Sondheim - A Monodrama - A-V Cues
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Transcript of Sondheim - A Monodrama - A-V Cues
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I – 1 – 1
STEPHEN SONDHEIM
A Monodrama by
THOMAS HARTWELL
ACT I
Scene 1
(The stage is dark. A screen hangs above the set, showing various
projections and recordings throughout the play. Lights up on STEPHEN
SONDHEIM, who stands next to a piano center stage. Around him are a
number of small black boxes. He addresses the audience)
SONDHEIM
There are only three principles necessary for a lyric writer, all of them familiar truisms. In no
particular order, and to be written in stone:
Content Dictates Form.
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
Less Is More.
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
God Is in the Details,
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
all in the service of Clarity,
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
without which nothing else matters.
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
(The boxes placed to his satisfaction, he moves back to the piano.)
If a lyric writer observes this mantra rigorously, he can turn out a respectable lyric. If he also has
a feeling for music and rhythm, a sense of theater and something to say, he can turn out an
interesting one. If in addition he has qualities such as humour, style, and imagination, he might
even turn out a good one. And with an understanding composer and a stimulating book writer—
the sky’s the limit.
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
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I – 1 – 2
(Lights fade as the recording starts up.)
RECORDING
YESTERDAY IS DONE,
SEE THE PRETTY COUNTRYSIDE.
MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG, ROLL ALONG,
FOLLOWING DREAMS!
TRAVELING’S THE FUN,
FLASHING BY THE COUNTRYSIDE.
EVERYBODY MERRILY, MERRILY—
1975!
(lights up on SONDHEIM at the piano)
SONDHEIM
I’m working on a new show with Hal Prince and John Weidman—Pacific Overtures—about the
American invasion of Japan in, uh, 1853. And we hit this crucial moment of the negotiations
between Japan and America in a treaty house. And John informed us that nothing dramatic at all
happened in the treaty house. Which is problematic. So we talked, and out of our discussion
came the idea of somebody’s memory—we would flash forward in time, perhaps, and an old
man would come out, and he would remember what happened, and his younger self, a young
boy, would materialize, and we’d see the event through the eyes of both of them. And we would
have a warrior under the floorboards of the treaty house reporting what he hears. So we’ll have
an old man remembering what happened, his younger self reporting what he sees, and a warrior
reporting what he hears. And Hal liked it, so all that’s left is to write it. I think the main reason
the idea appealed to him is that there’s no other way of solving it, and generally when that
happens, Hal says “we’ll have Steve write a number”. And that’s the way he solves those things.
(beat, he picks up a packet of paper)
I had John write a script of the scene for me. Even if we know that a piece of material is gonna
be a number, I like to have the playwright write out what he thinks it would be. He doesn’t have
to polish it or anything, but just give it a tone. I wanted John to invent an old man and a young
boy and a samurai, because I didn’t know how they would talk in John’s style.
(beat; he starts to read from the packet)
“The lights come up on an old Japanese man wearing nondescript robes. And the old man says
“Pardon me, but I was there”. And the reciter says “you were where?” and the old man says “At
Kanagawa. In the treaty house. I was there and saw it all. I snuck up to the treaty house and hid
behind a tree, which grew just there”, and he gestures towards a barren spot. And he says “at
least I think that was the spot.” And a tree suddenly appears. “Just as I remembered.” He tries to
climb the tree and he can’t, and he says “Well, I was younger then”. The Reciter looks skeptical.
(beat)
The hardest part of writing is you’ve got to get something on paper, it’s the only rule—it’s the
only rule is that you must get something down on paper so that you can then look at it and start
to work on it. All that writer’s block consists of is that censoring that happens before the pencil
hits the paper. And that of course is death, and that’s the hardest thing to overcome.
(beat; he sighs)
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I – 1 – 3
I’m a lazy writer. My idea of heaven is not writing. On the other hand, I’m obviously compulsive
about it. I end up working seventeen hours a day, because I’m a procrastinator. It’s my own
fault—I’m disciplined in the work but not disciplined in work habits.
(beat, he grabs some of his materials)
I use soft lead pencils, very soft. Supposedly that makes the writing easier on your wrist, but
what it really does is allow you to sharpen them every five minutes. I write on a yellow legal pad
with thirty-two lines, and use the Roget’s Thesaurus, and a rhyming dictionary, the Clement
Wood, which is the only one I would recommend because it’s the only one with lists of words
where the eye goes up and down the columns. When I’m not at the piano, I write lying down on
a couch, for the obvious reason that it allows me to fall asleep whenever I encounter difficulties,
which is often.
(he grabs a piece of paper)
Okay, so what is the old man really talking about, apart from not remembering and not being
able to climb a tree? What is he thinking…
(he pauses and thinks a moment, and starts writing down random thoughts
as they come to him.)
It’s the tales that count…Outsiders see details, insiders aren’t objective. I noticed…everything—
I see everything. It’s the details that matter. It’s the word, not the sentence, It’s the pebble not the
stream, it’s the stroke, not the painting. Fragment of the day. Everything affects everything. If I
hadn’t been there, it might have been different. Who’s to say? I was part of it.
(beat; sudden realization)
I was someone in a tree.
