Salad Days (musical)
| Salad Days | |
|---|---|
| Music | Julian Slade |
| Lyrics | Julian Slade and Dorothy Reynolds |
| Productions | 1954 Bristol 1954 West End 1958 New York 1976 West End revival 1996 West End revival 2009–12 Hammersmith (two revivals) |
Salad Days is a musical with music by Julian Slade and lyrics by Dorothy Reynolds and Julian Slade. The musical was initially performed in the UK in Bristol and then in the West End, running for 2,283 performances.
Julian Slade and Dorothy Reynolds had been working together on writing musicals since 1952, writing the book, music and lyrics. Reynolds was also an actress. They wrote Salad Days as a "summer musical for the Bristol Old Vic's resident company."
The title is taken from William Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra: "My salad days, When I was green in judgment, cold in blood, To say as I said then!", and the phrase has come to be used generally to refer to one's days of youthful inexperience. The musical's enduring popularity lies in its light-hearted innocence and apparent simplicity, in sharp contrast to the many "hard-nosed" American musicals of the era, and its bright score including the songs "We Said We Wouldn't Look Back", "I Sit in the Sun", and "We're Looking for a Piano".
Jane and Timothy Dawes meet in a park, soon after their graduation, to plan their lives. They agree to get married, and do so in secret, but Timothy's parents have urged him to ask his various influential uncles—a Minister, a Foreign Office official, a General, a scientist—to find him suitable employment. He and Jane, however, decide that he must take the first job that he is offered. A passing tramp offers them £7 a week to look after his mobile piano for a month, and, upon accepting, they discover that when the piano plays it gives everyone within earshot an irresistible desire to dance!
After attempts by the Minister of Pleasure and Pastime (Timothy's Ministerial uncle) to ban the disruptive music, the piano vanishes, and Timothy enlists his scientific Uncle Zed to take them in his flying saucer to retrieve it. When it is found, the tramp reappears to tell them that their month is up and the piano must be passed on to another couple. He also reveals that he is a hitherto unknown uncle of Timothy (whose parents had referred to "the one we don't mention"). Timothy and Jane look forward to the future with confidence.
Salad Days premiered in the UK at the Theatre Royal, Bristol in June 1954, and transferred to the Vaudeville Theatre in London on 5 August 1954, running for 2,283 performances to become the longest-running show in musical theatre history until overtaken by My Fair Lady in the U.S. (1956) and Oliver! in the U.K. (1960). In the Evening Standard Awards for 1955, Salad Days was given the Award for Most Enjoyable Show (although The Pajama Game won as Best Musical). The musical was produced by Denis Carey, with dances arranged by Elizabeth West, and with a cast that featured Dorothy Reynolds in a variety of roles, John Warner as Timothy and Eleanor Drew as Jane. Slade played one of the two pianos. The reviewer in The Guardian wrote: "There is no pointed satire, only a passable line of wit, but the effect is one of genuine high spirits and those who liked it on Thursday were ready to call it the gayest piece of entertainment since The Mikado. Others were heard to compare it to a children's party, meaning that they found the fun jejune, 'undergraduate,' and limited."
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