Dancing bears seem ill prepared at beginning of scene in musical (3,10)
I believe the answer is:
les miserables
'scene in musical' is the definition.
'les miserables' can be an answer for 'musical'. I'm not sure about the 'scene in' bit.
'dancing bears seem ill prepared at beginning' is the wordplay.
'dancing' indicates an anagram.
'prepared at beginning' becomes 's' (I am not sure about this - if you are sure you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'bears'+'seem'+'ill'='bearsseemill'
'bearsseemill' anagrammed gives 'lesmiserable'.
'lesmiserable'+'s'='LES MISERABLES'
'of' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for les miserables that I've seen before include "Novel, muscial and film about Jean Valjean" , "Hugo-based musical" , "Well-known musical" , "Victor Hugo novel, Valjean its hero" , "Musical from Victor Hugo" .)