Stephen Sondheim, master of musical theater, dead at 91

Sondheim had just celebrated Thanksgiving with a dinner and friends the day before, Pappas told the Times.

Over the course of his career, he won an Oscar, a Pulitzer, eight Grammy Awards, eight Tony Awards, a Kennedy Center honor and the Presidential Medal of Freedom.

“I’m interested in the theater because I’m interested in communication with audiences,” he told NPR’s “Fresh Air” in 2010.

Stephen Joshua Sondheim was born March 22, 1930, in New York, the son of a well-off dress manufacturer and his wife, a designer.

Sondheim attended Williams College in Massachusetts, where he won a fellowship for his music that allowed him to continue study.

His first success, at age 27, was as lyricist to “West Side Story,” with music by Leonard Bernstein.

A long dry spell followed, finally snapped in 1970 with “Company,” which ran for more than a year and took home a Tony for best musical.

“Company” and “Follies” were notable for their almost plotless presentations; “Pacific Overtures” , about the 19th-century American entry into Japan, was performed kabuki-style.

PBS and Showtime filmed “Sunday in the Park” for television, a version later released with Sondheim’s commentary.

The composer, a reticent man when not waxing rhapsodically about his Clement Wood rhyming dictionary or praising his collaborators, was typically modest about the reaction.

A virtual concert celebrating Sondheim’s 90th birthday and body of work was organized last year amid the global pandemic.

“Perhaps not since April 23rd of 1616 has theater lost such a revolutionary voice,” actor Josh Gad wrote.

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