I have a friend who hates Sondheim... — Page 3

newintown - valid point.

I think I need someone to make a compilation of the grand, sweeping, romantic stuff just for me It's for that reason that NIGHT MUSIC is the one score I can listen to straight through with basically pure enjoyment.

I don't think of Into the Woods as a good show for people just getting into Sondheim. I see it as part of his later work, of which I am not a huge fan. My introduction came when I was fourteen, with a very good high school production of Sweeney. I think it's undoubtedly his best work, and not just because it was my first.

On a side note, I was having dinner with my mother in the theatre district last week and she said, "Sondheim? I thought he was dead." People were staring.

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newintown - all familiar to me, and I agree. Now I just need to get them all on one CD (yes, I'm that kind of dinosaur )

From the 2nd book of Proverbs:

It is useless to teach a pig to sing, it's impossible, and it pisses off the pig.

"There are legions of lyrics that I kind of regret. Particularly a number of the very purple-prose lyrics in West Side Story: 'It's alarming how charming I feel.' Coming from a Puerto Rican girl - what, is she studying Noël Coward?" - Stephen Sondheim

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To Pal Joey:


"It bewildered me how anyone could listen to even one of those and utter the by-now cliche condemnation of "cold." I would laugh at it,"


Well, I'm going to give you a couple of laughs at my expense, free of charge, just because I like you.

Usually, when something is voiced long enough and often enough to become a cliche, more often than not, there's at least some grain of truth to it. And so I feel it is with Sondheim. Yes, I find his work cold, and, truth be told, mean, too. That means overall, not every specific song, or every piece of music, but overall in the tone and attitude of his work.

"Company" is my favorite Sondheim show, and some songs are dazzling. But I would call it overall, very cold. Bobby has emotion all right. For himself. He's selfish and self-absorbed. To me, that's chilling. And you think "The Ladies Who Lunch" is not cold? Well, not if the bitterness and nastiness that it reeks of are not considered cold. And "Could I Leave You?" If there's a meaner, nastier, more bitter song than that one, I can't think of it offhand.

Then there's the music itself. Many categorize it as cold. I see their point. Someone could say "Night Waltz" is sweeping and grand. And it is. But to me, the music is still cold. "The Embassy Waltz" and "The Carousel Waltz" are sweeping and grand. Their music is warm.

You obviously relate emotionally to his work. None of his songs make me cry. Plenty by Rodgers and Hammerstein do. I think they're a thousand times better. And so are Porter, Berlin, Kern, Gershwin, Arlen, and the list goes on.

Not everyone responds the same way to his work. Nor is there a need for everyone to.

Hope you laughed well.

Feh. So what? I don't want EVERYONE to love Sondheim. Many critics don't love Sondheim. Too cerebral and not enough catchy tune/soaring melodies a la Jerry Herman or Lerner & Lowe. Atonal is overstating things a bit but it does give a clue why it doesn't work for her. Big deal.

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The reason those two songs seem "red hot" and not "ice-cold" to me is that--IF PROPERLY SUNG AND ACTED--the cold facades both women project at the beginning of the songs fall apart at the climax of the song, leaving the women open and vulnerable at the end.

So even though Phyllis is projecting sarcasm with the opening phrases ("How do you wipe tears away when your eyes are dry?") and mentioning unpleasant aspects of Ben, like his pills and the dull dinners, once she spits out the line about "passionless lovemaking," it becomes clear that she is not simply angry but also deeply in pain.

The anger in the rest of the song then becomes a mask, or a cover-up, for a throbbingly lonely woman who never dreamed that her life would end up so empty. The paradoxical question at the climax of the song, "How could I leave when I left long ago?" actually betrays a lie: She HASN'T left. She's still there. Which begs the question: Why hasn't she?

That question is answered at the end of the song--or, rather, NOT answered. There are a million ways for a good actress to play the final "Will I leave you?...Guess!" and a million ways to interpret how it's played, but I've always assumed that the reason the song ends with "Guess!" and not "Yes!" is that Phyllis still loves Ben. And that is her tragedy, her "folly": She loves a man who doesn't beat her, doesn't mistreat her, he simply doesn't care. And that I find inescapably moving.

I won't go on as long about "Ladies Who Lunch," but, again, the song starts off with Joanne passing judgment on the "ladies who lunch" and the "girls who play smart" and the "girls who play wife," but it ends with Joanne dissecting herself.

When it's well played, Joanne launches into that 4th group of girls, the penultimate group, the "girls who just watch," and starts to realize that she's describing herself: When she gets depressed, she's the one who opens another bottle and disapproves and jests and zings.

To me, that's what the growl on the "Ahhhhhhhhh-lll drink to that" always means: It's the cry of an animal whose leg is caught in a trap. In this case, a trap of her own devising.

So when she launches into the final verse and sings about looking into the eyes of these women and seeing that they know they will die, she is no longer passing judgment in a way that should be described as "cold." She is saying, "Everybody rise!" and pay respect to those of us who have wasted our lives. Pay respect to me. And to you. And to you and you.

It is what the French call a "cri de couer." And when it's played with that kind of depth, I weep.

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Updated On: 1/7/11 at 03:14 PM

To Pal Joey:

"It is what the French call a "cri de couer.""

Actually, I think they call it a cri de coeur. :)

But thank you for your intelligent and impassioned analysis of these songs. It's clear why you feel so passionately about Sondheim's work, and also why you're one of the finest posters here.

I didn't back up my rather snotty question, but I couldn't help but be snotty.

I mean, atonal is a type of music. People compose music that way. Just because the harmonies are complex, just because the rhythms aren't your "Um-pah, um-pah" show music rhythms, just because the structure isn't always AABA, doesn't mean the music is atonal. Sondheim composes tonal music.

I've come to the conclusion that a lot of people are stupid. They go to the theatre expecting to sit back and either A) See a pleasant story with some pleasant tunes and a happy ending or B) Sit back with their mouth agape staring at empty-headed spectacle. Sondheim's shows fall into neither category A or B, they fall into Category C- Good theatre...meaning, The Theatre of Surprise.

I've often wondered what it was like to be at Sweeney Todd's first preview, or Company or Follies first Boston preview, expecting Hello, Dolly!, and getting something completely different and completely jaw-dropping- whether you like jaw-dropping or not. Or to have at least seen some of these shows early in their runs, maybe before the reviews even came out (I'm sure PalJoey can tell us a story or two about times like this). I mean, it must have been really...shocking. And shocking is a word used too often nowadays. Shocking nowadays is nudity, the N word or swastikas- not a show without a plot, a show about a sympathetic mass murderer, or a show about imperialism. I mean, that's pretty shocking.

Edited because- Well, I can't believe I contradicted myself by mistake! LOL

Updated On: 1/9/11 at 06:58 PM