Andrew Lloyd Webber and Stephen Sondheim Sing Each Other Happy Birthday

In a video now available on the Broadway website, Lloyd Webber sings Happy Birthday to the tune of Sondheim's "A Little Light Music" before extending his greetings. The English impresario then recognized his "friend" as the "greatest legend that's happened in my lifetime in the theater."

Meanwhile, the American-born composer sings a more traditional Happy Birthday while washing his hands. Stephen Sondheim has just turned 90 while Lloyd Webber has turned 72.

The pair was among the numerous guests to appear in the return of Emmy-winning "Rosie O'Donnell Show". The special one-night-only event was also streamed live on Broadway as a fundraiser for The Actors Fund due to the global coronavirus pandemic.

Both Webber and Sondheim have been credited with the survival and growth of musical theater. Born in 1930 in New York, Stephen Sondheim is best known for his works in "A Little Night Music" in 1973, "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" in 1979, and "Into The Woods" in 1987. He also wrote the lyrics for West Side Story. His works, described as having "reinvented the American musical", earned him 8 Tony Awards and 8 Grammy Awards, among others. In recognition of his outstanding contributions, a Broadway theater has been renamed in his honor last 2010.

Meanwhile, Andrew Lloyd Webber was born 18 years after Sondheim in Kensington, London, to a musical family. Best known for his songs in "The Phantom of the Opera" and "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat," Webber has six Tonys and three Grammys. He is also among the chosen few to part of EGOT laureates - people who have won an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony. Webber is one of the fifteen people to have this extraordinary achievement. Other artists would include John Legend, Whoopi Goldberg, and Audrey Hepburn

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Aside from sharing the same birthday, Sondheim and Webber also have a similar yet unrelated experience. Back in 1997, both were working on their respective musicals in Washington DC planned for a June opening. Both were also promptly canceled.

Lloyd Webber, recently granted the title Lord in February, was rewriting "Whistle Down the Wind" when it closed in the same month. Its scheduled June 1997 Broadway opening was canceled, being moved instead to a July 1998 opening at London's Aldwych Theatre.

The New York-based Sondheim was then working on his upcoming musical, "Wise Guy," which was written by John Weidman. Initially planned for a June 1996 release at the Kennedy Center, it was repeatedly postponed until its first production in October 1999. By then, it had already taken on a new title, "Road Show."

In honor of Sondheim's 90th birthday, the New York Times released a special nine-page theater supplement together with their March 15 issue. The published edition includes comments and tributes from "Critics, Performers, and Fans on the Bard of Broadway."

On the other hand, Sondheim's London-based contemporary announced last January that he is currently working on a "Cinderella" musical set for a September 2020 release.