Much of the hope for the musical's survival resides in the acerbic intelligence of Stephen Sondheim, whose tenth musical, Sweeney Todd, opened in New York [in the winter of 1979]. In collaboration with his director / producer, Hal Prince, Sondheim has given a sense of occasion back to the musical and moved it away from the Shubert Alley formula of "no girls, no gags, no chance."… Sondheim has become the American musical: a king on a field of corpses.

Traditional musicals dramatize the triumph of hope over experience. Characteristic of their flirtation with modernism, Sondheim's shows make a cult of blasted joys and jubilant despairs. He admits that joy escapes him. "If I consciously sat down and said I wanted to write something that would send people out of the theater really happy, I wouldn't know how to do it." His mature musicals sing about a new American excellence: desolation...