The answer to that question is part of the interest in Best Worst Thing That Ever Could Have Happened, a documentary abou the original Boradway cast of the show originally directed by Harold Prince, with book by George Furth, music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. The documentary's director is Lonny Price, who co-starred as "Charlie" in the original cast. His title comes from a lyric in the show, when friends try to assure the central character that the collapse of his marriage is really "the best thing that ever could have happened." I just watched the film twice.
Early in the documentary, Price shows us his collection of Sondheim show cast albums ("long-playing" LP vinyl records, for those too young to remember), and asserts that "no one my age loved Sondheim as much as I did. No one." But he's way off. Immediately, every cast member gets to tell the camera how they, too, knew every song, owned every album.
I'm Price's age, and I owned every album, too. In September 1981, when Price and company began rehearsals for their preview in November, I was in Jackson, Mississippi, a rookie teacher of drama and humanities, saving money for my trip to see Merrily during Christmas break. I'd memorized Carly Simon's recording of the show's big ballad "Not a Day Goes By," released two months in advance of the show's opening.
Because Merrily We Roll Along is the story of middle-aged friends ruing how, "rolling along" with life, they've ended up far from where they'd hoped to be in their high school dreams, the documentary about the cast's reflections in middle age is full of meta- moments, for Price, for the actors, and for me. We see how Merrily's theme has been lived in the time between two comments recorded by the documentary. In 1981, Hal Prince explains to actors age 24 or less that he's casting them for middle-aged roles because "you know something we [50-year-olds] don't know." But in 2015, Terry Finn, once one of those young actors, now tears up when she reflects, "Young people don't know... you're building something."
Price's making of the documentary is itself part of the documentary. We see on camera Price's first viewing of a long-forgotten tape of him at age 21, when young Price said that being cast in the show was "it," that he could be hit by a truck the day after the show opened and not mind, because his whole life's dream was fulfilled. At age 55+, Price gets asked, "Do you like him?" about his younger self, and, "Would he like you?" Price tears up, and so do I. Price says yes, although he'd feared that "he'd" be embarrassing, and, "I like to think he'd like some of my work." And that's both musical and documentary in microcosm.
The other time I get emotional during the documentary is watching the benefit performance onstage in 2002. The actors today remember aloud what clips from 1981 confirm, how troubled the show was, how the creators --"theatre gods" -- were all too human, realizing too late that they'd made bad choices: casting young amateurs, going for a stripped-down look, losing sight of the "simplicity" of their original concept, to the bafflement of audiences. But then an actress who remembered "waves" of people leaving the theatre during her performance in 1981 tells of people standing and cheering for the reunion concert twenty-one years later, "not just Sondheim fans, but Merrily fans." We see Sondheim and Prince hug center stage before the ecstatic crowd.
Why do I weep at that happy moment, I wonder? "Redemption" always pushes my buttons. Sondheim tells Price that he was angry at the "glee" people took in hating the show, but he also felt that he'd let people down. Prince tells Price that he didn't want to go to the reunion concert in 2002, but it ended up being "the best night of my life." My reaction to the triumphant curtain call of that reunion concert may also be from a validation: in the depth of my engagement with Sondheim's work, I've always felt pretty isolated, but there on the video is the roar of my tribe; I belong.
For fans of the show, there's a meta-moment to end all meta-moments. In 1981, Lonny Price invited the cast and creators to his birthday party. Through cassette tape and Polaroid snapshots, we get the moment when the party gathers at the piano to hear Stephen Sondheim premiere his song "Good Thing Going," written for the scene in which a party gathers at the piano to hear Lonny Price's character "Charley" premiere his song "Good Thing Going."
What a gift Merrily We Roll Along is, 37 years after that miserable Christmas flop, a good thing going and still giving.
Of related interest
On Christmas night, just yesterday, my friend Suzanne and I were surprised that songs of Merrily We Roll Along show up in the hit movie Lady Bird. She had accompanied me to Cincinnati in 2012 to see Merrily in a high-profile production directed by John Doyle. Read my review of Doyle's Merrily.
I also saw the HD broadcast of the Olivier-Winning London Version with my friend Susan, and wrote a long piece about the impact of a single song on the whole show: Rhymes with Integrity. I reflect on Lady Bird, with director Greta Gerwig's observations about Merrily We Roll Along (link).
[Photo: After seeing Lady Bird, Suzanne and I found no place open for dinner. We ended up at the Waffle House, where I also received a Christmas text from my former student, bike buddy Jason, who takes me to Waffle House during my annual Thanksgiving visit to him. Both Jason and Suzanne were tots in 1981; they are now the age I was when I moved away from Mississippi to the Atlanta area. More Merrily reflections come to mind. Here's my photo to Jason, sitting across from Suzanne, at Waffle House, Christmas night, 2017.]
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