Stephen Sondheim's legacy and little links to my life

It's impossible to imagine a world without the music and lyrics of Stephen Sondheim. The prolific composer-lyricist died on November 26 at age 91. His passing got me reeling through my years on and offstage, and how, like so many other fans, his work wove its way into our lives, and for me, as the eventual inspiration for an entire novel.

 

The world-renowned lyricist and composer won eight Tony Awards throughout his extensive career, alongside an Academy Award, seven Grammy Awards, a Pulitzer Prize and a Laurence Olivier Award.

 

The first Broadway show that Sondheim composed both the lyrics and music for proved to be a winner out the gate. He scored a Tony Award for Best Musical for that show, the 1962 comedy A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, which ran for more than two years.  

 

As a former actor and dancer, now a writer, his art had a strong influence, despite my never having exactly performed in any productions of his shows. But before I reminisce about Sondheim, and my briefly meeting him, here are some other reflections from more prominent voices.

In comes company
Bernadette Peters, who performed in six of his shows, tweeted, “He gave me so much to sing about. I loved him dearly and will miss him so much. Thank you for all the gifts you gave the world, Steve.”

Star of Rob Marshall’s 2014 film version of “Into the Woods” Anna Kendrick tweeted, “I was just talking to someone a few nights ago about how much fun (and f – – king difficult) it is to sing Stephen Sondheim. Performing his work has been among the greatest privileges of my career. A devastating loss.”

Other performers shared online tributes to Sondheim, including Mandy Patinkin, Carol Burnett, George Hearn, and others. Playbill has a great round-up of quotes from the 2010 celebratory concert in his honor. Sounds of Broadway's hosting a weekend mix tribute of Sondheim songs. I'm sure they're not the only ones binging on Sondheim's music.

Womb to Tomb
My first dose of Sondheim's talent was allegedly prenatal. My parents attended a New York City screening of the film West Side Story while my mother was several months pregnant with me (my brother and sister were left with a babysitter). 

Before the film made its eagerly anticipated network TV premiere, the promo commercials had me excited (the crotch-level shot of three Sharks may have had something to do with it), and with the album and a used record player, I spent many a night dancing and singing along in our Ohio home's basement.

Our parents encouraged their kids' artistic inclinations. My sister took ballet lessons, and my brother and I tagged along for shows at Ashland College with our parents sometimes participating; my father in two shows. When the college produced A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, with no kids needed in the cast, I instead snuck into dress rehearsals and shows, mostly to ogle the hunky student playing Miles Glorioso.

But Gypsy became a more immersive experience. The film adaptation being a regular Sunday matinee on a local TV station, we already knew the show. As young newsboys, my brother, me and a few other boys were a small part of the cast, but I watched the rest of it through almost every rehearsal, with a few of the older guys becoming the subjects of my intense preteen crushes.

I'd love to see how good this production was, but in my child's eye, it seemed terrific. My collected memories were slightly fictionalized in my seventh novel, Finding Tulsa. The fictional part of the story is about a gay film director in the 1990s who gets a big break on a serious TV movie, only to rediscover the hunky student actor from his childhood production of Gypsy. What then happens is complete fiction.