A Lyrical Analysis of Santa Fe
reposting this for the SECOND TIME, from the first time I had tumblr because I canât find my original post
Long analysis of Santa Fe from both the 1992 movie and the musical version under the cut.
First off, you have to consider the context of where Santa Fe is in the musical versus the movie.
In the movie, Jack sings Santa Fe after meeting the Jacobses for the first time. His first couple of lines are âSo thatâs what they call a family / mother, daughter, father, son.â
In the musical, Jack sings Santa Fe after the strike goes wrong and Crutchie gets arrested. His first couple of lines are âFolks, weâve finally got a headline / Newsies crushed as bulls attack.â
These differences in time and lyrics immediately show the different interpretations each Jack has. Movie Jack is thinking about family. Musical Jack is thinking about how badly heâs messed up.
âSo you ainât got any family / Well, who said you needed one? / Ainât you glad nobodyâs waiting up for you?â Movie Jack sings. This reads like Jack trying to convince himself that this is trueâthat he really is happier without any family, and that itâs better that he has no one to miss him when he finally leaves for Santa Fe.
âGuys are fightinâ, bleedinâ, fallinâ / Thanks to good olâ Captain Jack! / But Captain Jack just wants to close his eyes and go!.â Musical Jack sings. He blames himself for the fight gone wrong and wants to escape his feelings of failure. Heâs the older brother, he shouldâve protected the newsies better. He has a family, and he cares about them, but he refuses to admit that theyâd miss him if he left.
Then we have the transition.Â
Movie Jack is quiet and reserved, going from âAinât you glad nobodyâs waiting up for you?â to âWhen I dream on my own / Iâm alone, but I ainât lonely.â On the other hand, Musical Jackâs transition is loud and angry. He screams out, âBut Captain Jack just wants to close his eyes and go!â before singing quieter âLet me go, far away / somewhere they wonât never find me,â like someone is forcing him to stay behind in New York.
âFor a dreamer nightâs the only time of day.â versus âAnd tomorrow wonât remind me of today.â Movie Jackâs Santa Fe is a hopeful dream. Musical Jackâs Santa Fe is an escape.
Both Jacks express the sentiment for being âon the train thatâs bound for Santa Fe.â But while Movie Jackâs thoughts are straying, Musical Jack is talking about the moonâwhich he later compares to the moon in Santa Fe. I have some ideas for why Movie Jack wouldnât want to think about Santa Fe during the day. Maybe he doesnât want it to interfere with selling, or maybe he doesnât want the other newsies to find out, especially since itâs unclear in the movie if anyone except for Davey and Sarah knows about his dream. Movie Jack has a friend in all of the newsies, but not Crutchie as his closest friend, as the Musical implies.
One of my favorite lines in the Movie Santa Fe is âAnd Iâm free like the wind / Like Iâm gonna live forever.â It gives such a feeling of whimsy and hopefulness, which is what Jack feels when he thinks about Santa Fe. In Santa Fe, he can go wherever he pleases and his life wonât be limited by selling papers.Â
In the Musical, Jack says, âAnd Iâm gone, and Iâm done / No more runninâ, no more lyinââ which is a much more cynical take. Like I said above, Santa Fe is less of a dream for Musical Jack and more of a necessity. He needs to get out of New York, he needs to escape the people hunting him. Musical Jack feels older than Movie Jack because of this.Â
His next line has the same feeling, âNo more fat old men denying me my pay,â which focuses more on the life he has now that he hates, than the life Santa Fe can give him, which is what Movie Jack focuses on when he says âItâs a feeling time can never take away.â
Musical Jack then brings up the Santa Fe moonââa moon so big and yellow / it turns night right into dayââcomparing it to âthe moonâ in New York that looks âold and grayâ and therefore comparing life in New York to Santa Fe. Meanwhile, Movie Jack focuses on how he just âneeds a few more dollars / and Iâm outta here to stay.â Heâs actively saving up to go to Santa Fe. Musical Jack is only yearning for the chance to go.
Both Jacks sing the same lines before the chorus (give or take a few minor wording differences):Â
Whereâs it say you gotta live and die here?
Where does it say a guy canât catch a break?
Why should you only take what youâre given?
Why should you spend your whole life livinâ
Trapped where there ainât no future?
Even at seventeen
Breakinâ your back for someone elseâs sake
If the life donât seem to suit ya
Howâbout a change of scene
Far from the lousy headlines
And the deadlines in between
Here we get some of the motivation behind why Jack wants to leaveâheâs tired of living the hard life of a newsie, trapped in New York where heâs destined to go from one back-breaking job to the next. Jack wants out of the life thatâs been handed to him.
Then we get to the chorus.
Movie Jack sings âSanta Fe, are you there / Do you swear you wonât forget me? / If I found you, would you come and let me stay?â He almost personifies Santa Fe like a parent or a lover, asking them to remember him and let him stay with them. Musical Jack sings âSanta Fe, my old friend / I canât spend my whole life dreaminâ / Though I know thatâs all I seem inclined to doâ, treating Santa Fe as, like he said, a friend, and perhaps one that is telling him to stop dreaming and be realistic, projecting his internal struggles onto his dream.
Both Jacks know that they âainât gettinâ any younger,â but where Musical Jack says that he âwants to start brand new,â Movie Jack just wants to get to Santa Fe âbefore [his] dying day.â Both want âspaceâ (Musical Jack also wants âfresh airâ) and both dare people to âlaugh in my face / I donât care.â Then they both ask Santa Fe to âsave a placeâ for them, that âIâll be thereâ, like Santa Fe will disappear if they take too long.
And then Movie Jack laments about family again. âSo thatâs what they call a family / Ainât you glad you ainât that way? / Ainât you glad you got a dream called Santa Fe.â Once again, heâs talking like heâs trying to convince himself that Santa Fe is what he wants, more than family or even a place to belong. Even though he already has the newsies. Even though Santa Fe is just a dream.
Musical Jack, meanwhile, asks Santa Fe to âbe realâ and ânot some paintinâ in my head / âCause Iâm dead if I canât count on you today / I got nothinâ if I ainât got Santa Fe.â Once again, he takes a more cynical approach to his dream, begging Santa Fe to be real, believing that he will be âdeadâ if he canât have it. And, just like Movie Jack, heâs blind to the fact that he doesnât have nothingâhe has the newsies, and he has Crutchie, someone important to him who just got sent to the Refuge! (Perhaps heâs already treating Crutchie like heâs dead, which is also really sad.) The âpainting in my headâ part also relates back to the aspect of his character that the musical swapped for liking cowboys, which is the fact that Jack is an artist.
The last note is also really important. In the Movie, Jack once again takes a softer approach, breathing out the âSanta Feâ like a prayer or a plea. In the Musical, Jack holds out the âSanta Feâ like heâs calling out to it, begging his dream to come true.
And thatâs my analysis of the different versions of Santa Fe. Just as a note, I do prefer the movie Santa Fe to the musical one (at least lyric- and tone-wise), but both versions are really well done and fit the context of their respective media. The interpretations of Jack from Christian Bale and Jeremy Jordan are both amazing in their own ways and are equally important and valuable to the larger narrative of Newsies. I just find it interesting that a âfewâ lyrical changes can shift the whole feel of a song.
I hope you liked this! If you have any thoughts or comments, please let me know, Iâd love to hear them! Maybe Iâll do more analyses like this in the future, but I dunno, I just thought this could be fun. Also, ariaxuwr has some great thoughts on Santa Fe being an important song in both the movie and the musical, so you should definitely check out their post here.












