I was twenty years old and in the audience on the opening night of Rodgers & Hammerstein's South Pacific-a guest of the Richard Rodgers family. Stephen Sond-heim was there as well, a guest of Oscar Hammerstein's. It was on that night that Mary Rodgers introduced us for the first time. It's difficult to describe how triumphant that opening night was, but I'll try.
South Pacific was and remains the most romantic musical I have ever seen. When the first notes of "Some Enchanted Evening" were heard-for the first time-you could feel a palpable shiver of pleasure, a collective wistful sigh, from the audience. When Ezio Pinza brought the song to its quiet (and oh so theatrical) finale, the audience went wild.
The evening personified a collaboration of theater artists at the top of their form: Rodgers and Hammerstein; Joshua Logan, the play's director; Leland Hayward, its producer; the design team; and what a cast!
There was a moment in the play, when Pinza and Mary Martin shared a brandy snifter, which ranks up there with Laurette Taylor's entrance in The Glass Menagerie and Marlon Brando calling "Stell-a-a-a!" At the end of the evening, the ovation was tumultuous. There was a party on the roof of the St. Regis, and I don't believe anyone in the glamorous world of Broadway was absent.
The next morning, I went to my job as office boy for George Abbott. He sat me down and informed me that I had witnessed an epic night in theater history. Then he quizzed me (it was a little like being back in school): Why was it epic? What had changed the shape of musical theater? If I was lucky enough to be in the theater that night, what had I learned? It was a tad confrontational, and I was a whole lot terrified. After mumbling, "Well&, well&, well&" and "I think&," mixed with "I suppose&" and "I guess&," he put me out of my misery, and then, carefully-teacherly-he explained what made the show epic. For the first time, a musical had moved without interruption, had flowed as if it were a film. In his mind, this was Rod-gers & Hammerstein's most integrated score. And it was as near perfect as any show could be.
Harold Prince directed the premiere productions of She Loves Me, Cabaret, Company, Follies, Candide, Pacific Overtures, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, Evita, The Phantom of the Opera, Parade, and Love-Musik. Before becoming a director, Mr. Prince produced such shows as The Pajama Game, Damn Yankees, West Side Story, and Fiddler on the Roof. He served as trustee for the New York Public Library and on the National Council of the Arts of the NEA, and is the recipient of a National Medal of Arts and twenty-one Tony Awards. He was a 1994 Kennedy Center Honoree.
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