The dumbing down of the country reflects itself on Broadway. The shows get dumber, and the public gets used to them.
I'm interested in the theater because I'm interested in communication with audiences. Otherwise I would be in concert music.
Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos.
Musical comedies aren't written they are re-written.
If I cannot fly, let me sing.
Musicals are, by nature, theatrical, meaning poetic, meaning having to move the audience's imagination and create a suspension of disbelief, by which I mean there's no fourth wall.
All the best performers bring to their role something more, something different than what the author put on paper. That's what makes theatre live. That's why it persists.
One of the hardest things about writing lyrics is to make the lyrics sit on the music in such a way that you're not aware there was a writer there.
In the Rodgers and Hammerstein generation, popular hits came out of shows and movies.
Music blows lyrics up very quickly, and suddenly they become more than art. They become pompous and they become self-conscious ... I firmly believe that lyrics have to breathe and give the audience's...
I'm very opinionated about movie musicals when they're adapted from live shows. You'll sit still for a three-minute song in a theater. But in movies, a glance from someone's eyes will tell you the who...
I prefer neurotic people. I like to hear rumblings beneath the surface.
One difference between poetry and lyrics is that lyrics sort of fade into the background. They fade on the page and live on the stage when set to music.
The worst thing you can do is censor yourself as the pencil hits the paper. You must not edit until you get it all on paper. If you can put everything down, stream-of-consciousness, you'll do yourself...
Over a period of time it's been driven home to me that I'm not going to be the most popular writer in the world so I'm always happy when anything in any way is accepted.
A folktale without a moral is merely a whimsy.
Must it all be either less or more,Either plain or grand?Is it always 'or'?Is it never 'and'?That's what woods are for:For those moments in the woods...Oh, if life were made of moments,Even now and th...
Was that me? Yes it was. Was that him? No it wasn't.. Just a trick of the woods! Just a moment, One peculiar passing moment. Must it all be either less or more, Either plain or grand? Is it always 'or...
Though it's fearful, Though it's deep, though it's dark And though you may lose the path, Though you may encounter wolves, You can't just act, You have to listen. you can't just act, You have to think...
Alright! You sir, you sir, how about a shave?Come and visit your good friend Sweeney.You sir, too sir? Welcome to the grave.I will have vengenance.I will have salvation.Who sir, you sir?No ones in the...
