Skip to main content

Sondheim Saturday

I feel you, Johanna
I feel you
I was half convinced I'd waken,
Satisfied enough to dream you
Happily I was mistaken
Johanna
I'll steal you, Johanna
I'll steal you
Do they think that walls can hide you?
Even now I'm at your window
I am in the dark beside you
Buried sweetly in your yellow hair
I feel you, Johanna
And one day, I'll steal you,
'Til I'm with you then I'm with you there,
Sweetly buried in your yellow hair.


This is among Sondheim's most famous love songs. Bernadette Peters uses it in concert. It was first performed by Victor Garber, in the Broadway debut of "Sweeney Todd," and Garber went on to appear in the James Cameron movie "Titanic"--and now you can see him in "Hello, Dolly!" The song is like something from "Porgy and Bess." I'm sure that's deliberate. Sondheim admires P and B because the verses pack a great deal of meaning into simple language--"fish are jumpin' and the cotton is high"--and, well, isn't Sondheim going for that same trick here?

First, Anthony is smitten. The love is so intense, he can sense Johanna's presence even when he doesn't have "ocular proof." He had briefly imagined she was just a dream, and had half-reconciled himself to this possibility--but it's not true! "Waken" and "mistaken"--it's the penultimate syllable that does the rhyming work. That will happen again in the next verse: "hide you and beside you."

We shift from daydreaming to resolution-making: Anthony will "steal" Johanna. He moves past walls, to J's window; then, through a hormonal fit of physics-defiance, Anthony dreams himself through the locked window and into Johanna's bed, in the dark. (Hitchcock said you should film all murder scenes as love scenes, and vice versa, and there is something slightly troubling about the images in "Johanna." "Theft" of the woman, stalking her "in the dark"--this seems deliberately unsettling, and a little bit sexy, to me. I mean that in a consensual "Fifty Shades" way, not in a pervy way! Anthony's goal is the "little death" of orgasm; he will be "buried sweetly" in Johanna's yellow hair. "Buried sweetly" seems to be a flashy oxymoron, more interesting than "jumbo shrimp.")

The last four lines condense the plot of the song. "I feel you--and, one day, I'll steal you." The "then" of Anthony's realized dream is contrasted with the "there" of the present; today, at least, I'm with you "there," in my head. Sondheim inverts "buried sweetly"; it's "sweetly buried," now, to suggest movement, a transition, the end of a short trip-through-words. (Also, the repetition of the loved one's name--"Johanna, Johanna, Johanna"--makes me think of an earlier Sondheim work, "Maria." "Say it soft and it's almost like praying.")

And that's all for today. Below: see Bernadette!

https://www.google.com/search?q=bernadette+peters+johanna&oq=bernadette+peters+johanna&aqs=chrome..69i57.4027j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to Host a Baby

-You have assumed responsibility for a mewling, puking ball of life, a yellow-lab pup. He will spit his half-digested kibble all over your shoes, all over your hard-cover edition of Jennifer Haigh's novel  Faith . He will eat your tables, your chairs, your "I {Heart] Montessori" magnet, placed too low on the fridge. When you try to watch Bette Davis in  Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte , on your TV, your dog will bark through the murder-prologue, for no apparent reason. He will whimper through Lena Dunham's  Girls , such that you have to rewind several times to catch every nuance of Andrew Rannells's ad-libbing--and, still, you'll have a nagging suspicion you've missed something. Your dog will poop on the kitchen floor, in the hallway, between the tiny bars of his crate. He'll announce his wakefulness at 5 AM, 2 AM, or while you and another human are mid-coitus. All this, and you get outside, and it's: "Don't let him pee on my tulips!" When...
3 comments
Read more

Joshie

  When I was growing up, a class birthday involved Hostess cupcakes. Often, the cupcakes would come in a shoebox, so you could taste a leathery residue (during the party). Times change. You can't bring a treat into a public school, in 2024, because heaven knows what kind of allergies might lurk, in unseen corners, in the classroom. But Joshua's teacher will allow: a dance party, a pajama day, or a guest reader. I chose to bring a story for Joshua's birthday (observed), but I didn't think through the role that anxiety might play in this interaction. We talk, in this house, quite a bit about anxiety; one game-changer, for J, has been a daily list of activities, so that he knows exactly what to expect. He gets a look of profound satisfaction when he sees the agenda; it doesn't really matter what the specific events happen to be. It's just about knowing, "I can anticipate X, Y, and Z." Joshua struggled with his celebration. He wore his nervousness on his f...
2 comments
Read more

Josh at Five

 Joshie's project is "flexibility"; the goal is to see that a plan is just an idea, not a gospel, not a guarantee. This is difficult. Yesterday, we went to a restaurant--billed as "open," with unlocked doors--and the owner informed us of an "error in advertising." But Joshie couldn't accept the word "closed." He threw himself on the floor, then climbed on the furniture. I felt for the owner, until he nervously made a reference to "the glass windows." He imagined that my child might toss himself through a sealed window, like Mary Katherine Gallagher, or like Bruce Willis, in "Die Hard." Then--thank the Lord!--I was able to laugh. The thing that really has therapeutic value for Joshie is: a firetruck. If we are out in public, and he spots a parked truck, he wants to climb on each surface. He breathlessly alludes to the wheels, the door, the windows. If an actual fire station ("fire ocean," in Joshie's parla...
Post a Comment
Read more