 FOLLIES
a musical in one act. Book by James Goldman. Music and lyrics
by Stephen
Sondheim.
Produced at the Winter Garden, New York, 4 April 1971 with Alexis
Smith (Phyllis), John McMartin (Ben), Dorothy Collins (Sally) and
Gene Nelson (Buddy). Produced at the Shaftesbury Theatre, London,
in a revised version, 21 July 1987 with Diana Rigg, Daniel Massey,
Julia McKenzie and David Healy.
Story
It is 1970 and on the stage of the Weismann Theatre,
New York, the eponymous Dimitri Weismann has gathered together
the surviving players of his lavish pre-war Follies, from the silver
screen goddess Carlotta Campion to the most nondescript chorine,
for a first and last reunion: an invitation "to glamorize
the old days, stumble through a song or two and lie about ourselves" -before
the theatre is demolished to make way for a parking lot. As Roscoe
serenades those Beautiful Girls, the now-elderly ing6nues
and matronly starlets, veterans of a more innocent age of entertainment,
descend the famous Follies staircase one last time. For Sally and
Phyllis, both now married to their respective stage-door Johnnies,
Buddy and Ben, the theatre seems haunted by their younger selves,
the giddy hopefuls of 1940. Don't Look At Me, Sally babbles
to Ben as they meet for the first time in years. But they're both
glad they came.
Once the party gets under way it isn't long before the regulars
are gleefully dusting off their old acts: Theodore and Emily
Whitman recall their sweetly naive duct, Rain on the Roof:
Solange purrs her way through the fake Gallic sophistication
of Ah, Paree!; and Hattie proclaims again that she's,
indestructibly, a Broadway Baby. For Ben and Buddy, too,
the memories of three decades come flooding back - all those
hours after the show Waiting for the Girls Upstairs in
their dressing rooms - but for Ben these memories awake old regrets
as he looks back at a lifetime of lost opportunities (The
Road You Didn't Take). Sally tells Ben about her life with
Buddy in Arizona - cooking, flower-arranging, trips to the mall,
but In Buddy's Eyes, she knows, she's still his princess.
Yesterday, though, tells another story: young Sally and young
Ben pledging their love. And, in the haze of nostalgia, the past
seems to be seeping into the present. As Stella leads the 1940
Follies girls through "the mirror number"
(Who's That Woman), shadowy wraiths of their younger selves
mimic their movements. For Sally and Buddy, Phyllis and Ben,
the resurrection of their distant pasts only serves to point
out the inadequacies of their marriages. Only Carlotta seems
relaxed and philosophical about the old days: good times, bum
times, she's grateful just to have got through it, and confidently
declares I'm Still Here. Seeing Sally again, Ben realises
he's spent Too Many Mornings dreaming of her. If you don't
kiss me, " Sally tells him, I think I'm going to die."
Young Phyllis, Ben, Sally and Buddy taunt their disillusioned
older selves with the failed promises of youth. Ben tells Sally
that he no longer loves her, that for him "all of it was over
years ago". For Buddy, life is all about findingThe Right
Girl and he has, sort of. a 23-year old called Margie. But
you can't turn the clock back: as Heidi Schiller reminds us in
an eerie operetta waltz, all dreams are a sweet mistake and eventually
we have to face reality: all we can hope for is One More Kiss -
and a brief glimpse of those dreams.
Phyllis, having successfully seduced Kevin, one of the waiters,
is by now wondering Could I Leave You and live without Ben,
without his sneered jokes, his loveless love-making, his dreary
big-shots from the UN. Ben, goaded, starts to argue with Phyllis,
and soon Sally and Buddy, together with their younger selves, join
in. They all shout hysterically at each other, screaming out all
the bitterness that has, until now, been more or less repressed.
At the height of the confrontation the orchestra suddenly swells
and Loveland calls, luring them back to a playground of
overwhelming optimism, where skies are ever blue. On the drab stage
of the derelict theatre Loveland rises - the apotheosis of a Weismann
Follies set, a fabulous wedding cake reaching for the stars, an
enchanted citadel where the two couples can re-visit their individual
follies. The young sweethearts Ben and Phyllis promise each other
that You're Gonna Love Tomorrow, and for young Sally and
Buddy, nothing is so certain but that Love Will See Us Through.
Afterwards, though, Buddy's The-God-Why-Don't-You-Love-Me-Blues begin
to get him down, as he scuttles frantically between mistress and
wife, while poor miserable Sally moans in a smouldering torch number
that she's Losing My Mind. Phyllis raunchily sings The
Story of Lucy and Jessie (Lucy being Phyllis and Jessie being
Sally), telling us that if only juicy but drab Lucy and dressy
but cold Jessie could only combine then I could tell you someone
who would finally feel just fine." Lastly Ben takes the stage
with Live, Love, Laugh, singing of how clever and adept
he is at everything - but his song gradually starts to go wrong.
He forget his lines, the tune, the dance steps and finally, in
his mind, all the past evening's traumatic experiences are regurgitated
in one terrifying mass. Panic-stricken, he rushes off, screaming
out his wife's name and we return sharply to reality.
Having exorcised the ghosts of their pasts the two couples depart
Dimitri Weismann's reunion; they'll have to find out whether anything's
really changed in their lives. They've come a long way from those
days waiting around for the girls upstairs, but they're still here.
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