couple of inches tall, poor Thumbelina is worried she'll never meet someone her own size, until she happens to catch the eye of Prince Cornelius of the Fairies. Just as soon as she finds love, however, it's torn away from her when she is kidnapped by Ms. Toad. Now Thumbelina has to escape Ms. Toad's grasp and search for Prince Cornelius. Luckily, there's a whole city of animals willing to help her.

Expert conman Joe Thanks teams up with half-breed Bill and naive Lucy to steal $300,000 from the Indian-hating Major Cabot. Their elaborate plan is full of disguises, double-crosses, and chases, but Joe always seems to know what he's doing.

A down-and-out gangster hires a down-on-his-luck agent to make his girlfriend a recording star within six weeks.

The Muppets gather to watch their newly-finished big-budget rich-and-famous feature film: a talent agent persuades Kermit the Frog to leave the swamp to pursue a career in Hollywood. On his way there, he meets a bear, a pig, a whatever (his future muppet crew), and some special celebrity guest stars, while being chased by the desperate owner of a frog-leg restaurant!

Molly and Terry Donahue, plus their three children, are The Five Donahues. Youngest son Tim meets hat-check girl Vicky and the family act begins to fall apart.

The story of American showman P.T. Barnum, founder of the circus that became the famous traveling Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus.

In the deep south during the 1930s, three escaped convicts search for hidden treasure while a relentless lawman pursues them.

Millionaire conservative Bob Roberts launches an insurgent campaign against incumbent senator Brickley Paiste, firing up crowds at his rallies by singing '60s-style acoustic folk songs with lyrics espousing far-right conservative social and economic views.

Gambler Nathan Detroit has few options for the location of his big craps game. Needing $1,000 to pay a garage owner to host the game, Nathan bets Sky Masterson that Sky cannot get virtuous Sarah Brown out on a date. Despite some resistance, Sky negotiates a date with her in exchange for bringing people into her mission. Meanwhile, Nathan's longtime fiancée, Adelaide, wants him to go legit and marry her.

A Reno singer witnesses a mob murder and the cops stash her in a nunnery to protect her from the mob's hitmen. The mother superior does not trust her, and takes steps to limit her influence on the other nuns. Eventually the singer rescues the failing choir and begins helping with community projects, which gets her an interview on TV—and identification by the mob.

A small-time conman has his loyalties torn between his estranged mother and his new girlfriend, both of whom are high-stakes grifters with their own angles to play.

Archie Rice, an old-time British vaudeville performer sinking into final defeat, schemes to stay in show business.

A home, a motorcar, servants, the latest fashions: the most eligible and most finicky bachelor in Paris offers them all to Gigi. But she, who's gone from girlish gawkishness to cultured glamour before our eyes, yearns for that wonderful something money can't buy.

Cowboys Beauregard Decker and Virgil Blessing attend a rodeo in Phoenix, where Decker falls in love with beautiful cafe singer Cherie. He wants to take Cherie back to his native Montana and marry her, but she dreams of traveling to Hollywood and becoming famous. When she resists his advances, Decker forces Cherie onto the bus back to Montana with him, but, when the bus makes an unscheduled stop due to bad weather, the tables are turned.

A chronicle of the rise and brief career of rock 'n' roll star Buddy Holly, who aspires to play music the way he wants it to sound. Holly and his band, the Crickets, are first invited to record in Nashville, where they encounter creative differences with the producing staff. Later they play a major booking at the Apollo Theater, scheduled there under the mistaken assumption that they're a black band. Holly's career eventually goes solo -- until the tragic day the music dies.

Aging small-time conman Augusto works with two younger men: Roberto, who desires to become the Italian Johnny Ray, and Carlo, nicknamed Picasso. Through a series of mishaps and personal entanglements, things go badly for Augusto.

Alain Moreau sings for one of the few remaining dance-bands in Clermont-Ferrand. Though something of an idol amongst his female audience he has a melancholic awareness of the slow disappearance of that audience and of his advancing years. He is completely knocked off balance when he meets strikingly attractive and much younger businesswoman Marion. She seems distant and apparently otherwise involved but soon shows quiet signs of reciprocating his interest.

A look at what goes on backstage during the last broadcast of America's most celebrated radio show, where singing cowboys Dusty and Lefty, a country music siren, and a host of others hold court.

To save her parents' small-town nightclub, a Broadway dancer stages an all-male, Christmas-themed revue — and meets a guy with all the right moves.

A wagon master and a con-man preacher help freed slaves dogged by cheap-labor agents out West.

Sharpshooter Calamity Jane takes it upon herself to recruit a famous actress and bring her back to the local saloon, but jealousy soon gets in the way.

A boy, no bigger than a thumb, manages to outwit two thieves determined to make a fortune from him.

