Musical Theatre writing - when the book came first

[Mr. Nowack]

Posted: 7/12/16 at 2:55am

I've read that for both of my favorite musicals, SHE LOVES ME and A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC, the book was written in its entirely first and then given to Bock & Harnick/Sondheim to musicalize. I think this makes sense why the structure and story for both is so impeccable, and also why the songs seem to inform the action so perfectly.

Does anyone know any other musical that were written this way? I understand that it's probably not common knowledge for most shows, which order the elements were written, and also that for most shows including the two mentioned above it's probably not as cut and dry as that but I thought it would be an interesting discussion. As an audience member/consumer I find the creative process fascinating.

Updated On: 7/12/16 at 02:55 AM

[broadwayguy91]

Posted: 7/12/16 at 3:32am

I'm thinking of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals. They seem to have quite a seamless transition from dialogue to singing IMO.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 7/12/16 at 9:40pm

Mr. N, writing the book first is quite common and is the method taught (or that used to be taught) in the BMI (formerly Lehman Engel) workshops. Aaron Frankel, on the other hand, taught that because most musicals are adaptations, the book could wait: he taught songwriters to musicalize the emotional high points first and to then let the book writer fill in the spaces between songs. Frankel's experience was that writing songs first helped solve the problem of too-literal adaptations.

In my experience, though, everybody is working simultaneously. The songwriters are indeed setting the highlights to music even while the book writer is turning a 120-page play or screenplay into a 60-page play. Then the songwriters take the best parts of the book writer's 60-page version and turn THOSE into songs.

This is the primary reason why being the book writer is such a thankless job.

Now the above assumes that the musical is an adaptation, as 90% of them are. If it is entirely original, I think some sort of book has to exist before songwriters can know what needs to be musicalized.

[Mr. Nowack]

Posted: 7/12/16 at 10:20pm

I never knew that was how BMI taught it.

I'm not surprised to hear that in practice it's pretty simultaneous. Especially since in reality a show is always being rewritten whether during previews or an out of town or between productions.