Compass
It’s Not Perspiration, It’s Persistence That Triumphs
Books & Music: Donald Sosin
06/11

Pardon my curmudgeonliness, but I found it difficult to be swept away by any of the songs from the new musicals that were showcased on the Tony Awards Sunday night. Jerry Herman may have written, “The best of times is now” and for many other reasons, that’s probably true. But I will bet that the music from the revivals — “West Side Story,”  “Hair,” “Guys and Dolls,” “Pal Joey”— will last a lot longer than the music from this year’s Tony-winning score, “Next to Normal.”

   That show’s songwriting team did offer encouragement to those crazy enough to write the shows in the first place, while the wonderful three young boys who shared the “Best Actor in a Musical” award encouraged their peers to persist. And persistence is certainly what it takes to make it in the theater, which brings me to the story of composer/lyricist Stephen Schwartz, who, despite the phenomenal success of “Wicked,” and his superb scores for other fine shows — “Godspell,” “Pippin,” “The Baker’s Wife”— has never won a Tony, although his southern Connecticut home houses the three Oscars he received for his film songs and scores.

   Schwartz is the subject of a fascinating new book, “Defying Gravity,” by Carol De Giere (Applause Theater & Cinema Books, 2008). Unlike many showbiz biographies, this one gives more than equal time to the process of bringing Schwartz’s many theatrical productions to life, and the very long uphill struggle he has had to win acceptance in the Broadway world. His early shows have won him a large audience over the years, but he has also had many flops along the way, and more than once vowed that he would never write another musical, so depressing was the aftermath of the failure of shows like “Rags” and “Working.”

   One reason “Working” failed, Schwartz says, was that the producers felt it would have a better shot at the Tonys in a year where there was not much competition, but that meant dispensing with an out-of-town tryout in Washington that might have solved many of its structural problems.

Thus it was not until the success of the Disney films “Pocahontas” and “Hunchback of Notre Dame” that Schwartz’s work finally won the kind of recognition that many of his friends felt he deserved all along.

   A major part of the book, over 200 pages, is devoted to an excellent and thorough description of the inception and development of Wicked, the 2004 musical that is still drawing packed houses, and reveals much about Schwartz’s dedication to craft and perfection, qualities that he attempts to instill in the younger songwriters who attend the musical theater workshops he runs at ASCAP.

The book is filled with Schwar-tz’s reminiscences. De Giere includes anecdotes and comments from 100 different collaborators and colleagues who demonstrate that theatrical success is often a long and arduous road.

   De Giere’s writing is clear and concise, and the beautifully designed, large-format paperback has dozens of photographs, as well as numerous examples of Schwartz’s lyrics, both in early drafts and in their final versions. For anyone who aims to peer behind the proscenium,  “Defying Gravity” is a winner., “Defying Gravity” is a winner.

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