Stephen Sondheim
Filmed over two years, this new documentary takes an exclusive inside look at Tony-winning director Marianne Elliott’s creative process of bringing a reimagined gender-swapped production of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s musical Company to Broadway during the COVID-19 pandemic. Featuring rehearsal and performance footage, plus new interviews with Elliott, Sondheim, Katrina Lenk, Patti LuPone and members of the original 1970 cast, the broadcast tells the story of the show’s Broadway debut in a city on the verge of bankruptcy to its reimagination 50 years later as both Broadway and New York City emerge from one of the greatest crises in contemporary history.
Created specifically for Signature Theatre with special permission from Sondheim himself, this jam-packed revue features over 30 songs from the composer’s canon. The quintessential “Finishing the Hat,” “Another Hundred People,” “Losing My Mind” and “The Worst Pies in London” meet lesser known gems including “Country House,” “Saturday Night” and “Goodbye for Now” and are fused with new orchestrations by longtime Sondheim collaborator Jonathan Tunick. With a lush 16-piece orchestra leading the way for 12 phenomenal singers, including Broadway’s Norm Lewis (Jesus Christ Superstar Live in Concert, Sondheim on Sondheim), Solea Pfeiffer (Hamilton, Signature’s Gun & Powder), Conrad Ricamora (How to Get Away with Murder, The King and I) and Emily Skinner (The Cher Show, Prince of Broadway) along with Signature favorites Bobby Smith, Awa Sal Secka, Tracy Lynn Olivera and more, this exclusive event satisfies every Sondheim craving.
Archival footage provides a glimpse into the life of Cameron Mackintosh; the storied producer famous for Les Misérables, Phantom of the Opera, Cats and many more.
A starry line-up of Broadway favorites are toasting Stephen Sondheim with a once-in-a-lifetime concert event live on Broadway.com A benefit for ASTEP
A remake of the 1961 film about two youngsters from rival New York City gangs fall in love, but tensions between their respective friends build toward tragedy.
The Hollywood Bowl becomes an enchanted world of magic beans, towering giants, and handsome princes as the setting for our annual fully staged musical – the darkly humorous and hauntingly beautiful masterpiece by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine, Into the Woods. As the Baker and his Wife travel through the forest trying to reverse a witch’s curse, they come across Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, and other famous storybook characters all in search of their own wishes…but “happily ever after” turns into a tale of “be careful what you wish for” when granted wishes have unexpected effects. This is Sondheim at his finest, with such memorable songs as “Children Will Listen” and “No One Is Alone.”
Featuring archival clips from his many groundbreaking productions, the performance-documentary includes interviews with many of Prince's collaborators, including Stephen Sondheim, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Mandy Patinkin, John Kander, Susan Stroman, and Angela Lansbury, all sharing their firsthand insights into his pioneering achievements in the theatre.
New York, 1971. There’s a party on the stage of the Weismann Theatre. Tomorrow the iconic building will be demolished. Thirty years after their final performance, the Follies girls gather to have a few drinks, sing a few songs and lie about themselves.
As the world prepares to celebrate the 60th anniversary of West Side Story in 2017, dancer Bruno Tonioli and broadcaster Suzy Klein go in search of the true stories behind the inception of this classic show. For the first time on television, they hear first-hand from those involved in the show when it opened on Broadway in September 1957, including Sondheim himself, producer Hal Prince and original cast members from both show and movie, including Chita Rivera Carol Lawrence and Rita Moreno. With the BBC Symphony Orchestra and specially cast singers, we re-live some of the wonderful music and, in the company of Suzy and Bruno, we discover how West Side Story placed the 1950s phenomena of racial tension and teenage gangs centre stage to create a hit that changed musical theatre forever.
This film from acclaimed theater director Lonny Price charts the journey of the original cast of Stephen Sondheim's "Merrily We Roll Along" in the 30-plus years since the musical debuted on Broadway at the Alvin Theatre in 1981.
Murder, mayhem and the ultimate revenge. Stephen Sondheim's macabre musical masterpiece comes back to life in this bold new production, starring Bryn Terfel and Academy Award winner Emma Thompson.
In a woods filled with magic and fairy tale characters, a baker and his wife set out to end the curse put on them by their neighbor, a spiteful witch.
Triple Olivier Award-winner Maria Friedman makes an extraordinary directorial debut with a flawless cast. With music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by George Furth, Merrily We Roll Along starts in 1980 and travels backwards in time. This powerful and moving story features some of Sondheim’s most beautiful songs including "Good Thing Going", "Not a Day Goes by" and "Old Friends".
