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Tonight won't be just any night
Staying cool: Gangs in motion in West Side Story at The New Alexandra Theatre in Birmingham
WEST Side Story opened at The New Alexandra Theatre on 1 April 2014 for a three week run after sell out dates around the country and a sold-out season in Paris at Christmas in 2012 and performances in Australia, China, Japan and throughout Europe. This international touring version uses the
original Jerome Robbins choreography from the 1957 Broadway premier and
is directed by Robbin’s former assistant Joey Mcneely. Roger Clarke is not alone in thinking this is the best musical ever and her he explains why. SO
what makes West Side Story
the best musical ever? Well, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, book by
Arthur Laurents, music by Leonard Bernstein and choreography by Jerome
Robbins, all from from an original idea by William Shakespeare is a good
start. There are other
contenders of course, some stronger then others, such as
Les Miserables
which has been running continuously for 29 years making it the second
longest running musical in history after
The Fantastics
which ran for 42 years. Then there is
The Sound of Music, Rodgers and
Hammerstein’s final collaboration, which has its supporters as does the
inventive Blood Brothers
which is a favourite of some. Andrew Lloyd Webber’s output, particularly
Evita and The Phantom of the Opera, can call on torchbearers
while among the outsiders Guys and Dolls deserves a mention, if
only for the colourful characters from Damon Runyon’s wonderful
underworld of Broadway. La Cage au Folles , involving Arthur
Laurents again, could stake a claim as the leader of the coming out of
musicals, so to speak, while there can be some surprising contenders
among the theatre going public. Leaving The New Alexandra Theatre one evening
after reviewing All the Fun of the Fair I even heard a woman tell
her companion it was the best musical she had ever seen – perhaps she
did not get out much and I do hope that she returns to the Alex to see
West Side Story for comparison – even though David Essex is not in it. A recent radio station poll had Les Mis
top with West Side Story only eighth behind Wicked, Phantom.
Sweeny Todd, Rent, A Chorus Line and Into the Woods. Another list has Gypsy top with Les Mis
down in 52nd spot, two below Wicked, while Entertainment Weekly
had Guys and Dolls top with West Side Story at five. It is not an exact science, not even a science at
all, just an opinion. You pays your money and takes your choice, so what
is the case for West Side Story. First it is relevant, the Romeo & Juliet theme of
star-crossed lovers from opposing families is both universal and
contemporary. Shakespeare’s play was set in the Middle Ages but Verona’s
Montagues and Capulets easily became the Sharks and Jets, the gangs of
Peurto Ricans and Polish-Americans in West Side Story 57 years ago, but
you could just as easily read it today as Northern Ireland’s Protestants
and Catholics or the divide of Christian and Muslim, Jew and Muslim,
black and white, lovers from opposite sides of an intolerant, ethnic
divide, facing hatred and threat, lovers who still die in suicides and
honour killings . . . honour perhaps being the greatest misuse of
a word in any language. Other contenders tell a story but it is not a
story with any real echoes today. Les Mis, for example, good as it is,
is about a draconian French penal system long gone and a minor
insurrection in a small part of Paris in June
It doesn’t make the also rans lesser musicals of
course but West Side’s story is just as relevant now as it was even in
Shakespeare’s day. When it comes to the score few musicals can
compete. The show opened on Broadway in 1957 with an orchestra of 31 and
Bernstein recorded Symphonic Dances from West Side Story, an
orchestral piece, four years later, a suite that has become part of the
repertoire of many major orchestras. The full overture is a symphonic piece on its own
while every song is recognisable with more standards among them than
most musicals can muster, and all were original. Songs such as Maria, Tonight, Somewhere, I
Have a Love, One Hand, One Heart and so on can be found in the CV
of artists from Phil Collins to Pavarotti, There is no hint of padding, no feeling a song
has been thrown in just to keep someone happy with a solo or to give
time for a costume or scene change . . . or because musicals have songs
and it is about time we had another one. These songs are there because they are part of
the story, moving the narrative along. Its opening night was a sensation, a theatrical
revolution. Sure, there had been dance musicals before, but they were
merely vehicles for dancers such as Fred Astaire, until he went to
movies, to show their party pieces. Musicals up to West Side Story had been musical
comedies with paper thin plots, vehicles for singers or dancers, with
formulaic dance numbers and a happy, romantic comedy ending. West Side Story broke just about every rule. The
music, songs, dances, characters and story were interweaving, each
depending upon the rest, each needed to tell the story with the tendrils
of ballet and opera intertwining around them. Instead of happy-go-lucky cowboys, socialites,
sailors or middle class urbanites here was a real drama about gangs,
juvenile delinquents, teenagers killing each other on the streets
outside, a world it was easier and safer to pretend did not exist. There were no top hat and tails here, no smart
cut suits, s It had taken ten years but one show
changed the way we looked at musicals for ever For the first time the audience had been taken
beyond musical comedy, it had reached musical theatre, drama told
through music. It was a realisation that a musical could be more that
smiles, wisecracks and pretty steps as boy meets girl, obstacles are
overcome and then an ending with a big number as love conquers all and
boy and girl live happily every after. This had all the drama of the
play and a far from happy ending, no feel good factor to head home with
here. The first act ends with two dead bodies sprawled
across the stage and second with our dead hero laid out in the shadow of
the tenements and there is no big number to finish. The changes were profound. Under Robbins’
choreography and direction a cast had to not only dance, but sing and
act. The dance meant as much as the book, as much as the lyrics and as
much as the music. Total theatre. As for big star names . . . there were none. The
cast were young and a conscious decision was taken not to cast singers.
