Word: heyward
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...cripple Porgy, this time with music for himself and the 75 other blacks living in Catfish Row, returned last week to Manhattan. He was still the brainchild of Playwright DuBose Heyward, still the protege of Manhattan's Theatre Guild which took him under its wing eight years ago. For one week Porgy and Bess, with a 700-page score by Composer George Gershwin (TIME, Sept. 30), played in Boston, won high praise. On opening night in Manhattan half the Somebodies in town crowded in to hear this latest attempt at a U. S. folk opera...
...combined talents of George Gershwin as composer, DuBose Heyward as librettist and Rouben Mamoulian as director have been welded by the Theatre Guild's skillful wand into "Porgy and Bess" an "American Folk Opera" of unique distinction. Although it is essentially operatic material Mr. Gershwin has put his work upon the legitimate boards through a desire to give it broader circulation than it could achieve through operatic channels, and a good thing it is indeed...
...those of academic turn Mr. Gershwin's music may seem a brilliant but superficial tour de force; to this reviewer it appeared a magnificent blending of striking themes which truly represent the musical content of Mr. Heyward's material, and clearly a work which can proudly take its place beside Gershwin's previous compositions as representative of the promise of American music. There are songs such as "Woman is a Sometime Thing", "I got Plenty o' Nuttin'", and "It ain't Necessarily So", which have a haunting melodic appeal and seem destined for considerable popularity. And there are themes such...
...Heyward has converted his play into a libretto of natural and powerful drama, rich in action and skillful in thematic development. Rouben Mamoulian has performed a near-wonder of directorial genius aided by the sets of Sergei Soudeikine and the conducting of Alexander Smallens...
Composer Gershwin took his subject from DuBose Heyward's play Porgy, persuaded Heyward to prepare a libretto which would cleave to the original plot, yet suit the structure of continuous music. Ira Gershwin, Brother George's collaborator in many a Broadway show, was called in to supply special lyrics. Director Mamoulian, who made his name with the original play, was willing to leave Holly wood. Mamoulian liked working with Negroes, had a steadfast admiration for the primitive tragedy of Charleston's Catfish Row. This time, though, his problem was harder. His actors had to be singers, trained to time themselves...