Forced out of Germany by the Nazis, Weill is beset by setbacks--contracts canceled, projects falling through, uncomprehending critics and audiences--as he struggles to survive. He journeys to the U.S. in 1935 and soon decides to make it his home. Broadway rewards him several years later when Lady in the Dark becomes a smash hit.
Read Text-Only Chronology1933
23 March
13 April
New York, Empire Theater: translated by Jerrold Krimsky and Gifford Cochran; directed by Francesco von Mendelssohn; conducted by Macklin Marrow. The show runs only twelve performances and is a critical failure.
7 June
Paris, Les Ballets 1933; text by Bertolt Brecht; scenario by Edward James and Boris Kochno; choreographed by George Balanchine; conducted by Maurice Abravanel. Part of a program of six ballets, the last collaboration of Weill, Brecht, Lenya, and Caspar Neher is received coolly by the critics and public. After a three-week run in Paris, Les Ballets 1933 moves to London for a similar span of time.
Left to right: Anna II (Tilly Losch) and Anna I (Lotte Lenya) are two sides of the same personality
Program from the original production
From the "Anger" scene in the original production
From the "Envy" scene in the original production
18 September
31 October
November
His new house is part of the former estate of Madame du Barry, a mistress of King Louis XV.
3 November
Radio Paris: text by Robert Desnos; directed by Antonin Artaud. Most of the score is lost.
26 November
Weill is angered by the reaction of the French press, which he believes sides unjustly with Schmitt.
1934
February
Early March
The project falls through despite Weill’s interest.
Summer 1934
Gauty records the songs and performs them frequently. Yet they are mostly forgotten until Teresa Stratas receives the sheet music from Lenya in 1980 and makes a recording that propels both songs back into the repertory.
August
29 September
With Otto Pasetti out of the picture after two years, Weill and Lenya reconcile.
11 October
Amsterdam, Concertgebouw Orchestra: conducted by Bruno Walter. Weill has composed the symphony, also known as Symphony no. 2, in response to a commission from la princesse de Polignac. Critical reception is poor, but Walter goes on to conduct the work in New York and Vienna.
The first page of Weill's manuscript score of Symphony no. "1" bears a dedication to the princesse de Polignac. This work is now known as Fantaisie symphonique, or Symphony no. 2.
Program from the New York premiere
Photo from the Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf shows Bruno Walter, Sergei Prokofiev, and Weill
22 December
Théâtre de Paris: book and lyrics by Jacques Deval; directed by H. Henriot; conducted by Edmond Mahieux. Weill has high hopes for a collaboration with one of France’s most popular authors, but the show has a short, unsuccessful run; Weill blames the failure on Deval. Some songs are recorded by popular French singers.
1935
22 January
28 June
London, Savoy Theatre: original German text by Robert Vambery; English lyrics by Desmond Carter; book by Reginald Arkell; directed by Ernst Matray and Felix Weissberger; conducted by Muir Mathieson. The show runs only about two weeks and meets mixed critical reception. The original German version is not staged until 1994.
Photo from The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News shows the leads, Webster Booth and Jacqueline Francell (center)
Program cover featuring a drawing by Hein Heckroth
Excerpt sung by Webster Booth and Jacqueline Francell; broadcast by the BBC, 1935
August
10 September
They move into the St. Moritz Hotel.
S.S. Majestic
Broadcast 9 March 1941 on NBC Blue Network (radio); Weill recounts his feelings on arriving in New York Harbor
October
23 November
17 December
Many officials and patrons of the League, an organization formed to promote contemporary music, do not consider Weill sufficiently serious or modern.
1936
January
March
May
3 May
4 June
September
19 November
New York, 44th Street Theatre, 68 performances: Group Theater; directed by Lee Strasberg; conducted by Lehman Engel. The cast is rife with young actors who go on to distinguished careers, but problems with sets and direction hobble the production. The WPA Federal Theatre Project produces two new stagings in Boston and Los Angeles in 1937.
Cannons (voiced by the men's chorus) sing to the sleeping soldiers in "Song of the Guns"
The French Nurse (Paula Miller, behind the bed) sings "Mon Ami, My Friend"
Advertising flyer
1937
7 January
Manhattan Opera House: original text by Franz Werfel; English text by Ludwig Lewisohn; directed by Max Reinhardt; conducted by Isaac Van Grove. A costly spectacle on a grand scale, the work awes the New York press but cannot consistently meet its running expenses , forcing it to close after 153 performances. Weill never sees a penny in royalties.
The death of Moses from Part II of the original production
Broadcast 3 January 1937, shortly before the premiere
Manhattan Opera House, 1937
Act II: Moses (Samuel Goldenberg) kills the Egyptian taskmaster (Raymond Miller)
19 January
28 January
Many actors from the Group Theatre have also come to seek film work after internal dissension weakens the company.
13 May
27 August
Weill and Lenya travel to Canada and obtain new immigration documents when they return to the U.S.
October
1938
April
1 June
Paramount Pictures: directed by Fritz Lang; lyrics by Sam Coslow; starring George Raft and Sylvia Sidney. Weill’s first Hollywood film.
"The Right Guy for Me" sung by Carol Paige
Weill and Boris Morros, the head of the music department for Paramount, supervise the recording of the score of You and Me
July 1938
Weill’s parents and siblings, along with their families, are all out of Germany by the end of 1938.
19 October
New York, Barrymore Theatre, 168 performances: book and lyrics by Maxwell Anderson; directed by Joshua Logan; conducted by Maurice Abravanel. The source of “September Song,” Weill’s first American hit, performed by Walter Huston as Pieter Stuyvesant.
Walter Huston as Stuyvesant and Jeanne Madden as Tina Tienhoven
Final chorus sung by Walter Huston, 1938
Poster for the Broadway production
Weill at the piano with Walter Huston, Jeanne Madden, and Maxwell Anderson
1939
30 April
New York World’s Fair: Text by Edward Hungerford; directed by Charles Alan; conducted by Isaac Van Grove. A vast spectacle featuring real locomotives and Pullman cars, the show plays four times a day through both years of the World’s Fair. Millions of people hear Weill’s score, a mixture of original composition and arrangements of folk songs.
The "golden spike" scene from the original production, depicting the completion of the first transcontinental railway
Narration of the beginnings of railroading in the U.S.
A scene from the original production
25 May
July
Autumn
Ira Gershwin joins the team early in 1940; writing and rehearsing Lady in the Dark takes most of the year.
December
1940
4 February
CBS Radio: text by Maxwell Anderson; conducted by Mark Warnow; narrated by Burgess Meredith.
Closing moments of the original broadcast, 1940
First page of Weill's manuscript score
17 June
15 July
August
24 December
1941
23 January
New York, Alvin Theatre, 777 performances (initial run of 467 followed by a tour and return to Broadway): Book by Moss Hart; music and lyrics by Weill and Ira Gershwin; directed by Moss Hart and Hassard Short; conducted by Maurice Abravanel; starring Gertrude Lawrence. Weill’s first unequivocal Broadway success. The film rights are sold within a few months for $285,000, a record at the time for a Broadway show. Lawrence dominates press coverage in the leading role; young actors Danny Kaye and Macdonald Carey launch their careers.
By decree of the President of the United States, a Marine (Macdonald Carey) paints Liza's portrait for a new 2-cent postage stamp while the chorus sings "Girl of the Moment"
Excerpt sung by Gertrude Lawrence, 1941
Sung by Danny Kaye, 1941
Poster from the return to Broadway in 1943