Sondheim vs. ALW

How come ALW's shows are perceived as mindless moneymakers, only created to make money, while Sondheim shows are perceived as being utter genius. I'm not bad, and really don't care either way. About 3 Months ago, I would have been all for ALW, but I'm slowly becoming a Sondheim fan. I'm not usually a fan of typical "musical theater" sounding stuff, but I feel in love with Assassians, and can't wait to hear the new Sweeny. Anyways, just curious why this is so? ALW did give us Phantom - Cats (which w/o the song "memory" would suck). Yet, Sondheim has never had a blockbuster? It just seems so weird to me that one of the most famous guys in modern musical theater, has never had a long running success on Broadway (or has he?)...

So you wouldn't consider like Women in White, Cats, and Phantom works of art? I would think at least WiW and Phantom would be considered works of art and are really just beautiful. Cats is pretty groundbreaking in its story line and the guttsiness (sp?) of the musical. I mean, I think its common knowledge that both of them have contributed to musical theater, you just tend to hear about them in different ways.

As far as runs go, Sondheim's longest run was the original A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (960-something), definetly his most accessable.

This argument is had a fair amount on this board, for better or worse. And let me say up front (for those who don't remember from last time) that I am NOT a fan of Andrew Llyod Webber, but am a HUGE fan of Stephen Sondheim.

In any case, I think the biggest thing is resentment. To put it into simple TV terms (not that I feel I need to for some of you, I just feel like it for some reason), ALW shows are like American Idol. A lot of people love them, a lot of people hate them, but EVERYONE knows about them, and they make money for it. Sondheim, on the other hand, is like Arrested Development. It's quite possibly the best show on TV, but practically no one watches it. (Hey, I'm complaining about 2 society problems at once! Yay, me!)

The bottom line is that they represent the 2 polar end of the musical theatre spectrum. ALW shows are about entertainment and giving people a good time, whereas Sondheim shows are about making an audience think, ask questions, and most importantly, feel.

If I may premire a theory in this thread: I call it, "The Rodgers & Hammerstein Theory." It says this: both ALW and Sondheim loved R&H shows growing up - Sondheim right up front and ALW from way accross the pond. However, Sondheim was taught from Hammerstein his experimentation with characters and the musical theatre in general, while ALW was influenced more by the lovely and popular tunes of Dick Rodgers. Whereas R&H were able to put those things together for shows that were both very popular AND daring and inventive, ALW has popular tunes and shows while Sondheim is very inventive and daring. If we could ever have a team (or for that matter one person) who could put those things together again, the musical theatre, I hypothosize, will once again be one of the most popular forms of entertainment. Take it or leave it, that's what I think.

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but I certainly think that a musical about dancing and singing cats is not a work of art

I cant help but think that T S Elliot would disagree with you. While Cats may not be up to par with the Wasteland, they were written by the same man. And the Wasteland is one of the greatest pieces of American and British (due to his citizenship change) literature.

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I think they are both works of art. Let me take a moment and defend Cats. (Wow, did I just say that?) Cats fascinates me for several reasons: the costumes, the makeup, and the dancing. Purely spectacle reasons, yes, but they are reasons. As a dancer, watching the Jellicle Ball sequence, knowing the completely hell those dancers are in, and knowing they are doing it anyway... that's amazing. I love to watch it. And yes, Cats is pointless and silly but I've seen it twice just to watch that scene and if given the oppurtunity I will probably see it again.

Now. I love Sondheim for a completely different reason.

I've only really been in two shows in my life though I've been involved with quite a few more - I was a dancer in Oklahoma! and Cinderella's Stepmother in Into the Woods. Yeah, I know, Cinderella's Stepmother doesn't exactly get the profoundest of lines, but (as the director of the production will most certainly verify!) I wasn't all that concerned with my lines anyway. I remember reading my script, reading the lyrics to 'No More' (before ever having heard the music, mind you) and thinking "My god." At the time I was very into musicals such as... well, such as Cats, Cats and Wicked. I'd never read or listened to lyrics that made me think like that. The contrast between the 'Into the Woods' at the end of the first act and the 'Into the Woods' in the finale fascinated me. I remember the rest of the cast complaining about how difficult it was to learn the lines in the finale and Act I finale, but I never had that problem simply because I read them over and over trying to figure them out. 'No One is Alone' was like no other show tune I'd ever heard: it was comfort that was only temporary. And I got to thinking... well, isn't that how it is, really?

