Broadway loves nothing better than a happy ending, and that yearning for redemption was richly satisfied by this season’s standout production of “Merrily We Roll Along,” the Stephen Sondheim-George Furth musical that flopped when it premiered on Broadway in 1981 and has been desperate to prove itself ever since. That there hasn’t been a Broadway revival of the show until now tells you all you need to know about the musical’s traumatic history. Sondheim , whose storied partnership with director Hal Prince went bust over “Merrily,” spent years toiling to fix the show.
There were a few successful outings along the way, most notably Michael Grandage’s Olivier Award-winning production at the Donmar Warehouse in London in 2000. But not until now has anyone made the case that “Merrily” isn’t merely a favorite of Sondheim cultists but a musical masterwork that deserves to be placed in the same category as “Sweeney Todd” and “Sunday in the Park With George.” How did director Maria Friedman finally solve the riddle? Casting, casting, casting is the obvious answer, though there’s a bit more to it than that.
Based on the play of the same title by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart, “Merrily We Roll Along” tells the story of three friends — composer Franklin Shepard, playwright Charley Kringas and writer Mary Flynn — whose professional and personal dreams are tracked in reverse chronology. From the cynicism and compromises of middle age, the show wends.