Inspired by George Seurat’s magnificent painting, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s soaring musical is itself an artistic masterpiece. The musical begins with the story of George and his model and lover Dot. As George struggles to find his artistic voice, he becomes more and more distant from the one woman who truly sees him for who he really is. A century later, George and Dot’s descendants, themselves struggling artists, grapple with the same issues of artistic ingenuity, and a public who just doesn’t understand.Through melodic and heartbreaking music, poetic lyrics, and quick, jaunty wit, Sunday in the Park with George reveals universal truths about the nature of art, love, and passion, with the breadth and depth of art’s most enduring masterpieces. Filmed live at the Châtelet in Paris in 2013 and broadcast on Mezzo.
This intimate documentary explores the life and career of the stage legend Stephen Sondheim through six of his best-known songs.
Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods weaves together many famous fairy tales in an allegorical story of family, love, growing up and the hazy areas between right and wrong. This production was captured by Digital Theatre live at London’s Regent’s Park Open Air theatre and was directed by Timothy Sheader. Into the Woods takes the stories of the Brothers Grimm and gives them a dark and humorous twist. The popular tales of Red Ridinghood, Jack (of Beanstalk fame), Cinderella and Rapunzel are interwoven with that of the Baker and his Wife and their quest to have a child. However this re-telling goes beyond "happily ever after" as the familiar characters find themselves in unfamiliar circumstances and hopes and dreams are questioned and revisited.
Join us for a rousing celebration of the life and works of one of Broadway's greatest legends - the one and only Stephen Sondheim. For the master composer and lyricist's 80th birthday, many of musical theater's brightest stars gathered in March of 2010 to perform more than two dozen sensational numbers from Sondheim's illustrious career, and several of these enduring songs are performed by the original Broadway cast members. David Hyde Pierce hosts this magical event with Stephen Sondheim's longtime collaborator Paul Gemignani conducting the New York Philharmonic.
A general making-of piece featuring principal members of the cast and crew. A brief history of the demon barber is provided, as well as the actors' preparation for their singing roles and glimpses of the set design and general production.
Originally entitled Threes, its plot revolves around Bobby (a single man unable to commit fully to a steady relationship, let alone marriage), the five married couples who are his best friends, and his three girlfriends. Unlike most book musicals, which follow a clearly delineated plot, this movie is a concept musical composed of short vignettes, presented in no particular chronological order, linked by a celebration for Bobby's 35th birthday.
The infamous story of Benjamin Barker, a.k.a Sweeney Todd, who sets up a barber shop down in London which is the basis for a sinister partnership with his fellow tenant, Mrs. Lovett. Based on the hit Broadway musical.
Cast and crew of "Reds" revisit their memories and stories while making the film.
Passion is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and a book by James Lapine. The story was adapted from Ettore Scola's film Passione d'Amore. Central themes include love, sex, obsession, illness, passion, beauty, power and manipulation. Set in 19th century Italy, the plot concerns a young soldier and the changes in him brought about by the obsessive love of Fosca, his Colonel's homely, ailing cousin.
Documentary attached to the 25th anniversary MGM collection. Details how this successful stage production was reared and molded into a beautiful cinematic one. Deep dives into how Robbins' choreography and Bernstein's score making processes.
Broadway: The Golden Age is the most important, ambitious and comprehensive film ever made about America's most celebrated indigenous art form. Award-winning filmmaker Rick McKay filmed over 100 of the greatest stars ever to work on Broadway or in Hollywood. He soon learned that great films can be restored, fine literature can be kept in print - but historic Broadway performances of the past are the most endangered. They leave only memories that, while more vivid, are more difficult to preserve. In their own words — and not a moment too soon — Broadway: The Golden Age tells the stories of our theatrical legends, how they came to New York, and how they created this legendary century in American theatre. This is the largest cast of legends ever in one film.
An all-star cast performs the music of one of the greatest composers of our time... Stephen Sondheim. Anxiously anticipated by the myriad fans of the legendary composer, Putting It Together marked the return of Carol Burnett to the Broadway musical stage for the first time in over 35 years. Stephen Sondheim has won a record seven Tony Awards for his songwriting, and the Pulitzer Prize for Sunday in the Park with George. His Broadway smash shows and movies include Gypsy, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Sweeney Todd, Dick Tracy, and West Side Story. This Cameron Mackintosh stage production was captured live in performance during its Broadway run and recorded in high definition with a widescreen format using ten cameras and over 40 microphones.
