Now that Stephen Sondheim is dead, I can write this blog post without possibly incurring his wrath. In my opinion, Sondheim's furious reaction to Austin Tichenor's article in The Sondheim Review — which highlighted similarities between The Fantasticks and two Sondheim musicals (Sunday in the Park With George and Into the Woods) — was hugely overblown. I'm not 100% onboard with all of Tichenor's thinking, but the similarities between the Act I ending/Act II beginning of Sunday and Fantasticks really can't be denied. In both shows, Act I ends with the characters triumphantly striking a pose. Act II begins with the characters still in position, struggling to hold that pose, and complaining about how hot it is. This similarity struck me way back in 1984 when I saw Sunday on Broadway. Sondheim might at least have acknowledged this much to Tichenor. I mean, it's not as if Tichenor brought up the fact that "No One Is Alone" has the same first six notes as "The Candy Man"!
And while we're on the subject of Leslie Bricusse/Anthony Newley songs, I've wondered for a while now about the similarities between The Roar of the Greasepaint, The Smell of the Crowd's Where Would You Be Without Me? (1965), and Company's What Would We Do Without You? (1970). Is the Company song supposed to be an actual parody of the Roar song? "What Would We Do" erupts from the relatively placid "Side By Side By Side" with a self-consciously "show biz" flair, as if the married couples have to resort to pastiche in order to fully express their affection for Robert. The songs' very similar, internally-rhymed question-titles are sung in identical rhythms. And just today it struck me that there's an instrumental break that's almost identical in both songs, even down to being in the same key:
Granted, this musical break may be derived from a traditional vaudeville or circus fanfare, and thus not really be written by any of these gentlemen. But even though these songs are about "owing a debt", I've never read any acknowledgement of the similarity, from Sondheim or anybody else.
