My problem is that I have no idea what my favorite musical is. Not even close, like a top 3 or favorite Golden Age, modern, movie, etc. musical. Sure, most people don’t, but most people also don’t tell every stranger they meet that they like show tunes (when the conversation naturally shifts towards music). Most people don’t face the question often, and when they do, they haven’t pinned any part of their identity to it. They’re certainly not still trying to make a good first impression. I imagine most people know each other for quite a while before resorting to Broadway as a conversation topic.
I know that it’s ridiculous to have a favorite musical. How could anyone reduce all the stories, music, characters, choreography, and productions of shows as varied as A Chorus Line, The Wedding Singer, Once, The SpongeBob Musical, and Hamilton onto a single subjective scale?
But it still gets to me. Even if favorites are nonsense, I want to be able to give an answer that actually reflects my preferences and is not either the musical I listened to most recently (Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown) or Les Miserables, arguably the greatest of all time. Now it also bugs me how frequently and consistently I get myself into this situation without ever seeing it coming.
Don’t go thinking this is a declaration of my favorite musical. I’ve given up on that. Maybe I could take the time to go through everything I’ve seen or listened to and rank them on all these categories, and see what I feel compelled to bend the rubric for. But I know that’s not the type of person I am. I’ve resigned myself to dodging, copping out, or pretending to think so long they change the subject. Besides, now that I’ve named the problem, it’s lost the power to shock me.
All I want is a place to talk about musicals I like and what I like about them. Inspired by Merlin Mann, I will try my best to say what I like about musicals and avoid defending them to imaginary critics. And if it goes horribly, you’ll only ever know what I think about Company.
Company
I recently saw Company alone in the back row on closing night of the revival tour in Seattle which makes it sound like a last minute plan when, in fact, I booked a flight back from Nashville just so I could make it because I liked the original 1970 Broadway cast album so much. Going in, I was most familiar with that and the excellent documentary of its recording.
The revival is gender-swapped. Robert becomes Bobbie, and that’s how I’ll refer to her since it’s what I saw most recently.
Company is a Sondheim musical about a single 35 year-old New Yorker named Robert Bobbie (the revival was gender-swapped), her romantic interests, and her married friends. There’s no plot. It’s more ethnography than story. Everyone fills an archetype. The couples pretend they’re happy but constantly bicker or actually are happy but are getting a divorce or have cold feet. The suitors are “hot and stupid”, “old good-on-paper friend”, and “interesting bad boy”. The set is a few monochrome gray NYC apartments framed with light that slide on and off stage. Not just interchangeable. More like a blank template: intended to be interchanged. Even the New York backdrop is merely aesthetic. There’s not much about the particulars of dating or marriage in the City.
Ninety percent of the musical is like a good New Yorker cartoon. It’s clever, broadly relatable humor about a very specific demographic. The only real moral or normative claims come in Bobbie’s solos and character growth.
What stood out to me the most from seeing the live production was the running gag where all Bobbie’s friends tell her all the rules about making a wish and blowing out her birthday candles, and, when she fails (usually because all her friends are in the way), she claims that she wasn’t wishing for anything anyway.
It makes me think the whole show is about stunted desires, and the relationship talk is purposely shallow. When people are always telling you what you want and how you should want things, it’s hard to figure out what you actually do want. It’s easy to go along with whatever other people say you should want or to clam up and pretend not to want anything or to actually not want anything and to go through the motions pretending to be someone who does. It’s telling that all Bobbie’s songs are about desire. First, she has fantastical wishes in “Someone Is Waiting” and “Marry Me a Little”. The show ends not with her “getting the guy” but in her understanding what she wants. I won’t spoil what happens with the birthday candles.
The Songs
- Company
- A favorite and classic from the recording. I might have had too high expectations, but it was cool that they did all the choreo inside Bobbie’s cramped apartment
- Sorry-Grateful
- I used to always skip this but it really grew on me to see it live and actually listen to the lyrics. Probably helped that it was sung by James Earl Jones II
- You Could Drive a Person Crazy
- Just have to point out iconic Sondheim lyrics: Rhyming “personable” with [matador] “coercin’ a bull”
- Another Hundred People
I don’t know how, but this may be the first (even before “Being Alive”) number that I loved from this musical. Particularly Anika Noni Rose’s performance and Seth Rudetsky’s deconstruction.
- Someone Is Waiting
- All of Bobbie’s numbers have grown on me since starting to write this
- Getting Married Today
- A popular number I’ve never been able to get into. It always seemed like a fast song for show-offs, but it was by far the best number in the revival. Everyone looked like they were having fun, especially the minister, who got drunker and drunker.
- Marry Me a Little
- Embarrassingly, I have no recollection of whether this was in the show I saw. I only discovered it when writing this (it’s not in the original recording either), but it’s quickly become one of my favorite numbers. Feels like important setup for the Act II finale.
- Side by Side by Side/What Would We Do Without You?
- A favorite of mine. Exactly what you want from a large chaotic ensemble number. I wish I could have seen it more times to catch more of the choreo
- Tick-Tock
- This is very skippable instrumental, but it’s notable because it’s the one time they really took advantage of having a female lead and made it a night scenario housewife montage. Curious what it was in the original production.
- Barcelona
- Another one I always skip and never noticed the humor in it until seeing it performed.
- The Ladies Who Lunch
- I freely admit to not really understanding this song. It’s quite popular, and I don’t know why. It has grown on me, but I still can’t say I get it.
- Being Alive
- If you have no interest in musicals and have been cringing this whole time, you should still be aware of “Being Alive”. Watch Adam Driver sing it in Marriage Story. It also never occurred to me that both acts’ finales are solos which is a bold choice. The revival’s Bobbie was solid but no Raul Esparza.
If this makes you at all interested in Company, but you’re only patient enough for one recording, I recommend the 2007 recording. It has the most spoken parts (including the candles once), and Raul Esparza is incredible in it.