Please note: This transcript has been edited for clarity. The Roundabout Live Chat took place on Tuesday, May 5, 2008.



Moderator: Welcome to our first Roundabout Live Chat. Tonight we’re talking with the composer-lyricist of SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE, Stephen Sondheim, and Roundabout Theatre Company’s Artistic Director, Todd Haimes. We are also thrilled to welcome Roundabout’s Executive Producer, Ms. Sydney Beers.

For the next hour, they will answer your questions and chat about life in the theatre, behind the scenes at Roundabout, and the acclaimed new production of SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE.

If you have a question, or a comment, submit it in the field below, and it will enter the question/comment queue.

For more about SUNDAY, visit www.sundayintheparkonbroadway.com. Use code SPCHAT when buying tickets for an exclusive Live Chat price.

Let’s get started. Hi, Stephen, Todd and Sydney. Thanks for joining us.



PRE-SUBMITTED QUESTION from Genevieve: For Mr. Sondheim - where did the idea of SUNDAY come from? Mr. Haimes - how/why was it decided to bring this play to the NY stage?



Stephen_Sondheim: The idea came from the fact that I wanted to write a show with James. We met over a period of weeks to decide what we wanted to write. I wanted to write a theme and variations. He showed me an issue of Bizarre, a monthly magazine published in Paris. One of the issues was devoted entirely to variations of the Mona Lisa (visual and verbal) Mona Lisa with a mustache, one by the artist Charles Addams, etc.

James had directed a so-called play by Gertrude Stein called Photograph. I say “so-called” because it was really more a scenario than a play (it was only one page long). He talked about images he had used. One of the images he had used was the Seurat painting. We started to talk about the painting and the fact that it looked like a stage set. There were over 50 people in the painting and nobody was looking at anybody else. We started to speculate why that should be true. Then, James said the key thing: the main character is missing. And I picked up my cue and said “Who was that?” The painter. Once he said that, we knew we had a play, and it was about a man who controlled his landscape. Then we discovered, to our delight, that Seurat was a very private person and that you could invent about him based on the few facts that were known about his life. Obviously if you decide to write about Van Gough, you know he cut his ear off, but nobody knew anything about Seurat, so we were able to invent freely.

So, what James Lapine did was to take the figures in the foreground of the painting and assign each of them a role, so that they were in some way interconnected. One of the interesting things about that is that the figure under the tree of the old lady is in a famous poem by Delmore Schwartz as an old man. If you look at it carefully, you cannot tell if it is a man or a woman, and James chose a woman. That is emblematic of his invention.



Moderator: Mr. Haimes - how/why was it decided to bring this play to the NY stage?



Todd_Haimes: I take no credit for this one. I love, we love all of Steve's work. One of the things that is so unique about Steve, in addition to his obvious genius, is that unlike a lot of authors, he relishes to have his work re-interpreted by newer artists. And there have been so many examples of that, obviously, Doyle's Sweeney Todd. This production of Sunday was done by a younger producer and director in London. The director was 26 years old when he conceived this production. He was an animator, which explains his ability with the projections and other spectacular aspects of this particular production. I saw it in London and was one of many people interested in bringing it to NY. Luckily it ended up at Studio 54.



Moderator: PRE-SUBMITTED QUESTION from David: What is the level of Mr. Sondheim’s involvement in the rehearsal process for the revival productions?



Stephen_Sondheim: Most of the time, not much. When a revival of one of my shows is done, it is usually very firm in the mind of the director what he or she wants to do. I and my collaborators have given permission for this new production and pretty much stay out of the way until a final run through or dress rehearsal, where any comments we make would be valuable. If the director calls us in, as John Doyle did with me on Sweeney Todd and Company while the show was in rehearsal, then I am happy to go in and give them my two cents. In the case of Sunday in the Park with George, James and I went to London to see the production, which was already running at the Menier Chocolate Factory, where it was about to transfer to the West End. We were able to give the director, Sam Buntrock, our comments. That was the only input we had on it. Then, Roundabout decided to do it in New York. We were able to give more comments, because it was a new cast except for the two leading players who came over from London. Also, it was a larger budget and production, and therefore more opportunity for various effects. The spectacular effects of the show are very much a part of its appeal because they are something that has never been seen before.



