Chapter Text
In Trousers is the first musical in the Marvin Trilogy, written by William Finn, and released on February 21st, 1979. It follows the character Marvin, and his adulthood, more so, him escaping his adulthood by thinking back on his past, specifically his fourteenth birthday.
The rest of The Marvin Trilogy consists of March of the Falsettos, and Falsettoland (which were later combined into the more known Falsettos). Marvin struggles with internal homophobia, misogyny, and he’s overall a bad person. He doesn’t know how to treat people for the majority of his life, and he learns to when it’s already too late.
This is going to be a pretty long analysis, and I will be listing my sources, which are mostly fan-marked, as not many people think to analyze The Marvin Trilogy. I think it’s important I go into brief detail about the characters as they’re introduced, as long as creating a set timeline, as it does get pretty confusing. This analysis does mostly focus on Marvin, as we have the most information on him.
Timeline
The Marvin timeline is pretty confusing, so I’m going to break it down as best as I can, from what I know. According to redditor, Th3Aft3rLif3, the timeline is as follows:
1943 — Marvin is born
1957 — In Trousers starts (the events from Marvin’s childhood)
1967-68 — Marvin and Trina get married (Trina may possibly be pregnant at this time)
1978 — Marvin cheats on Trina with Whizzer.
1979 — Start of Falsettos
1981 — End of Falsettos
This, of course, is a brief, undetailed, version of the timeline, as each event will have more detail put in when the time comes.
I’m going to start the timeline portion of this analysis by saying that this is all inferred due to scenes/lyrics in the musicals, and it’s all from viewer interpretation.
1943-57
Not much is known or stated about Marvin’s early childhood, it is left up to interpretation, but from what I’ve been able to infer, his parents were distant, which will be mentioned in more depth later on in this analysis. There are several lines in Your Lips and Me, as well as moments in How Marvin Eats His Breakfast, that back up this claim (which will be said when I go into detail about Marvin’s character). I believe his parents distance is what caused him to be how he is in the future.
In Trousers takes place on Marvin’s 14th birthday. In the cast recording, it isn’t directly stated that it’s Marvin’s 14th birthday, but in both productions I’ve been able to find, it does say so. Again, not much to say here, as it’s hard to go into detail about a timeline that’s being summarized.
1967-68
Though I have my theories about when Jason was born, it is theorized that Marvin and Trina got married around this time. I believe that Marvin and Trina married because Trina was pregnant, which lines up with the timeline, as Jason is around 10-11 in the first act of Falsettos, which takes place in 1979. Trina, in fact, says, “My father cried ‘You’ll marry!’ / I married!” which stems my belief that the marriage between Trina and Marvin was strictly due to Jason.
This sets the stage for the more known Falsettos (which is what I’m using for this essay, due to there being few lyrical differences between Falsettos and the two musicals it came from. Although in March of the Falsettos, Trina is more suicidal, which is a detail I found A) fit her character, and B) made her character much more deep).
1978
When Marvin cheats on Trina could’ve been any time between 1968 and 1979, but it’s inferred to be in 1978 (thanks to In Trousers). Trina talks about Marvin cheating on her with someone, although she hadn’t known Marvin had cheated with a male at first, in the song Your Lips and Me.
This may also be when the song Whizzer Going Down takes place. It’s said that she caught them “in the den, with Marvin grabbing Whizzers ass”, (or stuck in Whizzers ass, depending on the version) in the song “I’m Breaking Down.”
1979-81
This is when Falsettos takes place, and I’m assuming you know the Falsettos timeline if you’re watching this essay. To summarize it: Marvin and Whizzer are together, Trina meets Marvin’s psychiatrist and they fall in love and get married, Marvin and Whizzer break up, Two years later Jason is 12 and turning 13. Everyone is getting ready for his Bar Mitzvah, Jason invites Whizzer to his baseball game, Marvin and Whizzer get back together. They’re happy together, until Whizzer collapses, Dr. Charlotte says he has HIV/AIDS, and he dies at Jason's Bar Mitzvah. It’s heavily implied that Marvin, who also has HIV, dies shortly after Falsettos ends.