Starring Broadway legends Patti LuPone and George Hearn with the San Francisco Symphony under Rob Fisher. Sondheim's Sweeney is based on playwright Christopher Bond’s stage thriller Sweeney Todd, The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. The music and lyrics for Sweeney are by Stephen Sondheim and the book is by Hugh Wheeler. Adapted by Christopher Bond and originally directed by Harold Prince, the Philharmonic performances of Sweeney was directed by Lonny Price and conducted by Andrew Litton. The New York Choral Artists also participated in the program.
'Hey, Mr Producer!' features selected scenes from the productions of the world's most successful musical producer, Cameron Mackintosh - classic songs from classic musicals performed by the ultimate cast.
Giorgio, a young soldier, is in love with the married Clara and becomes her lover. But they are separated when Giorgio is posted far away, where he meets the unhappy, unhealthy, and unattractive Fosca, who develops a passionate love for Giorgio and tries to make him love her. Film of the Broadway production.
Anyone Can Whistle is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and a book by Arthur Laurents. Described by theater historian Ken Mandelbaum as "a satire on conformity and the insanity of the so-called sane," the show tells a story of an economically-depressed town whose corrupt Mayoress, in an attempt to draw tourists, decides to create a fake "miracle" - which draws the attention of Fay Apple, an emotionally inhibited nurse, a crowd of inmates from a local asylum called "The Cookie Jar," and a "doctor" with secrets of his own.
Stephen Sondheim and librettist John Weidman discuss their stage musical Assassins, and offer advice for future productions. Sondheim, seated at a piano, focuses on the arrangement of his score, singing excerpts from the show's songs as examples. Weidman focuses on his text and the meaning of individual sequences. Scenic designer Loren Sherman, who designed the set for the 1990 Off-Broadway production of the show at Playwrights Horizons, displays his model for the set and offers advice on dealing with the scenic design challenges presented by the show. Each man appears separately and addresses the camera directly, with no interviewer present.
A collection of fairy tale characters head into the woods, and soon learn that fairy tales don't end at "happily ever after." This rendition of Stephen Sondheim's Tony Award-winning musical was recorded on the stage with an all-star Broadway cast.
The comic strip detective finds his life vastly complicated when Breathless Mahoney makes advances towards him while he is trying to battle Big Boy Caprice's united mob.
Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine discuss their stage musical Into the Woods
Documentary that follows Stephen Sondheim, during his spell as visiting professor of drama at Oxford University, as he takes students through the creative process of writing a musical. The film was made during rehearsals for the UK premiere of Sunday in the Park with George, which won the Olivier Award for best musical in 1991.
A Little Night Music is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by Hugh Wheeler. Inspired by the Ingmar Bergman film Smiles of a Summer Night, it involves the romantic lives of several couples. Its title is a literal English translation of the German name for Mozart's Serenade No. 13 for strings in G major, Eine kleine Nachtmusik. The musical includes the popular song "Send in the Clowns".
A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte by Georges Seurat is one of the great paintings of the world, and in "Sunday in the Park with George," book writer James Lapine and composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim bring a story based on the work brilliantly to life. While the painting depicts people gathered on an island in the Seine, the musical goes beyond simply describing their lives. It is an exploration of art, of love, of commitment. Seurat connected dots to create images; Lapine and Sondheim use connection as the heart of all our relationships. Winner of the 1985 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Film of the legendary 1985 concert performance presented by the New York Philharmonic of Stephen Sondheim's classic musical at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center. The plot of the musical centers around a reunion of showgirls who appeared in an annual Follies extravaganza when it was staged between the wars.
In 1985, Barbra Streisand released "The Broadway Album," which remains one of her most popular records. Barbra's first television special on HBO debuted in 1986. The special—which combined an interview with director William Friedkin with documentary footage of Barbra in the recording studio making 'The Broadway Album' - was only 40 minutes long. The best of Broadway comes to life in the tour, as Streisand rehearses "Putting it Together," "Can't Help Lovin' That Man of Mine" and "If I Loved You." Also included is the music video for "Somewhere."
