He Never Does Anything Twice

My, all these conflicting reports I’m getting from Chicago from people who have visited the Goodman Theatre in the last couple of weeks! Regarding Bounce, the new Sondheim-Prince musical (and isn’t it a delight just to be able to use the term “Sondheim-Prince musical” again after all these years?), I’ve heard everything from “It’s a hit, it’s a hit, it’s a palpable hit!” all the way down to “When a musical’s that bad, what on earth can anyone say?”

I’m sure that the truth — as so often is the case in life — lies somewhere in between. But take it from one who saw the Boston premieres of Company in 1970, Follies in 1971, A Little Night Music in 1973, and Pacific Overtures in 1975: Sondheim knows what to write when he must come up with new material.

Only one new song was added to Company late in the game: “Being Alive,” which replaced “Happily Ever After.” Many submit that it turned the whole show around. Two new songs were inserted into Follies, and while lots of people feel that “The Story of Lucy and Jessie” isn’t better than “Uptown/Downtown,” I’ve never heard anyone claim that “Can That Boy Fox-Trot” is superior to “I’m Still Here.” As for A Little Night Music, “In Praise of Women” took over for “Bang!” “It Would Have Been Wonderful” was added, and “Silly People” was excised before the Broadway opening. For Pacific Overtures, more was added to “Chrysanthemum Tea” and “Next,” and that was pretty much that.

In my experience with Boston tryouts, I saw far many more changes in Darling of the Day, Dear World, and Sherry; far fewer in Come Summer, Cry for Us All, and Cyrano; and just about as many in Bajour, High Spirits, and A Time for Singing. There weren’t wholesale changes in I Can Get It for You Wholesale, which was frozen by the time I caught it, as were The Roar of the Greasepaint, The Smell of the Crowd and Zorba. But the point is that, while Sondheim (and Prince, of course, and occasionally Michael Bennett) made comparatively few changes to their shows, theirs counted the most. Granted, Sondheim and Prince are much older now than when they created their landmark shows, and they haven’t worked together in close to a quarter-century. Still, I’m not betting against their pulling yet another rabbit out of yet another hat.

Yet while I was writing this, something else completely came to mind — something I hadn’t noticed in 40-plus years of Sondheim-watching. Has anyone else noticed that, when it comes to Broadway, this man has — to paraphrase one of his best songs — never done anything twice? Here’s what I mean. His first Broadway writing credit was for The Girls of Summer (1956), a full-length play for which he provided a song. That would be the first and only time he did that. His first musical, West Side Story (1957), was based on a classic play by Shakespeare. That was the first and only time he was involved in a Shakespeare adaptation. Gypsy (1959) was inspired by an autobiography, the first and only time he worked from one of those.

Are you getting the point? For Invitation to a March (1960), he wrote his one-and-only incidental score for a play. A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (1962) was adapted from many different full-length plays (ancient Roman comedies, they were). Anyone Can Whistle (1964) wasn’t adapted from anything but was an original — in more ways than one. Do I Hear a Waltz? (1965) was adapted from an American play. Company (1970) was based on a several recent, unproduced one-act plays by George Furth.

An aside: Furth used the plays that he and Sondheim didn’t mine for Company to fashion Twigs in 1971. Sondheim wrote a terrific song for that play; it was called “Hollywood and Vine,” and Tony-winner Sada Thompson delivered it sensationally. While this credit would seem to indicate that Sondheim was once again writing a song for a play as he did for The Girls of Summer, the distinction is that here he was writing a song for a one-act. (A stretch? Maybe, but that’s fitting in reference to a guy who has always stretched himself.)

At first glance, Follies (1971) would seem to be an example of Sondheim’s doing another original musical, as he did in Anyone Can Whistle. But many musical theater history books state that an important inspiration for Follies that helped changed it drastically from the original conception (called The Girls Upstairs) was the Life magazine photograph of Gloria Swanson standing in the middle of the rubble of the just-destroyed Roxy Theatre. So, in a tangential but not insignificant way, Follies was based on a photograph.

A Little Night Music (1973) was adapted from a foreign film and Pacific Overtures (1976) from a recent, unproduced full-length play (as opposed to Furth’s recent, unproduced one-act plays). But let’s not forget the Sondheim work that came between them: Candide was there in 1974 as, for the first and only time, Sondheim officially helped to retool a Broadway flop.

Sweeney Todd (1979) was based on a recent British reworking of a British classic. Merrily We Roll Along (1981) was based on an American play, just as Do I Hear a Waltz? had been — but this play had a plot that moved backwards in time instead of forward. I see a distinction there, even if you don’t.

Sunday in the Park with George (1984) was based on, of all things, a painting. Into the Woods (1987) was just as much based on a series of fairy tales as it was on Bruno Bettelheim’s psychological study on them. Assassins — which I’ll count here because it is Broadway-bound — was based on a title, for God’s sake. You have heard, haven’t you, that Sondheim saw Charles Gilbert’s script for a play called Assassins on a desk, loved the title, and called up the guy and asked if he could have it? (I don’t believe he ever read Gilbert’s original play — which, by the way, I’d like to see. Wouldn’t you? What did Mr. Gilbert have to say? Was it much that Sondheim and Wiedman said or much that they didn’t?)

Passion (1994), like A Little Night Music, was based on a foreign film, but it had a novel as a basis, too. (Isn’t it surprising that Sondheim’s first musicalization of a novel came so late in his career?) Getting Away With Murder (1996) was a Sondheim work with no musical score at all; it was just a play, co-written with Furth. And now coming to Broadway (well, we’re all hoping!) is Bounce (2003), based not on an autobiography, like Gypsy, but a biography: The Legendary Mizners by Alva Johnson. I’m telling you, this guy never does anything twice — unless you count coming up with great material time and time and time again.

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[To contact Peter Filichia directly, e-mail him at pfilichia@aol.com]