CReatiVitY - An Eternal Mystery
Sponsored by Stuart & Ginger Polisner
BEST WORST THING THAT EVER COULD HAVE HAPPENED
Tuesday, February 28 at 7:30 pm
Members $11 | Public $16 | Discussion follows film
In Person: Original “Merrily We Roll Along” cast members Mana Allen & Paul Hyams
Acclaimed theater director Lonny Price’s acclaimed new documentary explores the creation of Stephen Sondheim’s “Merrily We Roll Along” and charts the journey of the original cast in the 30-plus years since the musical debuted on Broadway in 1981.
In 1981, Stephen Sondheim, Harold Prince, and George Furth embarked on Merrily We Roll Along, a musical based on the 1934 George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart comedy told in reverse: the characters, played by a cast of teenage unknowns, begin as disillusioned adults and end as starry-eyed adolescents. Though the original, much-ballyhooed production was panned by the critics and closed after just 16 performances, Merrily We Roll Along would go on to attain musical theater legend status. This alternately heartbreaking and euphoric film by original cast member Lonny Price is a bittersweet meditation on the choices we all make, and the often unexpected consequences of those choices -- through success and failure. Featuring never-before seen footage of Price and Sondheim at work on the show and revisits many of Price’s fellow actors, all of them united by this once-ina-lifetime experience. (USA, 2016, 95 min., English, NR, DCP | Dir. Lonny Price)
