Joss Whedon

Live from New York, it’s Joss Whedon (and Stephen Sondheim)!

THE EVENT: "WALL-TO-WALL" 75th birthday celebration for Stephen Sondheim at Symphony Space in New York (95th street and Broadway), 11 a.m.-11p.m.

The Event Within the Event: "Sondheim and American Popular Culture" Frank Rich, Moderator; Melissa Bernardo (theater editor, Entertainment Weekly), Andrew Lippa (composer), Stephen Sondheim, and Joss Whedon, panelists.

Joss and Stephen Sondheim on the same stage. Was there any way I was going to miss this? No.

I met the ever-wonderful Darby and Sara on the "members only" line (they generously gave me a spare "members" ticket) at 2:00 p.m., hoping we could wind our way through the line and get in for the 5:00 start of Joss’ panel. What you out-of-towners have to realize about these Wall-to-Wall events is that they’re free for all: if you want to come, you can come right in. The only problem is that unless you’re willing to wait on line early in the morning, you have to depend on the good will of your fellow theatergoers. You have to hope that the early risers have had enough by about mid-afternoon and are actually willing to LEAVE.

But luck was with us—we got into the theater at 4:30 (relative early) and managed to catch two numbers from Pacific Overtures, one of Sara’s favorite Sondheim musicals. When jazz singer Nora York finished up with her version of "Being Alive," the crew set up for the panel. Sondheim sat on the far right, with Joss right next to him on the left. (Joss looked a little nervous sitting next to one of his idols.) Mr. Whedon went semi-formal for the occasion, with dark jacket and matching slacks and red tie. (Yes, he still had the beard.)

Frank Rich (the New York Times’ theater-critic-turned-political pundit) started right off with Joss and "Once More with Feeling." There was much talk about the Sondheim-ishness of the score, and how Joss (as a first time composer) had the advantage of "six years of rehearsals" with his cast, and the luxury of crafting the score to their strengths and weaknesses.

(Later on, post-Joss, choreographer Pat Birch told a story about A Little Night Music, and how director Hal Prince rehearsed the final scene of the first act before Sondheim had even completed the music. Prince brought Sondheim in to see the blocking; Sondheim went home and wrote "A Weekend in the Country" practically around the already-rehearsed scene. Sondheim is said to have commented that it would be a lot easier if he watched the rehearsals first and then wrote the score.)

Joss said that he came by his love of musicals very young, since his father and grandfather both wrote for the theater in New York before Joss’ dad packed up the fam and moved to L.A. He mentioned a small clique of musical theater freaks in T.V. with similar backgrounds, including one of Joss’ former classmates, a co-creator of Will&Grace. (Joss never mentioned which one.)

But by far the most interesting section of the discussion was the problem of adapting Stage musicals to Screen. Sondheim shook his head and said it has never been done to his satisfaction, including the adaptation of his own A Little Night Music to film. Sondheim said that the camera immediately and irrevocably alters the experience, and destroys the special relationship between a theater audience and the production. He mentioned (as an example) that a single close-up on screen would render an entire stage song completely useless: in an instant, the close-up would clearly register the emotion that it would take a three-minute song to describe on stage.

And that, folks, was pretty much all of Joss Whedon for this event. 45 minutes for the panel, and he was gone. So, "Buffy" fans? You didn’t miss much.

But you Sondheim fans out there?

I stayed for another six hours. It was a show for the ages.

Complete listing of everything I saw from 4:30 to 11:15 listed below