Pittsburgh Playhouse has ‘Sondheim on Sondheim’ (Wed., 10/19/22)

SONHEIM ON SONDHEIM (Multimedia musical documentary) by James Lapine. Pittsburgh Playhouse Conservatory  October 19 – 23.

Stephen Sondheim taking a smoke break during work in the 1970s.

Not unlike the Broadway legend himself, Sondheim on Sondheim, first produced by David Kernan in 2000 as Moving On! for London’s West End, has a much-storied and multilayered past. The musical revue, renamed Sondheim on Sondheim, was then adapted for American audiences by Director James Lapine in 2010, adding a mixed media presentation of interviews and commentary by Stephen Sondheim speaking about his artistic development and his theatrical upbringing.  An “adopted” son of Oscar Hammerstein and a wunderkind of musical composition, the young man found himself on center stage, proverbially, with West Side Story, for which he wrote the lyrics. Determined to write his own full musicals, Sondheim crafted A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, followed by Anyone Can Whistle, then Do I Hear a Waltz?  Of course, he was just beginning. Company, Follies and A Little Night Music would launch his career to another artistic plain in the early ‘70s. Few of his fans need to be reminded of his later compositions. Both a revue of more than 36 staged numbers and autobiographic documentary, Sondheim on Sondheim opens at Point Park University’s Highmark Theatre. 7:30 p.m. 350 Forbes Ave., Downtown. (C.P.O.)

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