With Stephen Sondheim having so many Broadway shows to his credit, you can expect at least one of the composer-lyricist’s songs in most any cabaret singer’s repertoire. As if to prove the point, more than 20 members of the Chicago Cabaret Professionals will sing Sondheim tributes this weekend at the Cultural Center.
Before you spend a “Sunday Afternoon with Sondheim,” listening to local crooners such as Audrey Morris, Denise Tomasello, Susan Petri, Daryl Nitz, Bradford Newquist and Tom Michael, On the Town invites you to test your knowledge of Sondheim and his music. (Answers are at bottom.)
1. Sondheim spent part of his adolescence in Bucks County, Pa., where he got to know one of musical theater’s great men. Who was this early Sondheim influence and what hit show was he working on when they met?
A. Alan Jay Lerner, “My Fair Lady”
B. Richard Rodgers, “South Pacific”
C. Irving Berlin, “Annie Get Your Gun”
D. Oscar Hammerstein II, “Oklahoma!”
2. Match the musical to its plot:
1. “A Little Night Music”
2. “Anyone Can Whistle”
3. “Company”
4. “Into the Woods”
A. Five couples are observed by a commitment-phobic friend.
B. A barren couple attempts to reverse a curse in order to have a baby.
C. Three mismatched couples spend a weekend in the country.
D. A town council fakes a miracle to attract tourists.
3. Sondheim’s “Bounce” played in Chicago and Washington, D.C., before the decision was made not to transfer it to Broadway. The show had been in development for years. What were two of the working titles for the show about resilience and a pioneering spirit?
A. “Wise Guys”
B. “Sentimental Guy”
C. “The Legendary Mizners”
D. “Gold!”
4. Which of the following has not been a character in a Sondheim musical?
A. The demon barber of Fleet Street
B. Red Riding Hood
C. John Wilkes Booth
D. Jennie Lee
E. Georges Seurat
5. Over the years Sondheim has had a number of collaborators. Whom in the list below has Sondheim not written with?
A. Madonna
B. Jule Styne
C. George Furth
D. Leonard Bernstein
6. Sondheim won an Academy Award for which of these songs?
A. “Little Dream”
B. “Sooner or Later”
C. “Goodbye for Now”
D. “It Takes All Kinds”
7. “Anyone Can Whistle” played only nine performances on Broadway. In what musical did Sondheim meddle with history by having his central character, a composer, enjoy his first Broadway hit in 1964, when “Anyone Can Whistle” flopped?
A. “By George”
B. “Merrily We Roll Along”
C. “Company”
D. “Follies”
8. Identify the actors in the list below who have played Pseudolus in Sondheim’s “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum.”
A. Nathan Lane
B. Zero Mostel
C. Guy Adkins
D. Guy Pearce
9. “Passion” explores love and obsession, but which of the following was not a number in the 1994 show?
A. “I Wish I Could Forget You”
B. “No One Has Ever Loved Me”
C. “Is This What You Call Love?”
D. “Loving Me”
10. What was Sondheim’s first produced Broadway musical as a composer-lyricist?
A. “West Side Story”
B. “Gypsy”
C. “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum”
D. “Anyone Can Whistle”
Answers:
1. D. Sondheim was so impressed with his neighbor he said he would have become a geologist if Hammerstein had been one.
2. 1-C, 2-D, 3-A, 4-B
3. A and D. “Bounce” was “Wise Guys” in 1999 with Sam Mendes directing Nathan Lane and Victor Garber. Harold Prince later stepped in to direct, and the show was renamed “Gold!” (“The Legendary Mizners” is the name of a book that inspired Sondheim’s interest in the project back in the 1950s. And “Sentimental Guy” is a title Irving Berlin considered when writing his own unfinished Mizner musical.)
4. D. Jennie Lee was a burlesque entertainer–but it was Gypsy Lee Rose who inspired Sondheim’s “Gypsy.”
5. A. Sondheim has not collaborated with Madonna, although she did sing various Sondheim songs in the film “Dick Tracy.”
6. B. The bluesy torch song from “Dick Tracy” won the 1990 Best Song Oscar.
7. B. “Merrily We Roll Along” didn’t fare much better, though. It ran for only 16 performances on Broadway in 1981. “By George,” by the way, is the title of Sondheim’s first musical, written at age 15.
8. D. Guy Adkins is a Chicago actor who appeared as Pseudolus earlier this year at the Marriott Theatre. Guy Pearce starred in the movie “Memento.”
9. D. But there is a song in the show called “Loving You.”
10. C. “West Side Story” and “Gypsy” were Sondheim’s first as a lyricist, but it wasn’t until “Forum” in 1962 that a score he wrote as composer-lyricist was produced.
`Sunday Afternoon with Sondheim’
When: 2 p.m. Sunday
Where: Claudia Cassidy Theater, Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington St.
Price: $25, 312-409-3106
———-
onthetown@tribune.com
