The original ending of COMPANY

[ljay889]

Posted: 4/26/20 at 4:00pm

I've never heard about this before. What do you guys think of it? 

This sounds intriguing, but I like the final ambiguous ending of the show, as it's very fitting for the piece. 

https://twitter.com/CompanyBway/status/1254497965353426945?s=20

Also, happy 50th Anniversary to Company!

[Luscious]

Posted: 4/27/20 at 6:31pm

Interesting but unnecessary. I think they made the right decision. The song, Being Alive, tells you in its lyrics everything you need to know about Bobby's emotional growth. Also, I don't like the idea of the other actors taking on different roles for just that one last scene.

Updated On: 4/27/20 at 06:31 PM

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 4/28/20 at 1:35am

Luscious said: "Interesting but unnecessary. I think they made the right decision. The song, Being Alive, tells you in its lyrics everything you need to know about Bobby's emotional growth. Also, I don't like the idea of the other actors taking on different roles for just thatone last scene."

I agree, Luscious. The change in "Being Alive" from "Someone to hold you too close," etc., to "Somebody, hold ME too close!" tells us all we need to know about Bobby's new state of readiness!

For anyone who cares, Larry Kert told me personally--and everyone else he ever met, I believe--that there was one matinee in Boston where they actually performed something similar to what Sondheim describes. Only in Larry's telling, Bobby was left between an attractive woman, who had wished him a happy birthday, and an attractive man, who had done the same, and Bobby looked back and forth as if choosing between them as the final curtain fell. (I assume the reprise of the title song came during the curtain call.) Larry insisted the Boston audience gasped instead of applauding, and that ending was gone by the evening's performance.

(For anyone who is confused, Dean Jones was playing Bobby at that point, Larry Kert was watching as the understudy.)

I have always doubted the story because of the authors' insistence that Bobby's sexual orientation is not at issue in the play. And, frankly, I think a COMPANY that is merely about Bobby maybe, sort of "coming out" is a rather thin evening.

But that was Larry's story--as I said above, I know a number of people to whom he told it--and I am surprised to hear Sondheim confirm even a little bit of it.