History
Man of La Mancha started as a non-musical teleplay written by Dale Wasserman for CBS's DuPont Show of the Month program. This original telecast starred Lee J. Cobb, Colleen Dewhurst (who replaced Viveca Lindfors), and Eli Wallach, and was not performed on a thrust stage, but on a television sound stage. The DuPont Corporation disliked the title Man of La Mancha, thinking that its viewing audience would not know what La Mancha actually meant, so a new title, I, Don Quixote, was chosen. The play was broadcast live on November 9, 1959, with an estimated audience of 20 million.
Years after this television broadcast, and after the original teleplay had been unsuccessfully optioned as a non-musical Broadway play, director Albert Marre called Wasserman and suggested that he turn his play into a musical. Mitch Leigh was selected as composer. He in turn selected Carlyle W. Hall to provide his orchestrations. Contrary to what has been stated on most playbills and on the cover of the various stage cast albums, Leigh did not write the orchestrations under the name of his company Music Makers; rather, it was actually Hall, who was his employee, and whose family retains the original orchestra ideas totally redone by Hall. Mr. Hall was a trumpet player for Tommy Tucker's dance band (1930–1945) a composition student of Tibor Serly and Béla Bartók, and Musical Director for Arthur Godfrey's "Talent Scouts" radio show. During the show's most recent Broadway revival in 2002, Leigh corrected history by reprinting all of the show's playbills and placing the name of Carlyle W. Hall Sr. in place of Music Makers, albeit posthumously for Hall. Mr. Leigh reprinted the playbills after discussions with the Hall family. Several sources, however still credit Music Makers, Inc. with the orchestrations. All prior playbill printings, including the initial 2002 first printing, did not reflect the stated corrected re-printing after late Feb. 2003 by Leigh, and reflect history prior to its correction. "Theatre World by John Willis with Ben Hodges Vol. 59 2002-2003", page 37, paragraph one, states unequivocally "Original Orchestrations Carlyle W. Hall Sr". This information is collated directly from the playbill of the revival of June 1, 2002–May 31, 2003. This clearly redacts any prior claims that Mr. Hall was not the sole original orchestrator for this musical on Broadway from its opening in 1965 to the latest revival (original is unambiguous and applies to all songs orchestrated for the original show).
The score was unusual in its time, because the orchestra had no string instruments other than a double bass, but rather uses brass, woodwinds, percussion, double bass, and flamenco guitars.
The original lyricist of the musical was poet W. H. Auden, but his lyrics were discarded, some of them considered too overtly satiric and biting, attacking the bourgeois audience at times. Auden's lyrics were replaced by those of Joe Darion.
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