Shows Improved by Later Revisions

Sunset Boulevard?

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The Scarlet Pimpernel's other versions.
People always like to defend SP 1, but it was very boring. The latter versions took more advantage of funny, swift moving plots and of course for the better, took advantage of Frank's music more.

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, when it grew from 20 minutes to warrant Broadway prices.

Sondheim and his co-creators have made changes in Company, and extensive changes in Merrily We Role Along. The motives of Frank, the main character, were fairly obscure in the original; there seems to have been a major attempt to make his motives clearer in the more recent versions, also the original did not contain a "little Frankie", Frank's son. This character appeared in the Kennedy Center version performed at the Sondheim festival of 2002. Other changes include the character of Gussie, originally, she was simply a wealthy man's wife when she meets Frank, now, she is an important musical comedy actress. The original opening and closing of the musical, which had Frank returning to his high school to give a speech, and also contained the school alma mater, has also been cut.
I think these changes have helped to clarify things a bit, they still don't explain why Frank thinks producing movies is more important than writing musicals, nevertheless they show that Sondheim and his book writer (George Furth) put a lot of effort into rethinking the show.

Camelot - the post-opening revisions made a deeply flawed show into just a flawed one. Read the published script which is the one that opened and then watch the show as is licensed these days. Several scenes, a couple of songs and Morgan Le Fey are all gone from the finished show. Maybe 15-20 minutes total.

Merrily and Candide are much improved by later revisions although neither work, and I don't think they ever will. The best version of Candide is the stripped down 1974 Hugh Wheeler #1 version; the one that clocked in at 1:45 with no intermission.

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