Sondheim, no contest. I met JRB at a performance at Birdland last June and he was an absolute doll. Totally sweet. But yeah, I'd do just about anything to have a real conversation with Sondheim.
I had a class on Sondheim last semester with a professor who's actually helped to translate and edit the letters for LoveMusik. (Apparently one semester when he was doing a show with Hal Prince he got him to come up and do a Q&A for his Sondheim class, but I wasn't as lucky.) He had a great story about being at Yale at the time Sondheim did The Frogs there. At the opening night party, my professor said that Sondheim was standing all by himself. So he thought, "What the hell, it's Sondheim, I'll never get a chance like this again." So he went up and talked to him. Can't remember a word of their conversation, though.
The one I would do ANYTHING to meet and have a conversation with? Stephen Sondheim. The man is a genius.
I'd also love to meet Jeff Marx. I've talked to him many many many times over Myspace (so he actually knows me.) but I've never really MET him. He's a very sweet guy.
"I'm tellin' you, the only times I really feel the presence of God are when I'm having sex and during a great Broadway musical." - Nathan Lane - Jeffrey
Michael John LaChiusa Paul Scott Goodman Adam Guettel David Yazbek (just to tell him who really deserved that Tony for Best Score back in '01) Stephen Sondheim Henry Krieger
Butters, go buy World of Warcraft, install it on your computer, and join the online sensation before we all murder you.
--Cartman: South Park
ATTENTION FANS: I will be played by James Barbour in the upcoming musical, "BroadwayWorld: The Musical."
I met Jason (? Howland), the composer of Little Women and he was very nice.
I also met on the street Matthew Skar, who composed the Wedding Singer and asked if I had fun and whatnot and he said "I don't care what the critics think. I see people leaving this theater happy and having fun and I feel fulfilled." Or something along those lines.
I'd like to have a 6 course dinner with Sondhiem and enjoy every singly moment of it.
"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view - until you climb into his skin and walk around in it."
To Kill A Mockingbird
Sondheim. I have also heard about how shy he is but whenever I have seen him (at the talkback after Encores! Follies, for example) he seems so bright and funny. I like the idea of a six-course dinner, too, just me and him and two other people he is comfortable with - to put him more at ease.
I am a firm believer in serendipity- all the random pieces coming together in one wonderful moment, when suddenly you see what their purpose was all along.
Kander and Ebb. Sondheim needs to stay on the pedestal I placed him on in my mind and needs to retain that god-like quality. I've seen him once and that was enough of him I'd ever need in my memory, beaming and proud. LaChiusa hopefully wouldn't be too full of himself, but I'd settle with the dynamic duo.
Also, I'd love to meet ALW and tell him that I actually like CATS.
I am a firm believer in serendipity- all the random pieces coming together in one wonderful moment, when suddenly you see what their purpose was all along.
Sondheim Kander (and Ebb, although he unfortunately is no longer with us) Rodgers (though he's dead), although I hear he wasn't a particulary nice fellow Guettel Herman Yeston
I met Duncan Sheik and that was absolutely amazing. But other ones would be: Andrew Lippa Stephen Schwartz Stephen Sondheim Adam Guettel Jason Robert Brown David Yazbek Henry Krieger (He's my friends cousin) John Kander
Then there are a ton of people who aren't alive, specifically Fred Ebb and Jonathan Larson.
Please don't say the Richard Rodgers wasn't a nice guy, you'll crush my dreams! He HAD to be nice!
Rodgers Webber (Genuinely) Schoenberg
The rain we knew is a thing of the past -
deep-delving, dark, deliberate you would say
browsing on spire and bogland; but today
our sky-blue slates are steaming in the sun,
our yachts tinkling and dancing in the bay
like racehorses. We contemplate at last
shining windows, a future forbidden to no one.
Derek Mahon
"Maybe all one can do is hope to end up with the right regrets."