String of Pearls

By T.E.K.

SIDE BY SIDE BY SONDHEIM

Music and Lyrics by STEPHEN SONDHEIM

Stephen Sondheim is the master jewel cutter of the modern U.S. musical theater. His lyrics are iridescent triumphs of wit and precision; his compositions are faceted with prismatic brilliance. In Side by Side by Sondheim four Britons have performed a lavish labor of love in tribute to him.

Sondheim's pearls are strung together so as to link his guiding themes. He turns obsessively to the tensions and tenacity of marriage, its tidal lure and its shipwreck debris. Almost at the moment that his songs brighten with the delights of love, they darken with the pain of love's transience and loss. Sondheim's inner beat is the tempo of Manhattan and Broadway. His scores are minidramas. His people are night people, thirsting for fame and applause and always vulnerable to the morning-after of the defeated quest. Some of Sondheim's songs are as hard-edged as New York's steel and glass spires, but this British quartet sensitively records their underlying compassion.

One member of the foursome (Ned Sherrin) acts as a kind of M.C. and spins off topical jests with the aplomb of Johnny Carson. The other three--Millicent Martin, Julie N. McKenzie and David Kernan--sing 31 full songs with style, relish and a neat change of pace. Uniformly responsive, the opening-night house came to a roar on at least three numbers. Millicent Martin brings the granitic grit of survival to I'm Still Here (Follies); Julie N. McKenzie belts out Another Hundred People (Company) like a trip hammer; and David Kernan joins the two women for a satirical swinger done in Andrews Sisters' fashion, You Could Drive a Person Crazy (Company). The entire evening swings and swings and swings. T.E.K.

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