Theatrimelz: Mr. Haimes and Ms. Beers are there future plans for another Sondheim revival or production in the works at RTC?



Todd_Haimes: We hope to produce Merrily We Roll Along in 2009/2010 Broadway season. And that production will be directed by James Lapine.



george: Now that Sweeney Todd has been put on film, which of your musicals would you most like to see adapted for motion picture at this time?



Stephen_Sondheim: It's not so much a question of which I would like to see, rather which I think would lend itself to film. I think Company would lend itself to filming. I think it's very cinematic in its theatrical concept. There is a move afoot to do Follies movie with a well-known director and a well-known star, and I'm not going to tell you who they are. Those are the ones that come immediately to mind. Steven Spielberg would like to remake West Side Story. Whether or not that will happen…



dissi: Will the Sunday revival go on a national tour?



Sydney_Beers: The hope is, yes. There are plans.



martymartin67: Who is one Broadway star you would like to write a show around?



Stephen_Sondheim: Unfortunately, there are very few “stars.” There are many very talented actors and musicians in musicals, but a star is usually defined as someone who can sell tickets. And unless they come from the world of television or movies, there are very few. Now, if you're asking whom I would like to write for, I can name a number of people. They are mostly people I have worked with before, such as Bernadette Peters, Angela Lansbury, Mandy Patinkin, Donna Murphy, Raul Esparza. I could go on with others, because most of the actors I have worked with are performers I would like to work with again. There are also a number of performers whom I have not worked with that I would like to. They are numerous, and I am not being coy. Theatre is filled with sensationally talented singer-actors of both sexes.



Moderator: If you’ve recently joined us, we’re about halfway through our Live Chat with Stephen Sondheim, the composer-lyricist of SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE, Todd Haimes, the Artistic Director of Roundabout Theatre Company and Sydney Beers, Executive Producer of Roundabout Theatre Company. They are answering your questions.



For more about SUNDAY, visit www.sundayintheparkonbroadway.com. Use code SPCHAT when buying tickets for an exclusive Live Chat price.

Let’s hear from the next fan.



richardjloftus: How is a show like Sunday In the Park with George cast? Is their reliance on people looking like people within Seurat's painting, or can that be achieved through costume?



Stephen_Sondheim: The interesting thing about that was that Seurat himself was about 6' 1". I don't know how tall Mandy Patinkin is, but he's probably about 6". Daniel Evans is about 5' 7". We cast him partly because for physical resemblance (he has a beard), but mostly because he's a wonderful actor. There is a joke about an actor saying "I can act tall." And it's true, he’ll come out on stage and he’ll appear tall. When Daniel appears in the 2nd act and he's bald, some people think it's another actor, because he has been so convincing in the 1st act. It's something all good actors do. There are beautiful actresses who can play ugly and be completely convincing because of the acting. And I am now spouting clichés and will stop.



Joey: What advice do you have for someone who would love to produce intelligently crafted, original musicals in today’s commercial musical theatre climate?



Todd_Haimes: It's so dependent on money. And it's sad but true. When something unusual as an unknown guest produces on Broadway or even Off-Broadway, it usually is a happy confluence of, obviously the talented writers, but also the passionate producers who are usually compelled to produce that show on stage. As a result, while some unique and adventurous work does get produced, one has to assume that the majority of the unique and adventurous musical theater work never gets the opportunity to be seen by a large audience. Something like Spring Awakening, which I was involved in the developmental process of, took literally 7 years to end up in NYC. And that case was largely through the passion of the director, Michael Mayer, who, because he had success with other commercial properties, was able finally to get someone to pay attention to Spring Awakening.



George: My friend Aileen over at Finishing the Chat, the Sondheim message board, wants to know just what “put your dimple down” means!



