Merrily We Roll Along Analysis
Writing What You Know: An Exploration of the Autobiographical Nature of
Merrily We Roll Along
Artists of all kinds — writers, painters, actors, musicians — are encouraged to begin their creative explorations from where they are, working with what is familiar to them before discovering what is new. Sondheim, though hardly considered an amateur, has spent the majority of his career writing intimately about things that he himself admits he is not well-versed in. He was a person who “never even met a Puerto Rican” (Sondheim & Co.) before he wrote about racial tensions in West Side Story; a bachelor writing about the complexities of marriage in Company; a white American writing about colonialism from the Japanese perspective in Pacific Overtures. …show more content…
Kaufman play, Merrily We Roll Along. It is interesting then, that at the time of its debut Merrily We Roll Along was not only arguably the most autobiographical piece Sondheim had produced at that point …show more content…
Unlike other musicals he wrote where the distance between him and the reality of the source text or subject was expansive, there is no denying that Sondheim knew an awful lot about what it was like being a Broadway composer working in the 60s and 70s. Sondheim did not just modernize Hart and Kaufman’s piece — they glamorized it. Sondheim did not necessarily need to know what it was like to backstab or betray those close to him, but he knew what it meant to collaborate with others — often his dear friends — on artistic projects in theatre where something as simple as the right show at the right time meant the difference between community recognized fame, or utter failure. It is not impossible to imagine that even if he didn’t see it in himself, Sondheim could see in others working at his level the consequences of greed and self service in a highly glamorized industry — which in theory, made him an ideal artist to help portray the story of Frank Shepard. In execution, Merrily We Roll Along was nothing short of a flop, which is fascinating when one considers how close Sondheim’s reality was to that of the
Merrily We Roll Along
Artists of all kinds — writers, painters, actors, musicians — are encouraged to begin their creative explorations from where they are, working with what is familiar to them before discovering what is new. Sondheim, though hardly considered an amateur, has spent the majority of his career writing intimately about things that he himself admits he is not well-versed in. He was a person who “never even met a Puerto Rican” (Sondheim & Co.) before he wrote about racial tensions in West Side Story; a bachelor writing about the complexities of marriage in Company; a white American writing about colonialism from the Japanese perspective in Pacific Overtures. …show more content…
Kaufman play, Merrily We Roll Along. It is interesting then, that at the time of its debut Merrily We Roll Along was not only arguably the most autobiographical piece Sondheim had produced at that point …show more content…
Unlike other musicals he wrote where the distance between him and the reality of the source text or subject was expansive, there is no denying that Sondheim knew an awful lot about what it was like being a Broadway composer working in the 60s and 70s. Sondheim did not just modernize Hart and Kaufman’s piece — they glamorized it. Sondheim did not necessarily need to know what it was like to backstab or betray those close to him, but he knew what it meant to collaborate with others — often his dear friends — on artistic projects in theatre where something as simple as the right show at the right time meant the difference between community recognized fame, or utter failure. It is not impossible to imagine that even if he didn’t see it in himself, Sondheim could see in others working at his level the consequences of greed and self service in a highly glamorized industry — which in theory, made him an ideal artist to help portray the story of Frank Shepard. In execution, Merrily We Roll Along was nothing short of a flop, which is fascinating when one considers how close Sondheim’s reality was to that of the