WEST SIDE STORY ON SYDNEY HARBOUR

West Side Story Costumes

The composer: Bernstein. American. 20th Century.

The music: An eclectic mix of jazz, theatre music and classical forms.

The setting: The Broadway musical is set in the 1950s. This production takes some cues from the 1950s but is set in a contemporary, timeless world.

The history: Premiered on Broadway in 1957 after a run in DC. A 1961 film version became a cult classic and cemented the musical’s place in history.

Conversation Starters

• Robbins originally planned to write a story about a star-crossed romance between a Jewish girl and Catholic boy on New York’s Upper East Side. 
• Bernstein and Laurents changed his mind when Puerto Rican and American gang violence began to figure in the news.
• Robbins visited a high school dance in a Puerto Rican neighbourhood of New York to get real-life inspiration for his choreography
• Robbins wouldn’t let the original Jets and Sharks casts mix, to help create real tension on set. They rehearsed in different rooms and weren’t allowed to eat lunch together.
• Chita Rivera, who played Anita on Broadway, and dancer Tony Mordente, who was a Jet, actually got married and had a child! (And that was in spite of Robbins’ ban on Shark-Jet socialising).
• Robbins decided not to kill off Maria after composer Richard Rodgers told him: “She’s dead already, after this all happens to her.”
• ‘One Hand, One Heart’ was actually written for Candide. Bernstein swapped it out for ‘O Happy We’, which he originally wrote for West Side Story.
• Bernstein and Sondheim had a late stroke of inspiration and wrote ‘Something’s Coming’ just 12 days out from opening night.
• The 1961 film brought home 10 Academy Awards, and still holds the record for most awards won by a musical.
• Sondheim got the gig as lyricist through a bit of old-fashioned networking. Talking to Arthur Laurents at a party, the pair got to discussing Laurents’ new project with Leonard Bernstein. Sondheim asked who they’d found to do the lyrics, and was just in time – they hadn’t contracted anyone.
• Sondheim was actually looking to move into writing music along with lyrics, but was keen to meet Bernstein, so he agreed to play for him.
• Sondheim made up nonsense street slang so the language wouldn’t date. He wanted it to be the first Broadway musical to use the 'F word', but learned they’d never get a cast album approved. The boys say ‘Krup you!’ instead.

FACTS AND FIGURES

• The harbour stage is more than twice the size of any Australian indoor stage. It can support up to 150 tonne.
• Surf Life Savers keep a watchful eye on the over water activities of construction workers, performers and staff.
• The freeway overpass on set is 30m long and 15m high.
• The pop-up site is built in about 15 days, then construction continues for seven days while the cast and creatives rehearse on set. More than 150 construction workers are involved.
• 65km of power, data & audio cables power the stage and venue.
• Over 26 performances, audience members enjoy almost 21,000 glasses of sparkling wine.
• There are approximately 3,000 seats in the grandstand.
• About 330 people work on site during performances.

WEST SIDE STORY ON SYDNEY HARBOUR
OPERA ON SYDNEY HARBOUR, FLEET STEPS, MRS MACQUARIES POINT
MARCH 22 – APRIL 21, 2019