Happiness is You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown

The Sharon Playhouse concludes its Summer 2024 Season with the joyous You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown.

It’s hard to believe that Clark Gesner created this classic musical more than 50 years ago, in 1967. Gesner wrote the music and lyrics that bring Charles M. Schultz’s iconic comic strip Peanuts characters to vibrant life, while the “book” of the musical is credited to John Gordon, but, according to the Guide to Musical Theatre, that is actually a pseudonym for collective efforts of Gesner, the cast members, and the production staff, all of whom collaborated on the script. The original cast included Bob Balaban, Gary Burghoff (who would go on to Radar O’Reilly fame in the long running series M*A*S*H), Bill Hinnant, Skip Hinnant, Karen Johnson, and Reva Rose in a star-making turn as Lucy. One of the many charms of this adorable show is that the Peanuts children were portrayed by adult actors, giving the show added wit and poignance. 

The score boasted such tuneful songs as “Beethoven Day,” “Book Report,” the heartwarming closing number “Happiness Is,” as well as the title song.

The Off-Broadway production – which won Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards as well as a Grammy nomination for Best Show Album – was well received with The Village Voice praising the “strikingly talented” cast. Walter Kerr in The New York Times called the show “a miracle,” saying, “Almost everything works, because almost everything is effortless.”

While the musical had a brief Broadway run in 1971, it resurfaced on Broadway in 1999 with a revised book and new songs and arrangements by talented Broadway composer/lyricist Andrew Lippa (The Wild Party, The Addams Family). In this version, the character of Patty was replaced by Charlie Brown’s younger sister Sally Brown.

The 1999 version, which is the version being produced by the Sharon Playhouse, is notable for its diverse and multi-ethnic casting, and for the knock-out new songs added by Lippa. More significantly, the role of Sally Brown launched the career of Kristen Chenoweth (later of Wicked fame,  On the Twentieth Century, The Apple Tree, Promises, Promises and the upcoming new musical Queen of Versailles). For this now-classic turn, Chenoweth received a Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical. Moreover, Roger Bart, so memorable in The Producers and currently giving an hilarious Tony-nominated performance on Broadway in Back to the Future, vividly portrayed the character of Charlie Brown’s outrageous beagle, Snoopy, also winning a Tony Award in the process.

This musical is perfect for the entire family! Join us for what is certain to be a wonderful production of You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown, playing in the Bobbie Olsen Theater for one week only (only two weekends!) September 20-29. We promise that you are sure to know what happiness is.