{"id":2374263,"date":"2026-04-15T12:14:52","date_gmt":"2026-04-15T12:14:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2374263"},"modified":"2026-04-15T12:14:52","modified_gmt":"2026-04-15T12:14:52","slug":"why-broadways-dog-day-afternoon-sounds-so-groovy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/why-broadways-dog-day-afternoon-sounds-so-groovy\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Broadway\u2019s \u2018Dog Day Afternoon\u2019 Sounds So Groovy"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\n \u201cI took the approach of, How would I want to listen to music?<\/em> Bad-sounding music drives me crazy.\u201d
\n Photo: Matthew Murphy and Evan Zimmerman<\/span>\n <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n

Nobody would consider Dog Day Afternoon <\/em>to be a music-forward film. The 1975 bank-heist drama breaks out a trio of songs only at its start and end, focusing instead on the interior complexities of the leading men portrayed by Al Pacino and John Cazale who want to take the money and run. So imagine the surprise for viewers of its new Broadway adaptation<\/a> when they sit down, the curtain rises, and \u201cQueen Bitch,\u201d by David Bowie, reverberates with a sound quality that rivals a Madison Square Garden concert. While the reviews of the adaptation have been mixed \u2014 our critic had a more positive take<\/a> \u2014 one particular accolade has followed the show since opening night: Man, the music kicked major ass, didn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n

\u201cWe started to build a palette months ahead of being in the theater to keep that \u201970s, gritty New York feel,\u201d sound designer Cody Spencer says. \u201cI paid attention to what was being played on the mainstream and college radio at the time. What were people hearing in Brooklyn in 1975?\u201d While Spencer was left to his own devices to answer that question, playwright Stephen Adly Guirgis specified in his script that Bowie\u2019s music should be prevalent. \u201cQueen Bitch\u201d is joined by \u201cMoonage Daydream\u201d to close the first act, while \u201cAladdin Sane\u201d punctuates all the action in Act Two.<\/p>\n

Two Marvin Gaye songs, \u201cInner City Blues\u201d and \u201cTrouble Man,\u201d further enhance the pressure-cooker environment inside the bank, and a few transitions are even set to avant-garde jazz. That includes \u201cThe Edge<\/a>,\u201d one of the most-sampled songs in hip-hop that was composed by the man who played Ducky in NCIS.<\/em> One cue, \u201cI Zimbra,\u201d by Talking Heads, was selected despite being an anachronism due to how good Jon Bernthal strutted to it. \u201cWe did look the other way on that one,\u201d Spencer admits. \u201cWe put it in early and were like, Okay, at some point we\u2019ll get something different<\/em>. We just didn\u2019t find anything. It\u2019s the land of imagination doing theater. It fits so well for his entrance and gives you a little suspense.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spencer estimates that he selected 150 songs to experiment with, only to whittle them down to 14 final picks. \u201cIn the preview process, we were changing out songs constantly to see how they felt,\u201d he says. \u201cSometimes it lasted one show, sometimes it lasted multiple shows. There\u2019s a lot of transitions where we\u2019re just playing eight seconds of a song. It\u2019s trying to make them land and have people not think, Oh, that\u2019s a whip playing<\/em>, but actually have an emotional response to that whip playing.\u201d He was disappointed that he couldn\u2019t find a place for one of his favorite bands, New York Dolls, despite a seemingly obvious narrative synergy. \u201cIt was too gritty and too hard to place in any of these eight-second segments,\u201d he explains. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t find the right place. I\u2019m a little sad about that, but you know how it is.\u201d Attempts to include MC5\u2019s \u201cKick Out the Jams\u201d were also thwarted for reasons of melodic agelessness: \u201cIt doesn\u2019t sound like it fits in that time period at all. It honestly sounds like it was recorded in 2001.\u201d<\/p>\n

With the soundtrack set, Spencer began the process of tuning the room\u2019s system so theatergoers could best listen to it \u2014 an experience, for a play, he had yet to try in his career. \u201cI took the approach of, How would I want to listen to music?<\/em> Bad-sounding music drives me crazy,\u201d he says. A piece of cutting-edge technology in the concert and Broadway worlds, L-Acoustics, was used to ensure the most immersive sound possible, which bled over to the more impactful helicopter and gunshot effects. (He had previously used the technology for the musicals Here Lies Love <\/em>and The Outsiders<\/em>.) \u201cIt\u2019s hyperreal,\u201d Spencer notes. \u201cBecause of this technology, I\u2019m able to process the music a bit differently to give it that shine. Down there in the orchestra is our optimal location. That\u2019s where I tuned for, because I know that\u2019s where a lot of people are sitting and that\u2019s where the more expensive seats are. But I wanted to make sure every seat in the house had that same experience.\u201d<\/p>\n

Underneath the orchestra and above the mezzanine, he mounted miniature subwoofers to the ceilings. \u201cThis was the first time I ever did that with a play, because I felt this show needed an extra oomph since it has star power,\u201d Spencer adds. \u201cI have a special processing thing I\u2019ve never done before to help Jon and Ebon Moss-Bachrach\u2019s microphones stand out more onstage. But I can\u2019t give away all of my secrets.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Dog Day Afternoon <\/em>reaches its crescendo, the audience feels more and more of an outside presence \u2014 where the crowds and police officers loudly congregate \u2014 while the action is contained inside the bank. Spencer used more than a thousand sound effects throughout the show to get to this moment, since, unlike the film, he couldn\u2019t just employ hundreds of extras to loiter on a city street. \u201cSome of the effects nobody notices,\u201d he says, \u201cand some of them are so subtle that you\u2019re like, Did I just hear a police siren go by outside or was that part of the show?<\/em>\u201d Being on a busy midtown street didn\u2019t help matters during the rehearsal process. \u201cThere were a few times during the tech rehearsals where our director was like, \u2018I really like the siren that went by right then,\u2019\u201d Spencer recalls. \u201c\u2018And I was like, Uh, that might have been an actual emergency outside.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n