150 Years of Popular Musical Theatre.

By Andrew Lamb. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2001; pp. x + 380. $39.95 cloth.

For anyone who still believes that the musical is a strictly American theatrical genre, 150 Years of Popular Musical Theatre by British musicologist Andrew Lamb is required reading. In four clearly defined sections, the book presents a historical timeline for this popular entertainment form under a variety of terms (operetta, light opera, musical comedy, opera-comique, opera-bouffe, etc.). From the glittering French and Viennese operettas to the international pop-inflected musicals of today, Lamb places the evolution of this genre in the context of a century and a half of social, historical, and economic change. The focus throughout is squarely on the contribution of the composer, with secondary attention paid to librettists and lyricists. Other elements of the musical's history, such as stage technology and design innovations or the influence of the director-choreographer, are given only glancing attention.

For such a vivid and glamorous subject, the author's approach can be surprisingly pedestrian. Each period of development is diligently covered, always in the same fashion. A brief introduction, including a bit of biographical information, is given to each composer. His major works are described, each with a bit of plot summary and a short mention of the significant songs. This approach appears to have been adopted in order to move efficiently through a tumultuous history of creativity. But it does not always illuminate the accomplishments of the composers, and paradoxically, it serves to diminish many of the great works he describes. With few exceptions, major works are given the same amount of coverage as those of marginal impact. However, the book benefits from an elegant presentation, a well-organized index, and numerous illustrations including portraits, production photographs, posters, and broadsides.

A few song highlights are mentioned for most musicals discussed, but usually only in a general manner, with little discussion of why these songs stood out. Lamb is obviously knowledgeable and I would much prefer to hear his opinions than read brief plot summaries. Its strength, finally, is as a strict narrative history of the international development of the musical. Approached on those terms, it is a rewarding work that can fill in the gaps in one's understanding of this popular art form.

Lamb begins his narrative in 1850, with the operetta compositions of Jacque Offenbach and Herve developing in response to the ambitious and serious operas of Verdi and Wagner. The industrial revolution altered the populations of cities like Paris with the growth of working classes that demanded more accessible material than opera house fare. Offenbach in particular "exploited the opportunities to make something recognizably new, providing a basis for the whole of subsequent musical theatrical development." (x). This "something new" was a more informal style of musical theatre featuring hummable melodies, danceable tunes, and topical comedy, performed in cafes and music halls rather than in the more formal setting of the opera house. Offenbach's influence as composer, theatre owner, and impresario dominates the first part of the narrative, "Continental European Operetta from Offenbach to Lehar." The development and staging of key works like Orphee aux enfers in 1858 (the first full-length operetta and one with a particularly sharp satiric edge to its depiction of the mythological characters, Orpheus and Eurydice), provide context for the activities of other French composers of the period and set the stage for discussion of the Viennese waltz operettas.

Offenbach's operettas were soon translated and adapted for performance in Vienna, and their success spurred a new era of creativity among Viennese composers, chief among them "Waltz King" Johann Strauss. The Viennese operettas were characterized by a strong reliance on waltz rhythms and a more romantic, less satiric tone than their French counterparts. Lamb's description of the genesis of Strauss's most enduring work, Die Fledermaus (1874), spotlights the adaptability of the operetta. Using a risque French comedy whose plot revolved around a champagne-soaked supper leading to indiscretions by its married protagonist, librettist Richard Genee switched the French supper to a Viennese ball and set the stage for the Strauss waltzes and comic arias. As Lamb rightly notes, "Die Fledermaus is a work that has transcended the confines of operetta and gained a universally acknowledged place in the international operatic repertory." (57) Lamb completes his coverage of this fertile creative period with an extended discussion of the impact of Franz Lehar's The Merry Widow, which rapidly gained worldwide popularity following its premiere in 1905. The Merry Widow proved to be a benchmark in the development of the musical, with a sophisticated and erotic quality in its music, and a psychological depth in its character songs hitherto absent in this escapist genre.

Part II, "Comic Opera and Musical Comedy: Britain and America," includes one of the book's highlights in its coverage of the British musical stage from ballad operas, to romantic operas, to the imported Offenbach one-act operettas. These one-acters became popular as private presentations in London homes and clubs, and it was in such a setting that composer Arthur Sullivan and librettist Francis Cowley Burnand presented their one-act comic opera, Cox and Box (1866), which presaged the series of operettas Sullivan would write with playwright W.S. Gilbert. Lamb is in his element describing the sparkling wit and melodic invention of the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas created for impresario Richard D'Oyly Carte and his company of singing actors. Carte and the company's chief comic George Grossmith are among the vivid non-composer personalities encountered throughout the book.

