| Song and Dance | |
|---|---|
| Music | Andrew Lloyd Webber |
| Lyrics | Don Black additional lyrics by Richard Maltby, Jr. |
| Productions | 1982 West End 1985 Broadway 2007 Israel |
Song and Dance is a musical comprising two acts, one told entirely in "Song" and one entirely in "Dance", tied together by a love story.
The first part is Tell Me On A Sunday, with lyrics by Don Black and music by Andrew Lloyd Webber, about a young British woman's romantic misadventures in New York City and Hollywood. The second part is a ballet choreographed to Variations, composed by Lloyd Webber for his cellist brother Julian, which is based on the A Minor Caprice No. 24 by Paganini.
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The Song portion was written specifically for Marti Webb, and presented at the Sydmonton Festival in the summer of 1979. It was subsequently recorded and aired as a one-hour television special by the BBC the following January.
The Dance portion was recorded in 1978, and nearly became incorporated into Cats. (The opening sequence was utilized as the theme music for London Weekend Television's South Bank Show). Producer Cameron Mackintosh proposed that the two pieces be combined under the umbrella title Song and Dance to acknowledge the primary aspect of each act.
The musical had its world premiere on March 26, 1982 in the West End at the Palace Theatre, where it ran for 781 performances. Marti Webb performed the Song half; she subsequently was succeeded by Sarah Brightman, Gemma Craven, Carol Nielsson, Lulu, and Liz Robertson. The Dance portion was choreographed by Anthony van Laast and featured Wayne Sleep and Jane Darling.
Director/lyricist Richard Maltby, Jr. was approached to adapt the first act for an American audience, adding more plot. The Broadway production, choreographed by Peter Martins, opened on September 18, 1985 at the Royale Theatre, and closed on November 8, 1986, after 474 performances and seventeen previews. Bernadette Peters starred in Song for nearly thirteen months; she was succeeded by Betty Buckley for the final four weeks. Dance featured Christopher d'Amboise and Gregg Burge.
Singer-songwriter Melissa Manchester starred in a subsequent 6-month US national tour of the show in 1987, starting in Dallas, Texas and ending in Tampa, Florida.[1][2]
The Broadway production received eight Tony Award nominations, with Peters winning as Best Actress (Musical).
An English girl, newly arrived in New York, stumbles upon her boyfriend in her apartment. She confronts him and decides to break up. She writes to her mother in England about what happened, and that she has met a new man, Sheldon Bloom, with whom she travels to California. Bloom is a Hollywood producer and lives in a mansion named La Bohème. Days pass and the girl finds out how uneventful Hollywood is ("Capped Teeth and Caesar Salad"). She realizes that Sheldon has only been using her as a trophy, and she ends things once and for all. Los Angeles becomes a quick disappointment for her.
The girl meets yet another man, this time a younger one who she finds more fulfilling. Soon, however, it is time for the younger man to go away to work. The girl can't bear to let him go. Her friend later comes over to tell her about the man's infidelity, and she asks him for the truth. The girl walks through the streets of New York, very depressed. This time, she has met a married man. She reflects that the affair is wrong. The married man comes by to confess his love, and she realizes that she has been using him. In the end she decides that it wasn't the end of the world to have no one.
Act Two is the examination of one of the men (presumably the younger one), through the music of "Variations", in a series of dances. At the end, the man sees the girl, and they make up, joining both in Song and Dance.
The revised Broadway musical follows the London version; the girl is named "Emma" and is an aspiring hat designer. Through each of the men Emma becomes involved with she undertakes an emotional journey and learns something about herself. Although she has fallen in love with "Joe", he is unable to commit, and after he leaves her, she takes up with "Paul", the married man. Ultimately she realizes that she has started using men, as they had used her: "I'll be Emma again, If it means being hurt, I'll be hurt, But I'll like myself then..." ("What Have I Done").
Emma is alone on stage in Act 1, and the conversations she has with others and her out-loud musings take place with off-stage or imaginary characters. Act 2 belongs to Joe and tell his story through the "Dance" portion; he and Emma finally unite at the end, as Joe matures and realizes that he is in love with Emma.
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London Production
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Broadway production
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The Broadway original cast recording, titled Bernadette Peters in Andrew Lloyd Webber's Song and Dance was released in 1985 by RCA Victor.[3]
In Frank Rich's New York Times review, he wrote: "Miss Peters is more than talented: As an actress, singer, comedienne and all-around warming presence, she has no peer in the musical theater right now. In her half of Song & Dance, she works so hard you'd think she were pleading for mercy before a firing squad. Yet for all the vocal virtuosity, tempestuous fits and husky-toned charm she brings to her one-woman musical marathon, we never care if her character lives or dies.."[4]
John Simon, in The New York Magazine, noted that the unseen men seemed "nebulous and unreal, so too, does the seen woman", and in the Dance half, "things go from bad to worse." However, he wrote that "Miss Peters is an unimpeachable peach of a performer who does so much for the top half of this double bill as to warrant its immediate rechristening 'Song of Bernadette'. She not only sings, acts, and (in the bottom half) dances to perfection, she also, superlatively, 'is' ".[5]
| Year | Award Ceremony | Category | Nominee | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1982 | Laurence Olivier Award[6] | Actress of the Year in a Musical | Marti Webb | Nominated |
| Year | Award Ceremony | Category | Nominee | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1986 | Drama Desk Award | Outstanding Actress in a Musical | Bernadette Peters | Won |
| Outstanding Featured Actor in a Musical | Gregg Burge | Nominated | ||
| Outstanding Choreography | Peter Martins | Nominated | ||
| Outstanding Music | Andrew Lloyd Webber | Nominated | ||
| Grammy Award[7] | Best Musical Show Album | Nominated | ||
| Tony Award | Best Musical | Nominated | ||
| Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical | Bernadette Peters | Won | ||
| Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Musical | Christopher d'Amboise | Nominated | ||
| Best Original Score | Andrew Lloyd Webber, Don Black and Richard Maltby, Jr. | Nominated | ||
| Best Costume Design | Willa Kim | Nominated | ||
| Best Lighting Design | Jules Fisher | Nominated | ||
| Best Choreography | Peter Martins | Nominated | ||
| Best Direction of a Musical | Richard Maltby, Jr. | Nominated | ||