Sondheim's book is kind of bombastic. . .- Page 4

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/27/10 at 7:25pm

Maybe Stevie the S will talk about RENT in FTH2. He has said he plans a sequel, yes?

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/27/10 at 7:42pm

Namo, you never explained your reference to Mary Ethel.

Hey, and what's with all the peace sign iconography on this message board?

[hottieho13]

Posted: 12/27/10 at 7:54pm

i don't know if i want the book now

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 1:28am

Hoho! Have we crushed your desire to want Sondheim? That would be very Sondheimy of you, to lose the desire to have just as you are on the verge of possession! Is wanting always better than having? Is that Sondheim's big message? Desire fulfilled always leads to catastrophe? To, at best, mere disappointment - "I Shall Marry the Miller's Son," "The Road You Didn't Take," "Sorry-Grateful," "Bowler Hat," "Finishing the Hat," what is it with Sondheim and hats? - and, at worst, death, by which I mean of course SWEENEY TODD and ASSASSINS and PASSION.

Don't fall into the trap SS sets for you!

Get the book!

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 7:42am

Good morning!

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 1:38pm

I do that, I exhaust everyone, and then they flee.

Alas.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 2:00pm

How long you were expecting this discussion to go on. You've gone to a crazy extreme, PalJoey's gone to another and most everyone else is somewhere in the middle. I think it's done.

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 2:31pm

Omigosh I feel so scolded. PSR, I can talk and talk and talk, you know that. There's plenty more to say about SJS. SJS can be the subject of a lifetime. He is inexhaustible! We should talk of nothing but SJS all year across America! That'd solve a bunch of problems. Glenn Beck forced to discuss nothing but Sondheim! What a welcome change. I was just thinking this morning in the shower how someone - I forget who! - told Sondheim that he had spent his entire career trying to fix the second act of ALLEGRO. Have you spend your entire career trying to fix the second act of something?

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 5:40pm

I've spent my entire adult life trying to *have* a second act!

[Brick]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 6:16pm

I keep waiting for this thread to go away.

The book is a gem. If you can find another book anywhere near as insightful about entertaining about the craft of writing musicals, then we'll talk. Now, stop quibbling and enjoy.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 6:30pm

I've always found that the best way to make a thread go away is to bump it.

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 6:33pm

Yes, Brick, it's a swell book, is it not? Maybe all them aspiring musical-comedy-type-writers will read it, and learn stuff, and we'll have a musical theater renaissance, based on Sondheim's various principles! Cross your fingers!

[hottieho13]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 7:07pm

i was just being melodramatic but i'm still gonna get it!

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/28/10 at 10:49pm

I almost bought it tonight! But I didn't. Instead, I bought a bunch of critical studies of TS Eliot - just in case you wanted confirmation that I'm pretentious and years out of date. . .

[metropolis10111]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 12:31am

I often wonder how SS is even able to go through this life with soooooo much pointless use of musical notes being used for such undesirable things as melodies and such abhorrent and revolting lyrics its amazing that he is even able to listen to anything that he himself didn't write or inspire.. sigh I guess the ugly side of being THE GOD is that you, nor your diehard followers can enjoy anything in life that is so odious as ...urgh.... mortal lyrics...

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 1:06am

Well, metro, if you must know: I can't stand to listen to any musicals written by anyone but Sondheim after, um, 1976? At the latest? I confess I find RENT compulsively listenable, but it's like drinking down one of those green drink-y things with whipped cream and chocolate swirls that they sell at Starbux and Xmas, I feel kind of sick about enjoying it.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 1:09am

See, I don't get that impression of him. I don't think HE thinks he's a God, so I don't feel like it's blasphemy to complain about things about him that I don't like.

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 1:20am

I should proof read my messages!

Didn't Sondheim say nice things recently about Sheldon Harnick at a gathering honoring Harnick just before the guy died?

And as far as I can tell, in his ALL ABOUT ME, he's unfailingly gracious to "lyricists of my generation": Harnick, Lee Adams, Fred Ebb, Jerry Herman, et. al.

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 4:36am

Am I allowed to respond to myself?

SS does come across like kind of a sweet guy, in his recent interviews.

[ghostlight2]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 9:26am

Responding to yourself will eventually get you suspended if not banned, chekky. Are you not the same manic chekky that vanished from ATC a year or so back? Your style (not to mention your screen name) is strikingly similar.

[After Eight]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 9:30am

"We may not agree with what he thinks, but that's part of the reason we probably all worship the man."


I don't worship the man. Anything but.

And I think it's very poor form to cricticize other lyricists' works, especially when they are superior to him. It lacks class and reflects poorly upon him as a person.

And one more thing. If you're going to nitpick through scores of other lyricists' works, then you had better be perfect yourself. Because "liaisons" doesn't rhyme with "raisins," no matter how much you try to fudge the pronunciation.

[JerseyGirl2]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 11:20am

I wish I had gotten here in time to respond appropriately with, "Think twice before you poo poo it," but alas, I am too late.

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 11:25am

ghostlight! Thanks for the heads up!

As for "liaisons" and "raisins" rhyming or not, well: Doesn't Elaine Stritch haul that very question out into the open in her version of "Liaisons" currently on display at the Walter Kerr?

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 11:51am

I asked you what your old screen name was and you lied to me. You said you never had one.

[chekkyjr]

Posted: 12/29/10 at 12:04pm

Namo, I've never been on this message board before, and therefore never had a screen name here, before. I thought that was what you meant, seriously. I've had a bunch of different screen names in a bunch of different places, but I don't feel like sharing them. I hope that's okay. If you're wondering if I got banned from ALL THAT CHAT, well, I certainly did get banned from ALL THAT CHAT, and from at least one other place, too. I don't mean to be obnoxious. I type fast and I say whatever comes into my head. I'll try to be a little more chill.

Anyway, but do *you* think Sondheim has the right to say whatever he likes about the lyricists of yore? I wish he'd talked about Harold Karr and Matt Dubey. Do you think he liked HAPPY HUNTING? He can be a little scornful about Merman. . .