Company (1970)
Book: George Furth
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In short: The beloved and groundbreaking musical Company is considered a landmark in musical theater history. The show revolves around a bachelor’s romantic relationships, his friends, and his search for emotional connection.
Sondheim’s unique talents came together fully for the first time in the innovations, themes, music, and lyrics of Company .
The fact that it is so modern, so challenging, so wonderful blew my mind. The genius I think ultimately is in the score, that just propels you forward, constantly surprises you, delights you, moves you.
Robert Falls (theater director, Tony Award-winner)
Absolutely unique and revolutionary.
Overview Company - background and excerpts
Company is considered a milestone in musical theater history and ranks among the best and most beloved musicals of the twentieth century. With Company , Stephen Sondheim set the reinvention of the American musical in motion, shifting it from light entertainment to meaningful musical theater that explores adult themes, raises ethical questions, and offers intellectual challenge.
Plot Summary
Company has no chronological storyline; instead, it is structured as a series of scenes. The musical revolves around Robert (“Bobby”), a confirmed bachelor in his thirties, his married friends, and the girlfriends who come and go along the way. Over the course of the show, Bobby gains a deeper understanding of love, relationships, marriage, and his own desires for his life.
The musical begins with Bobby’s 35th birthday, as his friends - four married couples - throw him a surprise party. The evening reveals various facets of his friends' relationships through a series of short, non-chronological sketches. The show concludes with a scene in which Robert reflects on his own life and relationships, opening himself to the possibility of a deeper emotional connection.
It’s not talk of God and the decade ahead
that allows you to get through the worst.
It’s “I do” and “you don’t” and “nobody said that”
and “who brought the subject up first?”
Vernieuwing
Company was innovative in several ways, starting with its subject matter. Company focuses on the lives and relationships of upper-middle-class adults—in other words, the audience itself is the subject. This was groundbreaking in the 1970s.
Company was also one of the first successful “concept musicals.” Unlike traditional “book musicals,” which center on a hero(ine) and plot, concept musicals focus on a theme and the personal development of the characters. Company has no chronological storyline but is instead a collection of scenes. The entire show can be seen as a stream of thought lasting just one second, a reflection of the main character’s life and a moment of epiphany on his birthday. The characters are complex, each with their own insecurities, anxieties, and flaws, such as commitment issues and low self-esteem. Sondheim addresses these serious themes while maintaining a strong sense of comedy and entertainment. Recurring musical motifs emphasize the thematic cohesion of the piece.
Reception
Company received many enthusiastic reviews in 1970, but it also faced significant criticism. The critiques were largely tied to the show’s innovations, such as its less straightforward structure, somewhat unsympathetic characters, and reflective approach. Commercially, however, Company was a success; the show ran on Broadway for over a year and a half and received a then-record fourteen Tony nominations.
Productions en gender-swap
Today, the show is regarded as one of the best musicals of the twentieth century. The show contains several Broadway classics and many songs frequently performed in concerts. Company has had major revivals in London and New York in 1995, 2006, 2018, and 2021. The 2018 West End revival, directed by Marianne Elliott, was widely praised for its fresh approach in which Bobby (renamed Bobbie) was played by a woman. Sondheim approved the gender change and even adapted the lyrics to suit the new perspective. The Broadway revival of this version opened in late 2021, winning five Tony Awards, including awards for Elliott and for Patti LuPone in the role of Joanne.
Video excerpts (in show's order)
Most of the Company-excerpts on this website come from the Tony-winning 2008 Broadway revival starring Raul Esparza and a filmed concert version by the New York Philharmonic in 2011 featuring Neil Patrick Harris as Bobby.
