Walk around New York today and you’ll see just how vital to the city, the country, the world Broadway composer Stephen Sondheim, who died Friday at 91, remained for most of his extraordinary life.
Pass the Bernard B. Jacobs Theater on 45th Street and you’ll glimpse the marquee for the revival of his seminal 1970 musical “Company,” which currently stars Patti LuPone and opens in two weeks.
Downtown at Classic Stage Company in the East Village is his “Assassins,” a subversive show about presidential murderers that has been produced all over the US during heated election cycles ever since it debuted in 1990.
A Broadway house on 43rd Street, the Stephen Sondheim Theatre, is named for him.
Over at the Paris Theater near Central Park, you can watch Bradley Whitford play the man himself in the new movie “Tick, Tick… Boom!” an autobiography of “Rent” composer Jonathan Larson, who Sondheim inspired. The film is directed by “Hamilton” creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, who Sondheim also inspired. Take all that in.
And then on Monday, Steven Spielberg’s new film of “West Side Story,” which a young Sondheim wrote the lyrics for in 1957 — his first Broadway show! — will have its world premiere at Lincoln Center. A musical that has touched every generation since we first heard the words “When you’re a Jet, you’re a Jet all the way,” the movie features the original film’s star Rita Moreno, now 89, alongside popular youngster Ansel Elgort, 27. Should the red carpet event go off as planned, a celebration of a movie will become a celebration of life.
At 91, Sondheim was deeply involved in all these red-hot projects, he never officially retired and was actively writing a new musical.
The work of Sondheim, who was born and raised in New York City, has touched most people even if they don’t realize it. They’ve probably sang “I Feel Pretty” in the shower, or performed “Into The Woods” in high school. They’ve heard Barbra Streisand and Frank Sinatra croon his classics like “Send In The Clowns” and “Being Alive.” Every episode of “Desperate Housewives” got its title from a Sondheim lyric.
In the modern history of musical theater, there has been no more important artist.
While he had peaks and valleys of success, his name and reputation never faded and he will forever he spoken in the same breath as other American theatrical royalty: Rodgers and Hammerstein, Tennessee Williams and Arthur Miller.
The reason his musicals will endure for decades to come is that, like Shakespeare, he had a visceral understanding of what makes humans tick beyond the fleeting sounds and styles of the day. His oeuvre grows up as we do.
The feuding teens in “West Side Story” dream of finding “Somewhere” to play in peace; The song “Move On” from “Sunday In The Park With George” is every theater kid’s choice breakup listen; 35-year-old Bobby weighs staying single or getting married in “Company”; In his spin on fairytales, “Into The Woods,” all the Baker and his wife want is to have a child. Sweeney Todd fights like hell to be reunited with his daughter; Mamma Rose, the hurricane of “Gypsy,” drives her girls away with her relentless pursuit of fame.
Sondheim has emotionally tapped into our psyche like Freud, but he’s always gotten flack for not cranking out enough toe tappers. When Jerry Herman won the Tony for “La Cage Aux Folles,” beating “Sunday,” Herman took what many felt was a shot at his rival.
“This award forever shatters a myth about the musical theater,” he said. “There’s been a rumor around for a couple of years that the simple, hummable show tune was no longer welcome on Broadway. Well, it’s alive and well at the Palace.”
His critics are not wrong, but his songs were greater than catchy hooks and melodies. They had brains and soul and the unshakable feeling that this guy knew us inside and out.
Still, few of Sondheim’s Broadway shows were box office hits in their day. He gravitated toward adventitious topics (serial killer cannibals! Squeaky Fromme! A George’s Seurat painting!). The one time he wrote about sexy showgirls in “Follies,” the characters were older faded beauties recalling their glory days.
But that’s just it — he kept us guessing. If given the opportunity to choose Doors one, two or three, Sondheim chose 17 1/2.
At the first preview of “Company” on Broadway Nov. 15, the 91-year-old composer was whooshed in at the last minute before the lights went down. The legend — with work and art, not retirement, on the brain — got a long standing ovation from his adoring crowd. Not a bad way to go out.
To quote his brilliant “Company” song “Ladies Who Lunch,” “I’ll drink to that!”
