| INTRODUCTION
Sunday in the Park with George is a fictionalized story based on the work of French pointillist painter Georges Seurat and his best-known painting "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte." Little is known about the life of this artist, who experimented and died in obscurity, aged 31. It wasn't until much later that Seurat's pointillist representations of color and light were regarded as masterpieces.
The musical, which won a Pulitzer Prize in 1985, is not as much an attempt to interpret Seurat's life, but instead uses the artist's imagined life to comment on the nature of artists and art, and the difficult relationship between art and life.
THE PLOT
Act One is set on a series of Sundays in the 1880s, on the island where Seurat is sketching his subjects and in his studio, where he is busy working on the gigantic "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte". The people out strolling in the park comment on the odd artist and the world of 1884 Paris, and become figures in the painting as Seurat sketches them. There is also tension between George and his model/lover Dot. Eventually she leaves him, for a more attentive baker, and moves to America with George's newborn child.
Act Two flashes forward to the 1980s, in modern Chicago, where the anniversary of the painting is being celebrated. An artist named George, possibly the great grandson of Seurat, is struggling to balance his rather eccentric artistic style with the commercial and social demands of a booming capitalist art market. The modern, entirely fictional George shares his ancestor's passion as well as his inability to get close to people because of it. But with the help of his ailing grandmother Marie and the ghost of Dot George is able to reconnect with his past and find inspiration for new works.
(Source: Freely adapted from various Internet and written sources)
AWARDS
The 1990 NT production won 2 Olivier Awards:
- Best New Musical;
- Outstanding Performance of the Year by an Actor in a Musical (to Philip Quast!)
It had also received 4 other nominations:
- Outstanding Performance of the Year by an Actress in a Musical;
- Best Director;
- Best Costume Design;
-
Best Set Design.
MUSICAL NUMBERS
ACT ONE
Prologue
Sunday in the Park with George - Dot
No Life - Jules & Yvonne
Colour and Light - Dot & George
Gossip - Celeste No 1, Celeste No 2, Boatman, Nurse, Old Lady, Jules, Yvonne
The Day Off - George, Nurse, Franz, Frieda & others
Everybody Loves Louis - Dot
Finishing the Hat - George
We Do Not Belong Together - Dot & George
Beautiful - Old Lady & George
Sunday - The Company
ACT TWO
It's Hot Up Here - The Company
Putting It Together - George & & Company
Children and Art - Marie
Lesson #8 - George
Move On - George & Dot
Finale: Sunday - The Company |
In March 1990 the programme "Omnibus" on BBC One broadcast a documentary about the show, entitled Sunday in the Park with Stephen.
• Listen to some audioclips and watch some videoclips.In May 2007 Philip Quast and Maria Friedman performed 'Move On' during a Memorial Concert celebrating the life and career of director Steven Pimlott, who died in February 2007. |
Philip Quast as the two Georges sharply contrasts the older one's monastic fervour with the younger one's gregarious emptiness and projects the words with clarity, elegance and style.
Michael Billington |
Sunday does not "interpret" the great painting. Not does it pretend to be faithful to the relationship between Georges Seurat and his mistress. But given Seurat's self-enclosure in his art, what Sondheim and Lapine have to tell us rings true, as much in the concise and ever-eloquent prompting of the little orchestra as in the vocal line and the choice of words.
John Russell, NT programme |
It's been a battle (...) [Stephen Sondheim] gives very succinct notes and can explain and justify every word, every note, in the show. (...)
He is very nervous, but comes alive during the rehearsals and is very positive.
Philip Quast about the rehearsal process |
The opening scene
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SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE
Full Cast & Crew
