A Little Night Music

A Little Night Music
original Broadway production poster
Music	Stephen Sondheim
Lyrics	Stephen Sondheim
Book	Hugh Wheeler
Basis	1955 Ingmar Bergman film Smiles of a Summer Night
Productions	1973 Broadway 1975 West End 1977 Film 1989 West End revival 1990 New York City Opera 1995 Royal National Theatre 2000 Barcelona 2002 Kennedy Center 2003 NYCO revival 2008 London revival 2009 Broadway revival International productions
Awards	Tony Award for Best Musical Tony Award for Best Book Tony Award for Best Original Score Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Book of a Musical Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Music Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Lyrics

A Little Night Music is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by Hugh Wheeler. Inspired by the Ingmar Bergman film Smiles of a Summer Night, it involves the romantic lives of several couples. Its title is a literal English translation of the German name for Mozart's Serenade No. 13 for strings in G major, Eine kleine Nachtmusik. The musical includes the popular song "Send in the Clowns".

Since its original 1973 Broadway production, the musical has enjoyed professional productions in the West End, by opera companies, in a 2009 Broadway revival, and elsewhere, and it is a popular choice for regional groups. It was adapted for film in 1977, with Harold Prince directing and Elizabeth Taylor, Len Cariou, Lesley-Anne Down and Diana Rigg starring.

The setting is Sweden, around the year 1900. One by one, the Quintet – five singers who comment like a Greek chorus throughout the show – enter, tuning up. Gradually, their vocalizing becomes an overture blending fragments of "Remember", "Soon" and "The Glamorous Life", leading into the first "Night Waltz". The other characters enter waltzing, each uncomfortable with their particular partner. After they drift back off, the aging and severe Madame Armfeldt and her solemn granddaughter, Fredrika, enter. Madame Armfeldt tells the child that the summer night "smiles" three times: first on the young, second on fools, and third on the old. Fredrika vows to watch the smiles occur. Middle-aged Fredrik Egerman is a successful lawyer. He has recently married an 18-year-old trophy wife, Anne, a vain girl who is in love with Fredrik, but too immature to grasp the concept of marriage. The two have been married for eleven months, but Anne still protects her virginity. Fredrik laments his inability to make love to his wife ("Now"). Meanwhile, his son Henrik, a year older than his stepmother, is feeling extremely frustrated. He is a seminary student and everyone is always teasing him, never taking him seriously or letting him talk ("Later"). Anne is intrigued by him, but fails to understand his real meaning. Anne promises her husband that shortly she will consent to have sex ("Soon"). Anne's maidservant Petra, an experienced and forthright girl, slightly older than the teen herself, offers her worldly but crass advice.