As a performer, director and artistic producer, Peter Jorgensen had always admired the collaborative work of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein.
After all, they were the artists who unlocked each others' talent to write such ground-breaking musicals as Oklahoma!, Carousel, The Sound of Music, South Pacific and The King and I.
So it was no surprise that Jorgensen created a musical revue dedicated to them a show that premiered last year and is now touring the Lower Mainland that, next week, stops in Coquitlam.
"I wanted to create a tribute to two artists who really created contemporary musical theatre," said Jorgensen, who heads up Patrick Street Productions with Katey Wright.
Jorgensen said both men had found success before their partnership in the 1940s. For two decades, Rodgers wrote with Lorenz Hart and made musicals likes Babes in Arms and The Boys from Syracuse; Hammerstein had joined forces with composer Jerome Kern on Show Boat and Sweet Adeline, among others.
But with Hart's personal problems eclipsing his professional life, Rodgers hooked up with Hammerstein and the team soon transformed the musical theatre stage, winning 34 Tony Awards, 15 Academy Awards, two Grammy Awards and a Pulitzer Prize.
Their first success was Oklahoma!, an adaptation of the play Green Grow the Lilacs. As they wrote, "it was clear to both of them right away that they had the exact same interests in what musical theatre could do and that was to create a more unified, integrated piece that could tell a story," Jorgensen said. "We can take that for granted today when we think about musical theatre but it was kind of revolutionary back then."
Oklahoma! expressed its narrative through song, music and dance "something that hadn't been done to that much perfection before," he said.
Their songs Oh, What a Beautiful Morning, If I Loved You, Younger than Springtime, for example now hold a prominent place in the American songbook. Carousel is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year while the movie version of The Sound of Music last month marked 50 years since it opened.
Jorgensen said it's not unusual for his audience watching Out of a Dream to sing along with the actors. "And many of them know all the words," he said.
Rodgers and Hammerstein: Out of a Dream runs May 5 to 9 at the Evergreen Cultural Centre (1205 Pinetree Way, Coquitlam) at 8 p.m. with a 4 p.m. matinee on Saturday. For tickets at $39/$30/$15, call 604-927-6555 or visit evergreenculturalcentre.ca.
