thumb|Loewe and Lerner, 1962

Lerner and Loewe is the partnership between lyricist and librettist Alan Jay Lerner and composer Frederick Loewe. Spanning three decades and nine musicals from 1942 to 1960 and again from 1970 to 1972, the pair are known for being behind the creation of critical on stage successes such as My Fair Lady, Brigadoon, and Camelot along with the musical film Gigi.

Conversely, Alan Lerner was born in New York City and attended Harvard where his first musical theater contributions came from working on collegiate Hasty Pudding musicals.

Meeting

In August 1942 at the Lambs Club in New York City 24 year old American, Alan Jay Lerner and 41 year old Austrian, Frederick Loewe, officially met each other.

The very first of their collaborations, Life of the Party, was worked on in 1942 at a stock company in Detroit, ran for 9 weeks and never made it to a Broadway stage. The first of their productions to make it to Broadway was What's Up?, which received generally (if mildly) favorable reviews but was not a commercial success. Lerner later wrote that the musical ran for only one week before closing,

Brigadoon

Brigadoon was the pair's first significant hit. Loewe and Lerner reportedly auditioned their music fifty times before successfully finding investors to help mount their production.

After many frustrated work sessions and the input of Oscar Hammerstein, who had also tried to adapt the play with Richard Rodgers and failed, Lerner and Loewe abandoned the project.

After reevaluating the state of the musical theater "rules"—or, rather, the new lack of them—and determining that it was no longer necessary to have a subplot or a larger-than-life ensemble, in 1954 both Lerner and Loewe resumed the project and continued their efforts on the adaptation.

Gigi

Four years after My Fair Lady opened, Lerner sought to collaborate with Loewe on a film. Due to it being outside of stage work, Loewe at first passed on the opportunity, but relented after reading the script. at that time holding the record for the most Oscars won by a single film production.

Camelot

Much like Pygmalion, inspiration for Camelot came to Lerner from a book, this time, T.H White's The Once and Future King.

Final collaboration

Their final collaboration was on the 1974 musical film The Little Prince. The All Movie reviewer wrote: "Although Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe crafted a hummable and entertaining score, it is not among their best work; worse, its tone and style are frequently at odds with the story."

List of theatre works

  • Life of the Party (1942)
  • What's Up? (1943)
  • The Day Before Spring (1945)
  • Brigadoon (1947)
  • Paint Your Wagon (1951)
  • My Fair Lady (1956)
  • Camelot (1960)
  • Gigi (1973) – stage version adapted from the film

Films and film adaptations

  • Brigadoon (1954)
  • Gigi (1958)
  • My Fair Lady (1964)
  • Camelot (1967)
  • Paint Your Wagon (1969)
  • The Little Prince (1974)

Notes

References

  • Lees, Gene (2005, originally published 1991). The Musical Worlds of Lerner and Loewe. University of Nebraska Press (bisonbooks.com),
  • Green, Benny, Editor (1987). A Hymn to Him: The Lyrics of Alan Jay Lerner. Hal Leonard Corporation.
  • Lerner, Alan Jay (1985). The Street Where I Live. Da Capo Press.
  • Green, Benny. "Frederick Loewe, a prince of musical comedy", The Guardian, February 16, 1988, p. 33