Volume 49, Number 17 · November 7, 2002
The Other Half
By Brad Leithauser
The Boys from Syracuse
a musical by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, directed by Scott Ellis, with a new book by Nicky Silver
at the American Airlines Theatre, New York, August 18–October 20, 2002
This Funny World: Mary Cleere Harran Sings Lyrics by Hart
Varese Records, $17.98
There's something wrong with the familiar picture of Lorenz Hart at the opening of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma!, on March 31, 1943. That evening provides one of the most poignant anecdotes in the history of American musical theater. After nearly a quarter-century, the soaring partnership of composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist Lorenz Hart had finally crashed to earth. Hart, a headlong alcoholic who would sometimes disappear for days at a stretch, had proven so unreliable, as well as professionally recalcitrant about future plans, that Rodgers had at last secured a new partner, Oscar Hammerstein II. Oklahoma! was Rodgers and Hammerstein's first Broadway show.
Review, 3920 words
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