SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE Opened 30 Years Ago Today- Page 2

[Play Esq.]

Posted: 5/3/14 at 2:29pm

My favorite Sondheim...and quite possibly my favorite piece of theater.

I will always cherish the first time I saw this live...the Sam Buntrock production in London (which eventually transferred to Studio 54). I am not ashamed to say by the end of the first act I was in tears. Those damn tears came to my eye again by the end of the second act.

I can't wait for the upcoming DC production at the Signature Theater this Summer!

[musikman]

Posted: 5/3/14 at 6:41pm

Sunday isn't my favorite show, but it's most certainly the one closest to my heart. Nothing else comes close to capturing what it means to be an artist better than this piece. The parallels to Sondheim's life when compared with George are almost uncanny, as much as Sondheim will protest that nothing about it is based on his life. Jules is a perfect personification of all the gripes and criticisms of Sondheim that he was too avant garde, too out there.

The sheer brilliance of the musical composition from a purely theory standpoint - and of course melodically as well - always boggles my mind. I still love the fact that the orchestrations were scored for 11 musicians because that's the same amount of colors Seurat used in his painting.

Back in college, I studied the piece religiously, having to practically write a thesis on it for a class. Each viewing brought something new and unexpected, even in songs I used to fast forward through when I would watch it as a young teenager. When the first act would get to "Beautiful," I used to find it so boring, and would skip it as I thought it just halted the action. After studying the piece, it became one my favorites in the piece when I realized just how important the message of the song is to the entire show as a whole. His mother representing the old guard, Georges the new guard.

I finally had the opportunity to see the painting in Chicago last summer. I sat in front of it for hours just listening to the cast recording several times and cried my eyes out.

Updated On: 5/3/14 at 06:41 PM

[Mr. Nowack]

Posted: 5/3/14 at 7:00pm

"When the first act would get to "Beautiful," I used to find it so boring, and would skip it as I thought it just halted the action. After studying the piece, it became one my favorites in the piece..."

I had a very similar experience with that song. I had listened through the cast recording and watched the video loads of times without ever giving it a second thought or finding it very compelling. But then, completely out of the blue as I listened to it one day I was completely moved by what it was saying. Now I absolutely love it and it gives me chills every time.

[JBroadway]

Posted: 5/4/14 at 3:03am

I'm deeply envious of all of you who were able to see the original production live. This is probably my favorite show ever. I honestly can't put into words how beautiful it is. Sometimes I have a hard time believing it was written by human beings, and some immortal, mystical gods of wisdom and beauty (I know, I know, Sondheim IS a God).

I was fortunate enough to play George in a production of Sunday a few months ago. I have to tell you, BEING in the show deepened my understand of it so much (and I already had a pretty deep understanding, if you don't mind my saying it). It seemed like every day at rehearsal or even during the run of the show, I would discover some deeper meaning of some line or scene. I'm sure I'll continue to find new meanings in it over the years, too. It seems to be an infinitely deep show.

[AnthonyB]

Posted: 5/4/14 at 3:48am

I am from Sydney in Australia and I moved to London over eight years ago. I am a Sondheim fan and at the time of leaving Sydney (to the best of my knowledge) this show had never been performed professionally. It has since.

At the time I was completely unaware of this show. I was into Into The Woods and only knew of Bernadette Peters from this and by chance came across Sunday in the park with George on VHS at HMV and took a gamble and bought it thinking "It's a musical, I'm bound to love it".

I now have a copy on DVD and have watched this countless times, getting something from it every time. I have to agree with ray-andallthatjazz86 that when all of the characters bow to George, aw, it gets me every time. Even as I type this I get shivers down my spine!

I have purchased a copy of the DVD for anyone I know who has any vague interest in musical theatre. It's a must have in any collection.

Given the above, I (genuinely) never thought I would get the opportunity to see a professional production of this- ever. How happy was I when this was revived in London. I saw it twice. It started in a smaller theatre before transferring to the West End. The whole case transferred however interestingly, the character of Dot was recast.

