Stephen Sondheim's Old Friends to run in the West End with Bernadette Peters and Lea Salonga- Page 3

[Voter]

Posted: 9/11/23 at 3:44pm

An SEC filing for “Old Friends Broadway Ltd. Partnership” has appeared recently. It’s filed by the management office “Thompson Turner Productions” which also filed the SEC’s for Leopoldstadt and Merrily We Roll Along on Broadway under the same address.

[binau]

Posted: 9/11/23 at 3:52pm

I can only begin to dream what kind of cast they could get for this in NYC! 

[Dylan Smith4]

Posted: 9/11/23 at 5:37pm

Hopefully Patti will be attached!!

[Musicaldudepeter]

Posted: 9/12/23 at 10:05am

I would love to finally see a Bernadette / Patti led vehicle for this. It would be like Mary Martin and Ethel Merman performing together. And two divas so closely associated with Sondheim.

Updated On: 9/12/23 at 10:05 AM

[OhHiii]

Posted: 9/12/23 at 10:13am

Musicaldudepeter said: "I would to finally see a Bernadette / Patti led vehicle for this. It would be like Mary Martin and Ethel Merman performing together."

This would be an event in and of itself. And Patti could very well do this given it's not the commitment physically and mentally to a musical which has always been the crux of her gripe with doing musicals. And she wouldn't have to be Equity for a concert

[bholtzinger544]

Posted: 9/12/23 at 4:52pm

I'm 99% sure the Old Friends SEC filing is for Merrily's Broadway run. Sonia Friedman is listed as the main producer and Cameron Macintosh is the lead producer for Old Friends in London. I doubt he would give that up in the states. Every member of the Old Friends SEC filing is attached to Merrily. The Chocolate Factory Productions points to Menier Chocolate Factory, where the London revival initially played. Considering Old Friends is one of the main songs in Merrily, I think they just got creative with their SEC filing like a lot of shows do. 

[binau]

Posted: 9/13/23 at 4:43pm

I know for a fact at least one other SEC filing for a production company of a Broadway show also used a song title of the show as a funny pun so I wouldn’t be surprised if you’re right. 

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 9/22/23 at 3:48pm

Intermission. I may or may not have spontaneously gasped/sobbed when Bernadette said one word - “Harmony”.

[JasonC3]

Posted: 9/22/23 at 4:50pm

Jordan Catalano said: "Intermission. I may or may not have spontaneously gasped/sobbed when Bernadette said one word - “Harmony”."

I should hope so.  Failure to do the same is grounds for a tribunal hearing.

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 9/22/23 at 7:32pm

Lea Salonga commanded the stage with her "Everything's Coming Up Roses" and now I demand a production of "Gypsy" for her.

[Dylan Smith4]

Posted: 10/9/23 at 10:05am

WOW! JUST WOW! Someone start assembling a creative team for Lea to lead Gypsy!

 

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 10/9/23 at 10:43am

That’s nothing compared to how thrilling she was singing that, in person. I walked out of the show knowing I wouldn’t rest until someone mounts a production of GYPSY for Lea. There’s now no other human being I want to see more, than her. 
 

 

[binau]

Posted: 10/9/23 at 10:47am

It pained me slightly to see Lea upstage Bernadette a little in this concert, but she was just SO GOOD. I realised I don't think I had ever heard Lea sing Sondheim before now, and I wonder why? These tracks need to be on record! 

[BWNUT]

Posted: 10/9/23 at 2:46pm

Whoa!!!  Is this the same sweet Disney princess? Incredible! 😲🤗👏

Updated On: 10/9/23 at 02:46 PM

[Robbie2]

Posted: 10/9/23 at 8:57pm

The big question here is will Broadway get a production of this next year? Imagine-Lea, Bernadette & Patti!?

[JasonC3]

Posted: 10/9/23 at 9:04pm

I'd prefer to imagine Lea, Bernadette, Donna Murphy.

[Mskuphantm]

Posted: 10/9/23 at 9:14pm

Yes all the way to that trio Lea Salonga, Bernadette Peters and Donna Murphy!!!  

 

[OuttaTowner]

Posted: 10/9/23 at 11:32pm

Might we add Audra in there too, as long as we’re asking?  Thanks!

[binau]

Posted: 10/29/23 at 5:45am

I went again last night (so 4th time including the original concert) - I was a little worried that Bernadette might be getting tired because I saw her a couple Mondays ago and back then she was a little off pitch, out of time and at one moment kind of jokingly screamed 'wait' to the orchestra. She also didn't really manage to play the trumpet at all during "Gotta Get a Gimmick". And that was after a day off! I wasn't sure what she'd be like at the end of the week on a two show day (there are no Sunday performances for most west end shows it's a different schedule Monday-Saturday).

These fears were quickly laid to rest - Bernadette was absolutely on fire last night and the strongest vocally I've heard her since approx 2014. I'm not sure if it's because she pushes hard for the final Saturday night performance, was sick, a day off interrupts her muscle memory, the high energy Saturday night audience energised her or what it was - but it became clear to me very quickly Bernadette is absolutely loving every moment she has on that stage. Her "Send in the Clowns" is the best she's ever performed it, her comic timing on "Broadway Baby" and "You Gotta Get a Gimmick" at this point feels iconic, and her "Losing my Mind" cuts deep. During "Not a Day Goes By" she was literally clutching her hands together as if she was saying a prayer for Sondheim. It's the first time I saw the show with Lea that I felt Lea was not really upstaging Bernadette anymore. 

Enough can't be said about Lea though - who is bringing a brand new, extremely pure and powerful sound to Sondheim. And it's particularly poignant to hear "Somewhere" right now given the violence in the world right now and everything we've been through recently. 

