Friday, December 02, 2016
Stephen Sondheim Approves an Updated 'Company' for an Era of Single Women
The Atlantic: Before the Broadway premiere of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s Company in April 1970, American musicals mostly had a single purpose: to bring a man and a woman together in romantic (and melodic) harmony. But Company upended this tradition, offering instead a collection of vignettes featuring marriages in different states of (un)happiness, seen from the perspective of a flaky 35-year-old bachelor named Bobby.
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Buying a plane ticket and flying to see this show... if only! This reimagined adaptation of Company is so exciting. At first, the title of the article didn't intrigue me. Casting a woman in a man's role is not as uncommon as it seems at first glance. So I scrolled past. However, after reading the article I was excited to learn that this casting of Company will not only reimagine the genders being assigned to the characters in the story, but actually adapting the story to fit the new casting. For its time Company was eye-opening, cutting edge and really called on audience members to reflect on their own lives and the choices they made in regards to their life partners. I am interested to see how they rewrite and restructure the script to make it more relevant and modern. Will they base the struggles over technology? Will adding a gay couple be enough to push the story into the 21st century? Or will they find that the story and struggles that were relevant to a 1970's audience remain just as strong and thought evoking as they were almost 50 years ago?
I hope that Sondheim does not alter the music, but to correct the key. Company is an iconic show, and holds many fans in its cannon. I hope that altering and updating the show only brings the show and its fan base back to life and doesn't push away any already existing fans. Overall, Im excited for more news regarding this production, which I hope makes a transfer across the pond.
This revival is really cool. The show and the time definitely lend themselves to being gender swapped. I think it would be a disservice to perform Company in the way it was originally written, specifically because it was so significant and game changing at the time, so t seems inadequate to not try to continue the path it began down. But while it is an obvious choice, to me this article was interesting to read because it seems like this would be a director’s decision. I had never heard of these kind of intentionally guided updated revivals, and this article says that it was very unprecedented for Sondheim as well. However, I do think it is important that Sondheim has signed on, because hopefully it means a significant mount of artistic liberties. Men and women in 2016 find very different limitations from the typical relationship structure, and it would again, in my opinion, be a diservice to pretend that men and women are the same. I am very excited for the continuation of revolutionary theatre on big budget stages. TAKE THOSE RISKS.
Having recently discussed Company in my Foundations class, the idea of a revamp for the modern times is an interesting one. Company as a play is about a very specific type of malaise that occurs once all of your friends are moving on and having lives, and all they want for Bobby is for him to want something. This is an interesting perspective to throw a female into, especially in our age of political correctness. A woman not wanting to get married and remain independent in New York is nothing new for the 2010's, with a lot of women-led shows on television and women-led movies are about how they are just trying to find their place in the world without men, which is certainly beneficial to the culture as it helps remind people that women are more than the men they marry. However, Company's ending is one that leads the protagonist to decide they can't be alone anymore, and getting married is the only way they will actually feel alive, as they've seen everything they are going to see alone. This seems to run counter to the modern feminist movement, and, as such, I'm not sure how well it will be received, but it is certainly an important refresh that I'm sure will be very successful.
I am very interested to see what this revival ends up being. I have a sinking feeling that it will not be well received. I agree with Jacob's sentiment regarding the age of political correctness and women finding their place amongst men. We have come so far in our understanding and accepting of women's role in society that I am afraid Company may be an altogether too-dated production. I have concerns for the character of Bobbie falling into a series of tropes. This production could easily fall into stereotyping the new generation of single women, rather than portraying them in earnest. It is a very intriguing idea to put a woman as the lead of Company, but I am wary of how truly revolutionary it will be. Like Jasmine, I am a proponent of revolutionary productions on big budget stages. Hopefully this show will start a trend of risks taken on large scale productions. I am positive it will gain some sort of following as revivals tend to do.
I’ve never been a big fan of Company, for pretty much exactly all of the reasons the article listed. Especially since we are living in a time where being a ‘bachelor’ is idealized. But I think gender-bending the character of Bobby into a female brings an interesting new perspective on the show. Not only does it affect the existing meaning of the show, it also forces audiences to question their views on gender. It’s safe to say that 90% of the people who will attend this show have seen company before, as therefore are used to Bobby being played by a male. They already have this idea of the character in their head. So then to have them see Bobbie as female, this forces the audience to confront the way they view Bobby vs Bobbie. If an audience member viewed Bobby as a fun, bachelor type, but finds themselves viewing Bobbie as a spinster, then that creates a conversation on gender norms on today’s society.
I enjoy the gender-bending of Company because I think it updates the show. I feel Company is dated, as Emma said, because the ideals of a bachelor are not shocking to audiences anymore. A man in the later years of his life being alone might be a little weird, but nothing close to a woman being alone. By adding the element of Bobby being female, you add a level of expectation to that character that is absent from a male character. Women around the world are prepared for marriage from birth, while expectations for men are more lax in that regard. This could be the exact answer to keeping this show relevant in the modern age. Hopefully, the world will get to a point where an unmarried woman is as boring as an unmarried man.
