by VIC MATUS 😂 Ending on a lighter note, new Weekend Beacon contributor Peter Tonguette reviews Daniel Okrent's Stephen Sondheim: Art Isn’t Easy. https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!wOUY!,w_1100,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F5e917300-d0a6-4196- b0d1-565d3f0d8a26_695x491.jpeg Despite favoring sometimes-ghastly subjects, overly calculated lyrics, and eminently unhummable music, composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim was something of a conservative when it came to acknowledging his forbears. In Sondheim’s case, that chiefly meant lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II, who gladly accepted the role of substitute father to the boy then known as Stevie—a comprehensively unhappy child of divorce—and even more eagerly agreed to school him in musical-making. That he wanted to make musicals in the first place is a testament to the outsize influence of Hammerstein, who, with composer Richard Rodgers, created such masterpieces as Oklahoma! and South Pacific. “’In numberless interviews,’ writes author Daniel Okrent in his perceptive, efficient new account of Sondheim’s life, ‘Sondheim would later claim that if Oscar had been a geologist, he would have himself become a geologist.’ “Not fully explained in the book, but certainly obvious to sensitive and non-Sondheim-obsessive readers, is why Sondheim took up Hammerstein’s vocation, soaked in Hammerstein’s approbation, and treasured Hammerstein’s counsel but so thoroughly rejected Hammerstein’s worldview. “After all, Hammerstein was a purveyor of a tenderly affirmative vision of life—one that, for Sondheim, featured ‘the kind of nature imagery that makes me cringe.’ No one could accuse Sondheim of trafficking in cringe, at least not of the sweetly sentimental sort. One of his most enduring shows incorporates cannibalism into the plot (Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street), while another considers the backstories of presidential assailants or aspirant assailants (Assassins). Is it any wonder that he is said to have produced just a single song (’Send In the Clowns’ from A Little Night Music) that accrued popularity outside of its show?”