Bernstein said: "Anything that sounded more professional would
inevitably sound more experienced, and then the ‘kid’ quality would be
gone." All but a tiny handful of the 40 “kids” in the
original cast were making their Broadway debuts and Robbins kept the
Sharks and Jets well apart to avoid socialising. He wanted a gang
mentality to show through on stage. You could argue that the likes of Miss Saigon or
even Le Miserables might not have happened had not someone shown that
musicals could be made about stories that showed the raw, ugly side of
life. And it was West Side Story that took up the challenge. The stories in musicals had become more complex
through the 1940s, the same storylines but with a harder edge and a
glance at some side issues, with a hint of racism, for example in South
Pacific. But West Side Story laid it all bare, exposing
the violent underbelly of New York, although it could have been almost
any city, with all the prejudice, and racial hatred and the world of
violent street gangs. This was life in the raw and for the first time
love wasn’t going to conquer all, love wasn’t even going to win. There is hope though, the Another multi-voice song comes near the close of
the second act with A Boy Like That and I have a Love from
Anita and Maria, the supportive Anita changing sides and loyalties and
telling Maria to dump Tony who has killed her brother, “stick to your
own kind” while Maria sings the beautiful bittersweet I have a love.
“I have a love, and it’s all that I Have.” There is also a pointed shot at society. The
Gee, Officer Krupke! song might be funny, and it is, but listen to
the words, and that is what these kids were having to put up with. Their
problems were hardly going to be solved by labels and probably still
aren’t. Back in 1957 it was a revolution; fabulous
dancing and songs that were to become solid gold standards, a great
story, thanks to Bill, and symphonic music all pulling together, telling
the same story in a stark grimy, urban set of fire escapes amid inner
city slums. So does it deserve to be the best musical of all
time? But see it yourself and then you can make your
own mind up. Roger Clarke The show opened on Broadway in 1957 but
had its origins 10 years earlier when Robbins discussed a modern day
version of Romeo & Juliet with Bernstein and Laurents. The original idea
was a clash between an Irish American family and a Jewish family on the
lower East Side, with gangs of Irish Jets fighting the Jewish Emeralds.
It was to be East Side Story and a draft script
was produced but the idea just didn’t work and the three went their
separate way for five years. Laurents was then working in Hollywood and
Bernstein was conducting there so the two met up and started talked
about the new phenomenon of turf wars between teenage gangs. A clash in
Chicago was filling the papers. Bernstein suggested East Side Story
could be set in Los Angeles with a Mexican American gang, Laurents
preferred New York and Puerto Ricans. Robbins was contacted and work
started again - this time on West Side Story. Bernstein had intended
to write the lyrics himself, but decided writing the music would take
all his time, so Laurents approached well known writers and lyricists
Betty Comden and Adolph Green, but they turned it down so Laurents asked
the young, inexperienced Stephen Sondheim if he fancied giving it a try.
Laurents had heard Sondheim’s score for the still to be produced
Saturday Night and had been impressed by the lyrics, less so by the
music, but that hardly mattered as it was just words he wanted. There were still problems ahead though. Two
months before rehearsals were due to start the main producer Cheryl
Crawford pulled out. Every other producer had already turned the show
down as too depressing and gloomy so West Side Story was fighting for
its life. The crisis was averted when Sondheim convinced his friend,
producer Hal Prince, to listen to the score and that was that. Prince
took it on, albeit after cutting the budget, but at last the story was
set to be told. |
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1832.
It started with barricades one night and was put down the next. The
Sound of Music is about escaping Hitler and I suspect not many twins
are sold for cash in Liverpool these days – if ever any where.
hiny
tap shoes, champagne or sweeping staircases to dance up and down, just
grimy tenements, fire escapes, humid summer heat, slums and these kids
with attitude in jeans and trainers, with flick knives as a necessary
fashion accessory. Not only that but the dance was modern, athletic,
aggressive or suggestive with its roots more in ballet than the usual
fare of musical theatre with its diet of tap and ballroom.
re
is the ambition to get out in songs such as Somewhere with its
dream that “there’s a place for us, somewhere”. And you also see
the conflicts that dictate life in the ghettoes in the end of the first
act Tonight quintet from the ensemble as we see the Jets and
Sharks preparing for their rumble, Anita getting ready for her hot date,
and Tony and Maria singing about their love. Excitement, threat,
danger, romance and tragedy all tied up on one number.