Topic Gypsy tidbits from the General Chit-Chat forum.
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Bwaybaby
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3/10/2001 | posted: 3/7/2003 at 11:49:52 PM ET
Just a few interesting tidbits about GYPSY many of you may have already known some of this stuff...but I still thought I'd post it anyways)
-Betty Comden and Adolph Green were the first ones given the book to adapt but they couldn't figure out a way of doing it so they returned the advance
-Jerome Robbin's had conceived Rose's Turn as a ballet in which all the characters would appear. Although unable to make the dance work he asked that the number be done as a solo instead
-Irving Berlin had been approached to do the score but he turned it down. Cole Porter also turned down the show.
--Jerome Robbins originally wanted Steve to write both the music and lyrics for the show but Ethel Merman didn't want to take a chance on an unknown composer ( Gypsy only being Steve's 2nd show). She wanted Jule Styne to write the music and was happy to have Steve write the lyrics. Sondheim originally turned down the job but Arthur persisted in pushing him to write the lyrics. Finally, it was Oscar Hammerstein( Steve's mentor) who convinced Steve into taking the job.
- Everything 's Coming up Roses was originally a song called "In Betwixt and Between" from High Button Shoes( 1947) that was "thrown out"
- the melody for 'You'll Never get Away From me" was taken from a song Jule had written for a movie called Pink Tights. The lyricist never finished writing the lyrics so Steve wrote new ones to fit this show. Although Steve didn't know until afterwards that someone else had already completed the lyrics for another movie.
-early on in Gypsy's run Jerome Robbins, without telling anybody, cut " Little Lamb" from the show. Jule asked him to put the number back in but Jerry refused so Jule said if he didn't put the song back in he'd withdraw his entire score unless Little Lamb was put back in that night.
- Sondheim: "Ethel worked very hard, and she told us that we could put anything into the show up until one week before the opening. Thereafter, she would not change a single word, gesture, move or anything. Two weeks before the opening I thought
that SOME PEOPLE needed a verse because the dialogue that precedes the song is on a high pitch and the song starts low. It needed the verse to bring it down. The cue-in is clumsy and it would have helped the song a lot. After it was written, however, she said she felt it was too angry and she refused to learn it."
** most shows will "freeze" the show the way it is about a week before opening. There are several reasons why but this is how its usually done.
- Elaine Stritch was going to star as Mama Rose in London in the 70s but not enough money could be raised for the production. The role had originally been offered to Angela Lansbury, but she turned it down...however she changed her mind and was able to set up a deal with the producers so that they could afford to go on with the production in London
-Sondheim provided the voice of Rose's father on the original cast album.
** I also found some interesting info about Sunday in the Park with George and Into the Woods-- let me know if any of you want to hear that too.
|  Christine-NYC
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Registered:
3/23/2002
From:
New York City
Fav. BP Song: With So Little to be Sure Of
Fav. BP Show: Gypsy
Fav. BP Character: Marie (insert last name) lol There's a few
Fav. BP CD: Bernadette Peters Loves Rogers and Hammerstein
| posted: 3/8/2003 at 7:34:01 AM ET
By all means, post away. I love reading facts that I didn't know (well, some of those I knew, but not all). 
<3CMH<3
|  Linnie4Bernadette
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12/8/2002 | posted: 3/8/2003 at 7:54:17 AM ET
Thanks for sharing those facts Cindy.....very cool stuff! And yes, I would be very interested to hear some facts about SITPWG and Into the Woods
~Linnie
|  Jenny_loves_
bernadette
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Registered:
6/6/2002
From:
London | posted: 3/9/2003 at 4:51:43 AM ET
yeah please tell us about sitpwg and itw. I love 'em!!!!
they say bernadette's wonderful..........and she is
xx Jenny xx
| mikee
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12/4/2002 | posted: 3/9/2003 at 10:32:01 AM ET
Yay for INTO THE WOODS!!!
| Bwaybaby
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3/10/2001 | posted: 3/10/2003 at 12:11:03 AM ET
Sunday in the Park with George.....
- After Merrily We Roll Along pretty much got panned and closed Steve declared that he was going to give up writing for Musical Theatre and, instead, perhaps work on some mystery novels...until he got a call about collaborating on SITPWG.
- James Lapine was not a fan of Broadway, particularly Broadway musicals until seeing Sweeney Tood and after Steve sent him some tapes of all the shows he had ever done.
- Steve and James initially got the idea of the show from a French 50s and 60s magazine called Bizzare in which one issue was devoted entirely to a couple hundred pages of "every conceivable variantion of the Monda Lisa"
-Serat died of a mysterious illness in his sleep one night. His son also died of the same thing.
- "Putting it Together" was not put into the show until after the Playwrights Horizons run of the show.
- Lapine:"the original idea was for all the secondary characters to have songs".
