Review: ‘Old Friends’ Celebrates Sondheim in Luxury at Ahmanson

Our love for Stephen Sondheim is approaching the “Beatlemania” phase.

One wonder what Broadway Maestro would have made of “Stephen Sondheim’s old friends”, which opened Thursday at the Ahmanson Theater in preparation for his move to Broadway in the spring. The festive show is a biggest HITS REVY, devised by producer Cameron Mackintosh, the festive show is a true embarrassment.

Mackintosh has not spared any expenses for an extravaganza that seems to have anything but a good editor.

Sondheim, who died in 2021, admitted to me in a 2010 interview that he found these birthday concerts and tribute shows “exciting and embarrassing.”

“There is a up and disadvantage of becoming honor,” he said. “You start believing in your own messages and it is very dangerous. At the same time, it feels like it’s gold-watch time. It’s ‘Thank you so much for coming to the party.’ They are nails in the coffin is what they are. “

There is no longer any concern about how all this public fanfare will affect his creativity. But could all this Ballyhoo SAP interest in his work? It would be an irony worthy of Sondheim if his posthumous career after a lifetime was dismissed as for Highbrow, suffered from commercial overexposure.

Bernadette Peters and Lea Salonga in Stephen Sondheim’s “Old Friends.”

(Matthew Murphy)

Lea Salonga, who exceeds “Stephen Sondheim’s old friends” with colleague Tony winner Bernadette Peters, is the brightest star in a production overloaded with majestic singing talent. There is a purity of Salonga’s lyrical soprano that fills Ahmanson with the distinctive glow not only of the song she happened to sing, but of the musical from which it originated.

In “Loving You” from “Passion” of each show, intuitively conveys what I can only describe as the spiritual architecture of these musical landmarks.

The format to move from one number to the next on Tiktok mode encourages some of the artists to overplay their hands. There is a little too much ripening, italics and elbow nudging, as if we may not be able to enjoy Sondheim’s sensitive width on our own.

However, Salonga is a model of restraint that allows the lyrics to speak through her careful attention to Sondheim’s score. Matthew Bourne seems to have exaggerated all his genius as director of the elegant musical staging, leaving the actors to their own devices. But Salonga proves that less is actually more when supported by confidence in the material and is controlled by the artistic precision of a naturally gifted wonder.

Jacob Dickey and Bernadette Peters perform “Hello, Little Girl” in Stephen Sondheim’s “Old Friends.”

(Matthew Murphy)

Peters was not in a strong voice at the opening of the evening, and I wondered if she might be struggling with colds. When she came out at the top of the show with Salonga, the two elegantly decorated in the deep red of a Broadway stage curtain, the connection with the audience was immediately. The ovation that broke out threatened to derail the show.

Part of the original Broadway throwing of “Sunday in the Park with George” and “Into the Woods” is Peters one of the great Sondheim interpreters. (I still rank her performance in “Gypsy” up there with the best.) There is none like this Kewpie Triple threat, and even at half-mast she was able to summon some of the old magic.

“Into the Woods” joined Peters’ best work, including a duet with Salonga of “Children will listen” and a cupping de teâtre involving some red riding hood costume. A clumsy set up “Broadway Baby” from “Follies”, where Peter’s naughty-check herself was eventually redeemed when she stayed with other veteran groups in Leggy Kick-Line.

“Old Friends”, originally produced in London by Mackintosh, has a title that should not be taken too literally. The company brings together different generations united with their devotion to Sondheim. But the more experienced professionals get two of the biggest show stops. Beth Leave delivers a defiant Louche reproduction of “The Ladies Who Lunch” from “Company” and Bonnie Langford leave it all on stage in a wonderful guttural “I’m still here” from “Follies.”

The Banquet with Beautiful Song is too plentiful for a complete inventory. But Jeremy Secomb and Jacob Dickey’s exquisite reproduction of “Beautiful Women,” a lilly melody in the midst of the murderous machining of “Sweeney Todd”, deserves special praise. Jason Pennycooke makes a memorable impression in “Live Alone and Like It”, a song Sondheim wrote for the movie “Dick Tracy,” that was the only one I didn’t know all the lyrics for.

There were a few disappointments along the way. Peters had only intermittent success with “Send in Clowns” from “A Little Night Music” and “Misting Mind” from “Follies.” Her flicker of brilliance did not come under a flame.

Beth Leave, Bernadette Peters, Joanna Riding performs “You need to get a gimmick” In Stephen Sondheim’s “Old Friends.”

(Matthew Murphy)

Mackintosh, who made his biggest hits selection, favoring the shows he had a hand in producing, goes heavy on the comedic numbers. The second act begins to pull with slapdash vaudeville -showcases that look like SOPs for the artists.

Sondheim always insisted that his book writers should be given the same. Songwriting for him was an act of collaborative playwriting. His harping at this point could come across the doctrine. But since “Stephen Sondheim’s old friends” inadvertently betrayal, songs taken out of their context have not the same power as when dramatically embedded.

Mackintosh and Bourne reduces the injury by grouping some songs together and presenting them on a brilliant suggestive dramatic way. Matt Kinley’s Shapeshifting Scenic Design combined with Warren Letton’s hypnotic lighting and Jill Parker’s Swank costumes allow scenes to appear as an impresario’s dream images.

The irreplaceable Barbara Cook put her interpretive stamp on Sondheim’s songbook in her concert tribute and reanimated musical treasures through her own introspective moonlight. The role crew of “old friends” is for many to the level of personal intimacy, so we are back in a kind of limbo that is neither cabaret nor full scale resuscitation.

But in addition to Salonga’s brilliant example, there are group numbers that bring us closer to the sublime heights that Sondheim reached. “Sunday”, the culminating hymn about “Sunday in the Park with George”, Law 1 closes to MASTERIAL EFFECT. And “Being alive” from “Company”, led by Dickey with soaring vocal accompaniment, leads us into the outgoing last stretch of production.

There are glimpses of Sondheim on screen, but this is not another biographical show. It is an excessive but always stylish tribute. While there is no compensation for the musicals themselves, production will be appreciated by the fans who need to worship regularly at the altar on their Broadway God.