Enchanted Evenings:The Broadway Musical from 'Show Boat' to Sondheim and Lloyd Webber Block, Geoffrey (large ebook reader .txt) 📖

originally intended to be sung: “It didn’t take us long to find out that it wouldn’t work. That was when Jerry [Robbins] took over and converted all that stuff into this remarkable thing now known as ‘the prologue to West Side Story,’ all dancing and movement.”31

The three sung themes of “Up to the Moon” (Example 13.3) found their way into the instrumental Prologue and the instrumental portions of the “Jet Song” as we know it. A fourth theme (and much of the text) from “Up to the Moon” was salvaged in the eventual Broadway version of the “Jet Song,” when the Jets sing “Oh, when the Jets fall in at the cornball dance, / We’ll be the sweetest dressin’ gang in pants!”32 In Laurents’s fourth libretto (Winter 1956) the opening scene had shifted from a clubhouse to an alleyway, but it is not until the similar fifth and sixth librettos (April 14 and May 1, 1957) that the first scene—none of the eight librettos indicate a Prologue distinct from a first scene—begins to resemble the final version shown in the online website.33

Example 13.3. Vocal passages from “Up to the Moon” reused in Prologue and “Jet Song”

(a) “How long does it take?”

(b) “Gettin’ sweet and shined up”

(c) “Carazy, Daddy-O”

Sondheim recalled in the 1985 Dramatists Guild symposium that West Side Story “certainly changed less from the first preview in Washington to the opening in New York than any other show I’ve ever done, with the exception of Sweeney Todd, which also had almost no changes.”34 In Sondheim & Co. he comments further on the extent of these alterations: “Our total changes out of town consisted of rewriting the release for the ‘Jet Song,’ adding a few notes to ‘One Hand,’ Jerry potchkied with the second-act ballet, and there were a few cuts in the book.”35

Again, the evidence from the music manuscripts and libretto drafts substantiates Sondheim’s recollection on all these points. Bernstein’s early piano-vocal score reveals the rejected release for the “Jet Song” and two versions of “One,” the original one-note-per-measure version and the familiar three-notes-per-measure version.36 And in what is perhaps the most significant potch of the dream ballet sequence, “Somewhere” was originally intended to be danced rather than sung, at least until its conclusion when Tony and Maria reprise the final measures.

Sondheim also remembered Robbins’s preoccupation during the tryouts with a number that would be eventually rejected:

Jerry had a strong feeling that there was a sag in the middle of the first act [scene 6], so we wrote a number for the three young kids—Anybodys, Arab, and Baby John. It was called “Kids Ain’t” and was a terrific trio that we all loved, but Arthur gave a most eloquent speech about how he loved it also but that we shouldn’t use it, because it would be a crowd-pleaser and throw the weight over to typical musical comedy which we agreed we didn’t want to do. So it never went in.37

During the July rehearsals Robbins & Co. had taken steps to remedy the lack of a comic musical number caused by the removal of “Kids Ain’t.” Although there had been a comic exchange between Officer Krupke and the Jets in act II, scene 2, in the four 1956 libretto drafts, no song had yet appeared in this space. Only in the final libretto draft did a recycled “Where Does It Get You in the End?” from Candide materialize as “Gee, Officer Krupke.” Sondheim recalled that Robbins staged this number “in three hours by the clock, three days before we went to Washington.”38 At the time, Sondheim thought that “Officer Krupke” would be better placed in act I, since its presence detracted from the serious developments in the drama. After viewing the 1961 film in which “Krupke” and “Cool” were reversed “and weren’t nearly as effective,” Sondheim came to accept Robbins’s directorial decision and to acknowledge that “Krupke” “works wonderfully” in act II on the basis of its “theatrical truth” rather than its “literal truth.”39 Since its comic intent was meant to provide dramatic contrast and relief from the mostly tragic theme based on tritones and “Somewhere” motives (to be discussed), the absence of the latter and the softening of the former in “Krupke” is understandable and dramatically plausible and welcome.

Jerome Robbins (second from left) rehearsing West Side Story (1957). Museum of the City of New York. Theater Collection.

After “Krupke,” one final song, not indicated even as late as the final libretto draft of July 19, was added during rehearsals.40 This song, newly composed to conclude act I, scene 2, after Tony promises Riff that he will attend the Settlement dance, is, of course, “Something’s Coming.” Bernstein describes the circumstances and motivation for this song:

“Something’s Coming” was born right out of a big long speech that Arthur wrote for Tony. It said how every morning he would wake up and reach out for something, around the corner or down the beach. It was very late and we were in rehearsal when Steve and I realized that we needed a strong song for Tony earlier since he had none until “Maria,” which was a love song. We had to have more delineation of him as a character. We were looking through this particular speech, and “Something’s Coming” just seemed to leap off the page. In the course of the day we had written that song.41

At Robbins’s suggestion, Laurents added the meeting between Tony and Riff in front of the drugstore, and in the course of the Washington tryouts the song “Something’s Coming” replaced much of the dialogue.42 Sondheim’s recollection that the song ended with its eventual title is partially borne out by the Winter 1956 libretto, which concludes with the following exchange:

TONY: Now it’s right outside that door, around the corner: maybe being stamped in a letter, maybe whistling down the river, maybe—

RIFF: What is?

TONY: (Shrugs). I don’t know. But it’s coming and it’s the greatest…. Could be. Why not?43

In contrast to “Gee, Officer Krupke,” the purpose