MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG Star Paul Mescal Praises Stephen Sondheim

Paul Mescal is making it known: he is a huge fan of Stephen Sondheim. In a new interview with Rolling Stone, the Olivier Award-winning actor shared his appreciation for the late composer, who is known for such musicals as Company, Sweeney Todd, and Merrily We Roll Along. The actor is no stranger to the composer's work, as he is playing Franklin Shepard in Richard Linklater's big-screen adaptation of the latter.

"I have a sneaking suspicion that everybody wants to be in a musical,” he shared of the medium. “I love Sondheim more than I love musical theater." During the interview, he shouted out Sondheim's 1990 musical Assassins, specifically "The Gun Song." "What a musical, eh? Who wouldn’t want to be in such a one as that? So great, so sad. So full of longing." 

The film version of Merrily is being shot every couple of years over 20 years, similar to Linklater's 2014 movie Boyhood, and will star Mescal, along with Beanie Feldstein and Ben Platt. Check out the full Rolling Stone interview, where he also discusses his preparation for playing Paul McCartney in the upcoming four-part Beatles biopic, starring as Shakespeare in Hamnet, and more. 

Mescal can currently be seen in the movie The History of Sound and, later this fall, will be seen as William Shakespeare in Chloé Zhao’s Hamnet. Other credits include Gladiator II, All of Us Strangers, and Aftersun. Onstage, he starred in the 2023 West End production of A Streetcar Named Desire, where he won an Olivier Award, and in Death of a Salesman at The National Theatre.

Stephen Sondheim Photo Credit: Walter McBride

Paul Mescal Photo Credit: Bruce Glikas