Re: Weighty Second Acts

> I'll have to check exactly how Sondheim put it, but in the little
> interview piece tagged onto the recent TV COMPANY, he commented about
> the non-plot of COMPANY, saying something to the effect that many
> people weren't sophisticated enough to appreciate the plotless
> structure. =EF=BF=BDMaybe he didn't put it quite that way -- maybe
> "sophisticated" wasn't the word he actually used -- but that's the
> impression he left me with, at any rate, and I found it quite
> condescending. =EF=BF=BDA play with a strong, integrated plot is much
hard=
er
> to write than a plotless show, no matter how brilliant individual
> elements of a show might be, so why is an audience member more
> sophisticated if he or she doesn't care about plot?

Actually, it doesn't have a plot but it DOES have a structure.  The
show is framed as an argument Bobby is having with himself.  In the
first act he conjures up all the negative images of marriage he can
come up with.  In the second act, the loneliness of his life begins to
become more insistent as the compensations of marriage being to
predominate.  Complicated and VERY smart structure which the new
production highlighted beautifully.  Bobby's epiphany is a little
forced, but given the joy the rest of the show gives me I don't care
much.

Jeff