The cast recording of Road Show, the latest musical collaboration of composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim and writer John Weidman, was released in June on Nonesuch Records and PS Classics. It tells the tale of the real-life Mizner brothers, striving and frequently scheming to realize the American dream in early 20th-century America. The show's creators, Sondheim and Weidman, will appear on Bookworm, on 89.9 FM KCRW, Santa Monica public radio, Thursday afternoon at 2:30 PM, to talk with the show's host, Michael Silverblatt, about the new work and the long road that led to this cast recording. You can listen online at kcrw.com/bookworm.
Through the story of the two Mizner brothers, Addison and Wilson, Road Show tackles a very timely issue: the elevation of greed, the idea that no matter what their level of deception, perpetrators of social crimes need never apologize or confess.
In the Bookworm interview, titled "Lyrics as Literature," Sondheim and Weidman discuss the show's previous incarnations and its evolution over the years, pared down to its essentials on the way to the end result, heard on the cast recording.
"This is, and will be, the classical American musical," Silverblatt tells the
Los Angeles Times in a behind-the-scenes look at the broadcast. "It will be on the special list of things that shape America, the way Americans look at themselves."