Everybody in the theater who’d heard about John Logan‘s script for the new HBO series “The Miraculous Year” knew that the main character, a brilliant but self-destructive Broadway composer-lyricist named Terry Segal, was based on Stephen Sondheim.
Everybody, that is, but the great man himself.
When Sondheim read about the show in my column the other week — I got hold of the script for the pilot episode — friends say he was “blind-sided” and “furious.”
He believes Logan, who wrote the screenplay for the Johnny Depp film “Sweeney Todd,” betrayed him by turning his life into a miniseries.
The man who wrote “Send in the Clowns” sent in the lawyers. He demanded script changes, and since neither Logan nor HBO wanted to tangle with a Broadway legend, they agreed.
Sondheim’s called off the dogs, but he’s not in a forgiving mood.
“His friendship with John is over,” says a source.
I wanted more details on this juicy little story, so I e-mailed Logan for a comment. He ducked and covered and fobbed me off on HBO’s p.r. department.
“Terry Segal is an original fictional character not based on anyone,” the flack said. “That is our statement.”
Oh, really?
Well, let me point out a few similarities between Terry Segal and Stephen Sondheim.
Terry Segal lives in an elegant townhouse; Sondheim has a gorgeous brownstone in Turtle Bay.
Terry’s gay, as is Sondheim.
Terry writes sophisticated shows that please the critics but fail at the box office.
“Follies” anyone? “Sweeney Todd”? “Sunday in the Park With George”? “Passion”??
Terry drinks a lot; Sondheim once told the Times, “I have a large capacity for alcohol.” A few years ago, I saw him polish off a bottle of Chardonnay — Kistler, if I remember correctly — during the intermission of “Follies” at City Center. His young boyfriend gently guided him across the street for the second act.
Terry also does cocaine, as did Sondheim in the ’70s, which he told his biographer, Meryle Secrest.
And at the end of the pilot, Terry, who’s 44, has a heart attack. So did Sondheim, in 1979, when he was 49.
Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe Terry Segal’s based on Sigmund Romberg. But I don’t think so.
When “The Miraculous Year” airs early next year, a lot of the above will be cut or altered, per Sondheim’s demands. For instance, the heart attack triggered by Terry’s cocaine use has been changed to an aneurysm (shades of “Rent” composer Jonathan Larson, who’s dead, so he can’t sue).
Sondheim isn’t the only person who can give “The Miraculous Year” some trouble.
The producers and creators of “Wicked” might have a few objections if they see the script.
The first scene opens with Terry doing lines of cocaine off a “Wicked” Playbill.
Here’s how Terry describes “Wicked”:
“Corrupt junk. Give them the profound American mythology of ‘The Wizard of Oz’ and they reduced it to a f – – – ing PETA billboard: Be nice to winged monkeys.
“All set to an anodyne pop score . . . It’s so pedestrian it actually hurts me.”
Logan’s free to make fun of “Wicked,” of course. But if I were Stephen Schwartz, I certainly wouldn’t let HBO use the copyrighted “Wicked” logo to beat up on my show.
Maybe Terry should do a line off the Playbill from “The Girl in Pink Tights,” a 1954 flop — music by Sigmund Romberg.
michael.riedel@ny
post.com