Bobby, or maybe Bobbie?

November 17, 2021 9:29 PM

Company is finally back on Broadway this week after a 20-month hiatus. There were only nine preview performances before all the theaters in New York went dark during the pandemic. Now the cast celebrates its return with a Tiny Desk performance filmed a few blocks away from the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre at the CIVILIAN Hotel. It's the 35th birthday celebration for the lead character, Bobbie, but also a reunion for this ensemble.

Sondheim was interviewed by Stephen Colbert about the revival. "I don't usually tout my own stuff, but I urge everybody here to see it," he confessed. "You're gonna have such a good time. It's really one of the most entertaining evenings I've ever had in the theatre."

SET LIST
"Company"
"Someone is Waiting"
"Another Hundred People"
"You Could Drive A Person Crazy"

posted by hippybear (9 comments total)

i have never been to a legit broadway show. but, a local college performance of company was one of the most horrifying things i have ever witnessed.

hippybear, never stop. your posts on music and theatre are gold.
posted by j_curiouser at 9:37 PM on November 17, 2021 [2 favorites]

Well, watch this little clip of four songs. They are really excellent takes on familiar pieces, and I would not have posted otherwise.
posted by hippybear at 9:38 PM on November 17, 2021 [3 favorites]

This is SO INTERESTING. Just really quick thoughts:

I'm so used to hearing the women's names in "Someone is Waiting" that hearing other names is kind of jarring. (And I tend to think of Sondheim songs as being pretty sacrosanct, so changes of any kind feel a little wrong.) But I have a feeling it'll just seem delightfully different on the second or third listen.

I'm really curious whether they changed the vocal range for any of the songs. It sounded like "Another Hundred People" at least was in the same range as it has always been, and - despite what I just said about the songs being sacrosanct - I would have expected songs to be transposed higher or lower for the gender-swapped voices.

I bet there were a ton of interesting decisions that had to be made for this version. I hope they do a LOT of interviews so I can find out all about it.

This is a delightful treat, hippybear. Thank you!
posted by kristi at 9:52 PM on November 17, 2021

kristi, I once made a lyric tenor sing "Poor Wand'ring One" (usually sung by a coloratura soprano) in a Gilbert and Sullivan pastiche. I had no idea if he could do it going in, but I acted as if it was no big deal because it really worked with the story and I didn't want him to not agree to do it. After the first performance, he told me that he'd been convinced he couldn't do it but didn't want to let me down. It came out beautifully and the audience went wild.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 10:03 PM on November 17, 2021 [4 favorites]

I saw this version in London not long after it opened. I have a fondness for Company — it was the first Sondheim show I imprinted on when I discovered his work, and I think I listened to it in my car for a solid year absorbing it (the original Broadway cast album is one of the best sounding cast albums ever — hippybear, I hope you’ll do a post on the documentary about that recording — if someone hasn’t already.) I was also thrilled to be cast in a small role in my college’s production. I’ve seen many productions over the years — I had some friends in the John Doyle “they all play instruments” version. And… I have always thought that it’s a show that is more fun to be in than to watch.

I went in to the London production with low expectations— it seemed like a stunt to me. And then… I cried at least three times in the first act alone.

Strangely, one of those times was during “Someone Is Waiting”, a song that previously had always felt like a placeholder to me. I don’t even know why I wept— perhaps it was the particular resonance of the actress’s voice on that song.

To follow the comment made about “Another Hundred People” — I have heard it sung by men before, transposed, etc, and I think it’s just never as vocally exciting. It was composed for the female belt voice — in particular for Pamela Myers— the story being that she walked in and impressed both Prince and Sondheim enough that they changed their idea of the role to fit her, and Sondheim wrote this song specifically to show off her phenomenal belt. In the way that as time passes, athletes continue to break records, today someone belting that song is not the feat that it once was — but at the time it was extraordinary.

I don’t know if the male version of the character in the Broadway production is the same as the London— there, they had him play it as a Brit in New York. The original female character is portrayed as a truth-teller — she calls Robert on his uptightness and his blind spots — a prototype of the “downtown quirky girlfriend” who is there to loosen up the main guy. In the London version, the male Brit comes off as a pretentious hipster type — instead of speaking uncomfortable truth as the original character did, his delivery of essentially the same dialogue comes across as man-splain-y. So the song, which is all about the loneliness and isolation of New York, landed very strangely. Although it did have beautiful staging, with the ensemble dancing gorgeously. (As I said, not sure how they handled it for Broadway.)

The other brilliant change was the dance “Tick-Tock”, which often gets cut. Originally it was a moment for the brilliant dancer Donna McKechnie (later to be Cassie in A Chorus Line) to do a solo number while we hear the inner thoughts of Robert and the flight attendant April during sex — a variation on the gag that she’s falling in love and he can’t remember her name— which is followed up in their duet “Barcelona.”

BUT in this version… Bobbie and the flight attendant (who in London was played perfectly as sort of a himbo Rob Lowe type) go at it… and then doubles of the two characters emerge from other doors… the shower, the closet, the next room… as Bobbie envisions what their future might be … from hookup to live-in partners to baby and on and on… It was so striking and theatrical… simple and truthful… beautifully done. Powerful.

In the end, I don’t know that the show really takes us to its conclusion— and while I appreciate this version for shining a new light on the show… the ways in which women often are invisible while providing endless emotional labor… we of course need many many many more new shows placing women at the center.

But I’m glad they did it — what seemed like a conceptual stunt really brought new insights.
posted by profreader at 1:13 AM on November 18, 2021 [4 favorites]

Got my ticket for December 27!
posted by Melismata at 4:56 AM on November 18, 2021 [1 favorite]

Saw the London production twice, and thought it was wonderful. Company had musically been one of my favourite Sondheims for a long time (and I love the Pennebaker movie about the recording of the Original Cast Recording), but I couldn't see it working as originally written - there was something about Bobby that doesn't quite ring true, a 1950s bachelor in 1970s New York. The revised version works wonderfully, though. Hope they keep the choreography and magic (literally - a lot of business was designed by a stage magician) for the New York production, especially the unexpected appearances by the wedding officiant.*

*Or whatever she is - tried Minister, Priest, Priestess there but it just looked weird. You know, the woman who sings the line "Praise this day..."
posted by Grangousier at 5:03 AM on November 18, 2021 [2 favorites]

Ooh, and here's the director Marianne Elliott talking about it.
posted by Grangousier at 5:06 AM on November 18, 2021

Got my ticket for December 27!

I'll see you there!

I had tickets for the Before Times, and watching that date pass by was tortuous. As soon as tickets opened up again, I grabbed hold. Having something on the calendar to look forward to proved especially important, and Company is just the ticket!
posted by Capt. Renault at 8:20 AM on November 18, 2021 [3 favorites]