Lyrics Martin Charnin Productions 1967 Playwright Jerome Coopersmith Composer Edward Thomas | Book Jerome Coopersmith First performance 1967 Lyricist Martin Charnin | |
Basis Last years of Mata Hari Similar Musical plays, Other plays | ||
Everyone has something to hide robert guillaume from mata hari
Mata Hari is a musical with a book by Jerome Coopersmith, lyrics by Martin Charnin and music by Edward Thomas. The exotic dancer Mata Hari was accused of spying for the Germans during World War I and was executed by a French firing squad, but her guilt is still being debated. The musical is centered on her affair with a French intelligence officer who plays a major role in her arrest and execution and later regrets it. A parallel sequence of events follows a young French soldier who fights in the trenches, illustrating what war is really about. The musical was perceived as an anti-war piece at a time when the US war in Vietnam was sinking in popularity.
Contents
The show's premiere production was directed by Vincente Minnelli and produced in 1967 by David Merrick at National Theatre in Washington, DC. The production lost at least $500,000, and Merrick decided not to bring the show to Broadway. In 1968, after Merrick withdrew his support of the musical, the authors brought a more modest version of it to New York's off-Broadway Theatre DeLys (now the Lucille Lortel Theater) under the title "Ballad For a Firing Squad". In 1996, York Theatre in New York revived the 1968 version under the original title Mata Hari. A cast recording of that production was released in 2001.
Songs
1Act I: Gone
2Act I: Is This Fact?
3Act I: Everyone Has Something to Hide