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Aaron Tveit, Sutton Foster will next star in ‘Sweeney Todd’ Feb 11
2024, 01:33:38 AM
I haven't posted here in years, but I just wanted to jump in to mention that Sondheim was by no means wedded to the keys in which his songs were sung by the original casts of the original productions. They were rarely the keys in which he'd originally written the songs, and he fully expected that his original keys would often — probably more often than not — be changed to work well for the voices of those who were cast.
Back in January 2004, around the time the Roya
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Understudies/Standbys in City Center Encores productions? Apr 1
2020, 02:39:09 AM
I've been going to Encores! since the first season, although I haven't seen all of them. I have many of the playbills, including for some I didn't see, and I don't think understudies are listed in any of them.
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Phylicia Rashad Into the Woods question Feb 1
2020, 02:01:32 AM
IronMan said: "I don't know about Rashad's stint, but in the original cast it was Maureen Davis, the actresswho played Sleeping Beauty (only appears once at the end with Snow White, and also Bernadette's u/s) that doubled her for the change. Her face was covered by a mask and hood so it wasn't really seen;I can't imagine why they would have had to make any changes for Phylicia."
I've never come across Maureen Davis listed as a Witch under
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! Feb 11
2019, 09:38:40 PM
GavestonPS said: "Of course I don't mind, not at all. On the contrary, I appreciate the correction."
Thanks, GavestonPS. I thought you'd be OK with it. You're very easy-going. Not everyone is. But after not having posted here for some time, I felt a bit odd about coming back with something like that.
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! Jan 13
2019, 04:50:48 AM
GavestonPS said: Ethel Merman, Benay Venuta (Merman'sperennial understudy), Elaine Stritch (Merman's standby two decades before smoking and drinking destroyed her voice (granted, in an interesting, "character" way)), Tyne Daly (no Merman vocally, but she sings in the same style), Karen Morrow (the last Sally Adams I saw). These are the sort of "beltingbroads" who have play
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Talkin' Broadway All That Chat Nov 19
2016, 10:22:08 PM
Thank you for the kind words, newintown and MarkBearSF. You know, I've gone through periods of posting here, but I haven't in a long time. Even though I've always used a different name here, I assumed that anyone who knew me from ATC would quickly know it was me (although it seemed that not everyone did).
nobodyhome aka AlanScott
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In Sweeney, why is the Beggar Woman so obsessed with the Beadle? May 22
2015, 01:32:41 PM
I've always felt that the reason is what WickedCompany wrote.
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Barrett Wilbert Weed and Wes Taylor in Cabaret in DC May 21
2015, 04:35:06 PM
Thanks, Alix and BroadwayStud. What you describe, BroadwayStud, is the original version. Lines of dialogue from earlier in the show are repeated by Fr. Schneider, Herr Schultz and Sally, we hear Kost laughing, and Sally singing a brief reprise of the title song, and the Emcee closing it off with "Auf wiedersehen . . . A bientot."
Alix, the published script of the 1966 version has Schultz saying "Jewish" there. And it's what Werner Klemperer said in the 1987 revival. But, yeah, at least in the last Broadway production, Danny Burstein said "Yiddish," and I guess that's what it's probably always been in that Mendes-Marshall production (and perhaps in the published script for it).
Btw, the original London cast recording (the one with Judi Dench as Sally, Lila Kedrova as Fr. Schneider, Barry Dennen as the Master of Ceremonies, and Peter Sallis as Herr Schultz) has the original stage version of the finale. I think that for the OBCR, Goddard Lieberson must have felt that those lines would be meaningless to people who hadn't seen the show. Supposedly, Lieberson didn't like to have much dialogue on cast recordings. Fortunately, that 1968 London recording, which I love, is now available again, though still not remastered or with the tracks in show order.
Cabaret OLCR, Masterworks Broadway
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Barrett Wilbert Weed and Wes Taylor in Cabaret in DC May 19
2015, 03:17:24 PM
Thanks for all the info on the production. I have a question about a slight discrepancy in the accounts of the final sequence.
GetUp&LiveIt wrote, "At the end of the play as the principals repeated their lines referencing their blindness to the outside world the audience was flooded by several men in Nazi uniform."
Alix wrote, "Then, the end of the show: Music-wise, they used the orig
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Dorothy Collins Sep 21
2014, 03:23:46 AM
"According to EVERYTHING WAS POSSIBLE, that was one of the things that got them interested in her for Sally."
Yes, that seems to have been why Sondheim was interested. Prince had come close to casting her as Amalia in She Loves Me (another role she seems to have eventually done in stock). It came down to choosing between her and Barbara Cook. So they both already had strongly positive feelings about her.
