Great scores, not-so-great books

Looking back at DO I HEAR A WALTZ?, what are some of your favorite shows that had marvelous scores, but lousy books? My two favorites are CAMELOT (which was famous for its book trouble) and ASPECTS OF LOVE (I consider the score Webber's best work). Other favorites:

FOLLIES
MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG
ANYONE CAN WHISTLE (Hmm, a Sondheim theme...)
110 IN THE SHADE
JUNO
A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN
SUBWAYS ARE FOR SLEEPING

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Merrily has an impeccable book!

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Snoopy. I love the show but the book's not too great.

Aida
Taboo
Amour
The Last 5 Years
Camelot
Follies
Aspects of Love
A Class Act
Steel Pier
The Life
Merrilly We Roll Along

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You are so right about CINDERELLA, I hadn't thought of it.

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Sweeney Todd, Sunday in the Park with George, A Chorus Line

JK

Magruder, I love MERRILY. It's my personal favorite Sondheim. (I wouldn't say it is his "finest" work, but it's still my favorite).

But I think it's deeply flawed. My biggest problem with it is on a conceptual level. The audience is required to buy into the hypothesis that writing Broadway musicals is "art," and making films isn't. Which is hogwash. Does Frank really sell out by going to Hollywood? Is the revue "Frankly Frank" a good example of high art? It's not, of course. Frank, Charlie, and Mary all have a great desire to achieve success. When Frank achieves it and it destroys their friendship, is it because he's changed? Or are they simply angry that they didn't do that very thing? The musical wants us to believe in their pure ideals. But those very ideals don't make much sense.

How can you say 110 IN THE SHADE has a bad book? It is based on THE RAINMAKER, which was a big hit play and a successful movie, and the book was adapted by the original playwright, N. Richard Nash himself. About 75% of the dialogue is taken verbatim from the play, and many of the lyrics are amazingly close to the monologues they're based on. The only thing really different about the musical is the addition of a chorus and the character of Snookie, who's talked about but never seen in the play.

taboo

I would argue that with the exceptions of Sweeney Todd and Forum, every Sondheim show has a book that is unworthy of the score he created. Weidman's books are very interesting and thought-provoking, but overreach in their ambition, frequently ending up being somewhat muddled and meandering in spots, Lapine's books are disjointed, too "concept" and not enough coherence in the storytelling and character development and overall lack the incisiveness of the music, Furth's vignettes for Company and Merrily are cute but sitcom-ish and one-dimensional, while Goldman's work on Follies is melodramatic, morose and lacks conclusion. The Frogs and Bounce (along with a few other shows) lack the sort of singular vision and "through-line" in the book that you find in his compositional work. Perhaps it's too much to hope that Sondheim would work with book writers whose genius is equal to his (do they exist? Laurents' books for Gypsy and WSS, I suppose, match his brilliance as a lyricist), but it's rarely happened in his career.

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Baby and Aida

Magruder, I hear what you're saying, but I'm not really buying it.

Frank doesn't destroy Mary's life. Mary does.

And it's just the conflict that you're describing which makes the book unworkable for an audience, in my opinion. We're obviously supposed to side with Mary and Charley. And yet the actions that we see them perform during the course of the musical are much more dispicable than what Frank does by "selling out" and going to Hollywood. Charley's "Franklin Shephard, Inc." breakdown is inexcusable behavior, and Mary's drunken rage during the opening scene borders on terrifying. And yet we're still supposed to like these characters, and side with them in the argument that the belief in art as an ideal is more important than financial rewards.

THo the music isn't that great.....FOOTLOOSE's book is awful as well as Saturday night fever...ugh..so bad