Photo above from the 2017 production of Follies at the National Theatre in London, starring Tracie Bennett, Janie Dee, and Imelda Staunton, and directed by Dominic Cooke.
Class Preparation
- If you're not familiar with the score of Follies, then you might want to listen to some of the many recordings of it (or of individual songs). Just search for "Sondheim Follies" and see what pops up.
- The Wikipedia page for Follies contains many useful and interesting links.
Handouts
- Follies Fact Sheet
- Selected Follies Lyrics
- Follies Climactic Scene (in class we'll hear an audio file of this scene, but sometimes it helps to see the words as well)
- sondheim101_class_4_slides.pdf (This may take some time to load--it's a fat file. I got carried away with photos.)
Links to Websites Referenced in Today's Presentation
- Daisy Eagan singing "Broadway Baby" from the Carnegie Hall celebration of Sondheim in 1992.
- Elaine Stritch singing "I'm Still Here" at the New York Philharmonic's celebration of Sondheim's 80th birthday in 2010. (Sorry about the scrunched video--this is the only one I could find online.)
- A video preview of the 2011 Broadway Revival of Follies from Broadway.com.
- A preview of the National Theatre Live broadcast of Follies from NTLive.
- The "Loveland" section from Follies in Concert (1985) with Mandy Patinkin, Barbara Cook, Lee Remick, and George Hearn as the leads (including the abbreviated ending tacked on for this concert). The whole concert is also available on YouTube.
- Barbra Streisand singing "I'm Still Here" with her Sondheim-tailored lyrics--in a medley that includes "Everybody Says Don't" from Anyone Can Whistle and "Don't Rain on My Parade" from Funny Girl, which Sondheim didn't write. This is a fan-produced video using the recording released on Columbia Records.
- SPECIAL BONUS: Shirley MacLaine singing lyrics tailored for the "Debbie Reynolds character in Postcards from the Edge (1990).
Class Evaluation
What worked?
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What would make it even better?
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