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All-American (musical)
Encyclopedia
All American is a musical
with a book by Mel Brooks
, lyrics by Lee Adams
, and music by Charles Strouse
.
Based on the Robert Lewis Taylor
novel Professor Fodorski, it is set on the campus of the fiction
al Southern Baptist Institute of Technology where the worlds of science
and sports collide when the principles of engineering
are applied to football
strategies and football strategies are used to teach the principles of engineering. Hungarian
immigrant Fodorski's techniques prove to be successful, resulting in a winning team, and he finds himself the target of a Madison Avenue
ad man
who wants to exploit his new-found fame.
Adams and Strouse, flush with the success of Bye Bye Birdie, and Brooks, still a relatively unknown television
comedy writer, concocted an old-fashioned musical reminiscent of such lighthearted fare as Good News
, albeit one with a gay
subtext enhanced by director Joshua Logan
, who filled the stage with his trademark beefcake
scenes filled with flexing muscular men stripped to the waist. The show was beset with problems from the start. Brooks never completed the second act, leaving the task to Logan, a noted script doctor whose comedic sensibilities didn't jibe with those of Brooks, and the difference in writing styles was obvious. Additionally, Logan's emerging bipolar disorder
was beginning to affect his work. Once Ray Bolger
agreed to play Fodorski, the script was tailored to showcase his talents, but turning the musical into a star vehicle for a performer who no longer was the audience favorite he once was ultimately proved to be a mistake.
The Broadway
production, choreographed by Danny Daniels
, opened on March 19, 1962 at the Winter Garden Theatre
, where it ran for 80 performances. In addition to Bolger, the cast included Ron Husmann
, Anita Gillette
, Fritz Weaver
, and Eileen Herlie
.
Tony Award
nominations went to Bolger for Best Actor in a Musical and Logan for Best Direction of a Musical. An original cast album was released by Columbia Masterworks Records
.
In 2006, Harbinger Records released a CD entitled All American Live Backers Audition, a recording of a session for potential financial investors featuring Adams and Strouse performing their score, including songs cut prior to opening night, with Adams providing a running commentary between the numbers.
Act II
Musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...
with a book by Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks
Mel Brooks is an American film director, screenwriter, composer, lyricist, comedian, actor and producer. He is best known as a creator of broad film farces and comic parodies. He began his career as a stand-up comic and as a writer for the early TV variety show Your Show of Shows...
, lyrics by Lee Adams
Lee Adams
Lee Richard Adams is an American lyricist best known for his musical theatre collaboration with Charles Strouse.Born in Mansfield, Ohio, Adams received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Ohio State University and a Master's from Columbia University.Adams won Tony Awards in 1961 for Bye Bye Birdie...
, and music by Charles Strouse
Charles Strouse
Charles Strouse is an American composer and lyricist.-Life and career:Strouse was born and raised in New York City, the son of Ira and Ethel Strouse...
.
Based on the Robert Lewis Taylor
Robert Lewis Taylor
Robert Lewis Taylor was an American author and winner of the 1959 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.Taylor was born in Carbondale, Illinois and attended Southern Illinois University, which now houses his papers, for one year. He graduated from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with a Bachelor...
novel Professor Fodorski, it is set on the campus of the fiction
Fiction
Fiction is the form of any narrative or informative work that deals, in part or in whole, with information or events that are not factual, but rather, imaginary—that is, invented by the author. Although fiction describes a major branch of literary work, it may also refer to theatrical,...
al Southern Baptist Institute of Technology where the worlds of science
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
and sports collide when the principles of engineering
Engineering
Engineering is the discipline, art, skill and profession of acquiring and applying scientific, mathematical, economic, social, and practical knowledge, in order to design and build structures, machines, devices, systems, materials and processes that safely realize improvements to the lives of...
are applied to football
American football
American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
strategies and football strategies are used to teach the principles of engineering. Hungarian
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
immigrant Fodorski's techniques prove to be successful, resulting in a winning team, and he finds himself the target of a Madison Avenue
Madison Avenue (Manhattan)
Madison Avenue is a north-south avenue in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, United States, that carries northbound one-way traffic. It runs from Madison Square to the Madison Avenue Bridge at 138th Street. In doing so, it passes through Midtown, the Upper East Side , Spanish Harlem, and...
ad man
Advertising
Advertising is a form of communication used to persuade an audience to take some action with respect to products, ideas, or services. Most commonly, the desired result is to drive consumer behavior with respect to a commercial offering, although political and ideological advertising is also common...
who wants to exploit his new-found fame.
Adams and Strouse, flush with the success of Bye Bye Birdie, and Brooks, still a relatively unknown television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
comedy writer, concocted an old-fashioned musical reminiscent of such lighthearted fare as Good News
Good News (musical)
Good News is a musical with a book by Laurence Schwab and B.G. DeSylva, lyrics by DeSylva and Lew Brown, and music by Ray Henderson.The show opened on Broadway in 1927, the same year as Show Boat, but its plot was decidedly old-fashioned in comparison to Show Boats somewhat tragic and daring...