In describing the development of the musical in the United States, Lamb paints a convincing picture of the country as a melting pot of disparate influences, out of which poured a new and distinctive stew. While an early example of an American musical, The Doctor of Alcantara (1862), was heavily indebted to the plot conventions and song structures of European operetta, The Black Crook's (1866) mix of song, dance, and spectacle drew from then-current American entertainment forms such as minstrel shows and vaudeville. The American musical soon began developing along two parallel tracks: One, a continuation of the European operetta tradition, numbered such composers as Victor Herbert (The Red Mill, Naughty Marietta), and later Sigmund Romberg (The Desert Song, The New Moon) and Rudolf Friml (Rose Marie, The Vagabond King); a looser, more native form featured vaudeville elements and emphasized spectacle. It was in this vein that vaudevillian George M. Cohan created Little Johnny Jones (1904), the show that Lamb refers to as "the foundation of American musical comedy: vernacular American songs and dialogue woven into a lighthearted song-and-dance piece." (149).

These two distinct types of American musicals were melded in the work of Jerome Kern, who emerges in Lamb's narrative, along with Offenbach and later, Kurt Weill and Richard Rodgers, as a defining figure in musical theatre history. The songs he composed for musicals staged at the Princess Theatre (in collaboration with librettist Guy Bolton and lyricist P.G. Wodehouse) were as intimate as that tiny 299-seat theatre. As operetta had emerged in response to the grandiosity of opera, the songs and plots of the Princess musicals can be seen as a rebuke to what was now perceived as operetta fussiness. Lamb describes Kern's "They Didn't Believe Me" as symbolizing "the emergence of American theatrical song, in which swirling melodies, lush orchestration, and the romantic doings of places and princes were replaced by simple, gently tripping melodic lines and lyrics that expressed the workaday sentiments of ordinary people." (152).

Kern influenced a generation of composers, including George Gershwin (Lady Be Good!, Oh, Kay!), and Vincent Youmans (No, No, Nanette), whose tuneful and literate songs formed the basis for what we now recognize as the era of classic American popular song. Nanette's songs in particular embody this style for what Lamb calls their "straightforward phrasing, limited vocal and melodic range, and simple variations of rhythms" (161). This quintessential 1920s show was also notable for its tremendous success in Europe and England, and did much to establish the worldwide popularity of American musicals.

In the late 1920s and on through the 1930s, the American musical did indeed, as Lamb states, "come of age," and these pages are filled with familiar names and landmark titles. First and most significantly is Kern's 1927 Show Boat, one of many collaborations with librettist-lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II. It is a milestone musical for its dramatic, mature plot dealt with issues of race, miscegenation, and the break-up of families, and for its score encompassing everything from song-and-dance specialties, to character songs, to arias. After stretching the boundaries of the musical comedy form with the political satires Strike Up the Band (1927) and Of Thee I Sing (1931), George Gershwin and his lyricist brother, Ira, burst them completely with Porgy and Bess (1935), which Lamb compares to Bizet's Carmen for the scope of its operatic vocal and orchestral score, the number of its songs that have become favorites, and for its lack of acclaim in its premiere production. Like the Bizet opera, Porgy and Bess would take its rightful place in the opera house rather than on the popular musical stage. A dozen musical comedies by the team of composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist Lorenz Hart are also highlights of this period, enlivened by Rodgers bountiful melodies and the often-bittersweet wit of Hart's lyrics. Their run of successes culminated with Pal Joey (1940), which broke further ground in the musical theatre by focusing on an unsympathetic protagonist and featuring frank sexuality in its plotting.

It is a rich and productive period for the Americans, but as Lamb makes clear in Part III, "Continental European Round-Up," new schools of musical theatre were developing in other parts of the world. In Paris, the end of World War I brought with it the "Annees Folles," or "Crazy Years," which introduced a provocative new French style of musical comedy style, embodied by composer Henri Christine's Phi-Phi (1918) and Dede (1921). Marked by sexual innuendoes, comic anachronisms, and music in a variety of dance rhythms, both these long-running hits continue to be revived in France today, though like many of the European works of this period, their popularity remained strictly local. The 1930s saw the development of the "operette a grand spectacle" which, as its name indicates, emphasized spectacular settings as a kind of nostalgia for an early operetta era, but unfortunately without the benefit of strong scores.

