Famed American musical composer, lyricist and legend Stephen Sondheim has died at the age of 91 at his home in Connecticut.
Sondheim created such iconic musicals as “Sweeney Todd,” “Company,” “Into the Woods,” “Sunday in the Park with George,” “Assassins,” “Follies,” “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum,” “Sunday in the Park With George” along with writing the lyrics for “West Side Story” and “Gypsy”.
He has won nine Tony Awards, eight Grammy Awards, a Laurence Olivier Award, a Presidential Medal of Freedom, a Pulitzer Prize and an Oscar.
His Academy Award win came for Madonna’s “Sooner or Later,” one of the five songs he wrote for 1990’s “Dick Tracy” film adaptation by Warren Beatty. Another from that film, “More,” won a Grammy.
He also contributed to Beatty’s “Reds” in 1981, wrote a song for Herbert Ross’ 1976 adaptation of Nicholas Meyer’s “The Seven Percent Solution,” and wrote the score for the 1974 Alain Resnais film “Stavisky”. He only ever penned one film script – co-writing the murder mystery “The Last of Sheila” with Anthony Perkins.
Cinema had an influence on Sondheim in other ways though. Ingmar Bergman’s 1955 feature “Smiles of a Summer Night” served as the inspiration for Sondheim’s 1973 stage production “A Little Night Music” which included the famed song “Send in the Clowns”.
Tim Burton adapted “Sweeney Todd” to the screen back in 2007, Rob Marshall adapted “Into the Woods” onto film in 2014, Steven Spielberg adapted “West Side Story” which is releasing in a few weeks, and Richard Linklater is currently working on a movie retelling of “Merrily We Roll Along” which is being filmed over a twelve-year timespan.
Source: Variety
RIP Stephen Sondheim - Dark Horizons
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