Having worked on a recent production of this show I find the idea of switching the genders of Bobby to be a interesting prospect for the show does seem fairly dated to a modern audience. More so than just the gender change of Bobby to Bobbie I am more intrigued how the rest of the relationships in the show will be affected by this will they go through and switch more of the roles because I could become a very interesting look at are current time if they do. Because as Sondheim even stated Bobby was just ment as vehicle to be able view the relationships around him. The two song that really interest me if they were to be change are that of Not Getting Married Today and Ladies Who Lunch. The reason why I because these two songs could now be convincing sung by someone of any gender I feel and that could open up new door in how we preceive relationships and marige. This is a cool concept if they are not lazy and just change Bobby to Bobbie without change anything else.
I’ve only seen Company once, but from what I can remember the character of Bobby is presented as a fulfillment of the stereotype of a carefree bachelor who then throughout the play is forced to reckon with what it really means to be married vs. single. Like Cassidy I can’t help but wonder how changing the gender will affect an audience perception of Bobbie. Recently in my gender studies class we were talking about the gendered language surrounding marriage and how there isn’t really a male equivalent to the word “spinster.” Why is an old unmarried male not viewed in the same (negative) light as an unmarried female? Partially because of motherhood. Raising children is still viewed as a woman’s responsibility and a woman who does not want to marry is seen as not unfitting that responsibility. It will be interesting to see how the revival handles the differing cultural perceptions of unmarried men and women.
This is what theatre should be doing: updating ‘classics’ to better reflect the needs of theatre and the general population today. If a show does not resonate with the audience due to its historical content, it makes sense to update the piece to make modern audiences question today. In a way, I think this almost points to the cyclical nature the world and how the same issues keep coming up over and over again, and not always in different populations. For Company, the show is being drawn from a male-centric perspective into that of a woman’s perspective at a time when gender rights issues are spiking. I would be curious to know how many playwrights and composer and lyricists are updating their past works to appeal to a more audience and to employ a more diverse group of people. By making Bobbie female, Sondheim is also creating a big female role that did not exist before (and was in fact given to a man).
A few years ago I Stage Managed a production of "Company" and during Tech Week, when their was inevitably a lot of down time for the cast, they had gender swapped the show and remarried some couples, and basically did a super modern version. I remember it was all for fun and in good humor, but now that this is something Sondheim is working on, I am very intrigued. I think so many times we only see updates and gender swapping in the very classics of theater, like Shakespeare and other more ancient texts. I love that an update it happening to something that is only a few decades old. I think "Company" does a good job depicting a single man and his relationship with other married couples, and I hope that it translates well. I wonder if it would be best to not have "Company" as the spring board for this, and market it as a completely new show, or maybe just a sequel to "Company" because if anyone goes in expecting to see the Neil Patrick Harris version, I'm sure it will be quiet the surprise.
This is very exciting! I share a lot of the concerns that the people above be have voiced, and I too am concerned that even with these changes company will be all together too out dated, but at least we are trying. Right now there is a huge emphasis on doing the work of female writers, or writers that are people of color, and that is fantastic, don't get me wrong but it will take a very long time for those writers to catch up to the thousands of years of people who oppressed them and made it impossible for their work to be done. So as a culture we have to encourage that everyone is equally represented in new work, and adjust the old work to match what is coming in. Company, even if it fails, is trying really hard to bridge some of that equality gap, and hopefully change the way that we look at marriage, and the genders within one. What worries me more than anything is that audiences are not ready to see a woman play Bobbie. They aren't conditioned to see women in positions of power, or see women able to have a story line without a man, or stand on her own. I don't think that the show will be bad, or that the music is outdated, I think audiences do not want to go see a woman do what a man usually does, but I guess a few attempts have to fail before one works, and this is a great try. I look forward to seeing what happens, and hope it does very well.
Wow. I would absolutely love to see this. Company to me is a heart-breaking and haunting show. I can't imagine having seen it in 1970, when my only experience with musical beforehand would've been happy go-lucky Bye Bye Birdies and Guys and Dolls. Company's music and story seems so modern for that time. "Have I Got a Girl for You" could've been in a Jason Robert Brown musical today.
I'm glad that they're updating it, to make it revolutionary for this generation, too. I think it can work perfectly, as well. Bobby's character isn't totally set around gender. He's complex and his reasonings for staying single are complex as well. And they would translate excellently into a modern woman. I'd be interested to see who her choruses of love interests would be in the modern age, too. What do they deem as archetypical men in 2016? I'm glad that Sondheim is backing this revival.
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