Stephen_Sondheim: Somebody's been listening to Merrily We Roll Along. All it means is stop being coy. If you think of someone as having a dimple and putting your finger in the dimple of their cheek, they’re looking kind of innocent. Stop pretending to be innocent. Stop pretending to be coy. That's what she is saying to Franklin, the leading man in the show. There is a verb "to dimple," and that means to be coy...I think.



Edward: What makes for a good collaborator in musical theater?



Stephen_Sondheim: As a writer, it's somebody whose pace is similar but not entirely like your own. If it is too like your own, it's not good. You need some abrasion, as in a good marriage. And if you have that, then you have some life in the collaboration. On the other hand, you have to be, a phrase I loathe that's used all the time, "on the same page." Ugh!

And a good collaboration has to do with that with pace, viewpoint and sensitivities. My collaboration with Hal Prince had its strength in the fact that we saw everything big together and everything tiny together. Where we disagreed was in the middle ground. That's what made it lively theatre. I have that same collaborative feeling with every librettist I've ever worked with, and I look for that in everyone I work with in the future.



john: What does an executive producer do?



Sydney_Beers: Well, I honestly have one of the best jobs on Broadway. And the best job is working at Roundabout. I basically am the one that Todd will hand off a script to, and I am able to put the production together. From all the deals, to all the creative. I deal with all the elements of the physical production. I visit our scene shops, electrical shops, sound shops. I make all the actors’ contracts. I do all their deals. I then run the show and the personnel connected to the show. Roundabout being an institution, I don't do the same things a commercial general manager would do, such as banking, marketing and development. On the flip side, I do get to produce throughout the year which most commercial mangaers do not get to do. And working in institutional theater, I get to work on more projects than most commercial general managers, because we have the ability to do 16 weeks of a production vs. a general manager who would sign them for a year.



Lou: Mr. Sondheim, if you could rewrite a song that you've written in the past. Which would it be, and why?



Stephen_Sondheim: There's one song that I continually try to rewrite, and I can never make it work. It's in Pacific Overtures and it's called "Welcome to Kamagawa." It's supposed to be a dirty song. I've written 3 versions of it, and none of them are funny. I finally feel defeated. It will always be a little boil in the middle of a show I like a lot. Otherwise, I have had very little desire to rewrite songs.



Moderator: We have only 10 minutes left in our Live Chat with Stephen Sondheim, Todd Haimes and Sydney Beers. Send in your last questions.



gil: What are the chances of us seeing your rumored musical version of Groundhog Day, and what drew you to Groundhog Day as a musical?



Stephen_Sondheim: Groundhog Day is, in my opinion, a first-rate movie and it lends itself so clearly to musical treatment. I'm not the first person who's thought of it. Many have. But, I feel to make a musical of Groundhog Day would be to gild the lily. It cannot be improved; it's perfect the way it is. I don't want to touch it, because it's perfect. Pretentious as that sounds.



gavojeff: What happened to the planned film adaptation of "Into the Woods"?



Stephen_Sondheim: The original version was to be done with live actors, but with Jim Henson puppets playing the animals. Then Jim Henson died, and the project fell into a kind of limbo. I think that also would make a good movie. I forgot to mention it before. I hope that someday that will be done, but at the moment there is no plan to do it. I wrote two songs for the movie adaptation, both of which I like. And I hope someday, somebody will hear them.



Moderator: We have time for one more.



micah: Is there anything that you were offered the opportunity to write that you turned down? If so, do you regret that decision?



Stephen_Sondheim: No, there isn't, but I there is something I wish I had been offered to write. It was called Carnival, based on a movie called Lili. It was an MGM movie about a puppeteer starring Leslie Caron, and it was a really wonderful idea for a musical.



Moderator: That’s all the time we have for tonight’s chat. Thanks to everyone for joining us and for making this a lively discussion.

We have more Live Chats lined up for you. Please join the Roundabout’s e-mail club at Roundabouttheatre.org to be the first to know. For more about SUNDAY, visit www.sundayintheparkonbroadway.com. Use code SPCHAT when buying tickets for an exclusive Live Chat price. Thanks again, and have a good night.