“It’s sort of wherever the spirit
moves you,” said Kotis. “Wher-
ever there’s a strong idea - either
musical or lyric. But I think lyr-
ics come first more often, or the
lyric hook idea. A lyric hook will
probably become the title of the
song or is the phrase that is re-
peated, but it can be just a line
of dialogue.”
Writing is never fully done until
the show goes on and changes
can even occur after opening
night. In the case of The Sting,
Hollmann and Kotis were in-
spired to make changes to a
song that appears in the middle
of Act I after seeing it performed
in rehearsal.
“The lyrics weren’t quite match-
ing the story moment,” ex-
plained Kotis. “So we looked
at the script and one line of
dialogue from a character was
‘we’re back’ and that struck us
as a very strong emotional event
that could be our guide for writ-
NJ STAGE - ISSUE 45
ing a new song - something to
land on. One simple, clear idea
that characters express in song
that becomes sort of the orga-
nizing principle for that song.”
Hollmann added, “We saw the
song had to be replaced when
we saw the rehearsal. It wasn’t
working. It’s very much about
seeing something on its feet dur-
ing rehearsal that tells us wheth-
er or not a song is working.”
Essentially, the pair is basically
on call until the show begins.
Even more so for a production
like The Sting, which will be pro-
duced on Broadway following
its run at Paper Mill. No dates
have been announced as of
yet, but the production will be
produced on Broadway by The
Araca Group, Matthew Gross
Entertainment, and by special
arrangement with Universal
Theatrical Group. The Sting will
follow in the footsteps of previ-
ous plays like Disney’s Newsies,
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