Two of the most successful movie musicals adapted from Broadway shows are The Sound Of Music and Cabaret. Of course what could Maria Von Trapp and Sally Bowles possibly have in common, other than the times they live in and how they dealt with them.<br /><br />Cabaret takes place at the tail end of the Weimar Republic era as Sally and her crowd party on while Germany is surrendering its freedom to an authoritarian minded party and its leader. Liza Minnelli is Sally Bowles in what is her career screen role. <br /><br />With the fading away of the musical genre, we don't get to see Liza Minnelli too often as a singer so be grateful that Cabaret is recorded and popularly available. Her role also calls for a great actress as well, so small wonder she won an Oscar in 1972 as Best Actress. Her award was one of eight that Cabaret received. <br /><br />Cabaret ran for 1165 performances from 1966 to 1969 on Broadway and it was reversed there in terms of casting. On stage it was an English woman and an American man expatriate it Weimar Berlin and starred Jill Haworth and Bert Convy. Michael York took the role of the rather naive young man who while renting a room, falls in with Liza Minnelli and her hedonistic lifestyle.<br /><br />Repeating his role as the Cabaret emcee is Joel Grey who was the Best Supporting Actor for 1972. I think it would have almost been impossible to do a film version of Cabaret without Grey. He's one fey and evil man who is quite willing to adapt to the new Germany. My guess is he found a boyfriend later on in Ernest Roehm's SA and later paid dear for it, either killed during the Night Of the Long Knives or died in one of the camps.<br /><br />I've always loved the contrast between the Von Trapp family who saw what was coming to Austria and took measures to flee and Sally Bowles who kept on in her words, going like Elsie. York could see what was coming as did many others in her crowd. One can only hope she did eventually.<br /><br />Liza Minnelli's best song was one especially written for the screen version by songwriters John Kander and Fred Ebb. With all the awards Cabaret won, amazingly that Maybe This Time didn't even rate a nomination for Best Original Song. In an era when good film songs were at a premium, that was inexcusable.<br /><br />One other comparison with Sound of Music. The song sung by the young Aryan pure Germans, Tomorrow Belongs To Me is a frightening number. I could see young Rolf who became a Nazi while courting the Von Trapp eldest being part of that.<br /><br />Cabaret is a film guaranteed to last forever, something that will never date and something we always have to be reminded about.