Dance a Little Closer
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Dance a Little Closer is a musical with a book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner and music by Charles Strouse.
An updated version of Robert E. Sherwood's 1936 antiwar comedy, Idiot's Delight, it's set on New Year's Eve "in the avoidable future" in the grand Alpine Barclay Palace Hotel, where the guests find themselves in the midst of a potential nuclear Armageddon. At its core are American crooner Harry Aikens and Cynthia Brookfield-Bailey, who may have had a romantic fling years earlier. Among the others present are Cynthia's current paramour, Henry Kissinger-like diplomat Dr. Josef Winkler, a gay couple, a minister, and a freedom fighter.
After twenty-five previews, the Broadway production, directed by Lerner and choreographed by Billy Wilson, opened on May 11, 1983 at the Minskoff Theatre, where it closed after one performance. In his New York Times review [1], Frank Rich described it as "a huge, extravagant mishmash . . . that seems to have taken on a rampaging, self-destructive life of its own," a sentiment similar to those expressed by the other critics.
The cast included Len Cariou, Liz Robertson, George Rose, Don Chastain, and Alyson Reed.
An original cast recording is available on CD.
[edit] Song list
Act I
- It Never Would've Worked
- Happy, Happy New Year
- No Man is Worth It
- What are You Going to Do About It?
- A Woman Who Thinks I'm Wonderful
- Pas de Deux
- There's Never Been Anything Like Us
- Another Life
- Why Can't the World Go and Leave Us Alone?
- He Always Comes Home to Me
- I Got a New Girl
- Dance a Little Closer
- There's Always One You Can't Forget
Act II
- Homesick
- Mad
- I Don't Know
- Auf Wiedersehen
- I Never Want to See You Again
- On Top of the World
- I Got a New Girl (Reprise)
- Dance a Little Closer (Reprise)
