I saw Follies Sunday and thought it was great. So this afternoon I went to a behind-the-scenes discussion and Q&A with the four leads (Bernadette Peters, Ron Raines, Jan Maxwell and Danny Burstein) and Elaine Paige. The host asked questions about how the actors approached the characters, etc. He said that he understood that the song "I'm Still Here" was based on Joan Crawford's career, which kind of surprised me (I thought I had read that Stephen Sondheim had actually gotten some input from Yvonne DeCarlo, who sang the song in the 1971 production). Anyway, Elaine Paige started to talk about the picture of Joan Crawford that's on the wall of the set and how that was related to the song, etc, when her castmates corrected her--it's a picture of Gloria Swanson, not Crawford. So Ms. Paige said, (paraphrasing) "oh, I don't know the story about Joan Crawford."
The host asked about the performers' previous experiences with Follies. Ron Raines said that he had played the same role (Ben) when he was in his early 30's and that he was too young. Amazingly, both Jan Maxwell and Danny Burstein said that they had never seen the show and Ms. Maxwell said that she really hadn't known anything about it. They both said that they couldn't turn down the chance to do a Sondheim show. The host asked how each actor came to be in the show. They all said they were offered the parts, except Ron Raines, who said that he had auditioned and was happy to do so.
