#Adolph Green

[doyouknowthismusical]

[sondheims-hat]

1962. Sondheim, Bernstein, Adolph Green, Roddy McDowall.

[citizenscreen]

Taken January 31, 1960: Betty Comden, Adolph Green, and Henry Fonda rehearsing for the CBS TV special, “The Fabulous Fifties.” the special was a review of the previous decade through musical and comedy skits, commentary and news clips.

[streamondemand]

'The Band Wagon' – Fred Astaire goes to Broadway on Max

One of the great movie musicals, The Band Wagon (1953) stars Fred Astaire as Tony Hunter, a former Broadway hoofer who returns to New York when his Hollywood career dries up. He’s looking for a comeback and his friends, the fun-loving married couple Lester and Lily Marton (Oscar Levant and Nanette Fabray), have developed one just for him. When they sign Broadway’s hottest talent, enfant terrible…

[mthguy]

Celebrating the 75th anniversary of On the Town.

On the Town is a 1949 American film musical with music by Leonard Bernstein and Roger Edens and book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. It is an adaptation of the Broadway stage musical of the same name produced in 1944 (which itself is an adaptation of the Jerome Robbins ballet, titled Fancy Free, also produced in 1944.)

The film was directed by Gene Kelly (who also choreographed) and Stanley Donen, in their directorial debut, and stars Kelly, Frank Sinatra, Betty Garrett, and Ann Miller, featuring Jules Munshin and Vera-Ellen. It was a product of the Arthur Freed unit at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and is notable for its combination of studio and location filming, the result of Gene Kelly's insistence that some scenes be shot in New York City, including Columbus Circle, the Brooklyn Bridge, and Rockefeller Center.

The film was an immediate success and won the Oscar for Best Music – Scoring of a Musical Picture. It was also nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Cinematography (Color). Screenwriters Comden and Green won the Writers Guild of America Award for Best Written American Musical.

In 2006, the film ranked number 19 on the American Film Institute's list of Best Musicals. In 2018, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

[pureanonofficial]

This is to highlight lyricists who pretty much solely did lyrics, not composer-lyricists! If there's another lyricist you love who isn't listed here, please leave that in the tags!

[wingedballoonpeace]

[onenakedfarmer]

Currently Playing

BELLS ARE RINGING Original Soundtrack Album

Judy Holliday Dean Martin

André Previn

[mthguy]

Brilliant lyrics from Adolph Green, Betty Comden and Roger Edens and a spectacular performance by Gene Kelly and Donald O'Connor elevate "Moses Supposes," from the movie musical Singin' in the Rain, to comic genius!

Moses Supposes

[doyouknowthismusical]

Note that there are a lot of Peter Pan musicals, this is the 1954 one with Mary Martin originating the role of Peter

[sondheims-hat]

1978: Sondheim, Jule Styne, Phyllis Newman, Jerry Herman, Adolph Green.

[citizenscreen]

Publicity photos of Comden and Green (Betty Comden and Adolph Green) who had a 60-year partnership during which they wrote such shows as “On the Town” (1944) and musical films such as Singin' In The Rain (1952) and The Band Wagon (1953).

[brummie-man-interests]

"Bells Are Ringing" is an American romantic comedy-musical film based on the 1956 Broadway production by Betty Comden, Adolph Green and Jule Styne.

[mthguy]

Stephen Sondheim’s Follies  

The legendary 1985 concert performance of Stephen Sondheim's acclaimed musical Follies was presented by the New York Philharmonic at Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center. 

The thrilling - and possibly historic - New York Philharmonic concert version of Follies presented at Avery Fisher Hall was a reunion of sorts, albeit one with a happier ending. To cast this all too transitory event, the producer Thomas Z. Shepard brought together veterans of Sondheim musicals stretching from the 1964 Anyone Can Whistle to Sunday in the Park With George - among them, Lee Remick, Elaine Stritch, George Hearn, Liz Callaway and Mandy Patinkin. They were joined by other stellar musical-comedy hands who exemplify the Broadway heyday whose passing Follies mourns - Barbara Cook, Carol Burnett, Betty Comden and Adolph Green. Once this company paraded before the orchestra to the glittering melody of the opening song, ''Beautiful Girls,'' it was impossible to separate the fictional show-biz reunion dramatized in Follies from the real one unfolding on stage. The audience, more than willing to let the distinction slide, simply erupted into pandemonium.