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
(Lights fade as the recording takes over. SONDHEIM moves about the
space, rearranging and perfecting the position of the various black boxes.)
RECORDING
BIT BY BIT,
PUTTING IT TOGETHER.
PIECE BY PIECE—
ONLY WAY TO MAKE A WORK OF ART.
EVERY MOMENT MAKES A CONTRIBUTION,
EVERY LITTLE DETAIL PLAYS A PART.
HAVING JUST THE VISION’S NO SOLUTION,
EVERYTHING DEPENDS ON EXECUTION:
PUTTING IT TOGETHER,
THAT’S WHAT COUNTS.
OUNCE BY OUNCE,
PUTTING IT TOGETHER.
SMALL AMOUNTS
ADDING UP TO MAKE A WORK OF ART.
FIRST OF ALL YOU NEED A GOOD FOUNDATION,
OTHERWISE IT’S RISKY FROM THE START.
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I – 1 – 4
TAKES A LITTLE COCKTAIL CONVERSATION,
BUT WITHOUT THE PROPER PREPERATION,
HAVING JUST THE VISION’S NO SOLUTION,
EVERYTHING DEPENDS ON EXECUTION.
THE ART OF MAKING ART
IS PUTTING IT TOGETHER
BIT BY BIT.
SONDHEIM
People often ask, you know, which comes first, music or the lyrics. Generally it’s both for me—
generally I like to get some kind of accompaniment figure—which, in this song was interesting,
one of the reasons I like this song so much, is that I decided one of the qualities of Japanese
music that wasn’t being taken advantage of enough in the score was its relentlessness, how it
goes on and on and on, and I thought I’d like to write a song, see how long I can sustain interest
by taking an accompaniment figure and just have it go on over and over again with the tiniest
changes in it. The figure that I made was this one:
(he demonstrates)
I thought I would use that beat—doh buh-buh buh-buh bum—throughout, but breaking it up
different ways, so as it develops it gets to—
(he plays another figure)
Which sounds different, but isn’t. And then I thought, supposing I kept that up with just little
variations, just dipping down every now and then to a note. And then I thought, as the old man
gets more and more desperate, it will grow a little bit, and get to be a crescendo, and gradually
build to the entrance of the boy. Because at the beginning, the old man repeats himself in
desperation because he runs out of excuses, because he knows that the reciter doesn’t believe that
he was there because he can’t climb the tree. So he keeps saying—I was younger then, I was
good at climbing trees, I was younger then. And the music just keeps doing the same thing that
he’s doing, only the music becomes more desperate as he’s becoming more desperate, so he’s
going—
(he starts to play and sing)
I WAS YOUNGER THEN,
He’s not worried yet. He tries again.
I WAS GOOD AT CLIMBING TREES.
Tries again.
I WAS YOUNGER THEN.
I SAW EV’RYTHING!
I WAS HIDDEN ALL THE TIME.
He tries again.
IT WAS EASIER TO CLIMB.
He’s getting desperate.
I WAS YOUNGER THEN.
I SAW EV’RYTHING!
WHERE THEY CAME AND WHERE THEY WENT.
I WAS PART OF THE EVENT.
I WAS SOMEONE IN A TREE!
I WAS YOUNGER THEN!
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I – 1 – 5
And then the boy comes in, at the top of his desperation, climbs up the tree—
(hits the final chord)
And he says “Tell him what I see”. And then it starts, but it’s all about building to that moment
where—thank god he got up the tree.
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
RECORDING
ART ISN’T EASY—
EVERY MINOR DETAIL
IS A MAJOR DECISION!
HAVE TO KEEP THINGS IN SCALE,
HAVE TO HOLD TO YOUR VISION!
SONDHEIM
It was fun to try to write something that, at the time that I started, seemed like an impossible
assignment—how do you write a trio about nothing? And then when you decide “I know, I’m
going to write about nothing”, it’s a very exciting moment. Because it’s a song literally about
nothingness, and about everythingness—every little detail and change in the music is important.
When I played it for John, I sat at the piano and started to cry, which rather intimidated him. And
he said “I think that’s the best song you’ve written”, which—it is my favorite song. I find that,
when I sing it, the intensity of feeling I feel singing it is a reflection of the intensity of feeling in
the song. And it never fails for me—the song always moves me, whether I’m singing it or not,
whether it’s on a piano or in the orchestra, and it’s just—it’s just a personal thing.
(he continues to play the song)
AND THEY SAT THROUGH THE NIGHT
AND THEY LIT YELLOW TAPERS.
I’M A FRAGMENT OF THE DAY.
IF I WEREN’T, WHO’S TO SAY
THINGS WOULD HAPPEN HERE THE WAY
THAT THEY’RE HAPPENING?
A/V CUE – Click to Next Slide
IT’S THE FRAGMENT, NOT THE DAY,
IT’S THE PEBBLE, NOT THE STREAM,
IT’S THE RIPPLE, NOT THE SEA
THAT IS HAPPENING.
NOT THE BUILDING BUT THE BEAM,
NOT THE GARDEN BUT THE STONE,
ONLY CUPS OF TEA
AND HISTORY
AND SOMEONE IN A TREE!
End of Play