DVD & Blu-ray: ORIGINAL CAST ALBUM - "COMPANY" (1970) - Criterion Collection

original-cast-album-company-new-on-dvd-and-bluray-criterion-collection

Product Description: D. A. Pennebaker offers a rare glimpse behind the Broadway curtain, capturing the magic and demands of performance This holy grail for both documentary and theater aficionados offers a tantalizingly rare glimpse behind the Broadway curtain.

In 1970, right after the triumphant premiere of Stephen Sondheim’s groundbreaking concept musical Company, the renowned composer and lyricist, his director Harold Prince, the show’s stars, and a large pit orchestra all went into a Manhattan recording studio as part of a time-honored Broadway tradition: the recording of the original cast album.

What ensued was a marathon session in which, with the pressures of posterity and the coolly exacting Sondheim’s perfectionism hanging over them, all involved pushed themselves to the limit—including theater legend Elaine Stritch, who fought anxiety and exhaustion to record her iconic rendition of “The Ladies Who Lunch.”

With thrilling immediacy, legendary filmmaker D. A. Pennebaker offers an up-close view of the larger-than-life personalities, frayed-nerve energy, and explosive creative intensity that go into capturing the magic of live performance.

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MOVIE DETAILS

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Director: D.A. Pennebaker

Starring: Stephen Sondheim, Elaine Stritch, Harold Prince, Dean Jones, Donna McKechnie, Beth Howland

Genre: Documentary

Runtime: 53 min

Rating: Not Rated

Language: English

Studio: Criterion

Home Video Release Date: August 17, 2021

AVAILABLE FORMATS (click links to order from Amazon):

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DVD - Criterion Collection

Blu-ray - Criterion Collection

VIDEO

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DVD

Codec: MPEG-2
Resolution: 480i
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Encoding Format: 16:9
Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only)

Blu-ray

Codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Resolution: 1080p
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Region: Region A/1

AUDIO

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Dubbed:

DVD: None
Blu-ray: None

Audio Formats:

DVD: Dolby Digital Mono
Blu-ray: LPCM Mono

SUBTITLES

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DVD: English SDH

Blu-ray: English SDH

SPECIAL FEATURES & EXTRAS

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New audio commentary by composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim
Audio commentary from 2001 featuring director D. A. Pennebaker, actor Elaine Stritch, and Broadway producer Harold Prince
New conversation among Sondheim, orchestrator Jonathan Tunick, and critic Frank Rich
New interview with Tunick on the art of orchestrating, conducted by author Ted Chapin
Never-before-heard audio excerpts from interviews with Stritch and Prince, conducted by D. A. Pennebaker and Hegedus in 2000
"Original Cast Album: 'Co-Op,'" a 2019 episode of the TV series Documentary Now! that parodies the film
Reunion of the cast and crew of "Original Cast Album: 'Co-Op'" recorded in 2020, featuring director Alexander Buono; writer-actor John Mulaney; actors Rénee Elise Goldsberry, Richard Kind, Alex Brightman, and Paula Pell; and composer Eli Bolin
PLUS: An essay by author Mark Harris