He remembers some thought the show — focused on a 35-year-old single man whose friends are all coupled up — was odd.
“Williams changed my life,” he told The North Adams Transcript in 2010.
“Numerous students interested in musical theater over the decades have come to Williams primarily because it is Sondheim’s alma mater,” said W.
Sheppard pointed to Sondheim’s innovation as a major mark he left on music and theater. “With each new show he kept expanding what American musical theater could be, what forms it could take and what subject matter it could tackle,” he said.
“I felt that the music department, and the college, needed to celebrate its most honored music major alum,” Sheppard said.
Greta Jochem, a Report for America Corps member, joined the Eagle in 2021.