Times are hard in 1846 London and one must make do. Nellie Lovett adds something extra to the meat pies she peddles on Fleet Street. The secret ingredient: freshly murdered victims of her partner in crime, barber Sweeney Todd. Composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim refashions a macabre tale into a musical masterwork in this dazzling performance of the 1979 Broadway hit originally staged by Harold Prince. In her Tony-winning role, Angela Lansbury plays Nellie. George Hearn turns his stage role of twisted Sweeney into an Emmy-winning triumph. The score coils around itself in every-tightening spirals. The lines ripple with black humor and madness. Enter Sweeney's tonsorial parlor. Attend the tale.
An account of the revolutionary years of the legendary American journalist John Reed (1887-1920), who shared his adventurous professional life with his radical commitment to the socialist revolution in Russia, his dream of spreading its principles among the members of the American working class, and his troubled romantic relationship with the writer Louise Bryant (1885-1936).
Opening with the first day of rehearsals of the London production of "Sweeney Todd", this ninety-minute documentary focuses on the rehearsal process with the musical's director, composer and actors.
"Fredrik Egerman is very happy in his marriage to a seventeen-year-old virgin, Anne. Only she's been a virgin for the whole eleven months of the marriage, and being a bit restless, Fredrik goes to see an old flame, the famous actress Desiree Armfeldt. Desiree is getting tired of her life, and is thinkin of settling down, and sets her sights on Fredrik, despite his marriage, and her own married lover Count Carl-Magnus. She gets her mother to invite the Egermans to her country estate for the weekend. But when Carl-Magnus and his wife Charlotte appear, too, things begin to get farcical (Send in the Clowns), and the night must smile for the third time before all the lovers are united." Written by Kathy Li
Pacific Overtures is a musical written by Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman. The show is set in Japan beginning in 1853 and follows the difficult westernization of Japan, told from the point of view of the Japanese. In particular, the story focuses on the lives of two friends caught in the change. The original Broadway production of Pacific Overtures in 1976 was staged in Kabuki style, with men playing women's parts and set changes made in full view of the audience by black-clad stagehands. It opened to mixed reviews and closed after six months, despite being nominated for ten Tony Awards.Set in 1853 Japan, Pacific Overtures follows the Westernization of Japan, mainly through the story of Kayama, a samurai, and Manjiro, a fisherman. The lives of both men are radically changed by the coming of American ships to Japan.
Irresistible charm and talent helps Serge Alexandre alias Stavisky, small-time swindler, to make friends with even most influential members of French industrial and political elite during the early 30s. But nothing lasts forever and when his great scam involving hundreds millions of francs gets exposed result is an unprecedented scandal that almost caused a civil war.
A year after Sheila is killed in a hit-and-run, her multimillionaire husband invites a group of friends to spend a week on his yacht playing a scavenger hunt-style mystery game. The game turns out to be all too real and all too deadly.
A short documentary released as pre-publicity for the 1973 murder mystery, The Last of Sheila.
Stephen Sondheim's musical "Company" opened on Broadway in the Spring of 1970, and tradition dictates that the cast recording is done on the first Sunday after opening night. D.A. Pennebaker, the now-legendary documentarian, filmed the production of the original cast recording, the back and forth between Sondheim and the performers, and the dynamic of trying to record live performance. The film climaxes with Elaine Stritch's performance of "The Ladies Who Lunch". The show won 6 Tony Awards including "Best Musical" and ran for two years on Broadway. A plan to make a series of "Original Cast Album" films never materialized.
A wily slave must unite a virgin courtesan and his young smitten master to earn his freedom.
A young poet gets the brilliant idea to live in a department store, hiding by day, and courting his muse by night where it's quiet, and he can have all his needs met. But, to his surprise, he learns his brilliant idea's not exactly original; there are other residents who dodge the night watchmen, and who keep their existence secret at all costs. And one of them is a young woman who wants to leave, but is too frightened to go. And Charles finds that he wants to show her the larger world outside.
In the slums of the upper West Side of Manhattan, New York, a gang of Polish-American teenagers called the Jets compete with a rival gang of recently immigrated Puerto Ricans, the Sharks, to "own" the neighborhood streets. Tensions are high between the gangs but two kids, one from each rival gang, fall in love leading to tragedy.
Rejoice in the astonishing all-new footage of Spielberg at work in documentary filmmaker Laurent Bouzereau’s revealing The Stories of West Side Story. Composed of Opening, Prologue, Sharks & Jets, Dance at the Gym, The Romance, America, Gee, Officer Krupke, Cool, From Quintet to the Rumble, I Feel Pretty, Somewhere, Finale, and Tribute.