-the second act was not completed until after the workshop.However they did perform the final 3 performances of the workshop with the second act of the book and two songs.
- Sondheim: "The one difference was that at Playwrights, George was not a light sculptor( working with projections and lasers), he was a performance artist; and that was screamingly funny, but we worried about it making him out to be a fool.
So we changed that. Also, at one point we were going to go back to the Fifties. We even had a little boy in the cast to play george in 1953, but we never put that in."
- Mandy Patinkin " took classes at the Art Students League, watched documentaries, read books and even flew to Chicago twice to see the original painting" to prepare for the show's Braodway run. He also spent 7 hours staring at the painting and even did the whole first act of the play in frotn of it, talking to the people in the painting.
- Bernadette: " When we were in rehearsals for the Broadway production I had many concerns. I thought that the character of Dot wasn't strong enough. If George was such a defined character and if they had this deep connection in their relationship, then she needed to be a stronger person. " We Do Not Belong Together" was originally more of a duet, but Steve realized that this was a mistake; you didn't hear enough of the woman's point of view in this relationship, otherwise she would just be one of those other women that he sings about in " Finishing the Hat". So the number was refocused to carry Dot's emotions. The song, even more strongly, shows how Dot makes a decision and resolves within herself that they do not belong together, eventhough they do belong together."
-- "Lesson #8" and "Children and Art" was not written until after Broadway previews began
| Bwaybaby
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3/10/2001 | posted: 3/10/2003 at 12:13:29 AM ET
Into the Woods.....
- an earlier title of Into the Woods was Fe Fi Fo Fum
-As SITPWG was done at Playwrights so was ITW- with only a sketch of the opening number and all of Act One, but none of the rest of the score.
-Chip Zien orginally read for the role of Runplestilskin..however that role was cut and he went on to play the Baker.
- " Writing the score was, as usual, a painstaking process for Sondheim. His initial thought was to create specific musical identities for each of the show's characters: the Witch would perform Rap music; the Wolf. blues; Jack, folk songs; and Cinderella, operetta. These forms soon proved too confining and were abandoned."
- James Lapine was actually once a graphic designer
-Walter Cronkite was James' first choice for the role of the Narrator
-during the pre- Broadway rehearsal period two different actors were hired to play the Narrrator and the Mysterious Man
- in the show's pre broadway run in San Diego the baker's Wife died eating a poisonous apple
-Betty Buckley played the Witch during two weeks of rehearsals( which I'm sure many of you already knew)
- They didn't specifically think of Bernadette to play the Witch...she was coincidentally talking to James one day and he was saying how they didn't have anyone to play the Witch and she said it was a role she would be interested in playing
- ITW was Steve's first show to have a touring road company go out before the original Broadway company had closed
-- a survey showed that over 30% of the audience went to see ITW just because Bernadette was in it
| angelgrl9
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2/16/2003 | posted: 3/10/2003 at 1:33:13 AM ET
bwaybaby, did you get that 500 page book on sondheim? b/c i have that book and all that stuff was in it. i recomend it to everyone, it's so interesting to read about sondheim and his life and the stories of all his shows. i have a questoin for you, bwaybaby, if you do have the huge book i'm takling about. mine stops after into the woods i think and i was wondering if there was maybe an updated version out there somewhere. thanks 
ciao!
| Bwaybaby
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3/10/2001 | posted: 3/10/2003 at 10:13:43 PM ET
Hi sorry...I didn't see your post until now and yes I do have Sondheim & Co. mine does not stop at ITW tho. the book is out of print and can be very difficult to find but I've had this one for quite sometime.
| Christine-NYC
Registered User
Registered:
3/23/2002
From:
New York City
Fav. BP Song: With So Little to be Sure Of
Fav. BP Show: Gypsy
Fav. BP Character: Marie (insert last name) lol There's a few
Fav. BP CD: Bernadette Peters Loves Rogers and Hammerstein
| posted: 3/12/2003 at 8:03:41 AM ET
Is that the one with Bernadette on the cover from a scene of Sunday in the Park With George? Because I have that one...I've just never read through the entire thing 
<3CMH<3
| angelgrl9
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2/16/2003 | posted: 3/12/2003 at 12:53:54 PM ET
i don't know if bwaybaby has the same one that i have, but mine has a man's torso in a tux and buttons on his lapel of all of steve's shows.
| Bwaybaby
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Registered:
3/10/2001 | posted: 3/12/2003 at 12:56:54 PM ET
No, thats the first edition I believe. I have the newer one with the cast of ITW( and Bernadette) on the cover.
|  moljul
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4/2/2001
From:
New York
Fav. BP CD: I'll Be Your Baby Tonight
Fav. BP Song: Dublin Lady
| posted: 3/12/2003 at 12:58:34 PM ET
yeah I have that one too - the one with Bernadette on the cover. It says it is the updated version. haven't read it in a long time - I should get it out again.
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