On Friday, November 26th, the world mourned the sudden loss of legendary musical theater composer Stephen Sondheim. While he was 91, the thought of living in a world without Sondheim was inconceivable to many musical theater fans. Sondheim's influence wasn't limited to those who enjoyed song and dance and his loss will certainly be felt. He was a part of productions that changed the cultural landscape and influenced writers who went on to have prolific careers themselves.
This week, fans of Sondheim will be taking time to watch his productions and honor his work. However, long-term fans should not be the only ones to take a look back. Sondheim's work deals with themes that permeate all sections of society and therefore should be enjoyed by everyone. His death may be the end of an era in American musical theater, but with the following films, documentaries, recordings of stage shows and the audience's memories, Sondheim's memory will live on.
With Steven Spielberg's reimagining of the classic West Side Story coming in December, Sondheim's contribution to the piece has been in the public consciousness. Composer Leonard Bernstein, playwright Arthur Laurents and lyricist Sondheim came together in 1957 to adapt Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet into a modern musical. After seeing Broadway success, a film was produced in 1967, which went on to win awards and steal audiences' hearts. For being nearly 55 years old, the film still feels incredibly fresh. Modern viewers will find themselves fondly humming Sondheim's lyrics to themselves in the weeks leading up to the next movie.
After fourteen years in the industry and hits like Follies, Company and Gypsy under his belt, Sondheim had a massive flop in Merrily We Roll Along. The musical, which ran a total of 16 performances, follows a group of friends starting in 1980 and ending with their meeting in 1955. Before the show tanked, a documentary crew wanted to look over Sondheim's shoulder as he wrote what they thought to be a sure hit.
Best Worst Thing That Could Have Ever Happened was directed by Lonny Prince and premiered on Netflix in 2016. The film contains interviews with original cast members like Giancarlo Esposito (Breaking Bad) and Jason Alexander (Seinfeld) as well as rare footage from their rehearsal process. Even with a shorter runtime of 96 minutes, viewers will still learn quite a bit about what goes into creating a successful musical.
In 2010, Sondheim released a memoir titled Finishing the Hat, a reference to a number from his musical Sunday in the Park With George. This musical made its Broadway debut in 1984 and starred Mandy Patinkin (Princess Bride, Homeland) and Bernadette Peters (The Jerk, Into The Woods) who each played two different characters in the first and second acts. While these theatrical performances would usually be lost to future audiences, those who are interested are in luck. A performance with the original cast was professionally recorded and released by PBS and is still available to rent or purchase.
The story of Sunday in the Park perfectly captures the mind of an artistic genius by studying the artist George Seurat, who created a technique now called pointillism. This form of painting requires immense amounts of time and concentration, as it uses small dots of paint to create larger images, similar to pixels. Sondheim had a mind like Seurat's: concentrated, flourishing and always working. Some argue this show is his masterpiece, and it definitely deserves more attention from modern viewers.
The Act I finale of Sunday in the Park, aptly named "Sunday," is an inspiring song to anyone who listens to it. This included an aspiring musical theater composer, Jonathan Larson, the creator of Rent. Larson regarded Sondheim as a role model and was lucky enough to receive feedback from him. These interactions are dramatized in Netflix's new film, Tick, Tick...BOOM!, directed by Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hamilton). Sondheim is portrayed with an eerie perfection by veteran actor Bradley Whitford (The West Wing, The Handmaids Tale) in several intimate scenes.
There is one moment, however, where Sondheim himself makes an appearance in the film. When watching an early cut, Sondheim didn't enjoy the writing on a voicemail left by his onscreen counterpart to Larson, played by Andrew Garfield (The Social Network). Sondheim asked to rewrite the lines and ended up performing them himself. This choice notes two very important things about the legendary artist: he always sought to heighten work and always wanted to pay it forward.
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