WEST SIDE STORY LEONARD BERNSTEIN CONDUCTS WEST SIDE STORY THE MAKING OF WEST SIDE STORY THAT'S DANCING! THE BEST OF BROADWAY MUSICALS FROM THE ED SULLIVAN SHOW DAVE GRUSIN PRESENTS WEST SIDE STORY This product has not been reviewed at this time. . BUDDY RICH: THE LOST WEST SIDE STORY TAPES CHER: THE FAREWELL TOUR CAMP BROADWAY: THE AMERICAN MUSICAL BROADWAY: THE GOLDEN AGE BROADWAY'S LOST TREASURES III CAROL LAWRENCE BELL TELEPHONE HOUR APPEARANCES 1960 - 1967 Check out the selections at
West Side Story has been recorded for home video in every format that has existed for private non-commercial use, starting with 16 mm film and proceeding through the decades with the rudimentary CED Video Disc, the more popular video cassette tapes (VHS and BetaMax), a twelve-inch laser disc and most recently on DVD, first released in 1998 
as a single disc and re-issued in 2003 in a special edition. The twelve-inch laser disc format certainly provides the best sound quality (on comparable equipment) but, considering the film was released as part of the deluxe and bonus-happy Critereon Collection, the disc disappoints in its lack of the anticipated extra features. The 2003 Collector's Edition of the DVD makes up for that loss with a splendid package of extra material, but has plenty to answer for in the way of soundtrack synchronization. Most desirable would be some luxurious combination of all three. But with the twelve-inch laser disc going the way of the dinosaur, the best and most compact package is obtained by snapping the 1998 DVD into the 2003 collector's edition, while awaiting the inevitable presentation in the next generation of home video formats.
Included in this package is an excellent one-hour documentary called WEST SIDE MEMORIES, filmmaker Michael M. Arick's priceless collection of clips and outtakes, rare stills from both stage and screen, and candid interviews with several performers and creators, including stage heavyweights Arthur Laurents and Harold Prince.
This PBS documentary has the pleasant and not-so-rare distinction of being a better product than the work being documented. For his presumably historic recording of the complete score of West Side Story performed by opera singers, Mr. Bernstein agreed to have the aural record complemented by a visual
one. The result is a somewhat predictable mulligan stew of egos and temperaments, learning and stumbling, tempers tested and patience rewarded, efforts exerted and successes achieved, a compleat show-biz tale and not a particularly original one. But the real treat does not come from the exclusive "backstage peek" at the marriage of personalities joining together for this ambitious project. Instead, one gets to hear (and watch) the music performed outside the stage venue for which it was written, and, in a roomful of impresarios and prima donnas, the score itself emerges as the star. While theater-goers and especially dance enthusiasts watching the show can be forgiven for sublimating the brilliant music in favor of the more urgent and demanding action before their eyes, no such preoccupations exist here. Every note -- indeed, every rest between notes -- is an unencumbered gem. While criticisms have been levelled at the project for the hubristic employment of opera stars to perform a score that required anything but classically-trained voices, the music is exquisite as always, even when it occasionally leans away from musical theater toward symphony hall. Mr. Bernstein got what he wanted, his singular opportunity to hear his score sung by the best voices he could assemble. In return he gave the world an unforgettable rendition of his treasured composition, delivered with all the same skills and passions with which it was written nearly thirty years earlier.
After being out of print for some years, the disc was re-released in 2005 with a new title and cover.
The stars assembled once again to narrate and appear in this retrospective look at dance in Hollywood, from the silents and the earliest talkies through the post-WW2 heyday to the MTV era. The masterwork is suitably and admirably represented by "Cool."
For many years in many homes the American weekend would draw to a close with the consistently popular television show The Toast of the Town, later simply The Ed Sullivan Show. In a format that did not change in two decades' time, Sullivan offered his audience an evening of entertainment that defined the term "variety show." In the tradition of vaudeville, one act after another would enjoy the spotlight, each different from and unconnected to the rest: Singers, both popular and classical, solo dancers and dance teams and troupes, ventriloquists, comics, musicians, and, more or less inevitably, every type of animal act and plate-twirling exhibition you could think of. Some of it was memorable, much of it remained in its deserved obscurity, but the show and its stone-faced host were enough of a national institution, not to say mindset, to be relentlessly imitated, frequently parodied, and even honored as the subject of a show tune, performed by Paul Lynde and company in Bye Bye Birdie without exposition or explanation. No one never heard of Ed Sullivan.
Broadcasting (at first live) on Sunday nights (the one night 
of the week, at that time, that the Broadway theaters were dark) from the theater that now bears his name, Ed Sullivan frequently recruited stars and chorus members from whatever Broadway show happened to be causing the buzz of the moment, and had them perform the designated show-stopper for the cameras. The immediate effect is obvious: folks from across the country would get a genuine and typically lavish taste of the otherwise-exclusive entertainment being offered on the Broadway stage. Intended or not, the belated side-effect is perhaps the more rewarding and certainly the more enduring consequence of this inspired exercise. Some of the greatest musical performances of the era have thus been preserved for all time. Yes, it's certainly "as is," since television and its broadcasting techniques were in their infancy when some of these presentations were aired. The black-and-white is occasionally grainy, the later color is anything but "true," and sometimes you frankly wonder what the cameraman could possibly have been thinking. But it's real, it's live, and it's available. To paraphrase Birdie's Harry McAfee: "Ed, we love you."
