Posted: 6/10/15 at 2:08pm
Thanks to BWW for linking this 15 minute or so talk by Jason Robert Brown (who in the YouTube note apologizes for overstating some things) and no doubt making up for this:
In any event, the video: (which YouTube says in "unlisted")
Posted: 6/10/15 at 5:37pm
Bahaha I didn't know JRB was so funny! That was a really great speech.
Posted: 6/10/15 at 6:58pm
Lovely stuff. I don't think ANYONE is the new Sondheim, but Jason certainly has that edginess and the same outspokenness that a young Sondheim had in the 1970s. He's a talented, smart man.
Posted: 6/10/15 at 7:58pm
Has he ever had a commerical hit on BW?
Posted: 6/10/15 at 8:09pm
"Has he ever had a commercial hit on BW?"
Has Sondheim?
(As an original production.)
Posted: 6/10/15 at 8:41pm
""Has he ever had a commercial hit on BW?"
Has Sondheim?
(As an original production.)"
Ah yes, the urban legend that Sondheim never had a commerically succesful musical.
Let's take just one Sondheim musical "Into the Woods", it played 765 performances on its initial BW run, which is much more than twice the total of all Brown's BW musicals combined.
I know Sondheim himself likes to claim he's never been popular, becaue of some of his most beloved projects were not successful, but tain't true at all.
Supposedly FOLLIES lost money but it ran for a friggin 522 performances on BW when if first opened...
Updated On: 6/10/15 at 08:41 PM
Posted: 6/10/15 at 8:49pm
But FOLLIES still lost its entire investment...
Posted: 6/10/15 at 8:54pm
"But FOLLIES still lost its entire investment...
"
I know , but wasn't that more a matter of mismanagement? I mean was the show losing money every week of those 522 performances, which is close to 75 weeks. Unless the show was so costly to produce, but even then, I would think it was hardly "Spider Man -Turn out the lights" circa 1970's
Posted: 6/10/15 at 9:19pm
"Lovely stuff. I don't think ANYONE is the new Sondheim, but Jason certainly has that edginess and the same outspokenness that a young Sondheim had in the 1970s. He's a talented, smart man.
"
I really didn't mean it super literally. I just think he's the next iconic musical theater writer who will reach Sondheim status. I also believe people like Jeanine Tesori and Lin Manuel Miranda are also in this "status".
Posted: 6/10/15 at 9:37pm
"""Has he ever had a commercial hit on BW?"
Has Sondheim?
(As an original production.)"
Ah yes, the urban legend that Sondheim never had a commerically succesful musical.
Let's take just one Sondheim musical "Into the Woods", it played 765 performances on its initial BW run, which is much more than twice the total of all Brown's BW musicals combined.
I know Sondheim himself likes to claim he's never been popular, becaue of some of his most beloved projects were not successful, but tain't true at all.
Supposedly FOLLIES lost money but it ran for a friggin 522 performances on BW when if first opened..."e
That is all true. But I don't know whether or not "Into the Woods" made money. I tried to find out if it recouped but couldn't find the answer. The point I was trying to make is that writing a "commercial hit" is not necessarily the mark of a talented writer. I am in the camp of those that consider Sondheim to be a genius, but I also think that JRB is a very talented composer. Just because he has not written a financially successful show does not diminish his ability.
Posted: 6/10/15 at 9:38pm
Comparing this humorless, witless, musically-merely-competent self-promoter to Sondheim is ridiculous.
Forum, Company, Night Music, and Into The Woods were all hits. And several other Sondheim shows have made money in post-Broadway productions.
Brown will never have more than a minuscule following, and rightly so. His talent and skills are negligible.
Posted: 6/10/15 at 9:55pm
""""Has he ever had a commercial hit on BW?"
Has Sondheim?
(As an original production.)"
Ah yes, the urban legend that Sondheim never had a commerically succesful musical.
Let's take just one Sondheim musical "Into the Woods", it played 765 performances on its initial BW run, which is much more than twice the total of all Brown's BW musicals combined.
I know Sondheim himself likes to claim he's never been popular, becaue of some of his most beloved projects were not successful, but tain't true at all.