Truly, one of my favourite show of all time that (in my opinion) redefines musical theatre as we know it. Emotionally, musically, dramatically, visually- nothing comes even comes close.

I pride myself as a communicator but sometimes I struggle to truly express my feelings for this work of art.

[Someone in a Tree2]

Posted: 5/4/14 at 3:27pm

I have a really strong recollection of seeing one of the early previews of the original Broadway production at the Booth in '84. At that point Act I was as we all know it, but Act II was still not complete-- they had yet to add "Children and Art" or "Lesson #8". So the act sort of floundered until Bernadette's reappearance as Dot to sing "Move On". Seeing the 2 centuries finally merge was still a great payoff, but it was clear where the weaknesses were in our preview.

Ironically, I was working on the original production of "La Cage Aux Folles" at the time-- that show had been going great guns for 9 months and we were about to take out the 1st National Tour. An hour after I saw that first preview of "Sunday", I found myself in our stage Manager Fritz Holt's apartment. Arthur Laurents was on the phone and was dying to know what I thought of "Sunday". Knowing Arthur back then, it was best to tell him what you thought he'd like to hear rather than a painful truth about a rival's show. I lied and said I thought "Sunday" was rarified and precious with a really weak second act (that last part seemed true at the time).

May Arthur and Heaven forgive me for not telling him the whole truth that night, but in the last 30 years I've come to find "La Cage" a very middling show, where "Sunday" has rightfully taken its place as one of the greatest masterpieces of the musical stage.

[devonian.t]

Posted: 5/4/14 at 4:28pm

A great story.

It reminds me of the Salieri vs Mozart conflict in 'Amadeus'.

[uncageg]

Posted: 5/5/14 at 1:13am

Brillant. I still listen to it at least twice a week

[perfectlymarvelous]

Posted: 5/5/14 at 1:38am

The closing performance of the revival remains one of my most treasured theatrical experiences. It was my second time seeing it, and for some reason it just got to me emotionally so much more than it had previously. At the end of the second act "Sunday" when George turned and all of the people in the painting bowed to him, I burst into tears and couldn't stop crying. I think that was when I "got" this show...I was about to graduate from high school and move to New York to start studying theater and I think the weight of what it means to be am artist and what it is to see your creation come to life came crashing down on me in that moment. It was one of those magical moments that can really only happen in the theater.

[indytallguy]

Posted: 5/5/14 at 5:02am

I took a friend who had never seen the show to the Kennedy Center production during the Sondheim Celebration long ago. When the painting dropped at the close of the first act, he began heaving tears ... as I had done when I first saw the show.

And while the number Sunday is now used to a bit of manipulative effect in concert stagings, the magic of hundreds of people singing that song throughout the theatre at the most recent Sondheim Celebration was simply stunning.

[Scripps2]

Posted: 5/5/14 at 6:56am

Over here in England I remember my father buying the vinyl as soon as it came out (I must be much younger than Dev or I must have had much less pocket money than him). The first listen I was baffled. And the second as well, I think.

I couldn't see the Broadway production though I would later buy the dvd, despite my deep mistrust of taped theatre performances.

When it opened at the National Theatre starring Maria Friedman and Philip Quast I had grown up but still found it bloody hard work.

Subsequent productions at Leicester, the Kennedy Center and the Menier helped but I only felt the piece came together and worked for me when I saw the West End transfer of the Menier production. The graphics, far from being gimmicky, brought a coherence that I hadn't experienced in previous productions. So I fail to understand why graphics are any more of a gimmick than the flats rising out of the stage floor in the original production.

Graphics were a gimmick in The Woman in White, where they hindered the narrative rather than enhanced it but, for me, they greatly enhanced SitPwG.

Updated On: 5/5/14 at 06:56 AM

[promisespromises2]

Posted: 5/5/14 at 8:30am

My absolute favorite show. I watch the DVD constantly (wasn't born when it was actually on Broadway the first go-around). They are bringing a production to the Signature Theatre here in D.C. this August and I'm dying to see it live! This show has me in tears in the best possible way. It's so liberating.

[Replacement Cast]

Posted: 5/5/14 at 4:11pm

30 years! Timeless show.