Trivia / Stephen Sondheim

• Development Hell:
  • Sondheim's last project was his collaboration with playwright David Ives based on two Luis Buñuel films, The Exterminating Angel and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie. It was rumored to be almost ready for public production in the summer of 2016 and for sometime after, but gradually reports slowed to zero. After Sondheim's death, the musical was mounted Off-Broadway under the title Here We Are, after coming up with a dramatic rationale for the fact that Sondheim had completed relatively few songs for the second act.
  • His last completed musical, Road Show, ate up over a decade of his career; it was workshopped in 1998 under the title Wise Guys, but was withdrawn due to Creative Differences and a lawsuit against the original producer. It was then heavily rewritten and produced (and even recorded) under the title Bounce in 2003, but closed out of town. Finally a smaller-scale version, Road Show, made it to Off-Broadway for a short run in 2008.