Stephen Sondheim

Stephen Sondheim stood out as the leading composer and lyricist of his era while earning recognition as one of Broadway’s most esteemed figures overall. He fused intricate verbal dexterity with melodies and harmonies that broke from theatrical conventions through their sharp angles and chromatic complexity, all while remaining tonal. Even a somber ballad such as “Send in the Clowns” reached the pop Top 40 when Judy Collins recorded it in 1975. Early acclaim arrived for the words he supplied to the successful productions West Side Story in 1957 and Gypsy in 1959; his first opportunity to compose music for Broadway came with A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, which opened in 1962. From that point forward he functioned chiefly as his own composer and lyricist, crafting enduring yet somber masterworks that included Sweeney Todd in 1979, Into the Woods in 1987, and Assassins in 1990. An Academy Award recognized the song “Sooner or Later (I Always Get My Man)” he contributed to the 1990 film Dick Tracy, and his trophy case ultimately held a record eight Tony Awards for a composer, multiple Grammys, a Pulitzer Prize for Sunday in the Park with George, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Well into his eighties during the 2010s he continued writing and refining material; Bunuel received workshop treatment in 2016, after which he focused on Square One, a project developed with playwright David Ives.

Stephen Joshua Sondheim entered the world on March 22, 1930, in Manhattan as the sole child of Herbert Sondheim, owner of a dress-manufacturing firm, and Etta Janet (Fox) Sondheim, the firm’s head designer. An early fascination with music prompted piano lessons around the age of seven. During adolescence he encountered the renowned lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, who took on the role of mentor. While still in high school he began crafting amateur musicals, an apprenticeship he maintained at Williams College. After graduation he received the Hutchinson Prize, a fellowship that enabled him to study composition under Milton Babbitt. The production intended to serve as his Broadway debut as both composer and lyricist, Saturday Night, collapsed when its producer died unexpectedly.

The score for Saturday Night functioned as the audition that secured Sondheim the assignment of writing lyrics for Leonard Bernstein’s music on West Side Story. That show opened September 26, 1957, completed 732 performances, and embarked on a national tour. Its lasting stature, however, owes much to the 1961 film adaptation; the soundtrack album held the number-one position for more than a year, spurring revivals in 1964 and 1968 and securing the work’s canonical status.

Sondheim next supplied lyrics to Jule Styne’s music for Gypsy, drawn from the memoirs of striptease performer Gypsy Rose Lee. With Ethel Merman in the leading role the production opened May 21, 1959. Its cast album reached the Top Ten and captured the Grammy for Best Show Album; when the motion-picture version appeared in 1962, that soundtrack also entered the Top Ten.

Sondheim finally achieved the chance to furnish both words and music for a Broadway musical with A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. Adapted by Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart from the comic plays of Plautus, it premiered on May 8, 1962, and received the Tony Award for Best Musical the following year. While Forum was still running, Anyone Can Whistle opened on April 4, 1964, only to close after nine performances. Sondheim returned to lyric writing alone for Do I Hear a Waltz?, a collaboration with Richard Rodgers that opened March 18, 1965, and completed 220 performances. A film version of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, again starring Zero Mostel, reached theaters in 1966.

After Do I Hear a Waltz? closed in September 1965, nearly five years passed before Sondheim’s work reappeared on Broadway. During the interval he developed Follies, centered on a reunion of former performers from a Ziegfeld-style revue, and Company, constructed from brief scenes depicting prosperous middle-aged couples. Lacking a conventional plot, Company presented a sequence of vignettes revolving around a bachelor marking his thirty-fifth birthday and contemplating marriage. Regarded as the first “concept” musical, it opened April 26, 1970, enjoyed a run of 690 performances, and its cast album won the Grammy for Best Show Album while earning Sondheim his initial Tonys for Best Music and Best Lyrics. Follies followed on April 4, 1971, completing 522 performances and bringing him a second consecutive Tony for Best Score.

