Bye Bye Birdie


Bye Bye Birdie is a stage musical with music by Charles Strouse and lyrics by Lee Adams, with a book by Michael Stewart.
Originally titled Let's Go Steady, it is set in 1958. The play's book was influenced by Elvis Presley being drafted into the US Army in 1957. The rock star character's name, "Conrad Birdie", is word play on the name of Conway Twitty. Twitty later had a long career as a country music star, but, in the late 1950s, he was one of Presley's rock 'n' roll rivals.
The original 1960–1961 Broadway production was a Tony Award–winning success. It spawned a London production and several major revivals, a sequel, a 1963 film, and a 1995 television production. The show also became a popular choice for high school and college productions due to its variable cast size and large proportion of ensemble numbers.

History

Producer Edward Padula had the idea for a musical initially titled Let's Go Steady, a "happy teenage musical with a difference". Padula contracted with two writers and Charles Strouse and Lee Adams wrote seven songs for their libretto. Padula, Strouse, and Adams sought Gower Champion as director/choreographer, who until that time had choreographed only a few musicals. However, Champion did not like the book, and the writers were fired. Michael Stewart then took their place. Stewart's first draft, Love and Kisses, focused on a couple thinking of divorce whose children persuade them to stay together, a theme soon taken up by the Disney film The Parent Trap.
Champion wanted "something more". "The 'something more' had been right there in the newspaper. Rock-and-roll idol Elvis Presley was drafted into the Army on 20 December 1957, and in September 1958 left the US for eighteen months in Germany, provoking a media circus that included Presley's giving a specially-selected member of the Women's Army Corps "one last kiss". After brainstorming, Stewart and Adams "came up with the idea of a rock-and-roll singer going off to the Army and its effect on a group of teenagers in a small town in Ohio. The name of the singer initially was 'Ellsworth', which was soon changed to 'Conway Twitty' before we discovered there was already a Conway Twitty who was threatening to sue us, and then, finally, 'Conrad Birdie.

Synopsis

Act one

New York–based songwriter Albert Peterson finds himself in trouble when his client, hip-thrusting rock and roll superstar and teen idol Conrad Birdie, is drafted into the Army, leaving his heavily indebted firm Al-Mae-Lou Music in jeopardy. Albert's secretary, Rose "Rosie" Alvarez, comes up with a last-ditch publicity stunt to have Birdie record and perform a song before he is sent overseas. Having been stuck in a sort of romantic limbo for eight years, she longs for the Albert she once knew, an aspiring English teacher, before he wrote Birdie's first hit and abandoned those plans to pursue the seedier music industry. Rose's plan is to have Birdie sing "One Last Kiss" and give one lucky girl, chosen randomly from his fan club, a real "last kiss" on The Ed Sullivan Show before going into the Army.
In Sweet Apple, Ohio, all the teenagers are catching up on the latest gossip about 15-year-old Kim MacAfee and Hugo Peabody going steady. Kim reflects on how happy she is with her maturity, believing at 15 she has fully reached adulthood. She quits the Conrad Birdie fan club over the phone because of the new milestone happening in her life. Her best friend Ursula is shocked. Kim reconsiders when, after a lengthy phone conversation with Ursula, she receives the phone call telling her that she has been chosen to be Birdie's last kiss before going into the armed forces.
Meanwhile, Conrad, Albert and Rosie prepare to go to Sweet Apple. A crowd of teenage girls sees them off at the New York City train station, although one girl is sad because she thinks that by the time Conrad gets out of the army, she will be too old for him. Albert advises her to be optimistic. Soon, tabloid reporters arrive with questions about the seedy details of Conrad's personal life, but Rosie, Albert and the girls answer for him, hoping to protect his reputation and bankability.
Conrad receives a hero's welcome in Sweet Apple, and Hugo worries that Kim likes Conrad more than she likes him, but Kim assures Hugo that he is the only one she loves. Conrad shocks the town's parents and drives the teenage girls crazy with his performance of "Honestly Sincere", which causes all of the girls to faint. Conrad becomes a guest in the MacAfee house and irritates Kim's father, Harry, by being rude and selfish. Harry does not want Kim to kiss Conrad, until Albert tells him their whole family will be on The Ed Sullivan Show. Kim, Harry, Kim's mother Doris, and younger brother Randolph sing Sullivan's praises.
Albert's overbearing mother, Mae, comes to Sweet Apple to break up her son's relationship with Rosie. She introduces Albert to Gloria Rasputin, a curvy blonde she met on the bus who could replace Rosie as his secretary. Gloria, a tap dancer, secretly hopes that a connection with Albert could be her way into show business. Mae sings "Swanee River" as Gloria tap-dances. Albert gives Gloria a typing job. Rosie is furious, and fantasizes about violent ways to murder Albert, but instead comes up with a better idea: she convinces Hugo to sabotage the last kiss.
Since both Rosie and Hugo are jealous and angry, they plot to ruin Conrad's appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. On the broadcast, Conrad sings "One Last Kiss", and as he leans in to kiss Kim, Hugo runs onstage and punches him in the face, knocking Conrad unconscious. Rosie dumps Albert who, trying to cover for the mishaps of the evening, then leads a chorus of "Normal American Boy".

