The musical Kiss Me, Kate, the collaboration between composer and lyricist Cole Porter and writers Samuel and Bella Spewack, seems destined for greatness nowadays, but the circumstances at the time were less than ideal. Porter’s previous two musicals were commercial and critical failures, and the Spewacks were allegedly on the brink of divorce. However, when Broadway producer Arnold Saint-Subber approached the writer duo with his idea of turning William Shakespeare’s classic play The Taming of the Shrew into a musical, they took the offer and completed the book at an astounding speed. For music and lyrics, Bella insisted they enlist Cole Porter, against all odds. So Kiss Me, Kate was born – Porter’s widely recognised masterpiece that now returns to the Vienna Volksoper.
Saint-Subber supposedly got the idea for Kiss Me, Kate while working as a stagehand on the theatre production of The Taming of the Shrew in 1935. Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, the actors in the lead roles and real-life husband and wife, went at each other with such fierceness both on- and off-stage that they left a mark in the future Broadway producer’s mind. The Spewacks reimagined this conflict in musical form. On stage, the action follows Fred Graham, director, producer and leading man as he clashes with his on-stage partner and ex-wife Lilli Vanessi.
