Pal Joey (musical)

Pal Joey
Studio cast album 1950
Music	Richard Rodgers
Lyrics	Lorenz Hart
Book	John O'Hara
Basis	John O'Hara's novel Pal Joey
Productions	1940 Broadway 1952 Broadway revival 1954 West End 1957 film 1963 Off-Broadway 1976 Broadway revival 1978 Civic Light Opera 1980 West End revival 1995 Encores! 2008 Broadway revival

Pal Joey is a musical with a book by John O'Hara and music and lyrics by Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart. The musical is based on a character and situations O'Hara created in a series of short stories published in The New Yorker, which he later published in novel form. The title character, Joey Evans, is a manipulative small-time nightclub performer whose ambitions lead him into an affair with the wealthy, middle-aged and married Vera Simpson. It includes two songs that have become standards: "I Could Write a Book" and "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered".

The original 1940 Broadway production was directed by George Abbott and starred Vivienne Segal and Gene Kelly. Though it received mixed reviews, the show ran for 10 months, the third-longest run of any Rodgers and Hart musical. There have been several revivals since, including a 2008–09 Broadway run, and a 1957 film adaptation starring Frank Sinatra, Rita Hayworth and Kim Novak.

Author John O'Hara offered his stories of Pal Joey to Rodgers and Hart for adaptation as a new musical. Title character Joey Evans, an unsympathetic but charming antihero, was a striking departure from the usual musical comedy formula. Joey was amoral, but he was not presented as a villain, nor did his character change for the better.Richard Rodgers said: "Joey was not disreputable because he was mean, but because he had too much imagination to behave himself, and because he was a little weak." Rodgers and Hart maintained a cynical, dark tone throughout the work and employed two distinct musical styles in the show: the deliberately tacky nightclub numbers contrasted with the more elegant songs the characters sang to express their emotions, though these expressions were more ironic than sincere. Hart's lyrics frankly described Joey and Vera's affair; "Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered" included (among others) the lyrics, "Horizontally speaking, he's at his very best" and "Vexed again, Perplexed again, Thank God I can be oversexed again", while "In Our Little Den (of Iniquity)" included, "We're very proper folks you know, We've separate bedrooms comme il faut. There's one for play and one for show".