Sunset Boulevard is one of my favorite albums, and it's fairly easy to follow the story by just listening to it. I'm a huge POTO fan and I've never had to come up with an excuse for liking the show. Most people just assume the obvious, the music, the spectacle, the passion and romance, but most of all the music. The original film of SUNSET is a particular favourite of mine and when I read in 1981 that Stephen Sondheim and Hal Prince were planning it as a new musical for Angela Lansbury I was thrilled with idea...Like FOLLIES, it could trade on nostalgia by resetting the story to show the leading lady as a one-time star of big Hollywood musicals. This would give a chance for former Hollywood musical stars (Jane Powell, Debbie Reynolds, Marge Champion, etc) to appear. It would also set up some terrific pastiches of the M-G-M style overblown production numbers.
It never happened. (In a letter from Mr. Sondheim he explained to me that it was just Miss Lansbury's press agent wishing it into existence.)
A decade passed, and the CD of the London cast with Patti Lupone arrived. I listened in horror as the musical took sections of the original screenplay and set it to dull-ish recitative style music pausing (stopping dead actually) to plug in a big number. I found none of the songs seemed to be of the same cloth..and thanks to an article published in Show Music magazine I learned that ALW had pulled a selection of trunk songs and instructed the lyricists to outfit the tunes with new words. Many of the songs came from his score for his mini-musical CRICKET.
This is, obviously, not a way to ensure a consistent tone to the music, which is especially important in a mood piece like SUNEST BLVD.
When it opened in New York the reviews were very mixed but Glenn Close won raves for her star performance. The show quickly became a "hot ticket": but except for the stellar revival of SHOW BOAT it had no real challenger.
The Tony Awards committee debated the sad state of affairs: Should they cancel the awards that year and admit it had been a dismal season, or simply let SUNSET and the only other "new" show (a jukebox musical built around old songs) compete in two-show race for Best Musical. They chose the latter. They also awarded ALW a Tony for his score without any other nominees So, SUNSET swept the Tony Awards with the only real competition coming from revivals of SHOW BOAT and HOW TO SUCCEED. Vincent Canby summed up the sorry situation writing at the time "Awards don't really tell you much when the competition is feeble or simply nonexistent, as was the case the year that Sunset Boulevard won its Tony. Such prizes are for use in advertising and promotion and to impress the folks back home."
The show ultimately closed after a 2 1/2 year run "setting the record for the most money lost by a theatrical endeavor in the history of the United States" as reported in the New York Times. The London production also folded without recouping and the Toronto production played much of its run to small or heavily papered houses. (No wonder Diahann Carroll seemed distressed. Or maybe she just knew she was wrong for the part, a victim of stunt casting.) After Toronto it went to Vancouver for a short stay..ERIC: What were the sales like there?
Every so often someone posts here that they would like to see the show revived. Of course any show can be revived but the huge costs and losses associated with the original production would necessitate a scaled down production...and the one element that audiences loved in the original was the spectacular stage set of Norma's mansion.
SO what we have is poorly executed musical adaptation of a classic film, saddled with an erratic score which at times sounds way too contemporary for story set in 1949-1950. I doubt anyone could make a success out of this flop. Better to go back to the source material and start fresh. There is a great musical (or opera) to be made out of this story, but ALW's SUNSET BLVD is not it.
Hey...since ALW thinks it totally all right to interpolate his songs into the score of WIZARD OF OZ, would he allow someone else to redo much of the score for SUNSET? Probably not.
By the time SUNSET came along I was already becoming disenchanted with the Lloyd Webber shows. SUNSET finished him for me. I like SUPERSTAR and EVITA has long been a favourite show of mine. I did like JOSEPH at first until the show was done too often by local theatre troupes. But his later shows have left me cold... and none has been a bigger disappointment to me than his SUNSET BLVD.
In many ways ALW is a modern day Ivor Novello. (Novello produced opulent operettas on the London stage between 1935 and 1950. His shows were big hits with lush romantic scores - and are all but unrevivable today because of their clumsy books, and production designs that would bankrupt even the most deep-pocketed producer.)
Thanks to the millions generated by CATS and PHANTOM he can afford to produce his shows any way he likes, but I have to wonder how much longer the mounting losses generated by STARLIGHT EXPRESS, ASPECTS OF LOVE, WOMAN IN WHITE, BOMBAY DREAMS (which he produced) and two flop revivals of SUPERSTAR can be offset. These production illustrate the myth that all you need is Lloyd Webber's name on the marquee to sell tickets.
I like SUPERSTAR and EVITA has long been a favourite show of mine. I did like JOSEPH at first until the show was done too often by local theatre troupes. But his later shows have left me cold... and none has been a bigger disappointment to me than his SUNSET BLVD. How I wish the Sondheim/Prince/Lansbury version had come to fruition. (Some reports claim it was to be a movie musical remake, but the item published in the New York Times around the time MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG was starting previews in 1981 said it was projected for Broadway in the 1982/83 season.)
Cast albums are NOT "soundtracks."
Live theatre does not use a "soundtrack." If it did, it wouldn't be live theatre!
I host a weekly one-hour radio program featuring cast album selections as well as songs by cabaret, jazz and theatre artists. The program, FRONT ROW CENTRE is heard Sundays 9 to 10 am and also Saturdays from 8 to 9 am (eastern times) on www.proudfm.com
