Charles Strouse, the Tony Award-winning composer of the tuneful, upbeat, populist musicals Bye Bye Birdie and Annie, died May 15 at the age of 96. The sad news was confirmed by his children via a press representative.
Mr. Strouse, a born and bred New Yorker, struck gold with his first full Broadway musical, Bye Bye Birdie, in 1960. The comic tale, set in the anytown of Sweet Apple, Ohio, fictionalized the then-well-known story of Elvis Presley answering the draft. Rock star Conrad Birdie is due to enter the Army, but not before he participates in a highly orchestrated publicity stunt in which a member of his Sweet Apple fan club is selected to receive 鈥淥ne Last Kiss.鈥� The event turns the small town on its head. The show, directed and choreographed by Gower Champion, boasted a soon-to-be famous dream cast including Dick Van Dyke, Chita Rivera, and Paul Lynde. The script and score鈥檚 mix of light cynicism about the American media machine and sincere sentimentality regarding the tenacity of sweet, small-town values struck a chord with Eisenhower-era audiences.
The show won the Tony Award for Best Musical in 1961, and made Mr. Strouse a household name through the popularizing of such soon-to-be standards as 鈥淧ut on a Happy Face,鈥� 鈥淜ids,鈥� and 鈥淎 Lot of Livin鈥� to Do.鈥� The gently witty, bouncy, life-embracing lyrics were by Lee Adams, who would become Mr. Strouse鈥檚 primary collaborator over the next couple decades. Though they would never quite repeat the enduring critical and popular success of their initial effort, the two would score sizable hits with Golden Boy in 1964, based on the Clifford Odets play and starring Sammy Davis Jr.; and 1970鈥檚 Applause, a musicalization of the film All About Eve that starred Lauren Bacall in the Bette Davis role.
The latter featured a script by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, which updated the theatre-world story to the the- present day. It ran for two years on Broadway, won the Tony Award, and scored Strouse and Adams another popular standard in the title tune, an ode to show business. (The score also features the more cynical anthem, 鈥淲elcome to the Theatre,鈥� which tells of 鈥減inches from the stagehands鈥� and 鈥渄ark toilets in the hall.鈥�)
Mr. Strouse鈥檚 place in the musical theatre pantheon was cemented seven years after Applause, when he hooked up with a new lyricist, Martin Charnin. Mining the unlikely source material of the Depression-era comic strip 鈥淟ittle Orphan Annie,鈥� they came up with Annie, the hit of the decade, one of the feel-good stage shows of all time, and a musical that has since inspired the stage careers of thousands of pre-teen girls.
The idea was Charnin鈥檚, who said he had to talk Mr. Strouse and bookwriter Thomas Meehan into contributing. (The composer had ventured into comic strip territory once before, writing with Adams It鈥檚 a Bird...It鈥檚 a Plane...It鈥檚 Superman, which was not a success, despite the soon-to-be-standard 鈥淵ou鈥檝e Got Possibilities,鈥� originally sung by the late Linda Lavin.) There were endless backers鈥� auditions, and most producers turned the show down. Finally, there was a production at the Goodspeed Opera House in Connecticut. It was panned, but director Mike Nichols saw it and decided to produce it on Broadway. Two critical cast additions were made. Andrea McArdle was drafted as the title ragamuffin, whose optimism and gumption can鈥檛 be tempered by the daily drudgery in an orphanage. And Dorothy Loudon was tapped as Miss Hannigan.
The show proved well suited for its historical moment. The post-Vietnam country, also battered by Watergate and an energy crisis, was ready for a tale of hope and spirit. 鈥淭omorrow鈥濃攚hich, in Strouse and Charnin鈥檚 world, was sunny and 鈥渁lways a day away鈥濃攂ecame a standard sung (and eventually satirized) around the world. 鈥淗ere at last is a stage parade that rivals Macy鈥檚,鈥� wrote Harold Clurman. The show ran six years, won the Tony Award for Best Musical, and has been a tireless staple of community theatre and high schools. Hollywood has also been quite the fan. Two separate movie versions have played movie theatres, along with two separate TV productions. The show has also come back to Broadway twice, and has scarcely ever not been touring the country.
