UNAPPRECIATED MASTERPIECE OR ABJECT FAILURE?
Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein began the Golden Era of Broadway with two musicals that reimagined the previous form of musical comedies – a cluster of songs packaged together by a plot – by using songs to heighten and embellish a striking narrative. After creating Oklahoma! (1943) and Carousel (1945), two of the most successful musicals of all time, Hammerstein had in mind to create a show that would be a minimally staged work about the life of a small-town physician who rethinks his successful practice once he becomes an elite society doctor. Critic Martin Gottfried compared Allegro (1947) to Thornton Wilder’s Our Town (1938), in that they both had a bare-stage for an avant-garde look, a theme celebrating small-town America, and moral platitudes. In addition to the traditional singing chorus, Hammerstein added a Greek Chorus who would observe and remark on the action to both players and audience.
To say that the show received mixed reviews is an understatement. Thanks to advanced ticket sales, Allegro ran for 315 performances, but the show closed at a financial loss as audiences ultimately found it too experimental and overly-moralizing (or perhaps the songs just weren’t good enough, according to columnist Steven Suskin, even though the score includes the hit tunes “The Gentleman Is a Dope” and “So Far”).
Stephen Sondheim, a 17-year-old gopher on the production, said of Allegro: “It really was the first attempt to integrate epic theater and Brechtian techniques into the Great American Musical. Oscar had crafted a piece way ahead of its time.” The rave notices called Allegro “a work of great beauty and purity” and “a stunning blend of integrity, intelligence, imagination, taste, and skill.” Culled from the pans are “very grave disappointment,” “an out-right failure,” and “Messrs. Rodgers and Hammerstein seem to have confused “allegro” with, say, “lento.”
Now you get to experience live and in concert why critic Wayne Abrams wrote, “Nobody is neutral about Allegro – the musical play is either nigh unto perfection or a dismal flop. There’s that much room for disagreement.” Born out of the Academy of New Musical Theatre, Perpetual Surrey, a new choral ensemble (or “theatrichorale”) dedicated to singing and performing theatrical choral music, will present Allegro for one-night only at 7:30 on Tuesday, December 06, 2011 at the Met Theatre in Hollywood. For tickets and more info, go to: http://www.anmt.org/events.asp.
