The flop that finally flew: why did it take 40 years for Sondheim's Merrily We Roll Along to soar?

"In 1981 I wrote excitedly about a new Stephen Sondheim musical, Merrily We Roll Along, that I had seen in preview in New York; reviled by reviewers and shunned by the public, it then closed two weeks after opening. In 2023-24 the very same musical ran for a year on Broadway, won four Tony awards and was hailed by the critics."

"Based on a 1934 play by George S Kaufman and Moss Hart, it is still the same story, told in reverse chronological order, of dissolving relationships: a success-worshipping composer and movie producer, Franklin Shepard, looks back over his life and sees how time has eroded both his creative partnership with a dramatist, Charley, and their mutual friendship with a novelist, Mary."

"It no longer opens with a student song written by Franklin but with a gaudy party celebrating his latest movie success. The approach to casting has also changed. The 1981 cast was made up of fresh-faced performers who started by simulating middle age and eased naturally into youth as the evening progressed. Now it is standard practice to cast mature actors as in the Friedman production where Jonathan Groff, Daniel Radcliffe and Lindsay Mendez straddle the years with minimal adjustments."

"I should come clean and admit that I was moist-eyed for much of the Friedman film: my tears were prompted partly by the emotional heft of the story and partly by my pleasure in the music. The virtue of the narrative is that it will have different resonances for each individual. As in Pinter's Betrayal, which also uses reverse chronology, it shows how life inevitably in"

Merrily We Roll Along is based on a 1934 play by George S Kaufman and Moss Hart and tells, in reverse chronological order, of dissolving relationships among Franklin Shepard, his dramatist partner Charley and novelist Mary. The 1981 Broadway production closed after two weeks, while a 2023-24 revival ran for a year, won four Tony Awards and earned critical acclaim. Sondheim and George Furth made structural changes after 1981, including opening with a party rather than a student song. Casting approaches shifted from youthful actors simulating age to casting mature performers such as Jonathan Groff, Daniel Radcliffe and Lindsay Mendez. A live Friedman production has been filmed for cinematic release.

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