Jule Styne--most flops of any major composer?

He wrote the songs for My Sister Eileen, a movie musical version of Wonderful Town that is--except for one dance number with Bob Fosse and Tommy Rall--pretty awful. The score is utterly forgettable. It is ALWAYS a pleasure to watch Tommy Rall though, so the film isn't a total disaster. (BTW, this is the first film that Bob Fosse choreographed.)

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He also wrote the score for "Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol" for television with his Funny Girl partner Bob Merrill.

Terrific music. A true holiday classic.

Styne is one of my favorites.

He wrote extensively and very successfully for Hollywood as well:

Anchors Aweigh
It Happened In Brooklyn
Romance on the High Seas

He was nominated for nine Oscars and won for "Three Coins in the Fountain."

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Don't forget, he also wrote High Button Shoes and Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, two of the 1940s-1950s' most pleasurable musicals. Shoes introduced Nanette Fabray (Papa, Won't You Dance With Me) and Blondes introduced Carol Channing (Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend)

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I think Jule Styne is probably tied with Charles Strouse for most musical flops. It's insane how prolific these guys were. Though Styne, of course, had more hits.

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Bob Merrill had at least two major pre-Broadway failures as composer/lyricist: Breakfast at Tiffany's (a true legend) and The Prince of Grand Street (Robert Preston's last show). There may be one other.

Prettybelle for which he did the lyrics (music by Styne) died a horrible death in Boston.

There were a number of shows that didn't run in town either. Henry Sweet Henry comes to mind.

Considering Merrill's smaller output, his track record could be considered 'worse' than Styne's. Many (but not all) of Styne's failures were--how to put this gently--after his prime: Red Shoes, One Night Stand, Treasure Island.

Everyone with any kind of catalog has some bombs, Styne included (Subways Are For Sleeping--ugh). So did R+H, Porter and Sondheim. The last new Sondheim show to pay off in its original run was Night Music in 73.

I would love to get Styne's annual royalties from just one of his biggies like "People". Imagine how much money his estate gets from that one song in a year.

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Let us not forget the great Harold Arlen who never really scored with a big Broadway musical -- BLOOMER GIRL was maybe his biggest hit on the Main Stem.

And yet he is the man who gave us the most famous song of this century, and his scores for all his failures are just lovely.

No, he wrote "You Light Up My Life."

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"And I never realized he was behind the infamous flop of Red Shoes (which STILL sounds like a good idea for a show to me..."

Or, as some people call it, "The Dead Shoes."

Hugh Panaro talked about it quite a bit in his Chatterbox interview with Seth Rudetsky a few years ago and a little bit in an interview we did for his web site while he was in Seattle. And I've chatted with him a little bit.

By Hugh's account, the problem lay with the director. He said the version of the script and the score they started with was great. After a break, the first director had been fired and the new director made things a living hell for everyone involved.

He massacred the original script...cutting some of the better songs, constantly rewriting parts that had no need to be tweaked, adding more dancing where it was not needed. Yes, it's a story about a ballerina, but there were random dance numbers all over the place.

In Hugh's words, the director "got away with murder" during rehearsals and previews...mainly because Jule was in poor health and on kidney dialysis at the time.

He was also, according to Hugh, pretty abusive towards the cast. He pretty much didn't want anyone who'd been hired prior to his arrival and found ways to fire anyone who stood up to him.

Hugh said the entire experience was a "nightmare" for everyone involved and there was a sense of relief that it closed a few days after opening night.

I've heard one of the songs from it, "When It Happens To You." It's one of Julian Craster's solos...Hugh did it at a cabaret benefit last year, joking we were some of the only people to ever hear it. It's a very nice song...typical Styne, I'd say.

Besides Gypsy, my all time favorite Styne show is Darling of the Day! I love all the songs on it.

I also love The No-Tell Motel from Prettybelle, he had an act of writing terrific 11 o'clock spot numbers!

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Near as I can tell he ties with Charles Strouse (11 flops each) but Styne had far more hits (7) than Strouse (3).

Many of his (financial) flops at least ran the better part of a season: TWO ON THE AISLE (8 months); HAZEL FLAGG (7 months); SAY DARLING (9 months); DO RE MI (1 year); SUBWAYS ARE FOR SLEEPING (6 months); FADE OUT FADE IN (8 months) and HALLELUJAH BABY (9 months.)

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My **** - cat that is - is named Jule Styne.

When I first read the title of this thread, I thought of Charles Strouse. Now that guy knows how to write a flop!!!

I think he should start writing sequels to his misses instead of his few hits.

Who else is eager to see "Nick&Nora 2: Asta's Revenge"?

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Perhaps but Mitch Leigh isn't of the calibre (success wise--we can debate artistic I guess but I wouldn't :P ) of Styne.

Ginger great stories with Hugh--he apparantly didn't mention though that the director was the infamous/once great Stanley Donen! :) I didn't realize the Lar Lubovitch (what a nem) choreographyw as kept by the NYCBallet

"I know you are not intending to place blame on Styne for the failure of these shows, but it kind of comes off that way. As in, "Boy, did he write some crappy shows!" Some of the concepts were bad to begin with, but his work was for the majority, very, very good"

Sorry that was never ever my intention. Whatsoever. It just is fascinating when someone who seems to have such stunning Broadway instincts fails in huge "what happened' typs of ways.

(As for someone's SOndheim's comment--yes we kno his shows aren't huge hits but I thought hte original Into the Woods made a profit--at least with its big national tour--speaking of Lars Ludovitch again:P )

So no one caught Pieces of Eight?