The line that chokes me up is "on an ordinary Sunday." Because it's true. This WAS an ordinary Sunday. And this man made it extraordinary. That's the gift the artist gives the world.
"These people don't know they're going to be immortal, and so I'm going to write a song about that. They're going to be singing about themselves, and they're going to be acknowledging that they're immortal. And it all leads to the word 'forever' which is, when I wrote that word, I cried because I thought, 'That's what it's about.' ... Then I could see that they would all be singing that one idea: here we are in a park and we're going to be here forever." -Stephen Sondheim, Six by Sondheim (HBO)
This video is 38 years old, how many others are here after the incredibly gifted Stephen Sondheim passed away? A nod to Bernadette and Mandy for bringing this to life.
So many great moments (the parasol, etc.) but for me, it's the reappearance of the tree at 2:52 and his mother's joy. In the show's opening scene, George says, "I hate this tree," erases it from his sketch pad and the tree disappears. Moments later, his mother enters and says to her nurse, "Where is our tree, the tree we always sit near?" In this climactic song, George gives his mother back her favorite tree so she can sit in its shade "forever." Gets me every time.
I can’t count how many different productions, bootlegs, and clips on RU-vid I’ve seen of this show. Hell, I even named my first dog Seurat. And yet I’ve never caught this detail. Thank you!
@@richardmayora5310 Actually, having seen both, I would have given it to George Hearn as well. But "SITPWG" should have gotten score and probably Best Musical. It was years.... DECADES ... ahead of its time.
@@richardmayora5310 This masterpiece losing to La Cage says everything Sondheim was trying to say about art, especially in the second act. Oh the irony. He was a genius. The camera cutting to him at 4:55 damn near broke me. You can just see it all in his eyes.
@@Nickabod79 i disagree. while i think Sunday In The Park is way better than La Cage, Sondheim's message of originality and passion is present in La Cage. La Cage was one of the first shows to openly put forward gay charachters, a masterful choice still impactful today.
It never ages. It is immortal. I ADORE this musical and have loved Mandy ever since i saw it. This is what it is like to love someone who is in love with beauty.
How I love this performance. Mandy Pitinkin has the warmest sexiest voice ever and Bernadette Peter's voice is pristine - thats the only word I can think of.
Here I am sitting almost 40 years later and watching this over and over, and crying each time. I wonder if we'll ever be able to have these types of productions after the pandemic. Gives me the chills.
Just watched the wonderful doc "Six by Sondheim" on streaming...it ends with this magnificent song, which had me sobbing over his death and the beauty he left for us all. The power of this music! It has only increased since I was lucky enough to see the original cast perform it. We miss you, Steve.
I was so blessed to live in NYC for 35 years and saw almost every musical with the original cast....Evita, Dream Girls, Nine, Ragtime, The Wiz, etc and never missed a Stephen Sondheim show. But when I saw Sunday in the Park with George I was blown away. The chemistry between Bernadette Peters and Mandy Patinkin was brlliant as was the show. I saw the show 7 times and each time was magical! Thank you so much Mr. Sondheim for sharing your genius with us! R.I.P.
The piece transcends awards,if you understand it. I worked on it in producer's office. Stood back of house countless times and it changed my life. Sent me out of business side and to my dream of being a creative person. Mandy finished my hat.
@@kathleenscullion8348 I do understand it and of course awards aren't what defines great art--numerous examples through award history. I'm afraid I still get a bit frustrated when greatness isn't acknowledged, even knowing the politics, the "he just got it last year", etc. I can be a bit petty and still understand art.
@@scorpioninpink Perhaps. I do feel like Sunday in the Park is an atypical musical in many ways and maybe that made it less "of the moment" than La Cage was.
I think la cage aux folles is a good show, but it’s nowhere near Sunday in the park with George. This show is a masterpiece and it’s a shame that it was robbed at the Tony awards.
It didn't wom because it is a Sondheim creation. Prior to this, Sondheim has won a lot of awards already and La Cage was pretty grounbreaking at the time. If you ask me though, La Cage aux Faux and Sunday in the Park with George should both have won with a tie.
@@scorpioninpink yes totally!! Both shows are great!! La Cage Aux Folles definitely broke boundaries and Sunday in the park is just so smart!! A tie would have been splendid between the two shows!!
It made me so happy so see this musical (and this scene in particular) commemorated in Tick, Tick, Boom! This was the also the perfect song to honor Stephen Sondheim with today. Thank you Mr. Sondheim for leaving us with so many meaningful works ❤️
Transcendent. Still moves me to tears. You can hear the pointillism in the music. And that chord right after the word “park.” Chills. Highly conceived, everything abt this production, especially the inventiveness of the stage imagined as the canvas of the painting itself, makes this one of my very fav Sondheim works.
Mr. Sondheim, you took a masterpiece, and brought it to life in front of us. in doing so, you made your own masterpiece. we sing our sundays and hope you can hear them all the way up there. we'll miss your songs and your magic.
God bless you Stephen Sondheim. What a wonderful musical treasure you were. You will not be missed because through your music you will forever live on.
I've never seen this Tony performance "Sunday" before! It's so lovely and subtly different in a bunch of ways from the original cast version of the show I've seen literally hundreds of times. Gorgeous.
