Funny Girl

After countless alterations, a revolving door of writers and directors (which included Jerome Robbins, Bob Fosse, Sidney Lumet, and Garson Kanin), crazed tryouts, and an opening night that was delayed five times, Funny Girl turned out to be an unadulterated smash--and it still sounds great this much further on. Composer Jule Styne, at the peak of his brassy powers, custom-fitted the show to its star, Barbra Streisand, and she ran away with it. Streisand's delivery of "People" still sends a chill down the spine, and she completely radiates with the life-force of someone who's a star and knows it. Funny Girl is a delirious, larger-than-life Broadway epic that projects showstopping energy but never loses track of its characters' humanity. They just don't make 'em like that anymore. --Elisabeth Vincentelli