Mr. Sondheim performs for his public
Well, not exactly but kind of.
My good friend Steve Roth, whom I've known since high school (we did the "Paul is dead" presentation together) emailed me from his Boston adjacent home to tell me he was flying in to LA and then heading up to Santa Barbara to see an on stage conversation between Stephen Sondheim and Frank Rich.
Apparently this is is a limited road show of four West Coast dates (Sondheim and Rich will be at Royce Hall in LA on Thursday as part of UCLA Live). He was meeting a friend with relatives in SB -- but when those plans fell through, I offered to drive up the coast with him.
With benefit of a beautiful California day we put the top down on the convertible and headed up the PCH, stopping for lunch at Neptune's Net (tasty fish tacos) and ended up on State Street with plenty of time.
The venue for the Sondheim-Rich conversation, presented under the auspicies of the University of California at Santa Barbara was the Granada Theater on State Street, originally built in 1924 and beautifully restored.
On to the Main Event. Sondheim who will be 78 on March 22, looked good, younger than his years, and was in good spirits (there may have been something going on with his left eye (it seemed to droop) but it didn't seem to affect him in the least.
Sondheim seemed very much of New York -- and not a bit the haughty theater snob I might have imagined him to be. He talked at length about Oscar Hammerstein, and said that he admired him so, he would have done whatever Hammerstein did -- if Hammerstein had been a geologist, he would be working with rocks.
He talked about West Side Story, and Leonard Bernstein and Jerome Robbins, and Gypsy -- a show Oscar Hammerstein encouraged to work on to learn how to write for a star, Ethel Merman (and although Merman objected to Sondheim writing the music -- he had kind words about her acting ability).
He talked about "A funny thing" and how much difficulty he had writing the opening number -- because in essence what he needed to do was tell the audience that they were in store for an evening of low comedy. Finally on a two day deadline he wrote what has come to be one of the most famous songs, if not the most famous song from the show: "Comedy Tonight."
Interestingly, Sondheim said in a response to a follow up question by Rich that it was not the deadline that focused his mind as much as that once a show is staged with specific actors -- you can see what is missing and write specifically to that need. I found that interesting.
He discussed the various productions of Sweeney Todd and said he liked the movie version.By contrast later when he was asked about Baz Luhrman's "Moulin Rouge" he said that parts he liked, but others bored him.
Sondheim also talked about a failed musical and Rich pointed out how elements of that "failed" work have turned up in other Sondheim works.
Sondheim also talked about Bounce a musical he has worked on, on and off, in various incarnations since he was 22, and that he will stage once more next year.
Finally he said that often the tried to find write songs about things that hadn't been written about in song, and write from those places that were difficult or uncomfortable and write things that challenged him.
Good Advice.
My good friend Steve Roth, whom I've known since high school (we did the "Paul is dead" presentation together) emailed me from his Boston adjacent home to tell me he was flying in to LA and then heading up to Santa Barbara to see an on stage conversation between Stephen Sondheim and Frank Rich.
Apparently this is is a limited road show of four West Coast dates (Sondheim and Rich will be at Royce Hall in LA on Thursday as part of UCLA Live). He was meeting a friend with relatives in SB -- but when those plans fell through, I offered to drive up the coast with him.
With benefit of a beautiful California day we put the top down on the convertible and headed up the PCH, stopping for lunch at Neptune's Net (tasty fish tacos) and ended up on State Street with plenty of time.
The venue for the Sondheim-Rich conversation, presented under the auspicies of the University of California at Santa Barbara was the Granada Theater on State Street, originally built in 1924 and beautifully restored.
On to the Main Event. Sondheim who will be 78 on March 22, looked good, younger than his years, and was in good spirits (there may have been something going on with his left eye (it seemed to droop) but it didn't seem to affect him in the least.
Sondheim seemed very much of New York -- and not a bit the haughty theater snob I might have imagined him to be. He talked at length about Oscar Hammerstein, and said that he admired him so, he would have done whatever Hammerstein did -- if Hammerstein had been a geologist, he would be working with rocks.
He talked about West Side Story, and Leonard Bernstein and Jerome Robbins, and Gypsy -- a show Oscar Hammerstein encouraged to work on to learn how to write for a star, Ethel Merman (and although Merman objected to Sondheim writing the music -- he had kind words about her acting ability).
He talked about "A funny thing" and how much difficulty he had writing the opening number -- because in essence what he needed to do was tell the audience that they were in store for an evening of low comedy. Finally on a two day deadline he wrote what has come to be one of the most famous songs, if not the most famous song from the show: "Comedy Tonight."
Interestingly, Sondheim said in a response to a follow up question by Rich that it was not the deadline that focused his mind as much as that once a show is staged with specific actors -- you can see what is missing and write specifically to that need. I found that interesting.
He discussed the various productions of Sweeney Todd and said he liked the movie version.By contrast later when he was asked about Baz Luhrman's "Moulin Rouge" he said that parts he liked, but others bored him.
Sondheim also talked about a failed musical and Rich pointed out how elements of that "failed" work have turned up in other Sondheim works.
Sondheim also talked about Bounce a musical he has worked on, on and off, in various incarnations since he was 22, and that he will stage once more next year.
Finally he said that often the tried to find write songs about things that hadn't been written about in song, and write from those places that were difficult or uncomfortable and write things that challenged him.
Good Advice.
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