As with Bye Bye Birdie, Mr. Strouse had trouble following up this massive success. A Broadway Musical (1977) and the sequel musical, Bring Back Birdie (1981), both collaborations with Adams, were short-lived. So was 1980鈥檚 Charles and Algernon, on which he worked with writer David Rogers, and 1983鈥檚 Dance a Little Closer, a teaming with Alan Jay Lerner. Some of these ran for a single performance on Broadway.
He did a little better with 1985鈥檚 Mayor, which told the story of New York City Mayor Ed Koch, and for which Mr. Strouse wrote his own lyrics, with Warren Leight writing the book; it ran a couple months. And he had a minor critical hit with 1986鈥檚 Rags, if not a commercial one. 1991鈥檚 Nick & Nora, based on Dashiell Hammett鈥檚 detective characters from The Thin Man, was his last original Broadway credit. After running in previews for more than two months, the show closed in nine performances.
Another sequel attempt, this time for Annie, proved similarly tricky. First aiming for Broadway as Annie 2: Miss Hannigan's Revenge, the musical failed to get an audience and cancelled an announced Broadway run after a poorly received 1989 bow at Washington D.C.'s Kennedy Center. Extensively re-written and with a new plot, the Annie sequel would eventually resurface titled Annie Warbucks, which toured the U.S. and played an Off-Broadway run at the Variety Arts Theatre in 1993, lasting for 200 performances. The title has lived on through regional productions in the years since.
If such setbacks saddened Mr. Strouse, he never let on. He once said, 鈥淚 never said to myself, 鈥楬ow will I ever top this?鈥� That never even occurred to me. I mean, I like things to be a success, but the main thing is to keep working.鈥�
Charles Strouse was born June 7, 1928, and raised in New York City by Ira and Ethel (Newman) Strouse. He graduated from the Eastman School of Music, and studied under David Diamond, Aaron Copland and Nadia Boulanger. He and Lee Adams met while Mr. Strouse was making a living as a rehearsal pianist and Adams was a television writer. 鈥淲e learned our stuff in the mountains,鈥� said Adams, 鈥渁t Green Mansions, this place in the Adirondacks where young singles from New York would go to meet each other, and we had a full theatre program: Orchestra, sets, costumes, lights, a theatre. We would do an original revue every Saturday night鈥攎usic, lyrics, sketches all summer.鈥� The duo contributed songs to a couple revues in the 1950s.
The songwriter was plugging away as a rehearsal pianist for Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer on a show called Saratoga, when the stage manager, Edward Padula, heard one of Strouse鈥檚 songs. Padula had hatched an idea for a musical that would incorporate the rock 鈥榥鈥� roll culture of late 鈥�50s America, and was looking for a composer. Mr. Strouse was hired to compose what would become Bye Bye Birdie. He and Adams incorporated 鈥淧ut on a Happy Face鈥� into the score, a song they had written in the Adirondacks.
In 2002, Strouse and Adams got back together for Marty, based on the movie about a modest, homely butcher who finds love and a purpose in life. It played Boston to mixed reviews, and stalled after that.
Mr. Strouse also worked in film, composing the scores for Bonnie and Clyde, There Was a Crooked Man, The Night They Raided 惭颈苍蝉办测鈥檚, and the animated movie All Dogs Go to Heaven. The film about the burlesque king Billy Minsky became a Strouse stage musical, 惭颈苍蝉办测鈥檚, with lyrics by Susan Birkenhead. It premiered in 2009 at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles and was picked up by Broadway producers but never made it to the Main Stem.
Mr. Strouse and Adams also wrote the well-known theme song 鈥淭hose Were the Days鈥� for TV's All in the Family, which, 鈥淭omorrow鈥� aside, may very well be their most widely recognized composition.
Mr. Strouse married director-choreographer Barbara Siman in 1962. Together, they had four children: Benjamin, Nicholas, Victoria, and William, who survive both. Siman pre-deceased Mr. Strouse in 2023.
