Broadway: Worth and Sanctuary
We finally arrived on the streets of Manhattan. My wife and I were fortunate to attend a performance on Saturday afternoon of Jule Styne and Steven Sondheim’s Gypsy. The revival of this classic musical stars the multiple award-winning Audra McDonald as Rose, the overbearing mother of Gypsy Rose Lee. We then walked several blocks up Broadway to have dinner and a live performance at 54 Below, a cabaret featuring Broadway stars in an intimate setting.
Kathleen and I enjoyed a wonderful dinner and an evening of song and recollection provided by Donna McKechnie. The music of Stephen Sondheim was featured. This seemed very appropriate since Sondheim wrote the lyrics for Gypsy. Donna had worked with Sondheim on many of his productions (and the character “Cassie” in the musical, Chorus Line was based on her life).
I left the theater and cabaret that evening (returning to Stamford) reflecting on three themes that stood out for me from this brief time revisiting Broadway. First, there is the matter of being of worth in one’s life –and topic I am now writing about extensively (e.g. Bergquist. xxx). At the end of Gypsy, Mama Rose declares that she has sacrificed everything for her two “ungrateful” daughters.
Her younger daughter (Gypsy Rose Lee) comes on stage and asked her mother if she was doing this sacrificing for her daughters or doing it for herself. Mama Rose declares: “I just wanted to be noticed!” Gypsy Rose Lee responds: “Like I wanted you to notice me.” This interchange between Mama Rose and Gypsy Rose was very powerful, in part because of the dramatic flair and powerful voice that Audre McDonald brought to the part. However, something more was present in my Head and Heart.
I found myself returning to my work on the Psychology of Worth. When are we truly acting on behalf of our children? When are we trying to enhance their Worth, while actually trying to provide (or perhaps demonstrate) that we are a “worthy” parent? More generally, is authentic “Worth” harder to establish in a world of Stone and Law?
Perhaps, at a basic level, it is hard to be noticed by anyone in a world where “another 100 people just got off the train.” This sense of being alone and unnoticed in a crowd was particularly poignant as my wife and I navigated through massive crowds on our short journey from the theater to the cabaret. I felt powerless and not “worthwhile” while being pushed and jostled by many people who were trying to get places on Broadway, just as my wife and I were intending to do.
A second theme was particularly prevalent in Donna McKechnie’s monologue that accompanied her wonderful singing. As a close friend of many Broadway stars, composers, directors, and producers, Donna dropped many names and recounted many instances where something of importance occurred in the preparation of a Broadway musical for production. I was reminded of a lyric from the recent highly successful Broadway production called “Hamilton.” The lyric concerned the presence of someone at a major historical event in American history: “I was there when it happened.”
