Distant Duet

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
It's just a greasy spoooooooo-♫ Just a greasy spooooooon...♫

Two singers sing the same song, but they are separated in space. Can be used to show the commonality of the two singers (such as two lovers sharing a love song while longing for each other) but another variation is the protagonists singing a happy song while the villain is plotting.

Common among Star-Crossed Lovers. The Song Before the Storm often uses this format. Related to Two Scenes, One Dialogue.

Naturally, a sub-trope of Let's Duet.

Examples of Distant Duet include:

Anime and Manga

  • A rare print version of this trope pops up in Chrono Crusade. In New York state, Rosette flops down on the grass and begins to sing a musical version of Edgar Allan Poe's poem Israfel. In the middle of the song, the scene switches to San Fransisco, where her brother Joshua is singing the same song. Since this is the first time Joshua shows up in the present day (his previous scenes had either been flashbacks or only shown him in silhouette), the song is a clue that it's the same Joshua as it's mentioned he and Rosette sang together as children.

Fan Works

Film

  • The song "Touch-a Touch-a Touch-a Touch Me" from The Rocky Horror Picture Show has Janet singing as she's seducing Rocky in the lab as well as Columbia and Magenta singing as well... while mocking Janet from inside a bedroom.
  • The song "Come Back To Me" from On a Clear Day You Can See Forever. Daisy is avoiding the psychiatrist so he tries to reach her telepathically. She begins hearing the words of the song coming from the mouths of her cooking class teacher, police officers, and other random strangers. (Does not happen in the stage show.)
  • The second verse of "At The Opera Tonight" from Repo! The Genetic Opera is a duet between the Repo Man and Blind Mag. The distance between them is not simply physical: while Mag sings about how she's made peace with her fate, Repo Man is raging and planning a bloodbath.
  • All of John and Abigail Adams' duets in 1776. Especially fitting as the duets are based off their letters to each other.
  • Lalita and Darcy share a Distant Duet that was cut from the movie Bride and Prejudice but can be seen on the DVD.
  • Two in The Muppets: Piggy (in her dressing room) and Mary (at a restaurant) in "Me Party", and then Gary (on the street) and Walter (in the Muppet Studios basement) for "Muppet or Man" (there's an Imagine Spot where they're together in the middle, but as far as the reality of the film is concerned, they're not).
  • "Savages" from Disney's Pocahontas
  • "Somewhere Out There" from An American Tail. Two separated mice sing about their hopes of finding each other someday. * sniff*
  • "The Plagues" from The Prince of Egypt
  • The "La Résistance" Medley from South Park: Bigger, Longer, and Uncut, which is also a deliberate parody of these kinds of songs. The members of La Résistance, the mothers, the fathers, Terrance and Phillip and Satan all sing different parts, often reprising other songs from the movie.
  • The Award Bait Song "For Longer Than Forever" from The Swan Princess.
  • "Am I Feeling Love?", one of two blatant Award Bait Songs in the theatrical cuts of The Thief and the Cobbler.
  • "Shere Khan's Lost Song" from The Jungle Book was originally going to be one for Shere Khan, the film's Big Bad.
  • The canceled Betty Boop movie was planned to have a distant duet between Betty and her father. See it here.

Live-Action TV

  • "Walk Through the Fire" from the Buffy musical has a whole bunch of little subgroups.

Music

  • The Polish-Russian songstress' Anna German's song Echo of Love is kinda like that.
  • Frank Sinatra recorded a new version of I've Got You Under My Skin with Bono in 1993. The music video depicts Sinatra singing his part of the song in New York, with Bono singing his lines in Dublin.
  • Sound Horizon's "Shiseru Monotachi no Monogatari - Istoria" includes a duet between separated twins Elefseus and Artemisia, promising that they'll meet again one day.
  • Simple Plan's "Jet Lag" is sung from the perspective of a couple who are separated by continents, to the point where he's waking up just as the sun is setting where she is. They have released four official versions of the song—the English version with Natasha Bedingfield, a French version with Marie-Mai, a mixed English/Chinese version with Kelly Cha, and a one with an Indonesian band. In all four music videos he is shown at the airport while she waits for him to come home.

Theatre

  • "Tonight Quintet" from West Side Story.
  • "What You Own" in both the musical and movie versions of Rent. Mark's in New York, Roger's in Santa Fe, they meet for the final verse on the roof of their apartment building.
  • "Lily's Eyes" from The Secret Garden. Brothers who were in love with the same woman.
  • "I Wish I Could Go Back to College" and "Fantasies Come True" from Avenue Q both do this. The former has three singers, all in different buildings. The latter is a twist on the "love song" variant; the two singers are both singing about having found love, but not with each other. And one of the two people who's found love discovers immediately afterwards that it was All Just a Dream.
  • "Summer Nights" from Grease.
  • "Till Then" and "Yours, Yours, Yours", sung by John and Abigail Adams in 1776, basically dramatize their letters to each other. (And for extra Bonus Points are at least in part composed of actual passages from those letters.)
  • Parodied in "West End Musical", by Mitch Benn and the Distractions (also a Counterpoint Duet):

Kirsty:I'm on the left side of the stage.
Mitch:: I'm standing over on the right.
Kirsty: Silhouetted in a spotlight on my own.
Mitch:: That's interesting, so am I.
Kirsty: I'm not too sure just what this song's about.
Mitch:: I don't know either, don't ask me.
Kirsty: It's probably something to do with being alone.
Mitch: But I'm standing over here...

  • "Skid Row" from Little Shop of Horrors has various characters singing one line, before developing into a more conventional Distant Duet with Audrey and Seymour. (Subverted in the movie, where the two of them end up only a couple feet apart from each other on opposite sides of a corner, unware of each other's presence.)
  • Thirteen has a subversion. Evan and Patrice are standing right next to each other and are giving advice to Brett saying what they wish they would really say to each other
  • Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street has a distant trio, with Sweeney in his barbershop, Anthony searching for Johanna, and Johanna in an insane asylum.
  • "Christmas Makes Me Cry" from Brooklyn has Faith in Paris, singing to young Brooklyn, and Taylor in New York, singing to...anyone who'll listen, and both of them thinking of each other.
  • "What You Don't Know About Women" in City of Angels. Gabby and Oolie are separated not only by a split stage, but by the latter being a fictional character in a Film Noir written by the former's husband.
  • 'I Know Him So Well' from Chess, although this one depends on the production: in some versions, the two singers are actually singing to each other.
  • The finale reprise of "For Good" in Wicked.
  • "Friendship Isn't What it Used to Be" from Vanities: The Musical was originally a solo sung by Kathy after the other two characters leave the scene, but made a Distant Trio in later productions.

Video Games

Web Original

Western Animation

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