The development of the musical in Germany was shadowed by the rise of Hitler and the Nazi party, and Lamb, without overstatement, paints a clear-eyed picture of the period. Artists like Kurt Weill, whose astringent, cabaret-style score for The Threepenny Opera (1928) was a startling departure from romantic operettas, left Germany for the United States or other European countries. The majority of German works of this period cling stubbornly to old-style, undemanding stories and melodies, even to the extent of revisiting operettas of the previous century and rewriting both their librettos and substituting new music.

In the book's most fascinating sequence, Lamb looks at the theatrical scene in several countries where works by local composers stood alongside works of international interest. Most significant among these national schools is the Spanish zarzuela, for which the author appears to have a particular fondness. In a few well-organized pages, he traces the roots of this form which "implies a potpourri or mishmash, and that's exactly what this combination of song, dance, verse, and dialogue was" (242). Lamb discusses the major zarzuela composers and their works, particularly the sub-genre of the one-act genero chico (small kind), which combined Spanish characters and situations in extended dialogue sequences, accessible songs and dances, and the use of native instruments in the orchestrations. A remarkable number of variations were worked on the genero chico and other, more dramatic forms of zarzuela. While its local subjects and emphasis on dialogue have kept it from finding popularity outside those Spanish-speaking countries, Lamb's obvious enthusiasm for the zarzuela in all its variations makes the reader want to revisit or seek out for the first time examples of these works.

Upon arriving in the United States, Kurt Weill made significant contributions to the development of the American musical, and it is his achievements that begin the book's final section, "The Musical Since World War II." Weill's reputation today is dominated by the enduring popularity of The Threepenny Opera, which was produced to great success Off-Broadway after his death in 1950. Lamb is persuasive in his observations on the significance of Weill's American musicals, which combined unusual subjects with surprising treatments, such as Lady in the Dark (1941) which focused on the psychological problems of a successful female magazine editor and confined its musical numbers to extended dream sequences. Weill's Street Scene (1947), set in a New York City tenement, was operatic in the range of its composition and, like Porgy and Bess, has entered the opera house repertory.

The work of Weill and others was significantly overshadowed by the premiere of Oklahoma! in 1943, and while it is debatable whether this work by composer Richard Rodgers, working now with librettist-lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, was more innovative than Weill's, its phenomenal popularity set a standard for Broadway composition and storytelling for the next several generations as what is now referred to as the "integrated musical." As Lamb notes, "What Kern and Gershwin had experimented with as far back as the 1920s--a piece that was not just a collection of catchy numbers, but a fusion of drama, song, and dance--became a reality in 1943." (258)

The Rodgers and Hammerstein shows dominated the musical theatre in America and around the world for several decades, and remain popular with worldwide audiences. But as Lamb writes, the post-World War II era in the United States was marked by an abundance of creativity and energy, and he provides several excellent chapters on this "golden age." With clarity and precision he traces the major works of American composers (and lyricists) like Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe (Brigadoon, My Fair Lady), Cole Porter (Kiss Me, Kate), Irving Berlin (Annie Get Your Gun), Harold Arlen (Bloomer Girl), Jule Styne (Bells Are Ringing, Gypsy), and many others. His survey climaxes with a consideration of one of the towering figures of musical theatre, Leonard Bernstein, who combined rigorous classical composition with popular modes of vocal and dance music to create sophisticated, propulsive musicals in a variety of styles. Following the musical comedies On the Town (1944) and Wonderful Town (1953), and the comic operetta Candide (1956), Lamb places West Side Story (1957) at the pinnacle of Bernstein's--and the American musical's-achievements. A contemporary re-setting of Romeo and Juliet, its intensely dramatic score was filled with songs that have become popular standards, and highlighted by Jerome Robbins choreography set to what may be the most electrifying dance music ever written for an American musical. With West Side Story, Lamb writes, "the American musical had undeniably come of age as an artistic entity that might justly claim to be the true inheritor of the role previously occupied by opera." (274)

