Last month, Richard Maltby, Jr., awoke to some of the best reviews of his long and protean career as a lyricist, book writer, and director. Though he has been involved with some the most acclaimed — and most damned — mega-musicals in Broadway history (“Miss Saigon,” “The Pirate Queen”) the raves poured in as never before for the York Theatre revival of “Closer Than Ever,” the 1989 off-Broadway four-character musical revue which he penned with his longtime collaborator, composer David Shire. “If musicals were rated a la baseball’s slugging percentage, the numbers for the York Theatre’s revival … would be positively Ruthian,” the New Yorker pointed out in their listing.
The show’s musings on the tricky search for connection are wry and sophisticated. And they are poignantly handled by a top-shelf quartet: George Dvorsky, Sal Viviano, Jenn Colella and Christiane Noll. (Julia Murney and Jacquelyn Piro Donovan replace the latter two on August 6 and 3, respectively.) Maltby, the son of a famous bandleader, began his collaboration with Shire, his Yale classmate, in 1961 with the short-lived off-Broadway show, “The Sap of Life,” which dwelt on the idiocy that often accompanies the “sexual juice” of youth. Though “Maltby-Shire” has been a brand in theatrical circles since then, Maltby has achieved his biggest commercial successes outside of the collaboration: as the director and conceiver of two smash hits — the Fats Waller revue “Ain’t Misbehavin’” and “Fosse,” a compilation of choreographer Bob Fosse’s greatest theatrical achievements.
Not that the duo have given up: They are working on a new musical that Maltby would only cryptically say is “adapted from an unlikely source and has been produced elsewhere.” He was more forthcoming about the sanguinity he feels as a longtime mentor to young theatrical talent, and why so many Broadway shows run aground on the perceived need for spectacle and marketing over story.
Did you make any notable changes in the show for this incarnation, apart from writing three new songs and discarding two others?
It seems like a totally new show. Sometimes I’m sitting in the audience and I think, “I’ve never heard this before.” They’re different performers, of course, and the one simple directive that I gave them is to give people a back story. Don’t just give the audience what the song is saying, but the weight of the character’s past as well. The other adjustment was for the actors to play directly to the audience so that it becomes a conversation with them. “We’re all in this together.” And the reaction has been explosive. The audience can identify: That’s me up there.
Why do you suppose the reviews have been even better this time around?
I think that while it’s fun for an audience to go to a show where there’s lots of scenery and noise and a score you already know, the reason that we fall in love with the theater is for something new, emotional and touching. It’s not just because theater folk are “weird people.” The basic impulse is to feel an emotional connection to the people on the stage and to experience something that connects with your life.
Yet you’ve been involved with shows, like “Miss Saigon,” with lots of scenery and noise, haven’t you?
Yes. But one of the reasons “Miss Saigon” worked so well is because it’s ultimately an intimate story with concentrated scenes. There is a city teeming with life and other characters, but long before a helicopter was added, you always had these moments which are apparent when you do a simpler version of the show. There’s a production right now in Utrecht that is much more focused on the story and it’s more powerful as a result.
What is it that keeps you going back to the themes of love and romance and the obstacles that are often put in its path?
It’s called life. [Laughs.] I think it’s about living with irreconcilable contradiction: I want this but I also want that. This could not possibly go with that, and yet they do and it’s my life. Anybody who’s been in a relationship for more than ten years knows that it ain’t easy, that it’s a combination of things you love about a person and things that you can’t stand. And yet you go forward because that is the paradox of being human.
You address that in the song “One of the Good Guys,” which is about a guy who is faithful to his wife while being sorely tempted. What was the genesis of that?
I wrote it about my college roommate. Because nobody ever writes about the people who do things right, who plays by the rules, marries the wife, raises the children, and does a good job. It’s not something that life kisses you on the mouth for. In fact, if anything, you find yourself struggling while the shitheads get all the medals and awards. And you wonder if you somehow made the wrong choice.
How optimistic are you about the future of Broadway?
I’m going to make a fearless prediction: there’s a revolution coming. And the reason is that almost every college, in the last ten years, has set up musical theater programs. And they are turning out people who are going to reinvent the musical. I don’t know how. But I do know that there is a whole new generation who are crazy for the musical theater and who are coming in with new voices and inventive writing that touches the heart. Look at “Light in the Piazza,” “Spring Awakening,” “Next to Normal.” Almost every really daring new hit started with a “Huh?” reaction. A musical about Mormon missionaries? About a bipolar drug-taking mother? And look at the young creators of “Dogfight” [the new musical at Second Stage]. They’re in their twenties. They’re learning the craft and they are going to do something really important and really significant in the next couple of years.
As successful as you have been, a Broadway hit has eluded the Maltby-Shire collaboration.
We haven’t given up. Funnily enough, I always tell young writers that if they’ve done great work but haven’t gotten good reviews, you still win. New York is a lot, but [a bad review here] is not the end of the world. Our shows, while not monstrous hits in new York, have gone around the world. “Baby” is done all the time. The shows still go out and affect people. That’s why you get into this business.
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