Composer Writer-Director PG Wodehouse: Comic

ComposerANDREW LLOYD WEBBER Writer-DirectorAlaN AYCKBOURN P. G. Wodehouse:ith a name similar to those he assigned Comic to his characters, Master Pelham Grenville Wodehouse wrote his ndrew Lloyd Webber, Lord of y Jeeves is Sir Alan Ayckbourn’s fourth show to way to fame, a bit of infamy, and fortune. Appropriate to the word play which marks his work, he Sydmonton since the begin- appear at the Kennedy Center. Earlier, produc- pronounced his name “Woodhouse” and was called “Plum.” ning of this year, is currently tions of Absurd Person Singular, Bedroom Farce, W English-born and nanny-and-relative-raised, he began his professional life as a London Athe world’s most renowned and Absent Friends appeared to both critical bank clerk. Within two years, his spare-time writing propelled him into full-time self- composer of musical theater. The interna- B approval and favorable audience response in the employment. In addition to writing stories for a variety of publications, he became a tional success of Cats, Evita, and Phantom of Eisenhower Theater. columnist for the London Globe. the Opera alone have ensured that renown. Adding to it is the affection millions feel Those plays are among the 60-plus that Ayckbourn has By 1914, Wodehouse had moved to the United States; he wrote regularly for the for his other works, notably Jesus Christ written over the last 38 years. In a use of time that Saturday Evening Post, in which almost all of his stories appeared between 1914 to 1939. seems to defy the clock, Ayckbourn also directs—at Superstar, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Wodehouse also prospered as a novelist and as a book and lyric writer for musi- Dreamcoat, Starlight Express, and Sunset London’s Royal National Theatre, in the West End, and at cal comedies. Among the composers with whom he worked were Franz Boulevard. his home base, the Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, where he serves as Lehar, Victor Herbert, Jerome Kern, Sigmund Lloyd Webber’s artistic director. In l992, he even Romberg, Rudolf Friml, George Gershwin, and shelves are full to managed to fill the post of Cole Porter. He was frequently linked as bursting with acco- co-author of musical comedies with lades received in Cameron Mackintosh Professor Guy Bolton; they wrote, among others, the United States of Contemporary Theatre at and Great Britain, Oxford University. Leave It To Jane, Rosalie, Oh, Kay!, and Anything Goes. including multiple Almost 30 of his plays have been Tony, Drama Desk, produced at the Royal National Writer Lee Davis argues that Wodehouse, Grammy, and Theatre or in the West End. A Bolton, and Kern created the first musicals Olivier awards. larger number of them have been “to treat seriously music, book, and lyrics as UPI/CORBIS-BETTMANN As a producer, through the Really Useful translated into other languages—30, at last count. creative partners.” Group, Lloyd Webber backs the work of The recipient of all of Great Britain’s major theater Wodehouse had written the scripts for three films made in England, but it was other composers and writers as well as awards, Ayckbourn was made a Commander of the his two stays in Hollywood—which he called Dottyville-on-the-Pacific—that his own. It was the Really Useful Group British Empire in l987 and was raised to knighthood ear- which gave Washington playwright Ken increased his fortune and gave him new story subjects. lier this year. Ludwig his first hit production ofLend Me Wodehouse’s bit of infamy arose from five radio broadcasts he made from a Tenor, of which an American production About farce—which some think By Jeeves is— Nazi Germany in l940 during internment there. Wodehouse argued later was seen in the Eisenhower Theater in Ayckbourn says, “I love doing [them], but they’re bloody that the programs poked fun at his captors, and writer George Orwell 1990. hard work. They’re much the hardest thing to write.” published an article defending him, calling him “naively conciliatory.” Lloyd Webber wrote the scores for the By Jeeves—one of six musicals Ayckbourn has written— Whether he was naive, indiscreet, or something else, there remain those films The Odessa File, Gumshoe, Variations, is a vastly rewritten version of a work called Jeeves that who regard him as a traitor. Later in the war, he was released by the and Tell Me on a Sunday. was produced in l975, but did not fare well. The success Nazis and arrested by the French and charged with collaboration. Among Lloyd Webber’s recognitions are in London of this revised version led to the current pro- Released in l947, he left immediately for the United States, where he the Richard Rodgers Award for Excellence duction, seen first at Connecticut’s Goodspeed Opera became a citizen in l955. CONTINUED PAGE 6 in Musical Theatre and The American House and later in Los Angeles. Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) Triple Play Award. Earlier this year, he and lyricist Tim Rice received an Oscar for “You Must Love Me,” a song they wrote especially for the film Evita. 4 5.

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