another ASSASSINS question....

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 3/4/04 at 1:35am

On Sondheim's website it said that when ASSASSINS was staged in London they added the song "Something Just Broke", but it doesn't say when during the show the song takes place or WHO sings it. Does anybody know? I'm mad now cuz' basically my Assassins recording is incomplete... It'll probably be on the new Broadway Cast if it gets a recording....

[Menken Fan]

Posted: 3/4/04 at 8:15am

I saw a local production recently, which included "Something Just Broke." It was performed by the ensemble, not any of the major characters, and it was just before the big ending sequence.

By the way, this was one of the most dreadful productions I've ever seen of any show, let alone one of my favorite musicals.

[bob8rich]

Posted: 3/4/04 at 9:46am

SOMETHING JUST BROKE is an ensemble piece about the day of the JFK assassination, examining various people's memories of where they were and what they were doing on that day.

Sondheim wrote a new lyric for this song specially for the Royal National Theatre 25th Anniversary "Chain Play", in which he changed the setting to where various people were on September 11th, 2001. It closed the first act of the piece and was extremely moving.

(By way of explanation, the "chain play" was a play written by around 20 different writers, each of whom wrote one scene, then passed it on to the next writer who could take the play in any direction they wished for the next scene - and so on. It received its one and only performance in October 2001 at the Royal National Theatre in London. It was a quite fascinating afternoon of theatre.)