- “The Ladies who Lunch“
In this song, Bobby’s married friend Joanne confronts both other women and herself. The role and the song were written for Elaine Stritch, a member of the original cast in 1970. She performs the song in a clip from a “Leading Ladies” concert at Carnegie Hall in 1998. A never-completed documentary on the recording of the original cast album includes scenes of Stritch’s challenging recording session for the song; much of it can be seen here . - “Being Alive“
The closing number, “Being Alive,” is shown here in a full version performed by Raul Esparza and in a concert version by Patti LuPone. “Being Alive” is one of Broadway’s classic songs. The lyrics make a significant shift from “someone to” to “somebody” (hold me too close), which is difficult to maintain in translation. Writer and director Koen van Dijk created a Dutch version, “Dat ik besta,” available to listen to here . - The complexities and ambivalences within relationships are strongly expressed in songs like “The Little Things You Do Together”, “Marry Me A Little”, “Sorry-Grateful” and “Getting Married Today”.
- Bobby’s single life is highlighted in two songs sung by his casual girlfriends: “You Could Drive A Person Crazy” and “Another Hundred People”.
- “Side by side by side” shows Bobby as the fifth wheel.
Somebody hold me
too close,
somebody hurt me
too deep.
Why look for answers where none occur?
You’ll always be what you always were,
which has nothing to do with,
all to do with her.
Stephen Sondheim about Company
“Cold is an adjective that frequently crops up in complaint about the songs I’ve written, both individually and in bulk, and it all began with Company. […] Company, in fact, was the first Broadway musical whose defining quality was neither satire nor sentiment, but irony. It was an observational musical, told at a dry remove from beginning to end. […] The truth is that Hal [Prince, red.] was the ironist, […] and I the romantic. […] Nevertheless, “cold” has been the handy earmark for my work ever since, the ostentatious literacy of some of the lyrics only compounding the felony.
Continued exposure to the songs over the years seems to have instituted a thaw, but whether that’s merely wishful thinking on my part or not, Company is a show I’m extremely happy with. It influenced musicals, for good and ill, for years afterward and continues to do so. It made a lot of grown-ups who had disdained musicals take them seriously and it not incidentally gave me my first good notices.”
More Company: audio and video
Films/full shows/concerts
Go to More Sondheim for our Sondheim Archives.
Company in the Netherlands
Most recent large production
KONINKLIJK BALLET VAN VLAANDEREN
Opening: September 23rd, 1999, Theater aan de Parade, ‘s-Hertogenbosch
Cast: Jan Schepens (Robert) and others
Translation: Allard Blom
Director: Caroline Frerichs
Audio and video
Fontys Conservatorium (2014):
audio and photo’s.
Reviews of Company
Original production (1970)
“It is brilliantly designed, beautifully staged, sizzlingly performed, inventively scored, and it gets right down to brass tacks and brass knuckles without a moment’s hesitation, staring contemporary society straight in the eye before spitting in it. […] Stephen Sondheim has never written a more sophisticated, more pertinent, or— this is the surprising thing in the circumstances — more melodious score; and the lyrics are every bit as good. […] All of this is exemplary. Now ask me if I liked the show. I didn’t like the show. I admired it, or admired vast portions of it, but that is an other matter.” – Walter Kerr, New York Times (1970)
Broadway revival (2021)
“It’s silly and sophisticated, intimate and in-tune with the currents of modern life, brilliantly conceived and funny as hell. Company is the best of what Broadway has to offer adult theatergoers: a playful slap, an honest tickle and one of the 20th century’s greatest musicals gorgeously realized — and refined — to reflect the moment. […] Company has always reached to the heart of what it means to be a person in the world. But rarely has our human desire for connection — in the theater, over drinks with friends, even with strangers on the street — felt as urgent and essential as it does right now. “Life is company,” so the song goes. And Company is sublime. – Naveen Kumar, Variety (2021)
“Still, as strung together by Sondheim’s diamantine songs, Company offered a groundbreaking way of looking at its subject, less through a microscope than a kaleidoscope. Sarcasm warming into insight was the hallmark of the style, which borrowed the nonrepresentational techniques of midcentury drama and wed it to a psychological acuity rarely before seen in American musicals. The result was a new method of storytelling in which thematic consistency trumped conventional plot — and nearly obliterated it.” – Jesse Green, New York Times (2021)
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