A Good Thing Going

92Y has a good thing going with the educational and entertaining Lyrics & Lyricists series. If you are a musical theater fan with no plans tonight, I suggest you get a ticket for the final performance of A Good Thing Going: The Stephen Sondheim and Harold Prince Collaboration. But if you're reading this too late, at least keep the series on your radar for the future.

The program has a section devoted to each of the six shows that Stephen Sondheim and Harold Prince collaborated on as composer/lyricist and director/producer, starting with Company in 1970 and ending with Merrily We Roll Along in 1981 (with Follies, A Little Night Music, Pacific Overtures, and Sweeney Todd in between). As host/musical director/artistic director David Loud explains, it's really incredible that the team produced those enduring works in just 11 years. Hearing songs from all of them in one evening, performed by Kate Baldwin, Heidi Blickenstaff, Liz Callaway, James Clow, Jason Danieley, and Jeremy Jordan, really drives home that fact.

Each musical number, from Baldwin's "Could I Leave You" to Danieley's "Johanna" to Jordan's "The God-Why-Don't-You-Love-Me-Blues"(he'll probably make a surprisingly good Buddy in Follies some day), would make the trek to the upper east side worth it. But what really make the program memorable are Loud's stories. He played Ted in the original production of Merrily We Roll Along (Callaway made her Broadway debut in it as well) and tells about his audition and the crazy preview period, adding a personal touch.