"I think I read that as well as DO I HEAR A WALTZ, she was up for t
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Elaine Stritch: Sep 21
2014, 03:14:20 AM
"I hope I didn't give you the impression I minded the correction. I very much appreciated it."
No, I didn't get that impression at all.
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Elaine Stritch: Sep 18
2014, 07:51:41 PM
Oh, we all forget stuff or get a little confused from time to time. No one is perfect.
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Elaine Stritch: Sep 18
2014, 07:40:34 PM
There was an earlier discussion of this here, which can be found at https://www.broadwayworld.com/long-island/board/readmessage.php?thread=1069563&page=1
In that thread, I suggested that Stritch was perhaps getting Mrs. Lovett mixed up with Miss Hannigan. She was offered Miss Hannigan in London, but they supposedly couldn't come to terms on money, and the role ended up going to Sheila Hancock. Hancock also later played Mrs. Lovett in the first London production of Sweeney, after Patricia Routledge turned it down.
GavestonPS wrote, "And as for Merman v. Lansbury, joanna Merlin (whose opinion on acting I respect above all) said, 'With Merman it was chills, with Lansbury it was tears.' She was praising both."
Flora Roberts was quoted as saying something very like that, on page 57 of Sondheim & Co. (2nd edition). "The best way I can think of describing them is that it was goose bumps with Merman and tears with Lansbury." Perhaps you're thinking of that, or perhaps Merlin (if you heard her say it) was paraphrasing Roberts.
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The Miller's Son on Tonight Show - Question Mar 18
2014, 05:15:00 PM
As I said, I saw it three times and I don't recall noise. But I also tend to trust the person who told me this. I wasn't there when he saw the show. It does seem possible that there might have been an occasional problem later, especially given that a new set was built for the move.
I think there are times when we can definitively say something didn't happen. Ever. But things do go wrong sometimes.
IIRC, a couple of the critics complained about light shining off the panels.
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The Miller's Son on Tonight Show - Question Mar 18
2014, 07:42:27 AM
And I'm sure nothing ever, ever went wrong that might have caused them to be a little noisy at some performances, not even after the move to the Majestic, for which a new set was built (the original set went on the road). And, of course, Frank Rich was at every performance so he must know.
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The Miller's Son on Tonight Show - Question Mar 17
2014, 06:27:09 PM
Clarinet (maybe bass clarinet?), not oboe. But lovely.
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The Miller's Son on Tonight Show - Question Mar 17
2014, 06:23:40 PM
I know people who saw the show on Broadway, and they found the set's movements noisy. I saw it three times and I don't remember finding it at all noisy so I've always been mystified. But some people evidently did, even on Broadway. I don't know.
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The Miller's Son on Tonight Show - Question Mar 16
2014, 07:42:47 PM
There was an article on D'Jamin Bartlett in an early issue of The Sondheim Review. She talked about playing Desiree, and said that she didn't fully appreciate Glynis Johns's performance until she played the role. She realized that Desiree is not necessarily a terribly likable character. She's a woman having an affair with another woman's husband while trying to steal the husband of yet another woman. So it's important for the actress to make the audience like a character who might be cons
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The Miller's Son on Tonight Show - Question Mar 15
2014, 01:00:37 AM
After Eight wrote, "Uh, what idolaters like you don't seem to understand is, a) not many people think like you -- maybe about twenty people in the unverse, actually --- and b) the producers of the Tony Awards actually wanted people to WATCH the show, not turn off their television sets in droves."
Yes, that must have been why in 1972, rather than having Dorothy Collins sing "Losing My Mind," or Alexis Smith sing "Could I Leave You" or Ethel Shutta doing "Broadway Baby" or something like that, Alexander Cohen had this crowd-pleasing nine-minute sequence from Ain't Supposed to Die a Natural Death, culminating in Minnie Gentry putting a curse on the audience.
http://www.bluegobo.com/production/2879701/video/10386
Funny you should have written, "the producers of the Tony Awards actually wanted people to WATCH the show, not turn off their television sets in droves," because I remember watching this in 1972 and thinking, "I find this kind of interesting and powerful, but I bet an awful lot of people across the country are switching to another channel."
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The Miller's Son on Tonight Show - Question Mar 12
2014, 05:00:40 PM
This was from May 10, 1973, both clips. At least in the early Burbank years, I believe the show would come back to New York for a week or two each year. I'd be pretty sure this was during one of those times, although I can't find definite confirmation.
EDIT: Given how few understudies Prince had on this show, it would have been a disaster to fly both Johns and Bartlett out to California in mid-week.
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