Susanne Ishee News

Yes, I'll say it.  The 1959 Broadway stage version of The Sound of Music is far superior to 1965 film adaptation.  Yeah, yeah, I know…  The Oscar-winning best picture has all that lovely Austrian and Bavarian scenery and those cute kids and, oh yeah, Julie Andrews as the young postulant, Maria, sent to serve as governess to the seven children of Naval Captain Georg Ludwig von Trapp.  But it also has a watered-down screenplay by Ernest Lehman that cuts two of the best songs in Rodgers and Hammerstein's score and eliminates one of the most interesting aspects of Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse's original book; the depiction of nice, likeable Austrians who, unaware of the full extent of Hitler's atrocities, argue against resistance of the German overthrow of their country.  The stage musical even includes an important scene, altered in the film, where a Nazi in uniform commits a selfless act of compassion that helps rescue the von Trapps.

Paper Mill Playhouse presents The Sound of Music, directed and choreographed by James Brennan, now playing through December 30. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the production below.