Rags (musical)
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Rags is a musical with a book by Joseph Stein, lyrics by Stephen Schwartz, and music by Charles Strouse.
Set among the tenements and sweatshops of the Lower East Side of Manhattan in 1910, at the height of the wave of immigration pouring into America from Eastern Europe, it focuses on five new arrivals, particularly Rebecca Hershkowitz, who is searching for the husband who preceded her but never sent for her and their son. What she doesn't know is that Nathan, determined to assimilate the American way and lose his ethnic identity, has renamed himself Nat Harris and is climbing the local political ladder controlled by Tammany Hall. Subplots concern elderly Avram Cohen and his teenage daughter, Bella, and Ben Levitowitz, a brash young man in love with Bella who has come to make his fortune in a land where he believes the streets are paved with gold.
After 18 previews, the Broadway production, directed by Gene Saks and choreographed by Ron Field, opened on August 21, 1986 at the Mark Hellinger Theatre with little advance sale and to mostly indifferent reviews, and it closed after only four performances. The cast included Teresa Stratas, Larry Kert, Lonny Price, Judy Kuhn, Dick Latessa, Marcia Lewis, and Terrence Mann. Despite its failure, it garnered a good deal of attention during the awards season.
In 1991, Sony released a studio recording of the score. It featured most of the original cast joined by Julia Migenes replacing Stratas.
A few years after the Broadway closing, the creators reunited to present a dramatically rewritten and severely streamlined production at Manhattan's Jewish Repertory Theatre. Later yet, they reworked the show again, staging it first at Florida's Coconut Grove Playhouse and then the Paper Mill Playhouse in New Jersey.
[edit] Original song list
Act I
- I Remember
- Greenhorns
- Brand New World
- Children of the Wind
- Penny a Tune
- Easy for You
- Hard To Be a Prince
- Blame It on the Summer Night
- For My Mary
- Rags
- What's Wrong with That?
- On the Fourth Day of July
- In America
Act II
- Yankee Boy
- Uptown
- Wanting
- Three Sunny Rooms
- The Sound of Love
- For My Mary (Reprise)
- Democratic Club Dance
- Prayer
- Bread and Freedom
- Dancing With the Fools
- Finale
[edit] Awards and nominations
- Tony Award for Best Musical (nominee)
- Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical (nominee)
- Tony Award for Best Original Score (nominee)
- Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical (Stratas, nominee)
- Tony Award for Best Choreography (nominee)
- Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Musical (Stratas, winner)
- Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actress in a Musical (Kuhn and Lewis, nominees)
- Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Orchestration (nominee)
- Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music (nominee)