'Someone is on your side / someone else is not / While we're seeing our side / Maybe we forgot / They are not alone'

At that point I'd been a fan of musical theatre for about a year and I'd never encountered such real lyrics. I've been a huge fan of Sondheim since then.

I think the reason ALW shows are so popular is that people oftentimes don't want to think when they go to the theatre. My parents, for example, have this mentality of 'If I'm going to spend all that money I certainly don't want to be depressed' which they pulled on me when I was begging for them to take me to see Virginia Woolf.

ALW shows are about entertainment, nothing more. (With one notable exception in my eyes - Evita, which is my favorite ALW and one of my favorite musicals. I'm not very familiar with a wide range of ALW but this is the only one I've really encountered that doesn't give an answer, it doesn't say 'She was good' and it doesn't say 'She was bad', it says 'She was human.') And there's nothing wrong with that. There's certainly a market for it. And you know what? He does a darned good job at it. It's like the TV metaphor used a few posts above (which I adore, by the way, so 10 points to jam_man.)

In this way for me it's hard to compare ALW with Sondheim because they both obviously had such different intentions with their work.

They both have their good points and their bad, and they both have an equally nutso, don't-give-them-any-sharp-objects fanbase. It depends on what your tastes are. Most of the time I go for the question and eyebrow raising Assassins. But every now and then I'll get in a mood and put on Phantom of the Opera and dance around to the unbelievable catchy Masquerade. It's a matter of what you like.

"In most of Webbers' shows, the orchestrations are rather "large." So therefore, the production needs to be large."

I'd say it's the other way around - the orchestrations are made to suit the scale & mood of the show.

I think it's pretty pointless to compare ALW and Sondheim.
Their styles of music are totally different from each other.

Also, ALW doesn't write lyrics to his songs and Sondheim does, so... comparing these two WITHOUT considering lyrics is a bit useless.

hey...i like the song "Jellical song for jellical cats" from CATs too...but yeah..the show sucked

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I watched the film of "Amadeus" not too long ago, and it struck me... for some reason I kept thinking how odd it was these two composers kept reminding me of Webber (similar to Salieri) and Sondheim (similar to Mozart).

Not in personality, and certainly not an identical match... but here are the similarities: Both are contemporaries vying for a similar "theatrical" audience. Salieri was by far the more commercially successful of the two in his day, choosing more accessible and popular source material in general. Mozart was branded a "genius" at a very early age, but he decided to choose less obvious and sometimes controversial source material, and ultimately didn't give a damn about being commercial.

In the end, Salieri's works (big hits in their day) were largely forgotten, while Mozart's only continued to grow in popularity after his death.

I found this whole parallel drawn between them to be fascinating.

Time will tell...

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Updated On: 9/11/05 at 02:33 PM

I just think the biggest irony between the two of them is that Sondheim and Webber share the same birthday (March 22nd)!

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Updated On: 9/11/05 at 07:15 PM

Thanks ray-andallthatjazz86! I agree with you that Webber is a different kind of genius. To say that he just caters to popular tastes, and write him off as merely that, would be a shame. If it was that easy to write mega-hit shows, don't you think more people would be doing it? He has a rare gift and a keen perception. I also don't want to insinuate that Webber hasn't taken a few risks as well with material and subject matter... (though nothing like Sondheim's pioneering attempts!) Eva Peron, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and a poetry book about Cats aren't exactly obvious or easy choices to musicalize. BUT they were popular subject matter (unlike, say, the modernization of Japan, for example.) Webber definitely has insight... just a different kind.

And CastAlbumFan, ain't it strange?? I wonder if one of them had a secretary named "Kennedy" and the other one "Lincoln."

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So far I think best12bars is the one that has sort of made me understand more about ALW's kind of genius because it is true that it takes someone very smart to put the elements together for a show that runs 15+ years. But I still think Sondheim's music is so brilliant just because to me, his shows are going to become classics that are going to be analyzed by English majors and AP English students in the future. It's not about being a "theater snob" because I agree that Jonathan Larson is a brilliant composer, I just think Lloyd Webber is more of a businessman rather than a composer.

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Once when I was bartending I told this joke:

"What's the difference between ALW and and Uzi? An Uzi only repeats itself one hundred times a minute."

One of my customers responded by singing the following to the tune of "Send in the Clowns:"

"Aren't I rich?/Aren't I queer?/Writing this dissonant sh!t, year after year."

My personal opinion, though, is that one hundred years from now there will be more productions of SS than of ALW.