Had to return to library. Reading lyrics for shows you don't know is boring, but also the first show included isn't actually that good; I had a much easier time reading
Follies and
Merrily We Roll Along, which I haven't seen or listened to, than I did on
Saturday Night. And
Gypsy, God, the
Gypsy lyrics are amazing -- not sure how much of that is that I have in fact seen a performance, but never listen to the soundtrack because of Emotional Issues with the show's subject matter. Ghosts of music make everything sound better.
Sondheim is ruthless with everyone, including himself; I like him when he is being opinionated, although I reserve my opinion as to whether his rules for lyricists should really be rules of lyricists or just lyricists who want to write like Stephen Sondheim.
Was pleased he also felt Raul Esparza's Bobby was the only truly likeable one he'd seen, for much the same reason I did. He makes note of the orchestration (all Bobby's friends' instruments coming together in the finale), which I'd forgotten, but which was indeed brilliant and almost--almost--made that notoriously problematic finale work.
The book ends with
Sweeney Todd, oddly not including the work from which the title comes (
Sunday in the Park with George), but Google informs me there's supposed to be a second volume eventually.