Act two

Despite plans to re-film the broadcast, Rosie and Kim resolve to leave Albert and Hugo, lamenting their stupidity for having fallen in love. Conrad, with no visible effects from being knocked out, decides he wants to go out and have a good time on his last night as a civilian, and encourages the Sweet Apple teens to party. Kim sneaks out of her house and joins her friends. Conrad, Kim, and all the teenagers, except Hugo, head for the Ice House, "where people go when they want to be alone." Hugo goes to Maude's Roadside Retreat, the town bar, hoping to get drunk, but grumpy proprietor Charles F. Maude sees that he's underage and refuses to serve him.
When Harry discovers Kim has run away, he and Doris lament how disobedient kids are these days. Rosie ends up at Maude's Roadside Retreat and starts flirting with other men, but Albert phones her and begs her to return to him. Rosie interrupts a Shriners meeting in Maude's private dining room. She flirts with all the Shriners, and they begin a wild dance. Hugo and Albert rescue Rosie from the crazed Shriners, and Albert finally stands up to his mother, telling her to go home. Mae leaves, but not before lamenting the sacrifices she made for him. Hugo tells the MacAfees and the other parents that the teenagers have gone to the Ice House, and they all declare that they do not know what's wrong with their kids. Randolph joins in, stating that his older sister and the other teens are "so ridiculous and so immature".
The adults and the police arrive at the Ice House and arrest Conrad for attempted statutory rape. Kim, who unconvincingly claimed to be in her late 20s to Conrad, claims she was intimidated and gladly returns to Hugo. After a reconciliation with Albert, Rosie tells Mae that she will marry Albert despite Mae's racist objections, and despite being a natural-born American citizen from Allentown, Pennsylvania, she will deliberately play up her Hispanic heritage if it annoys Mae that much. Albert bails Conrad out of jail and arranges for him to sneak out of town dressed as a middle-aged woman, presumably so he can report for Army induction as scheduled; in turn, Conrad offers Albert a lifetime contract for bailing him out. Albert gets Mae to leave Sweet Apple on the same train, getting his mother and Conrad out of his life for good. Albert tells Rosie they're not going back to New York; they're going to Pumpkin Falls, Iowa, a small town in need of a English teacher. Albert professes that everything is rosy with Rosie, and they go off together happily engaged.

Characters

  • Albert Peterson: The central character of the story, a poet and former aspiring English teacher who was lured into the music business after penning a hit for Conrad Birdie. Peterson is neurotic, weak and easily manipulated by his mother.
  • Rose "Rosie" Alvarez: Albert's secretary and long-suffering significant other, loathed by Albert's mother
  • Kim MacAfee: A precocious teenage girl from Sweet Apple, outgoing president of the Conrad Birdie Fan Club who is on the cusp of giving up her fandom when she is chosen to receive her kiss from Conrad Birdie
  • Conrad Birdie: A rock and roll superstar with an implied checkered past and an unpredictable personality who is drafted into the Armed Forces
  • Randolph MacAfee: Kim's younger brother, who idolizes his father
  • Harry MacAfee: Kim and Randolph's befuddled and bad-tempered father, a World War II veteran and strong conservative utterly dismayed at the Baby Boomer generation
  • Doris MacAfee: Kim and Randolph's mother
  • Mae Peterson: Albert's manipulative, racist widowed mother
  • Hugo Peabody: Kim's strait-laced boyfriend
  • Ursula Merkle: Kim's hyperactive best friend and next-door neighbor, a Conrad Birdie enthusiast
  • Gloria Rasputin: A curvaceous tap dancer who hopes to be Albert's new secretary, whom Mae brings to Albert, hoping he will choose her over Rosie
  • Helen, Alice, Deborah Sue, Nancy, Penelope, Suzie, Margie: Sweet Apple teenage girls who are friends of Kim's, and Conrad Birdie enthusiasts; they perform solos in "Telephone Hour".
  • Harvey Johnson: A nerdy teenage boy who performs a few parts in "Telephone Hour"
  • Fred/Freddie, Carl/Karl and Roger: Sweet Apple teenage boys. Featured in "Telephone Hour"
  • Charles Maude: Owner of Maude's Roadside Retreat, second tenor in male quartet, and member of the adult ensemble
  • Mrs. Merkle: Ursula's mother
  • Mr. Johnson: Harvey's father
  • The Mayor: The mayor of Sweet Apple
  • The Mayor's Wife : The repressed wife of the mayor; she comedically faints multiple times during Conrad Birdie's performance of "Honestly Sincere".
  • Dishwasher/Bar Patrons: Three members of the quartet, with Maude; they perform solos in "Baby, Talk to Me".
  • Reporters
  • Policemen
  • Ed Sullivan: The host of the ''Ed Sullivan Show''