It was the most exciting music I'd ever heard, ... And 'Company' was the first album -- as in old-fashioned LP -- I ever bought for myself, which of course was pretty strange since all my peers were listening to the Rolling Stones. |
It's a complicated chain of events to recount, but to cut to the chase, I went to a camp with Mary Rodgers' daughter [grand-daughter of Richard Rodgers], ... And in 1973, when I tried to get a ticket to a special Sondheim concert, she passed my precocious letter on to him and he actually put his return address on his response. That was the beginning of a correspondence, and ultimately I got an invitation to tea where we talked about his work and I asked a million questions. As I was about to leave, Steve asked me if I wanted anything and I told him I'd love a recording of 'Anyone Can Whistle,' because it was out of print at that time. He went right upstairs and got a record for me. |
Plus, the show is very interesting to me politically at the moment, ... I think it speaks to our time in the way it looks at conformity and individualism and the whole question of speaking out. It seems to me these days that everybody is just joining the biggest line and not questioning things. And there's a lot of finger-pointing, with the red states against the blue ones, and those in the blue states labeled crazy while those in the red ones try to shut them up. |
This production may alienate some people, ... But I do think we're a bit afraid to question things these days, and get in trouble when we do. |
To go from the high of Thursday night -- which had been a great opening -- to the disappointment of Friday's reviews to Saturday packing up our stuff to leave the theater to Saturday night saying, 'We're going to run' -- it's been quite a roller coaster. |
We had planned to do a medley of all the songs we cut from the show during previews. But the producers just informed me that we are not closing tonight. |