Sondheim shifted from the experimental Company and Follies to a more traditional musical drawn from Ingmar Bergman’s 1955 film comedy Smiles of a Summer Night. A Little Night Music opened February 25, 1973, achieved hit status with 601 performances, and secured Sondheim’s third successive Tony for Best Score. Its cast album received the Grammy for Best Show Album; when Judy Collins reached number 36 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1975 with “Send in the Clowns,” Sondheim earned the Grammy for Song of the Year. A film adaptation appeared in 1977.

Following the success of a conventional musical, Sondheim pursued the more ambitious Pacific Overtures, which chronicled Japan’s opening to the West in the 1850s. His third project with director Hal Prince, it opened January 11, 1976, and closed after 193 performances.

With a book by Hugh Wheeler, who had written A Little Night Music, Sondheim next created Sweeney Todd, based on Christopher Bond’s 1973 play Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, itself a retelling of the Grand Guignol tale of a serial killer in Victorian London. Again directed by Prince, the production opened March 1, 1979, ran for 557 performances, and brought Sondheim another Tony for Best Score plus another Grammy for Best Show Album.

Merrily We Roll Along, adapted from the George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart play of the same title, traced an idealistic young man’s descent into cynicism and compromise. Like the original drama it unfolded in reverse chronology. The Prince-directed show opened and closed within November 1981 after only 16 performances, yet this setback did not deter Sondheim from the experimental Sunday in the Park with George, inspired by Georges Seurat’s painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. With a book by director James Lapine it opened May 2, 1984, completed 604 performances, and captured the Pulitzer Prize for Drama the following year; its cast album won the Grammy for Best Show Album.

Because the Follies cast album had presented only a truncated selection of its twenty-two songs, producer Thomas Z. Shepard arranged a 1985 concert performance of the complete score. Follies in Concert subsequently received the Grammy for Best Show Album.

Sondheim’s next musical, Into the Woods, drew upon a collection of fairy tales. Another collaboration with Lapine, it opened November 5, 1987, and enjoyed a run of nearly two years, earning yet another Tony for Best Score and the Grammy for Best Show Album. With a book by John Weidman, Assassins premiered off-Broadway in 1990; this one-act work examined the assassins and would-be assassins of American presidents. Meanwhile Sondheim composed three songs for Madonna in the 1990 film Dick Tracy, one of which, “Sooner or Later (I Always Get My Man),” won the Academy Award for Best Song.

The stage musical Passion derived from the film Passione d’Amore, itself an adaptation of Iginio Ugo Tarchetti’s novel Fosca. It became another success for Sondheim and Lapine upon opening May 9, 1994, securing both the Tony for Best Score and the Grammy for Best Show Album while also being named Best Musical at the Tony Awards.

By 1995 Sondheim was developing a musical with John Weidman, who had worked on Pacific Overtures, focusing on the brothers Wilson Mizner, a con artist and playwright, and Addison Mizner, an architect. The project advanced slowly; under the title Bounce it received regional stagings in 2003. In 2004 Assassins finally reached Broadway and captured five Tony Awards, including Best Revival of a Musical. A film version of Sweeney Todd starring Johnny Depp appeared in 2007, after which Bounce was revised and retitled Road Show, opening off-Broadway in 2008.

Sondheim marked his eightieth birthday with concerts and events that included Sondheim! The Birthday Concert performed by the New York Philharmonic at Lincoln Center. Road Show subsequently opened in the West End in 2011, and Into the Woods received a film adaptation, with screenplay by Lapine, in 2014. President Obama awarded Sondheim the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2015.

Drawn from films by surrealist director Luis Buñuel, the long-anticipated stage musical Buñuel had its planned off-Broadway premiere canceled in 2019. Another work, developed with playwright and librettist David Ives and titled Square One, received a reading featuring Bernadette Peters and Nathan Lane in September 2021. Following his death on November 26, 2021, Sondheim was widely acknowledged as a transformative force in musical theater.