When his father dies, poor Fella is left at the mercy of his snobbish stepmother and her two no-good sons Maximilian and Rupert. As he slaves away for his nasty step-family, Maximilian and Rupert attempt to find a treasure Fella's father has supposedly hidden on the estate. Hoping to restore her dwindling fortunes, the stepmother plans a fancy ball in honor of the visiting Princess Charmein whom she hopes will marry Rupert. Eventually, Fella's Fairy Godfather shows up to convince him that he has a shot at winning the Princess himself.

Following a childhood tragedy, Dewey Cox follows a long and winding road to music stardom. Dewey perseveres through changing musical styles, an addiction to nearly every drug known and bouts of uncontrollable rage.

A rascally nearing-retirement man juggles a workers' compensation suit while secretly working for his nemesis and flirting with his nemesis' young wife. As his estranged son returns, he faces new family responsibilities, while a banker plots to evict him from his home.

A small town girl and a city boy meet on the Sunset Strip, while pursuing their Hollywood dreams.

During the Great Depression, a con man finds himself saddled with a young girl who may or may not be his daughter, and the two forge an unlikely partnership.

Five oddball criminals planning a bank robbery rent rooms on a cul-de-sac from an octogenarian widow under the pretext that they are classical musicians.

In 1965, passionate musician Glenn Holland takes a day job as a high school music teacher, convinced it's just a small obstacle on the road to his true calling: writing a historic opus. As the decades roll by with the composition unwritten but generations of students inspired through his teaching, Holland must redefine his life's purpose.

Duets is a road-trip comedy which revolves around the little known world of karaoke and the whimsical characters who inhabit it. All roads lead to Omaha, site of a national karaoke competition where this motley group of singers and stars come together for a blow-out sing-off.

Harlem's legendary Cotton Club becomes a hotbed of passion and violence as the lives and loves of entertainers and gangsters collide.

A snobbish phonetics professor agrees to a wager that he can take a flower girl and make her presentable in high society.

A vibrant tribute to one of America's legendary bandleaders, charting Glenn Miller's rise from obscurity and poverty to fame and wealth in the early 1940s.

An aging, decadent landlord’s passion for music becomes the undoing of his legacy as he sacrifices his wealth in order to compete with the opulent music room of his younger, richer neighbour.

Mr. Jonny First arrives to the Wild West to present the art of the Cinematograph.

Famous singer Fanny Brice has divorced her first husband Nicky Arnstein. During the Great Depression she has trouble finding work as an artist, but meets Billy Rose, a newcomer who writes lyrics and owns a nightclub.

Henry Moon is captured for a capital offense by a posse when his horse quits while trying to escape to Mexico. He finds that there is a post-Civil War law in the small town that any single or widowed woman can save him from the gallows by marrying him.

A young but bright former window cleaner rises to the top of his company by following the advice of a book about ruthless advancement in business.

Young Bart Collins lives with his widowed mother Heloise. The major blight on Bart's existence is the hated piano lessons he is forced to endure under the tutelage of the autocratic Dr. Terwilliker. Bart feels that his mother has fallen under Terwilliker's sinister influence, and gripes to visiting plumber August Zabladowski, without much result. While grimly hammering away at his lessons, Bart dozes off and enters a fantastical musical dream.

An aging comic icon, Jackie Burke, has seen better days. Despite his efforts to reinvent himself and his comic genius, the audience only wants to know him as the former television character he once played. Already a strain on his younger brother and his wife, Jackie is forced to serve out a sentence doing community service for accosting an audience member. While there, he meets Harmony, the daughter of a sleazy Florida real estate mogul, and the two find inspiration in one another, resulting in surprising consequences.

All roads lead to magical, merry Toyland as Mary Contrary and Tom Piper prepare for their wedding! But villainous Barnaby wants Mary for himself, so he kidnaps Tom, setting off a series of comic chases, searches, and double-crosses! The "March Of The Wooden Soldiers" helps put Barnaby in his place, and ensures a "happily ever after" for Tom and Mary!

Jerry Mulligan is an exuberant American expatriate in Paris trying to make a reputation as a painter. His friend Adam is a struggling concert pianist who's a long time associate of a famous French singer, Henri Baurel. A lonely society woman, Milo Roberts, takes Jerry under her wing and supports him, but is interested in more than his art.

Stowing away after a failed con, a pair of swindlers end up on El Dorado, the fabled "city of gold", where they quickly get in over their heads when they are mistaken as gods by the inhabitants.

Three women set out to find eligible millionaires to marry, but find true love in the process.

John Russell, disdained by his "respectable" fellow stagecoach passengers because he was raised by Indians, becomes their only hope for survival when they are set upon by outlaws.

A top Hollywood talent agent finds his cushy existence threatened when he discovers that his wife is cheating on him and that his journal has been swiped by a reporter out to bring him down.