This edition, which is but one of a series, features performances from Annie Get Your Gun, My Fair Lady, Flower Drum Song, Hello Dolly!, Man of La Mancha, and Sweet Charity, among others. The jewel in this particular crown, of course, is the 1958 broadcast of the fire escape scene, featuring Carol Lawrence and Larry Kert. This priceless clip is proof positive of everything you've ever heard -- and perhaps doubted -- about these extraordinary singers. Larry Kert performs magnificently. He is passionate, ardent, open, thoroughly and even boyishly confident, and every inch a star. Carol Lawrence portrays Maria with less fever but with no less skill, charm and talent. Their duet is patently historic -- that ain't dubbed, folks, them's the goods -- and one gets a genuine if somewhat filtered feel of the excitement of the work when it was still new. The theater community is humbly in Sullivan's debt, and this brilliant excerpt from West Side Story is a vintage treasure that will never be out of date.
The noted film composer and conductor (The Graduate, The Goodbye Girl, Tootsie) follows in Leonard Bernstein's footsteps with video footage from the all-star recording session of the 40th anniversary audio tribute of the same name.
Two remarkable occurrences coincide to present this recording.
The more dramatic of the two is the discovery, in the year 2000, of the master tapes that had been presumed lost for a decade and a half. The more exciting, for music fans, is the event itself, a session of pure, exacting and occasionally mind-blowing jazz expertise. The showcase of course is the long-missing West Side Story piece, sadly thought to have been destroyed by fire, now painstakingly restored and re-mastered for the new technology and delivered in the unmistakable style of a true genius. Buddy Rich aka "Mr. Drums" began his career in the era of the big band, and he brought everything he learned with him when he formed a jazz group of his own. The finished product, neither Big Band nor Jazz but happily and often incredibly both, includes several other selections, and is supplemented by tributes from family members and some standard behind-the-scenes clips. Buddy Rich generously shares the spotlight with several of his musicians, particularly saxophonist Steve Marcus, but the evening belongs to Mister Drums, in an event wherein he and West Side Story do each other proud.
The ultimate diva includes in her concert-driven package a "special version" of West Side Story, in which, as she modestly announces, "I will be playing all the parts." 
Spoof, or affectionate tribute? The hip, no-nonsense persona of the throaty-voiced Cher does not exactly match everyone's idea of the virginal, wide-eyed Maria, and she does not conceal her difficulty with the higher vocal register. But on the whole the presentation succeeds through its unblinking confidence in the woolly idea, supported to no small degree by top-notch contributions from the hair and costume departments (no surprise to Cher fans) and some nifty visual wizardry. As for the lady herself, the twelve-minute medley reveals talent, hard work, dedication, and an unmistakable love of the masterpiece (were those real tears in her eyes as she sang "Somewhere"?), which is all we've ever asked of our divas. First-rate entertainment from a genuine star.
The masterwork takes some gentle ribbing in this off-beat tale of a summer theater camp. Its renowned lyricist is prominently included as well. Choreography by Jerry Mitchell is featured, and the film is dedicated to Arthur Laurents.
Hour Five of this splendid six-hour PBS documentary begins with what has come to be the obligatory tribute to the masterwork. Commentary by Arthur Laurents, Harold Prince, Jerome Robbins and Stephen Sondheim alternate with some interesting footage of scenes from Jerome Robbins Broadway, as well as a clip from a televised broadcast of the fire escape scene featuring Carol Lawrence and Larry Kert. This ambitious chronicle of a century's worth of American musicals gives West Side Story its fair share of coverage, and it addresses in brief several basic facts about the original production that are more thoroughly explored elsewhere.
Filmmaker Rick McKay interviews over a hundred legends of Broadway’s heyday to present a remarkable and comprehensive history of the so-called Golden Age. The scope of the piece is enormous but Mr. McKay’s loving and skillfully informed valentine to the theater and its pantheon of twentieth-century players only leaves the viewer wanting more. A segment is devoted exclusively to West Side Story, a show whose alumni constitute a kind of Hall-of-Fame within a Hall-of-Fame: Sharing their memories of the masterwork (and of other pieces with which they are associated) are Arthur Laurents, Carol Lawrence, Harold Prince, Chita Rivera and Stephen Sondheim.
This third collection of clips from various Tony Awards telecasts includes an exciting performance by Debbie Allen, Yamil Borges and members of the 1980 Broadway revival cast doing "America" and offers a dazzling look at the original Robbins-Gennaro choreography. The disc also contains several other rarely-seen Broadway performances, notably including that of Chita Rivera in her Tony-winning turn as Aurora in "The Kiss of the Spider Woman."
While Ed Sullivan was preserving the fading flavor of vaudeville into the 1960s, the Bell Telephone Hour presented a weekly show in a congruent format, one that was aimed specifically at the audiences of opera, theater, ballet and the concert stage. Carol Lawrence, the original Maria, is featured in an outstanding showcase of her 1960-1967 appearances, singing and dancing a variety of show tunes and standards with partners such as Howard Keel, then-hubby Robert Goulet, Matt Mattox and Bill Hayes. She also performs two numbers from the masterwork, decidedly as "numbers," in television-variety-show we're-not-performing-the-musical-here-folks-we're-just-singing-the-songs style. Patience is rewarded, however, as the disc is capped by an appearance by Larry Kert, singing "Maria" with the same skill and fervor with which he introduced it ten years earlier, a performance that stands unchallenged to this day. The song is followed, with merciful inevitability, by a duet by Miss Lawrence and Mr. Kert, now unmistakably in character as Maria and Tony, and together they offer one more brilliant performance of "Tonight" in the balcony scene. The poor color cannot distract the viewer from appreciating the thrill of seeing--and hearing--these two legends singing and acting in top form. Also included is producer Ernest Gilbert's terrific interview of the star as she re-counts some of the details of her stage, television and nightclub career. Carol Lawrence is beautiful, witty, articulate, generous and simply delightful, and every inch of that and more shines through on this wonderful disc.
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