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The Golden Age of Broadway with Rodgers and Hammerstein
Posted by JessicaStuhr | 06 October 2011 | Comments (0)
Thanks should be given to the original minds that challenged the norms of musical theater in creating Oklahoma!, a timeless story of hope, struggle and love. But this was not the work of untrained creatives. Although it was the first musical collaboration by Rodgers and Hammerstein, Oklahoma! was not the first production that put these men on the musical map. In their early careers, Rodgers and Hammerstein were successful songwriters before first working together in the 1940s.
Richard Charles Rodgers was born on June 28, 1902 near Long Island to immigrant parents. The Rodgers household was not a happy one. As he recalled in his later memoirs, family dinners were hellish, characterized by long, awkward silences, yelling and bickering. Although studies show that musical talent is typically genetic, many wonder if Richard’s gift was partly due to using music as an emotional escape from the turmoil he experienced at home.
But despite these issues, home was also a source of creativity and learning for young Richard. His father, William, was the soundest influence in his life and was fond of singing the latest Broadway tunes and often attended performances with his wife, Mamie. Richard started playing piano at a very young age and had a natural ear. He strongly rejected the mundane practice of reading notes when he briefly took lessons with his aunt. It wasn’t until adulthood and following much success that he ever took formal lessons again.
In his early career, Rodgers worked closely with lyricist Lorenz Hart, whom he met in 1919. It was a collaboration that would last 23 years. Rodgers composed the music and Hart followed with the lyrics. Their first collaborative piece debuted in 1920 and was titled Poor Little Ritz Girl. It was the first of 16 shows that would follow over the next two decades. In 1931 after a stream of seven successful shows, they tried their hand at writing songs for Hollywood. Despite their dislike of the creative environment, where they often had no control over their work, they did produce Blue Moon, one of their most successful shows. In 1935 Rodgers and Hart returned to Broadway and wrote a slew of hit material including Babes in Arms (1937) and The Boys from Syracuse (1938). In 1942 they wrote their final show together, By Jupiter. Hart died in 1943 at the early age of 48. And although it was a great loss for musical theater, this led to the unmatched pairing of Rodgers with Oscar Hammerstein II.
Oscar Clendenning Hammerstein II was born on July 12, 1895 into a bold, theatrical family. His grandfather, Oscar I, was an opera impresario and showman. His father, William, was the manager of Hammerstein’s Victoria, one of the best known vaudeville theaters in its time and his uncle, Arthur, was a famous producer. This musical upbringing was paramount in the development of Hammerstein’s talents and he would soon overshadow his theatrical predecessors. But despite the family’s theater background his father pushed him away from the stage. Oscar attended Columbia University with the intent of studying law. But despite all efforts by his father to steer him down a different path, it was at Columbia that his musical career really started. At the age of 19 he joined the Columbia University Players first as an actor and then a writer and later met his future professional partner, Richard Rodgers, who was also a Columbia alumnus.
After completing his first year of law school, Oscar persuaded his uncle to hire him as the assistant stage manager for an upcoming show. By 1919 he had been promoted to stage manager for all of Arthur’s shows and started doing some writing and re-writing on scripts in development. He was soon writing his own scripts and in 1922 produced his first successful show, Wildflower. In 1924 he produced Rose-Marie, a much bigger success than his first. He began working with composer Jerome Kern after Rose-Marie and together they produced Show Boat,a musical about life on the Mississippi River that put Hammerstein on the map as a writer and lyricist.
In 1929 Oscar divorced his wife of 12 years and remarried. He spent the next decade happy in his personal life but unfulfilled professionally while he worked in Hollywood on contract with several studios. In 1942 after his return to New York he was contacted by an old university acquaintance, Richard Rodgers. Rodgers, who had recently lost his friend and collaborative partner Lorenz Hart, wanted to collaborate with Oscar on a reconstruction of the not-so-successful play, Green Grow the Lilacs. Using the backward technique of writing the lyrics first and the music afterward, they joined forces and produced what was originally titled Away We Go! Several bad reviews and an integral re-write later, Oklahoma! was released on Broadway in March 1943 and was a second-day hit. The original reviews cautioned the usual opening night crowd but the second night had lines that rounded city blocks. Oklahoma! ran for a staggering 2,212 performances and received a Pulitzer Prize in 1944.
The unstoppable duo was born. Rodgers and Hammerstein, as the pair became known, would go on to produce a slew of greatly successful productions in the 1940s and 1950s. Their musicals and memorable songs -- along with the film versions that typically followed -- garnered an impressive collection of awards, which included 34 Tony awards, 15 Academy Awards, two Pulitzer Prizes and two Grammys. Their five best-known musicals, Oklahoma!, Carousel, South Pacific, The King and I, and The Sound of Music became global successes and icons in musical history. Hammerstein wrote and estimated 850 songs and Rodgers composed more than 900. Together and apart the work produced by Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II can be directly found in more than 40 Broadway musicals and indirectly in several Hollywood films and TV adaptations Together, Rodgers and Hammerstein created magic; stories that audiences worldwide still enjoy today, no matter how they’re told. Come see how Portland Center Stage is telling the story.
Find Oklahoma! tickets here!
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