Great Performances
Wednesday, February 20, at 9 p.m.
on WKAR-HD and WKAR-23
Sondheim Hit Comes to "Great Performances"
Long before “Sex and the City,” the Stephen Sondheim/George Furth musical Company took an unconventional look at love and commitment in complex modern New York. The 1970 era-defining classic was — and is — an honest, funny and sophisticated portrayal of five married couples seen through the eyes of their friend Robert, a waffling 35-year-old bachelor evaluating the pros and cons of wedded life.
How timeless the work remains is evidenced in its recent Broadway incarnation by brilliant British director John Doyle (Sweeney Todd). Showered by critical praise (“best musical of the year,” New York magazine; “unquestionable brilliance,” Entertainment Weekly), the 2007 Tony Award winner for Best Musical Revival comes triumphantly to television in the Great Performances production of Company. Raúl Esparza, who won Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for his portrayal of leading man Robert, heads the cast of actor-musicians.
As conceived by director Doyle, each performer doubles as orchestra member, placing all the music on stage rather than in the pit, adding a fresh warmth and spontaneity to the score. Even Robert, or Bobby as he is affectionately called, sits at the piano for his concluding number, “Being Alive.”
“Bobby finally joins the band of human life,” wrote Ben Brantley in his glowing New York Times review. “There’s something about Mr. Sondheim that allows Mr. Doyle to find a new clarity of feeling through melding musicians and performers. It is, after all, the person who controls the music in a Sondheim production who has the best chance of finding the show’s elusive but resonantly human heart.”
Completing the cast are Barbara Walsh (Joanne), Keith Buterbaugh (Harry), Matt Castle (Peter), Robert Cunningham (Paul), Angel Desai (Marta), Kelly Jeanne Grant (Kathy), Kristin Huffman (Sarah), Amy Justman (Susan), Heather Laws (Amy), Leenya Rideout (Jenny), Fred Rose (David), Bruce Sabath (Larry) and Elizabeth Stanley (April). Mary-Mitchell Campbell conducts and provides the new orchestrations.
Recorded on stage in performance at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre June 30, 2007, the production premiered at the Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park in early 2006. It opened at the Barrymore November 29 and closed July 2 the following year. Among its many musical highlights: “The Ladies Who Lunch,” “Another Hundred People,” “Barcelona” and “You Could Drive a Person Crazy,” this last performed by three of Bobby’s girlfriends blasting saxophones as if they were assault weapons.
Esparza, 37, is known to theater fans for his stunning performances in Taboo (Tony Award nomination, Drama Desk Award); Cabaret; Chitty Chitty Bang Bang; The Rocky Horror Show (Theatre World Award); and Jonathan Larson’s tick…tick…BOOM! (OBIE Award, Drama Desk nomination). His “singularly magnetic” (The Wall Street Journal) performance as Bobby netted his most recent Tony nomination. He is currently starring in Daniel Sullivan’s revival of Harold Pinter’s The Homecoming.
Director Doyle’s acclaimed production of Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny for LA Opera, starring Audra McDonald, Patti LuPone and Anthony Dean Griffey, aired on Great Performances in December 2007.
Beginning with You Can’t Take It With You in 1984, featuring Jason Robards and Colleen Dewhurst, program producer Ellen Krass has produced a number of outstanding programs for Great Performances, including Follies in Concert (1986) with Barbara Cook, Lee Remick, Carol Burnett and the New York Philharmonic and, most recently, Leonard Bernstein’s Candide in Concert”(2005) with Kristin Chenoweth, Patti LuPone and the New York Philharmonic.
The original Company production opened on Broadway at the Alvin (now the Neil Simon) Theatre on April 26, 1970, garnering 14 Tony nominations (the record until The Producers in 2001) and winning six, including Best Musical. The show was last seen on Broadway in a Roundabout Theatre Company limited engagement in 1995.
Great Performances online, pbs.org/wnet/gperf/, contains additional information about this and other Great Performances programs. The colorful Web companion contains a wide variety of images, in-depth information about the programs and activities for teachers, including lesson plans, tips and resources.
published: February 19, 2008
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