Cocktail Party Fact: The original title was Away We Go and there are many stories about how just about everyone in the theater thought this was a flop out of town. The Variety review is still famous to this day. Faced with the homespun nature of the material, and used to seeing a bevy of chorus girls coming out in the first number instead of a lone cowboy, he wrote: “No Girls — No Legs — No chance.” Oscar Hammerstein, who had nothing but failure before the show for almost ten years, responded to the acclaim in a wonderfully cynical way; he took out an ad in Variety which listed his last eleven shows before Oklahoma! which were all flops. Underneath the list he wrote “I’ve Done It Before And I Can Do It Again!”

Here’s The Plot: In 1907 when the Indian territories are about to become the state of Oklahoma, the young impetuous cowboy Curly comes to call on the headstrong young Laurie. They flirt, and he asks her to the box social, a town picnic. She doesn’t give him her answer, and when she sees him later being attentive to another girl, agrees to go with the hired hand from her Aunt’s farm, the lonely and menacing Judd. Laurie’s best friend Ado Annie meanwhile, has her hands full with her boyfriend Will Parker, who disapproves of Annie’s seeming willingness to bestow her affections on any man who asks for them. At the social Judd tries to force himself on Laurie, who fires him. She is rescued by Curly. Three weeks later the couple have married, and as the town celebrates, Judd returns with vengeance on his mind. In a fight with Curly, he falls on his knife and is killed. Curly is tried on the spot and found innocent, and he Laurie begin their new life in their brand new state: Oklahoma!

Memorable Melodies: “Oh, What A Beautiful Mornin’,” “The Surrey With The Fringe On Top,” “I Cain’t Say No,” “Kansas City?,” and “Oklahoma.”

Vital Statistics: Music by Richard Rodgers, book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, based on Green Grow The Lilacs by Lynn Riggs. Directed by Rouben Mamoulian, choreographed by Agnes De Mille. Originally produced by The Theater Guild. Opened on March 31, 1943 at the St. James Theater and ran 2,248 performances.

Why See It?: There are those who still roll their eyes at the wholesomeness and earnestness of this show, and looking at the plot it’s easy to see why. All it really is is a story about which fella Laurie’s going to go to the box social with. Still, it is not an exaggeration to say that without this show, musical theater as we know it would not exist — no Sondheim, Lerner and Loewe, Lloyd Webber, or any others. Although the integration of song and story had been done in Showboat previously, this is the show which still stands as the first real integrated musical, which uses dance as an equal element to move the story forward or show us the character’s state of mind. One not so fortunate consequence is that de Mille’s work was so influential, that for years practically every musical had to have their very own “dream ballet.”