ALW Selection Trivia Quiz

Answer:

Andrew Lloyd Webber has been composing musicals since 1965 when as a 17-year-old he collaborated with aspiring song writer 20-year-old Tim Rice to create "The Likes of Us". No financial backer could be secured at the time and it was not until 2005 that it was first publicly performed.

"Jeeves" (1975) came after the successes of "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" and "Jesus Christ Superstar", although Tim Rice came up with the idea but pulled out of the project. "Jeeves" did not do particularly well although a re-worked version "By Jeeves" (1996) achieved more success. It is based on British author PG Wodehouse's characters Bertie Wooster and his valet Jeeves using a mix of plot lines from books such as "The Code of the Woosters" (1938).

Successes with "Evita" and "Cats" preceded "Song and Dance" (1982). The 1982 musical started off as two separate works with the song portion being essentially the 1979 one-woman love story musical and album "Tell Me on a Sunday" (written with singer Marti Webb in mind) with the second act being ballet set to ALW's 1978 classical rock fusion "Variations" album, which was written with his younger brother Julian in mind.

"Cricket" followed in 1986. This was a musical commissioned by Prince Edward for Queen Elizabeth II's 60th birthday. Also called "Cricket (Hearts and Wickets)", this short musical finds a star cricket player's loyalties torn between his team and his girlfriend. The girlfriend eventually finds going off to watch horse racing more interesting.

"Aspects of Love" (1989) followed in the shadow of "The Phantom of the Opera" and is probably best known for the song "Love Changes Everything". It is an adaptation of David Garnett's 1955 novel of the same name, which explores the interconnected lives of a trio, a soldier, his uncle and a French actress, over the course of 17 years.

Another hit song, "No Matter What" by Boyzone, came out of "Whistle Down the Wind" (1996). This musical was an adaptation of an adaptation. The source is the 1958 novel by Mary Hayley Bell which was adapted for film in 1961. The US show was not well received and the Broadway opening was cancelled. A re-worked version did better in London's West End. The gist of the story is that some young children encounter a fugitive killer hiding in a barn and speculate that he is Jesus Christ.

A second Phantom musical arrived in 2009 in the form of "Love Never Dies", a loose adaptation of the 1999 romantic novel "The Phantom of Manhattan" by Frederick Forsyth. The same main characters are involved some ten years later now in Brooklyn rather than Paris. Poor reception resulted in substantial re-writes with the Australian production being the best received.

In the past Lloyd Webber had used TV as a way of finding new theatrical performers. He did this again for his "The Wizard of Oz" musical (2011), choosing Daniella Hope for the role of Dorothy Gale through the BBC TV series "Over the Rainbow". Dorothy gets transported with her dog Toto to the land of Oz by a tornado and has some adventures. Either that or she was unconscious the whole time. The musical is the third musical adaptation of the 1939 film, which in turn is based on the 1900 novel "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" by L. Frank Baum.

"Stephen Ward the Musical" (2013) was Lloyd Webber's take on the 1963 Profumo affair. This involved a government minister and a Russian-spy-connected mistress with Ward linking the two together. A miscarriage of justice was a departure from ALW's usual romantic themes. The show was not helped when the collapse of a ceiling at another West End theatre occurred during the opening night, taking away the media and theatre professionals who were attending as part of the audience.

The 2015 musical "School of Rock" came next and was a musical adaptation of the 2003 film of the same name. A band's guitarist gets kicked out of the band and loses his job. He finds salvation as a substitute teacher who forms a band with school pupils and enters a music competition. This was one of the four musicals ALW had on Broadway in 2017 at the same time, the first time since Rogers and Hammerstein achieved this.

COVID-19 delayed the opening of the final musical "Cinderella" in 2021. In this retelling of the classic fairy tale, new elements are introduced such as beauty shaming as well as some plot changes such as the prince eloping with Cinderella and a long-lost brother returning to be king. Known as "Andrew Lloyd Webber's Cinderella" or "Bad Cinderella" (as it was called on Broadway), it received negative reviews in the US in contrast to the more positive reception in London's West End.

The Stephen Sondheim musicals are "Company" (1970), "A Little Night Music" (1973), "The Frogs" (1974), "Into the Woods" (1987), "Assassins" (1990), and "Passion" (1994).