@@TheSunPost HAHAHA, you are correct. I was commenting on two separate show threads and mixed them up. On that thread someone was insisting Phylicia Rasha was the original witch. My bad.
I didn't love the second act of SITPWG. I saw the original cast. It felt thrown together and extraneous. But giving La Cage best musical was ridiculous. Compare this beauty to the nonsense of I am what I am. Blech.
can someone explain why this is so affecting? I, like so many others, find myself with tears in my eyes every time I see it -- yet I can't understand why.
So much from nothing. The creative process. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. Immortality. -- So many reasons to be found for the emotions it brings up. Seeing it live in the theatre in the 80s, I remember gasping when they struck the final pose and had no idea why.
@@beaellie9766 Yes! That happened when I saw it as well. The entire audience gasped! Then that horn 6th interval, and then shocked stunned silence before the applause. We were all in tears during the interval.
I know I have old and very good associations with it but I'm also wondering about the physics of the sounds and how that is affecting me as I listen. Wish I knew more about music or acoustics....
Etched in my memory as the first Tony performance I know for a fact I watched. Been an avid viewer of the townies ever since, only skipped the year _Six_ had six phenomenal stars and not a goddamn one of them was nominated.
Remember, George. [GEORGE, spoken] Order Design Tension Balance Harmony [COMPANY] Sunday, by the blue, purple, yellow, red water On the green, purple, yellow, red grass Let us pass Through our perfect park Pausing on a Sunday By the cool, blue, triangular water On the soft, green, elliptical grass As we pass through arrangements of shadows Towards the verticals of trees, forever By the blue, purple, yellow, red water On the green, orange, violet mass Of the grass In our perfect park [GEORGE] Made of flecks of light And dark And parasols Bum, bum, bum Bum, bum, bum Bum, bum, bum [COMPANY] People strolling through the trees Of a small suburban park On an island in the river On an ordinary Sunday Sunday, Sunday, Sunday
They gave the Best Musical to LA CAGE AUX FOLLES, as a “more practical business choice” of what would bring audiences to NYC in the 80’s when Broadway was said to be dying. It was not an “artistic choice”. It was what would be more commercial and make more money. I just wish they broke the rules and gave the Best Musical Tony to both.
Yet another masterpiece that makes me think the human race might be worth saving. I have a very low opinion of our species (myself included) and feel that little would be lost if something happened to make us go extinct (war, plague, AI, famine, ozone depletion, asteroid, etc.). As science has shown, we're a young species living on a 'pale blue dot' in the cosmos. We're probably one of billions of civilizations, many of which have evolved, and then perished, leaving no trace. If another asteroid like the one that killed all the dinosaurs hit us, it might end humans. In the cosmic stage, who would care? No one. No one at all. So what does it matter if our species vanishes? I usually say it doesn't matter in the least. But when I see a performance like this, I temporarily lose my cynicism and see that we are capable of short moments of beauty. Georges Seurat lived a hard and short life and created a lasting work of beauty. And Stephen Sondheim took George's artwork and turned it into a thing of musical beauty. It's almost enough to make me feel we have something to offer the universe. If only we could jettison our reptile brain instincts for war and dominance we may one day earn the right to join other advanced civilizations.
@@rachelwhitman21 Broadway production...the whole show is a beautiful adaptation of the book...if you know Marsha Norman's work, she penned the book for the musical.
@@jacobfoster6003 I will have to look into that. I remember reading the book in grade school. The movie the teacher showed us later was a little weird (in my mind), but I liked it.
Doubtful. Paul Gemignani had his hands full with finding an orchestra who did not think the music too difficult. Plus nothing in the original program for "vocal arrangements by" so one must assume that Stephen Sondheim did most of the arrangements himself.
That's actually not quite true! 'Sunday' was originally only in unison, so Gemignani added harmonies in rehearsals, and showed it to Sondheim, who is famous for being incredibly collaborative. Gemignani even came up with the descending line on "verticals of trees". This video (and entire series) is incredibly insightful - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-a52_bQ0S2_A.html
@@nickj7335 Of course.... I was just wondering why for example there were 2 soldiers one an actor and one a cut out...why did the musical creators do this...
My God, Mandy Patinkin's voice is excruciating to listen to. I'm convinced it qualifies as a form of cruel and unusual punishment under the rules of the Geneva Convention.
@@jandreidrn I think I am not making myself understood. It is not who sang it, or if they received awards for it. I just like the sound from Larson-Garfield better. The song is faster.
TBH, this is not my favorite Sondheim piece. It's a schmaltzy and pretentious ode to a control-freak, that borrowed its "living paintings" staging from the old fashioned 19th Century Tableaux vivant diorama performances. Being Alive from Company is a much better lyric and song, in my opinion.
Nope. And that's the beauty of it. Listen to Jerry Herman accept his Tony that year in a snipe at "Sunday" and Sondheim ("....rumor around Bwy for a couple of years that the simple, hummable showtune was no longer welcome on Bwy...well, it's alive and well at the Palace..."). It was an insultory comment and created quite a rift at the time.
@@beaellie9766 Shortly after the Tonys that year, Sondheim attended a Q&A in Houston. An audience member asked if he thought Herman's acceptance speech was directed at him. Sondheim's response "You should be embarrassed for asking that question."
