Posted: 10/29/23 at 10:12am
New York always gave Stephen Sondheim amazing birthday celebration concerts, etc etc. Why, since his death, have we not got a New York concert or a Broadway concert/show celebrating his life in the way that the West End did with Old Friends?
Posted: 10/29/23 at 10:31am
Do you not think next year we’ll get a Sondheim celebration? Even though we seem to have gotten at least 2-3 shows in the last couple years. Personally it wouldn’t surprise me if this coming year they bring in Old Friends for the 2024 holiday season. Let the current list of Sondheim finish. So they aren’t competing with that. I can’t remember which reporter asked Bernadette at the opening if they were getting this in New York and she was mum. But did say she was working on something in the USA that would happen in the next 12-18 months. (Maybe it’s just a concert series or something).
I would love to see a Patti Lupone, Bernadette Peters, Lea Salonga mounting of this with maybe like a Norm Lewis/Brian Stokes Mitchell/Danny Burnstien … it’s sad that the UK seems to have invested more into Sondheim tributes
Posted: 10/29/23 at 10:34am
Wasn't there a rumor kicking around these boards that the West End Old Friends might transfer? Or am I misremembering?
Posted: 10/29/23 at 10:53am
While it may seem strange to some that a tribute production was not mounted after his death, it is not as if we have lacked for similar shows on Broadway for each of his major birthdays plus other occasions. And as others have noted, we have had multiple Sondheim shows running in recent years.
Posted: 10/29/23 at 11:36am
Updated On: 10/29/23 at 11:36 AM
Posted: 10/29/23 at 11:44am
There was a private “by invitation only” memorial/life celebration earlier this year (I believe at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre). He expressly did NOT want a large public memorial.
Posted: 10/29/23 at 12:14pm
We’ve been celebrating him nonstop with all these productions, and thank goodness. God, I miss him.
Posted: 10/29/23 at 12:22pm
Yeah, COMPANY, HERE WE ARE, and CSC's ASSASSINS definitely *felt* like Memorials in some ways. Plus WOODS, SWEENEY, MERRILY, and Spielberg's WEST SIDE film. And with Sondheim being someone who liked looking forward, that's kind of fitting.
I wouldn't say the UK specifically has invested more in Sondheim tributes, Cameron Mackintosh just got OLD FRIENDS off the ground quickly (and was personally close with Sondheim). It's very possible that he has revue/concert rights tied up in New York, too, with the intention of bringing it to Broadway.
We've also had so many Sondheim tributes in New York over the years. I wouldn't mind another, but it might have an air of regurgitating what was done while he was alive. These things are also generally tied to fundraisers (like the Actors Fund Zoom 90th concert, or the NY Phil and City Center concerts for his 80th).
Updated On: 10/29/23 at 12:22 PM
Posted: 10/29/23 at 12:23pm
Yeah, I much rather have ITW, Sweeney, Merrily, and Here We Are than another revue or celebration. Revues in general bore me.
Posted: 10/29/23 at 12:26pm
His career is booming despite his death in a way that is almost unprecedented; the amount of psychological and actual production real estate devoted to Sondheim is a pretty significant chunk, which is well-warranted.
I like to say "rest in peace" with a little wink where Sondheim is concerned, because peace and resting were NEVER on the maestro's to-do list. Death is the only thing that could slow him down. In hindsight, it's sort of a miracle he remained so focused on musical theatre, because his polyglot tendencies were pronounced across literature, puzzles, video games, crime and the "immersive gaming event" prototypes that gradually evolved into today's escape rooms. Can you imagine an alternate timeline where Sondheim became a Rupert Holmes figure, the great genius who never concentrated on a single art form for long?
Posted: 10/29/23 at 12:48pm
I've been hearing that Old Friends is likely gonna transfer in the Spring with Lea and Bernadette and an all-American cast.
Posted: 10/29/23 at 1:31pm
Time flies by soooooooo fast. It will not be long before we are celebrating the Sondheim Centenary. I think that will be the best time for the next tribute concert.
dargquek, what do you mean by "literature"? I know he was not a fan of prose. Although it is fair to say he deserved the Nobel Prize for Literature as much as Bob Dylan did, if not more so.
Posted: 10/29/23 at 1:40pm
I think that every Sondheim production playing is a celebration, no matter how corny that sounds. Especially Here We Are.
Posted: 10/30/23 at 1:55pm
I'm surprised too.
In London Cameron jumped into act right away - that didn't happen in NYC.
Posted: 10/30/23 at 9:35pm
Sammy232 said: "Wasn't there a rumor kicking around these boards that the West End Old Friends might transfer? Or am I misremembering?"
I hear discussions are happening about a production of this for next Bway season so hopefully it will happen!
Posted: 10/30/23 at 10:01pm
Besides music and lyrics, for which he is best known, he wrote at least one produced screenplay and one produced play (both on his favorite pet topic, the gamifying of crime).
Posted: 10/31/23 at 12:38am
I’m curious if you heard the same word as I had (fall 2024 ( previews begin end of September, opening October, closing mid January ) with Bernadette and Lea reprising. As well as a company of Broadway names (personally I’m seeing it as like Matt Doyle, Norm Lewis, (one could hope for Patti) Cheyenne Jackson…)
Posted: 10/31/23 at 9:10am
Sorry, best we can do in this country in 2023 is an "Off-Broadway" production with a $200 ticket price floor and commercial productions that go to the least-threatening celebrities available. If our greatest musical theater writer had left us twenty years ago, or if we lived in a place that meaningfully funded the arts, things would be different. It's pretty shocking.
