So Little They Sang It
Here's another of those quite-wonderful songs you've never heard of from a Broadway musical. Despite its obscurity, it comes with impeccable pedigree. This is from the show, Rex, the second-to-last show written by Richard Rodgers, and for the lyrics he teamed up with Sheldon Harnick, who wrote Fiddler on the Roof and won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiorello!
The 1976 show about King Henry VIII was not successful, running only 48 performances, despite starring Nicol Williamson. By some accounts, Williamson was very difficult and part of the problem. The production also was very grand, something that was never the original intent, rather meant to be a much smaller, intimate and personal show. However, only last year, Harnick and, I believe, book writer Sherman Yellen, reworked the show to its original vision, and Rex got re-mounted in Toronto to a positive response. After a bit more work, the Richard Rodgers organization, which oversees and licenses his shows and had never included Rex, finally included it in the official portfolio.
The score is inconsistent, but has a lot of very good material in it. And this is one of my unknown favorites. It's a beautiful ballad sung by Penny Fuller (seen above with Rodgers, WIlliamson and Harnick in rehearsals), who played Anne Bolelyn. "So Much You Loved Me."
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