The cheering rarely subsided thereafter, and not without reason. Mr. Shepard assembled this evening to record the complete Follies score, which was mangled on its original Broadway cast album. Although there were still a few elisions (mainly of dance music) in the concert, this version was as complete, gorgeously sung and sumptuously played as Mr. Sondheim or his fans could wish. But there were other reasons for the thunderous response as well. Even in concert, Follies proved much more than merely a star-studded recording session. The performance made the case that this Broadway musical can take its place among our musical theater's very finest achievements. (Frank Rich, The New York Times)

[twittercomfrnklin2001-blog]

Take Me Out to the Ballgame

Not every MGM musical was a winner, not even when produced by Arthur Freed. Busby Berekeley’s (and really Gene Kelly and Stanley Donen’s) TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL GAME (1949, TCM) is more interesting as a warm-up for Kelly and Donen’s ON THE TOWN later the same year. Along with Kelly, both films feature Frank Sinatra, Betty Garrett and Jules Munshin. They both have lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green and new songs the team wrote with Roger Edens. But the later film has a much better script, also by Comden and Green, and leading lady. Though it’s maddening that Freed cut most of Leonard Bernstein’s score from ON THE TOWN, it hasn’t aged as badly as the earlier film.

Kelly and Sinatra are the star players of the Wolves, a turn-of-the-century baseball team. They’re shocked when they discover the team’s owner has died and left it to a woman (Esther Williams). They’re more shocked when she turns out to know a lot about baseball. Imagine, a competent woman. To get around her strict discipline, Kelly courts her, because, I suppose, any woman would give up her principles for a little loving. Sinatra likes her too, even though he’s pursued by Garrett, who’s a much better actress and can actually sing her duets with him. Then there are a bunch of gamblers led by Edward Arnold, who has some unstated relationship to Garrett. They’re betting against the top-rated team and set out to use Kelly to make them lose, and so what?

Kelly was an expert at playing brash characters, but here the writing makes him utterly obnoxious. He keeps trying to use Williams, and by the time he falls for her, it’s hard to care. It takes forever for him to get a solo, and when he does, though it’s expertly danced, it’s kind of a yawn. Kelly, Donen and Freed fought to make musicals where the numbers serve a purpose, but this is just a song he sings at a party. It has nothing to do with anything. Maybe it’s a metaphor for Williams’ presence. She’s hardly a great actress, and you may find yourself imagining what someone like Judy Garland or even Katherine Grayson could have done with her comic lines. Worse yet, aside from a scene in a swimming pool, she never gets to do what she does best.

With a big void where the leading couple should be, the focus shifts to Sinatra and Garrett, who are terrific. They act together with a grace and connection lacking in most of the film. He’s charming and natural and gets to sing a lovely ballad, “The Right Girl for Me,” when he thinks he’s in love with Williams. And Garrett is just a delight. For some reason, Hollywood always treated her as if she weren’t good looking, so she’s the latest in a line of female singers coming on to Sinatra in song. Her number, “It’s Fate, Baby, It’s Fate,” is arguably the best in the film. Sinatra has a few lines, but it’s mostly her solo, and she’s very funny. The Comden and Green lyrics are cleverer than the dialog by the film’s other writers. Munshin is also funny, as is Tom Dugan as one of the team’s managers. If you look quickly, you’ll spot The Blackburn Twins (Ramon and Royce), whose number was cut from the film. I’d rather have watched them than the dated Kelly-Sinatra duet, “Yes, Indeedy,” about the women they loved and dumped, including one who (this is the stanza’s punchline?!?) committed suicide.