I think what I found moving though was just seeing how visibly overwhelmed much of the cast were during the performance. Bernadette and the rest of the cast are either on the verge of, or actually crying during "Sunday" and the final choral "Being Alive". They know what they are creating, they are proud of it, they are proud sharing it and they are loving every moment. I'm guessing that the passing Haydn Gwynne might feed into some of the emotion of the cast at these moments I didn't feel before. 

In the program, Cameron Mackintosh says the show originally started to be convinced at Sondheim's suggestion while he was alive. They spit balled ideas, but not much progress was made until he died. The first person he called to cast was Bernadette, "she of course was also Steve's special muse."

When I see my favourite Broadway Star age 75 having the time of her life, singing my favourite songs of my favourite composer, being overwhelmed at the beauty of the music she is hearing, looking at photos of herself backstage with Sondheim and Lapine in "Sunday", playing Dot, playing a trumpet and shoving it between her legs to milk every laugh she can get and accompanied by an incredible co-star and good team, and knowing the entire Sondheim saga, history and context of practically everything she's ever done with him that led to this moment and feed at least subtextually into the outcome of why we are there together*, I think I realise I have just had my single greatest theatre going experience ever. 

The show feels like a gift not just for the audience, but for Bernadette herself. 

* (sure I've missed some things but):
1. Sunday in the Park with George
2. Into the Woods
3. Evening Primrose with Mandy (on his album Dress Casual)
4. Anyone Can Whistle at Carnegie Hall
5. Sondheim etc. Carnegie Hall concert
6. Gypsy
7. Screen tested as Mrs Lovett for the Sweeney Todd film
8. Bounce reading
9. A Little Night Music
10. Follies
11. Encores! A Bed and a Chair
12. 'Square One' (Here We Are) reading
13. Old Friends
(plus a child actress in the Gypsy national tour). 

And then to think in NYC we have a brand new "Here We Are", a revolutionary "Merrily" and a beautifully sung revival of "Sweeney". The sounds and memories of these shows also still fresh. I think I could die tomorrow now and I would be satisfied that I have experienced the highest peak of artistic achievement tailored to my specific tastes I will ever see. 

Perhaps we should also not take the Forbidden Broadway parody of Bernadette's Tell Me On a Sunday "See me on a Monday" so literally. 

Updated On: 10/29/23 at 05:45 AM

[Jay Lerner-Z]

Posted: 10/29/23 at 1:52pm

I'm glad to hear that Bernadette is in fine form. I think too much has been made of her age, it seems to be mentioned constantly. For years now, since I first became a devotee people have been harping on about it. She is Godess, always has been and always will be. That's really all there is to say.

[binau]

Posted: 10/30/23 at 3:55am

Adjacent anecdotes: At Stephanie J Block's concert last night in London, she recommended the audience check out 'Old Friends', describing it like church. She belted "Being Alive", and in the audience was the Les Miserables composer Claude-Michel Schönberg.  

Interestingly she opened the show with "As If We Never Said Goodbye". Very keen fans in London right now could have seen Stephanie J Block, Rachel Tucker (who was at the matinee of SJB's show according to SJB), and Nicole Scherzinger sing the same song on consecutive nights. 

[Jay Lerner-Z]

Posted: 10/30/23 at 10:28am

Claude Michel was probably there because of The Pirate Queen.

[binau]

Posted: 12/6/23 at 11:01am

I watched from the mezzanine recently and when Bernadette brings out the sheet music stack during Broadway Baby one of the pieces is the Sunday in the Park with George score! Original artwork. Such a cool Easter egg. 
 

[meredithchandler73]

Posted: 1/6/24 at 6:37am

I was in London for a few days and planned to see STEPHEN SONDHEIM'S OLD FRIENDS twice...but I ended up going four times. It was worth every penny.

I'm glad I got to see it several times and from different sections. I'm a huge Lea Salonga fan and she does not disappoint. (I know Lea was part a fundraising gala at Alice Tully Hall in 2011 called "Suites by Sondheim" which had a cast of Filipino-American performers. I'd love to hear Lea sing more Sondheim!) Bernadette Peters was fantastic. The raw emotion in her performances of "Send in the Clowns" and especially "Losing My Mind" blew me away.

The whole cast is magnificent. I saw the full cast twice, but the Clare Burt was out for the last two shows I saw. One of the younger performers (Monique Young) did Clare's part (Electra) in "Gotta Have A Gimmick" and was terrific. Janie Dee did "The Little Things You Do Together" with Gavin Lee - perfect. And Joanna Riding did "The Ladies Who Lunch" - excellent. You wouldn't know that these weren't songs they'd been doing all along.

I know that the album of the gala concert last year has been released and it seems highly unlikely that there would be a recording of this cast, but I really wish there was.

One question for those who saw the West End production earlier in the run: Bernadette starts the song "Broadway Baby" and after the other actresses join in, she ends up walking off the stage as they line up to sing the last chorus. I am pretty sure i've seen b-roll footage that includes Bernadette in that final part. I noticed Bernadette has been wearing some sort of knee brace, so perhaps she was taken out of the choreographed part? Does anyone know when that happened?

[binau]

Posted: 1/6/24 at 6:54am

It’s been a few weeks. Bernadette is injured as you’ve noticed from the knee brace. She also enters ‘children will listen’ from side stage instead of walking down the stairs. 
 

I’ve also noticed Bernadette has been sick twice during the run, and I saw her one night where she was so sick she couldn’t even hold the last note of Losing My Mind and instead repeated ‘my mind’ three times, as well as very challenged vocally throughout but she is well again. 
 

After watching Bernadette put herself through this all and never miss a single performance age 75 I have to ask myself why she can do it and others much younger and presumably fitter can’t.