In a rare interview, leading Broadway composer Stephen Sondheim talks about his work, and his Seattle stage chat

Stephen Sondheim does not give many interviews. Why should he?

Now 79, Sondheim long ago cemented his reputation as Broadway's most esteemed living composer and lyricist, and one of the American musical theater's greatest visionaries.

From "West Side Story" to "A Little Night Music" to "Sweeney Todd" and on, the eight-time Tony Award honoree has redefined and expanded the sonic and dramatic vocabulary of the Broadway musical, busting genre boundaries and nearly erasing the border between "serious" modern music and show tunes.

On that subject and others, Sondheim will be doing a lot of talking Monday night at Benaroya Hall, in one of the public dialogues he and Frank Rich, noted New York Times columnist and ex-drama critic, have taken to various U.S. cities.

And in anticipation of his Seattle gig, Sondheim agreed to a phone interview with this appreciative and admiring arts journalist.

Speaking from his home in Connecticut, he hardly seemed press-shy or wary. Rather, he was convivial, witty, candid, during a chat that began with an obvious question: After largely shunning the spotlight, why is he taking to the stage now?

"It was at the suggestion of Frank [Rich] a couple years ago," Sondheim replied. "It seemed like it would be fun and a way of airing opinions. I didn't see anything that wouldn't be good about it."

Sondheim also says he respects, likes and loves to banter with Rich — even if the latter didn't always react to his shows "with unbridled enthusiasm," in his 1980-1993 stint as a leading drama critic. (Rich now writes on politics and the media.)

At Benaroya, the two will likely chat about Sondheim's canon, musical theater past and present, Broadway's latest "West Side Story" revival.

They'll also field some queries from the audience. But most of the confab will be sparked by a list "of at least 100 questions Frank has compiled," according to Sondheim. "I never know beforehand what he'll ask me, though some topics recur from city to city.

"We feel free to argue with one another. And the questions can be very interesting and out of left field. That's what I like most, and why I keep doing it."

Judging by his creative output, Sondheim has long thrived on taking left turns into left field.

The New York City native wrote his first musical when he was a precocious 15-year-old. And in his youth he was mentored by another Broadway innovator: lyricist-author Oscar Hammerstein II, who with composer Richard Rodgers, crafted such landmark musicals as "Oklahoma!" and "South Pacific."

Sondheim began his own Broadway career writing lyrics for scores by such leading composers as Leonard Bernstein for "West Side Story" and Jule Styne on"Gypsy."

Later, he conceived and wrote lyrics and music for his unequaled trove of "concept" musicals — starting with a 1964 box-office flop, "Anyone Can Whistle," followed by the 1970 hit, "Company."

Sondheim's shows (the most recent, "Road Show," reached Off Broadway last spring) have been strikingly different from one another in theme, tone, setting, style.

Yet all challenged their savvy, far-reaching creator; his critics; and his loyal audience and cult of super-fans.

His artistic daring also strongly influenced a younger wave of stage composers — including "Rent" creator Jonathan Larson.

Sondheim is encouraged that "young people are still writing for theater, when they could be writing pop and rock tunes. It doesn't matter if their shows are good or bad. They're keeping the idiom alive."

He's also open to the current wave of edgy new revivals of his works.

Sondheim is a fan of a "chamber" version of "Sunday in the Park With George," (seen at the 5th Avenue Theatre recently) and other productions that strip down his orchestral scores.

"I liked the two (English director) John Doyle did in New York ('Sweeney Todd' and 'Company')," he acknowledged. " I tend to write intimate musicals, so chamber versions are more appropriate than if I was writing splashy shows."

Did he mind, though, that Doyle's 2005 Broadway rendition of "Sweeney Todd" (starring a tuba-blowing Patti LuPone) had all the actors doubling as instrumentalists in what appeared to be an insane asylum?

"No, I found it fulfilling. I guess I'm more flexible about it. I just accepted the concept as a fever dream, from Sweeney's point of view.

"You know, I thought of 'Sweeney' originally as an intimate piece, but Hal (director Harold Prince) refused to do the original show without making it big."

Tim Burton's recent "Sweeney Todd" film, with a singing Johnny Depp as the "demon barber of Fleet Street" also gets high marks from Sondheim.

"I think it's the one movie (based on my shows) that worked, because Tim made it a film, not a recording of a stage musical.

"I'm very opinionated about movie musicals, when they're adapted from live shows," he continued. "You'll sit still for a three-minute song in a theater. But in movies, a glance from someone's eyes will tell you the whole story in a few seconds."

As for the stage revivals replacing a full pit band with a combo, Sondheim said he'd love to go back to "full orchestrations. But theater in general is getting small, with this proliferation of one-man and one-woman shows. If you wrote a piece for 25 actors, a producer would laugh in your face."

Indeed, a career like Sondheim's in today's more corporatized Broadway, where shows are spun off hit movies or the songs of pop superstars, is unimaginable.

But Sondheim declined to assail such modern Broadway trends as the British invasion of Andrew Lloyd Webber shows, "jukebox" musicals and Disney's live remakes of animated films.

"I've tried not to make pronunciations in public," he stated. "With the British musicals, I thought it was a phase, and this too shall pass. We'll move away from the jukebox shows, too. But it will take longer, because pop is so popular."

For all their musical and other demands, Sondheim's best works have had impressive staying power — not just in high-profile revivals in New York, London and Seattle (the 5th Avenue mounted seven Sondheim musicals in the past decade) but in schools and amateur theaters.

Which show is done the most? "Probably 'Into the Woods,' because it has no four-letter words, and kids in grammar school can relate to the fairy-tale theme."

The many high-school stagings of "Sweeney Todd" are more surprising — though not to its composer.

"Kids love anything with blood. Vampires, horror stories — nice, harsh stuff, and that's 'Sweeney Todd.' "

Asked which show he'd like to see mounted more often, he points to "Merrily We Roll Along" (last staged here by ACT Theatre), "because (author) George Furth and I finally got it where I want it to be. And 'Road Show.' It will be done again — at least in England."

"Road Show," about a pair of late-19th-century brothers chasing the American dream in contrasting ways, underwent many rewrites until its Nov. 2008 New York debut to mostly positive notices.

But while he could easily retire on his bushel of laurels, Sondheim isn't planning to anytime soon.

He is writing essays for a compilation of his lyrics, "Finishing the Hat" (after a song from "Sunday in the Park with George").

As for his theatrical future, Sondheim revealed that he has "a couple of ideas I've been nibbling at with some of my collaborators."

And there are these occasional stage chats with Rich, which Sondheim clearly relishes. "We have such a good time. We wanted it to be like sitting in one of our living rooms, dishing the theater.

"We look at each other more often than at the audience, so I hope they don't feel left out. Every now and then I'll turn to them, just to remind myself I'm onstage."

Misha Berson: mberson@seattletimes.com