| re: the point was the play on the title "Life"... reading Life Magazine to stay in touch with life | |
| Last Edit: Chazwaza 01:12 pm EST 03/10/22 | |
| Posted by: Chazwaza 12:54 pm EST 03/10/22 | |
| In reply to: re: the point was the play on the title "Life"... reading Life Magazine to stay in touch with life - Thom915 12:13 pm EST 03/10/22 | |
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| So you're using my post clearly praising how clever and thoughtful Sondheim's lyric was to dismiss my pretty undebatable observation that the new lyric doesn't work on as many levels and isn't as good? You're arguing that it nonetheless does, even though it clearly doesn't, because... He wrote it also? You won't find a Sondheim fan who reveres and respects his writing more than me, I assure you. But that will never change that the original lyric here is way better than the new one. I hope you're sitting down... I *also* think other lyric changes he made for this production are not as good as the original, or good enough as replacements for a Company that is meant to reflect 2022. And... eeek... I think he's quite wrong-headed in his bashing of his "I Feel Pretty" lyrics. In fact I think his issues are actually kind of classist and insulting to the character and audience and come off as pompous... and I also think he chose that one song to offer as a sacrifice long ago so he had something easy to be self-critical about (despite his wonderful/dangerous malleability and un-preciousness with changes for revivals and movies, notice how rarely he ever spoke critically about his work on any other show... it's the lyrics in WSS, specifically IFP, and that he agreed with whoever it was who told him the score and book don't go together in Forum ... though, the success of the show, and how it plays live, seem to be all the proof you'd need to see that this is a strength in the show and part of why it works, and that perhaps a score that matched the lower comedy and broader farce of the book might have made the whole evening exhausting and one-note, so he can say that as a criticism all he wants, he knows it still made for a very successful and beloved musical). Even crazier... I don't think the changes he made for Follies in London were good at all... on their own it had some quality writing (some not as much), but not a single change was good for Follies or better than what was there, even though Sondheim in his prime did the rewrites. Eventually it came to be that he agreed with me (and the many who feel the same). Brace yourself for insanity... I think almost all revisions He made to Merrily are for the worse, and i'll always think he is deeply wrong about the show he wrote originally (though in this case I don't think he was ever able to see it for what it really was after it opened, the trauma he went through from that show's original Hal production and critical reception was too scarring for him to ever be able to see it objectively again)... and I don't care that he, a genius, and my favorite musical theater writer of all time, did the changes and insisted on them the rest of his life. He was wrong, and it's sad. And I don't care if that sounds ridiculous for me to say, or that I'm in the minority on this. Point is, Sondheim isn't always right, or more to the point, his fans don't have to agree with everything he does or says. You may think I'm wrong on all or some of these examples.. that's ok too. |
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| Previous: | re: the point was the play on the title "Life"... reading Life Magazine to stay in touch with life - Thom915 12:13 pm EST 03/10/22 |
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