Passion | |
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![]() Original Broadway windowcard | |
Music | Stephen Sondheim |
Lyrics | Stephen Sondheim |
Book | James Lapine |
Basis | Passione d'Amore by Ruggero Maccari Ettore Scola Fosca by Iginio Ugo Tarchetti |
Productions | 1994 Broadway 1996 West End |
Awards | Tony Award for Best Musical Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical Tony Award for Best Original Score |
Passion is a one-act musical, with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and a book by James Lapine. The story was adapted from Ettore Scola's 1981 film Passione d'Amore, and its source material, Iginio Ugo Tarchetti's 1869 novel Fosca. Central themes include love, sex, obsession, illness, passion, beauty, power and manipulation. Passion is notable for being one of the few projects that Stephen Sondheim himself conceived, along with Sweeney Todd and Road Show.
Set in Risorgimento-era Italy, the plot concerns a young soldier and the changes in him brought about by the obsessive love of Fosca, his Colonel's homely, ailing cousin.