'Make Mine Manhattan' Scores For Unsung Musicals

We don't know if Stephen Sondheim ever saw, heard of, talked about or wrote about the 1948 musical review Make Mine Manhattan.
And we don't know whether he ever listened to the album Make Mine Manhattan and Other Great Musical Reviews which was put out under the Ben Bagley banner. My guess is that he has indeed heard the album and has known about the show for quite some time. He's a veritable encyclopedia of Broadway musicals.
Anyway, we do know that 22 years after Make Mine Manhattan debuted on Broadway,  Sondheim hit the Great White Way with a concept musical called Company.
And when we traveled up to the Connelly Theatre on New York's Lower East Side over the weekend to see a new production of Make Mine Manhattan we were struck but the similarities between the two shows.
Like Company, Make Mine Manhattan revolves around a collection of New Yorkers and their experiences living, working, coupling and uncoupling in the Big Apple.
It's clear that the original 1940s revue Make Mine Manhattan was a mostly loving send-up of New York City's most infamous borough. Struggling actors, disgruntled theatre critics and hapless out-of-towners all interact in this zesty review produced by Unsung Musicals.
Company took the same approach but was a bit more acerbic as befit the 1970s' view of New York.
Written by Arnold B. Horwitt (Plain and Fancy, "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis") and Emmy Award winner Richard Lewine ("Cinderella", "My Name is Barbra"), this new production of Make Mine Manhattan is directed by Ben West (Gatsby, How Now, Dow Jones, Platinum) with choreography by Rommy Sandhu (How Now, Dow Jones, Encores! Applause associate), musical direction and arrangements by Fran Minarik (Gatsby, Making the Boys), lighting design by Joe Hodge (Perfect Crime, Gatsby) and costume design by Martin T. Lopez (Penelope, Orpheus).
The producers promised that Make Mine Manhattan would be presented as it was originally conceived by its authors; the initial drafts describe the musical as "a pocket revue, designed for a cast of eight with two pianos." This new production features discarded dialogue and four musical numbers cut prior to the revue's Broadway bow: "I Gotta Have You", "New York Gal", "Old Fashioned Girl" and "Please Take It Back".
The entire cast of the show is hugely energetic and the voices are almost uniformly strong.  But it would be unfair not to single out Nicholas Dromard, Bret Shuford, Gabrielle Ruiz and LaQuet Sharnell. We particularly enjoyed "The Subway Song", "Old Fashioned Girl", "Anything Can Happen In New York", "I Fell In Love With You" and "I Gotta Have You."
Make Mine Manhattan ran for 429 performances at the Broadhurst Theater in its original production and it marked the Broadway debut of a young comedian who later went on to major stardom on TV:  Sid Caesar.
The show is quick and breezy -- a glimpse back into the Golden Age of Broadway. This was a time full of tuneful songs, zippy choreography and mostly upbeat tales. It was a time when the words "musical comedy" really meant something.
Having just finished reading Stephen Sondheim's two volumes of notes and recollections (Finishing The Hat and Look, I Made A Hat) we know that he found much to admire in the music, the lyrics and the artists who made Broadway shine into the 1950s.
Was he inspired by the likes of Make Mine Manhattan?
Go and see the show and decide for yourself.
Click here for more information about the show, the theater, the company and tickets.