Supposedly FOLLIES lost money but it ran for a friggin 522 performances on BW when if first opened..."e
That is all true. But I don't know whether or not "Into the Woods" made money. I tried to find out if it recouped but couldn't find the answer. The point I was trying to make is that writing a "commercial hit" is not necessarily the mark of a talented writer. I am in the camp of those that consider Sondheim to be a genius, but I also think that JRB is a very talented composer. Just because he has not written a financially successful show does not diminish his ability. "
However I think even talented composers have to make a living, and creating music that is true to their vision AND commerically viable is nothing to sneeze at either, nor inherently confliciting.
Sondheim, and the other two composer mentioned, Lin Miranda and Tesori, have managed to do both. Again, They are not incompatible goals.
Having said that, in defense of Brown, I will say that a lot of factors go into making a successful commerical run on BW so it's not all on his shoulders.
Updated On: 6/10/15 at 09:55 PM
Posted: 6/10/15 at 10:03pm
I think Brown, Tesori, and Miranda are the best composers right now.
Funny cause JRB won the tony last year, Tesori won this year, and Miranda will win next year.
Posted: 6/10/15 at 10:06pm
It is therefore safe to say whichever composers are nominated against him need not waste their time composing acceptance speeches .
Posted: 6/10/15 at 10:18pm
This was amazing, one of my two favorite composers speaking about my other favorite composer. Could not be more perfect if it tried to be.
Posted: 6/10/15 at 11:21pm
Just no. He is not the next Sondheim, there's no such thing. He is still a very talented, if wildly uneven, songwriter. And that's fine.
Posted: 6/10/15 at 11:30pm
I'll see your Brown, Tesori and Miranda (all talented, I agree), and raise you Adam Guettel.
Posted: 6/11/15 at 12:48am
His point about so few composers and lyricists on Broadway today having the discipline and hyper-sophisticated attention detail of a Sondheim is a fair point, and asking who can be counted in that select class is the right question to ask.
I'd say there are more in that select few than just Jason Robert Brown and Jeanine Tesori , however. (Frankly I don't count Miranda in that class yet.) I agree with Gaveston about Adam Guettel. I think Shaiman and Wittman come close. Also the best work of Korie and Frankel. And the 3 or 4 greatest shows by Ahrens and Flaherty (though their worst work is much worse).
I fear for the time when some future budding composer makes a similar live analysis of the brilliant chord progressions in a work by Robert Lopez as an example of the greatest achievement in theater music in his lifetime.
Posted: 6/12/15 at 3:18am
Antagonistic post.
If Sondheim is a genius then how would you describe George Gershwin?
Posted: 6/12/15 at 3:53am
Jason Robert Brown wrote a musical to air his dirty laundry with his ex-wife in public. He also has negligible talent and an ego the size of the sun.
Posted: 6/12/15 at 8:48am
"If Sondheim is a genius then how would you describe George Gershwin?"
Also a genius, I suppose. The world is allowed more than one genius.
I prefer to avoid the word, myself - living in the age of the press agent, as we do, there's far too much hyperbole, overstatement, and reliance upon unnecessary superlatives in the discussion of just about anything (or, in Sondheim's words mocking the pretentious members of the blob who use such language [some of whom you might read right here on this site!], "It's the best! It's the first! It's the finest! It's the latest! It's the least! It's the worst! It's the absolutely lowest! It's the greatest! It's the single! It's the only! It's the perfect!").
Can't we just say that both Sondheim and Gershwin were markedly good at what they do/did?
Posted: 6/12/15 at 9:53am
"Brown will never have more than a minuscule following, and rightly so. His talent and skills are negligible."
I actually agree with this - Sondheim has his flops, but all of JRB's shows have closed within a 3 month period and have limited regional life. Sondheim has "Send in the Clowns" (and others), but what is a song that people can instantly relate to JRB? His pompous attitude will tell you otherwise, I suppose.
Posted: 6/12/15 at 3:29pm
I have always had a "three-time rule," whereby the first two times you ask what I thought, I loved it unconditionally. Only when you ask a third time will I tell you, as gently and professionally as possible, what I really thought. There are a handful of people in the business who want to hear the truth and I've probably only met one of them.
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