With the exception of the Gilbert & Sullivan operettas and a few others, the British would play a secondary role in the development of the musical until the appearance of Andrew Lloyd Webber and the pop opera wave beginning in the 1970s. Nonetheless, the British musical was far from moribund, and here Lamb makes a convincing case for a reassessment of its post-World War II output. The operetta-style works of Ivor Novello (Perchance to Dream, King Rhapsody) and Vivian Ellis' musical comedies (Bless the Bride) were popular but did not transfer beyond the British Empire. Other notable titles covered are The Boy Friend (1953), Sandy Wilson's pastiche of 1920s musicals, and David Heneker's Half a Sixpence (1963), both of which had success in New York and elsewhere. The team of Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley created two small, revue-style entertainments, both starring Newley. The scores for Stop the World--I Want to Get Off(1961) and The Roar of the Greasepaint--the Smell of the Crowd (1964) were filled with songs that became pop standards and both transferred to Broadway for extended runs. By far the biggest British musical success until the Lloyd Webber era was Lionel Bart's Oliver! (1960), adapted from Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist. It enjoyed international acclaim and remains the most successful musical adaptation of a Charles Dickens work.

These successes pale alongside the juggernaut of the international pop blockbuster ushered in by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Lamb places Lloyd Webber's works in the context of the new economic realities of musical theatre production. As production costs have risen and competition from films, television, and video increased, shows of marginal critical or popular success can no longer survive for extended runs. Nor do economics allow for the fine-tuning of out-of-town engagements prior to Broadway or West End premieres. Given these circumstances, Lloyd Webber's approach to composing and producing has been breathtakingly prescient. He circumvented the need for expensive out-of-town tryouts by producing studio recordings of musicals like Jesus Christ Superstar (1971) and Evita (1978), which were filled with rock styled, radio-friendly songs. Audiences attended these shows already familiar with their big song hits, and their aggressive marketing campaigns, positioning them as "must see" special events, helped drive them to record-breaking runs. (Lamb skirts the issue of their simplistic and often-derivative melodies, and frequently overblown productions, which assure their accessibility to worldwide audiences regardless of language skills.) With Cats (1981), Starlight Express (1984), and The Phantom of the Opera (1986), Lloyd Webber dominated the musical to an extent not seen since the Rodgers and Hammerstein years. His influence can be seen in the rush of similarly grand scale, through-composed shows that followed his lead, the most prominent being Les Miserables (1985) and Miss Saigon (1989), both by the French team of composer Claude-Michel Schonberg and lyricist Alain Boublil.

So completely has this style ruled the musical theatre for the last three decades that the contributions of latter-day American composers and lyricists seem almost diminished in Lamb's narrative. Significantly, Stephen Sondheim (Company, Follies, Sweeney Todd), who is usually revered as the most important figure of the contemporary musical theatre, is given no more coverage than his American counterparts, composer-lyricist Jerry Herman (Hello, Dolly!, Mame), composer Cy Coleman (Sweet Charity, City of Angels), and the team of composer John Kander and lyricist Fred Ebb (Cabaret, Chicago). Lamb notes that despite their successes, "they have also presided over a period when the stage musical has become a more specialist form of entertainment, less readily appreciated by the public at large." (312)

The remaining pages may seem both an anti-climax (one-off successes like 1776, A Chorus Line, Nine, Big River, The Mystery of Edwin Drood, and Blood Brothers can't halt a sense of the musical winding down into irrelevancy) and a depressing state of affairs (gargantuan stage transfers of animated films like Disney's Beauty and the Beast and The Lion King), but Lamb ends on a positive note in his discussion of Jonathan Larson's Rent (1996). (However, here the author makes one of his few errors. Larson's death, which made front-page news, was the result of an aortic aneurysm, not AIDS, as Lamb asserts.) Rent is the latest in a line of adaptations of Henry Murger's Scenes de la vie de Boheme, now set in New York City's Lower East Side, peopled with characters coping with HIV-positive status, drug addiction, and economic marginalization. Lamb draws a graceful arc from the swirling, satirical Offenbach confections of 150 years ago to the rock-tinged melodies of Larson's franker, more explicit age, observing that while musical styles and economics have changed, creativity and imagination still remain the currency of the musical. It is this continuity that 150 Years of Popular Musical Theatre celebrates--a resilient art form that constantly reinvents itself to reflect the values and tastes of each generation.

Kevin Winkler
New York Public Library for the Performing Arts