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"Chicago" on Broadway

 Jesse Green has a fun new piece about Broadway in the seventies. "A Chorus Line" went up against "Chicago." This wasn't really a contest. "A Chorus Line" had very little to say. (Its main message--"Performers are sort of needy"--didn't count as news.) By contrast, "Chicago" suggested that most of what you had learned in civics class was an elaborate fiction. "Chicago" seemed to predict the OJ Simpson trial--decades before the OJ Simpson trial. 


Though "Chicago" lost the Tony Award, this was like "Next to Normal" winning the Pulitzer over Sarah Ruhl. Michael Bennett's Tony win has not "aged" especially well.

Celebrating "Chicago"'s birthday, i'm reminded of some of my favorite lines:

Give them an act with lots of flash in it--
And the reaction will be passionate.

Also:

The folks atop the ladder are the ones the world adores--
So boost me up my ladder, kid, and I'll boost you up yours.

Also:

Lord knows, he ain't got the smarts.
Ah, but look at that soul.
I tell you that whole
Is a whole lot greater than the sum of its parts....

Jesse Green says that his favorite moment in the show is too naughty to be quoted. I think my favorite involves a housewife shrugging as she recalls a moment of misfortune that involved her spouse. "He fell into my knife. He fell into my knife--ten times!"

Hats off to "Chicago."

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