, albeit one with a gay
Gay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....
subtext enhanced by director Joshua Logan
Joshua Logan
Joshua Lockwood Logan III was an American stage and film director and writer.-Early years:Logan was born in Texarkana, Texas, the son of Susan and Joshua Lockwood Logan. When he was three years old his father committed suicide...
, who filled the stage with his trademark beefcake
Beefcake
Beefcake is a term denoting the use of nude or semi-nude male bodies. It can refer to a genre or a person. It often is used to denote male sexual attractiveness stemming from physical build but the definition has expanded to include anyone interested in physical fitness, bodybuilding and weight...
scenes filled with flexing muscular men stripped to the waist. The show was beset with problems from the start. Brooks never completed the second act, leaving the task to Logan, a noted script doctor whose comedic sensibilities didn't jibe with those of Brooks, and the difference in writing styles was obvious. Additionally, Logan's emerging bipolar disorder
Bipolar disorder
Bipolar disorder or bipolar affective disorder, historically known as manic–depressive disorder, is a psychiatric diagnosis that describes a category of mood disorders defined by the presence of one or more episodes of abnormally elevated energy levels, cognition, and mood with or without one or...
was beginning to affect his work. Once Ray Bolger
Ray Bolger
Raymond Wallace "Ray" Bolger was an American entertainer of stage and screen, best known for his portrayal of the Scarecrow and Kansas farmworker Hank in The Wizard of Oz.-Early life:...
agreed to play Fodorski, the script was tailored to showcase his talents, but turning the musical into a star vehicle for a performer who no longer was the audience favorite he once was ultimately proved to be a mistake.
The Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
production, choreographed by Danny Daniels
Danny Daniels
Danny Daniels is an American choreographer, tap dancer, and teacher.Daniels was a featured dancer in several 1940s Broadway musicals, including Billion Dollar Baby, Street Scene, and Kiss Me, Kate; although he continued performing during the 1950s and after, including a tour with the Agnes de Mille...
, opened on March 19, 1962 at the Winter Garden Theatre
Winter Garden Theatre
The Winter Garden Theatre is a Broadway theatre located at 1634 Broadway in midtown Manhattan.-History:The structure was built by William Kissam Vanderbilt in 1896 to be the American Horse Exchange....
, where it ran for 80 performances. In addition to Bolger, the cast included Ron Husmann
Ron Husmann
Ron Husmann is an American actor.Born in Rockford, Illinois, Husmann graduated from Northwestern University in 1959, and made his Broadway debut in Fiorello! later that year. In 1960 he was cast in Tenderloin, garnering a Tony Award nomination for Best Featured Actor in a Musical and winning the...
, Anita Gillette
Anita Gillette
Anita Gillette is an American actress, most notable for her work on Broadway and as a celebrity guest on various game shows....
, Fritz Weaver
Fritz Weaver
Fritz William Weaver is an American actor and voice actor.-Life and career:Weaver was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the son of Elsa W. and John Carson Weaver. His mother was of Italian descent and his father was a social worker from Pittsburgh. Weaver attended Peabody High School...
, and Eileen Herlie
Eileen Herlie
Eileen Herlie was a Scottish-American actress.-Life and career:Eileen Herlie was born Eileen Isobel Herlihy to a Catholic father and a Protestant mother in Glasgow, Scotland, and was one of five children. Herlie was trained as a theatre actress. Among her West End London theatre successes were The...
.
Tony Award
Tony Award
The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...
nominations went to Bolger for Best Actor in a Musical and Logan for Best Direction of a Musical. An original cast album was released by Columbia Masterworks Records
Columbia Masterworks Records
Columbia Masterworks Records was a record label started in 1927 by Columbia Records.It was intended for releases of classical music and artists, as opposed to popular music, which bore the regular Columbia logo. Masterworks Records' first release, in 1927, was a complete performance of the...
.
In 2006, Harbinger Records released a CD entitled All American Live Backers Audition, a recording of a session for potential financial investors featuring Adams and Strouse performing their score, including songs cut prior to opening night, with Adams providing a running commentary between the numbers.
Musical numbers
Act I- Melt Us
- What a Country!
- Our Children
- Animal Attraction
- Our Children (Reprise)
- We Speak the Same Language
- I Can Teach Them!
- It's Fun to Think
- Once Upon a TimeOnce Upon a Time (song)"Once Upon a Time" is a song with music by Charles Strouse and lyrics by Lee Adams from the 1962 musical All American. In the musical, the song was performed by Ray Bolger and Eileen Herlie, and their version appears on the Broadway Cast recording...
- Nightlife
- I've Just Seen Her
- Once Upon a Time (Reprise)
- Physical Fitness
- The Fight Song
- What a Country!
Act II
- I Couldn't Have Done It Alone
- If I Were You
- Have a Dream
- I've Just Seen Him
- I'm Fascinating
- Once Upon a Time (Reprise)
- The Real Me
- It's Up to Me
- The Fight Song (Reprise)
- It's Fun to Think (Reprise)