1920s inspire musical comedy

NEW YORK -- Sandy Wilson describes his fascination, some might say obsession, quite simply.\n"The 1920s impinged on me as a child and have remained with me ever since," the composer states with crisp understatement.\nIt was responsible for, among other things, "The Boy Friend," an endearing trifle of a show that became the most frequently performed and revived British musical during the 1950s. Before "Cats," "Les Miserables" and even "Oliver!", Wilson's sweet tale of girl meets boy -- for which he wrote book, music and lyrics -- was a success in London, New York and around the world.\nNow the show is back in a major revival -- first at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Conn., through Sept. 25, and then on a six-month North American tour. And the director is the woman who originated the role of Wilson's heroine, Polly, in the 1954 Broadway production, Julie Andrews.\nIf the star is now better known than the man who made her New York debut possible, the composer holds a special place in the history of musical theater.\n"Wilson is at the very top of the list of British musical theater writers of the postwar period," says historian and critic Ken Mandelbaum, author of "Not Since Carrie."\n"'The Boy Friend' is a perfectly realized spoof, written with wit, affection and great style."\nThe 81-year-old Wilson, sporting large owl-like eyeglasses, is casually dapper, dressed in a striped, russet-colored shirt and tan slacks. He sits in the lounge of a midtown Manhattan hotel and calmly sips an extra foamy cappuccino. It occasionally frosts his white mustache as he talks fondly about the era that jump-started his show-biz career.\nThose memories began with his sister's gramophone records. Wilson, born in the north of England, had three older sisters. The eldest, 14 years older than her brother, was a fan of such 1920s shows as "Lady Be Good," "Oh, Kay!" and especially "No, No, Nanette," which was a big success at the time.\n"I instinctively knew all the songs from it ('Nanette'), such as 'Tea for Two' and 'I Want to Be Happy,'" Wilson recalls. "That's why the theme song of 'The Boy Friend' is 'I Could Be Happy With You.' I knew `happy' had to come in somewhere."\nWilson remembers sitting on the floor and watching his sisters and their friends dance the Charleston. "For some reason, I just loved it. There was a sense of optimism and joy in the 1920s."\nEven as a child, he could compose tunes in his head, but could not write them down. Because he wanted to write music, he learned to play the piano.\n"I bought all the new music by people like Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, the Gershwins, Rodgers and Hart, played them and learned from them. That's the only musical education I really had. I never learned to compose. I learned from what I consider the great masters."\nEchoes of their work can be found in "The Boy Friend," which is set on the French Riviera in 1926. \n"Perfect young ladies" from the Villa Caprice, Mme. Dubonnet's finishing school, as well as several pairs of older folks are on the lookout for love, and, of course, they find it.\n"The Boy Friend" was born in the early 1950s at the suggestion of Wilson's good friend, actress Diana Maddox. Wilson, who had been writing material for revues, was asked to compose a short piece for the Players Theatre, which specialized in presenting Victorian musicals. It was a smash. A full-length version, equally successful, soon followed and then a move to London's West End.\n"I was under no sort of pressure," he says. The production was only going to last three weeks and Wilson was only earning a few dollars. "I felt, 'This is all that I ever wanted to do. Let's just have fun and enjoy it.' I had no idea what was going to happen. Not at all."\nWhat happened was a run of more than five years, a successful Broadway engagement and even a movie sale to MGM for a film that was not made until 1971.\nThe Broadway production was not a happy experience for Wilson, barred from rehearsals after a disagreement with the American producers over the show's direction. And Wilson describes the movie, directed by Ken Russell and starring Twiggy, by saying, "It wasn't painful. It was just astonishing."\nExpecting to be shocked, he sneaked into a midnight preview before the opening. "I have seen many Ken Russell films, and they are always outrageous and scandalous -- the devil in the nude or something like that. Twiggy was the only sort of human being in it."\nWilson's other musicals are virtually unknown in the United States, although some have had runs in England, including "Divorce Me Darling," a 1930s sequel to "The Boy Friend." His favorite is "Valmouth," adapted from a novel by Ronald Firbank about the eccentric female residents of an English spa town. It had a short run off-Broadway in 1960, apparently too rarified for American tastes.\n"Once you've had a success you are under pressure. What are you going to do next? What's it going to be like? And the only effect it's had, which is very difficult for me, is that everything I write is compared to 'The Boy Friend.'"\nAnd yet it is "The Boy Friend" that persists onstage.\nSo far in 2005, about 150 productions of the show have been licensed by Music Theatre International, a licensing company for stage musicals. The show has averaged about 100 productions a year in the United States for the last five years, mostly amateur productions, says Richard Salfas, MTI's director of international licensing. That's similar to other, much better-known shows from the 1950s such as "The Pajama Game" and "Damn Yankees." Not bad for a musical that has been available for nearly five decades.\n"I've never written anything else like 'The Boy Friend.' And I have no intention of doing so," Wilson says.\n"When people ask, 'Do you resent "The Boy Friend?" or are you fed up with it?' I say, `No, not at all. I love it.' But what I do resent is that critics can't see beyond that. But you have to live with it.\n"Vida Hope, who directed the original, was convinced it was going to be a tremendous success. ... I didn't believe her. I still don't. But that was 50 years ago, and it's still going strong"