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CHESSTHE MAKING

O F T H EM U S I C A L

WILLIAM HARTSTON

I N T R O D U C T I O N B YTIM RICE



C H E S ST H E M A K I N G O F A M U S I C A L

W I L L I A M H A R T S T O N

I N T R O D U C T I O N B Y T I M R I C E

PAVILIONMICHAEL JOSEPH



First published in Great Britain in 1986 byPavilion Books Limited196 Shaftesbury Avenue, London WC2H 8JLin association with Michael Joseph Limited27 Wrights Lane, Kensington, London W8 5TZ

Text (C) William Hart ston 1986Introduction ((' Tim Rice 1986Lyrics ((') 3 Knigh ts Ltd - Union Song s 1984, 85, 86

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may bereproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, inany form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the priorpermission of the copyright owner.

Rice, TimChess: the making of a musical.I. Musical revue, comedy, etc. Writi ng and publishi ngI. Title II. Hart ston , William R.782.81028 MT67

ISBNT 1-85 145-006-8

Designed by Peter Bridgewater and Lawrence Edwards

Filmset by BAS Printers Limited, Over Wallop,

Hampshire

Printed and bound in U.K. byW. S. Cowell Ltd, 8 Butter Market, Ipswich



Introduction by Tim Rice

A C T O N E T H E O P E N I N G

1 The Che ssm en 102 The Rice Gamb it 133 The Swedi sh Varia tion 16 4 The English Op eni ng 19

A C T T W O • T H E M I D D L E G A M E

5 Strat egic Plans 226 Positio nal Play 267 Combi natio ns 298 Exch angi ng Pieces 329 Time-Tro uble 35

A C T T H R E E • T H E E N D G A M E

10 Sacrifices 3811 Endg ame Techniqu e 4112 The Final Atta ck 4413 Checkm ate 47

C H E S S • T H E S O N G S 5 0



The following illustrations are reproduced bykind permission of:

Chapter 1 p. 11 Top right Poppe rfo to, p. 11Top left Popperfoto, p. 11 Centre leftPopperfoto, p. 11 Centre right Chester Fox(Camera Press), p. 11 Bottom right Chester Fox(Camera Press), Chapter 2 p. 14 Bo tto m cen treSyndication International, p. 14 Bottom left

Michael le Poer Trench, p. 14 Top Zoe Dominic,p. 14 Bottom right Dewynters, p. 14 Far rightDewynters, Chapter 3 p. 17 Cen tre left Mich aelle Poer Trench, p. 17 Anders Hanser (PolarMusic), Chapter 4 p. 20 Ce ntr e left AlanDavidson (Alpha), p. 20 Anders Hanser, Chapter5 p. 23 To p right Blair Seitz (Camera Press) ,p. 23 Bottom left Chester Fox (Camera Press),p. 24 Centre left Syndication International, p. 24Top Associated Press Ltd, p. 23 Centre LeftAssociated Press Ltd, Chapter 6 p. 27 Still rookPhotography, Chapter 7 p. 30 Bo tto m left

Associated Press Ltd, p. 30 Top left JohnHaynes, p. 30 Top right John Haynes, p. 30Centre right David Crosswaite, p. 30 Bottomright David Crosswaite, p. 30 Michael le PoerTrench, Chapter 8 p. 33 To p left Joh n Hay nes ,p. 33 Centre right John Haynes, p. 33 Bottomright John Haynes, Chapter 9 p. 36 Davi dCrosswaite, Chapter 10 p. 39 To p left JohnHaynes, p. 30 Bottom left and right DavidRedfem, Chapter 11 p. 42 John Hay nes ,Chapter 12 p. 45 Botto m left Mon it or PressFeatures, Chapter 13 p. 49 Top Alan David son(Alpha), p. 49 Rex Features Ltd.

Chess : The Songs Photographs by Suzi Gibbons(C) David Redfern

The following pictures in The Songs sectionwere reproduced by kind permission of JohnHaynes:

p. 52, p. 53 (bottom), p. 54, p. 55 (top), p. 58,p. 59, p. 60 (middle, bottom), p. 61, p. 62, p. 63(bottom), p. 64, p. 65 (left), p. 66, p. 72 (top left

and right), p. 78, p. 79, p. 81, p. 82 (top), p. 83(top), p. 86, p. 87, p. 91

Endpiece Photo David Montgomery/SundayTimes Magazine Additional photographssupplied courtesy of 3 Knights Ltd

Pencil drawings in Chapters 1-13 byChris Smedley

6



My work on CHESS has been going on for the best part of ten years to date, and I am still at it. It has been the dominatingelement of my work for the past four. I used to think that the longer one is in the musical game, the easier and speedierthe writing and production of shows would become, but, alas, this is not the case. The process by which my earliestefforts such as Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat and Jesus Christ Superstar reached record and stage nowseem effortless and uncomplicated compared to the sometimes tortuous route taken by CHESS to reach similardestinations. But in the end we finally made it and Bill Hartston's entertaining account of some of the trials and tribulations

reveals as much as we can without too much blood-letting.The important thing is that in the end we succeeded in producing a major hit musical, At the time of writing it is ared-hot ticket and looking set to remain that way for a long time to come. There were moments during the run-up tothe show when I was by no means convinced that this would be the case, and I find it extraordinary how many peopleunconnected with the project, now that it is doing so well, are saying (in some cases, criticising us for it!) that it wasan inevitable hit from the word go. There is no such animal, and those who accuse writers of hits of manufacturing themto order are, as I believe a popular saying goes, out of their tree. Anyone who reads Bill's story herein will soon discoverthat no success can ever be guaranteed.

The principal pleasures of CHESS as far as I am concerned have been the people 1 have worked with. Bjorn Ulvaeusand Benny Andersson would have needed to have done no thing more than their amazing work with ABB A from 1973to 1982 to have left a most su bstantial mark on the history of popu lar music - they ha ve now adde d the great achieveme ntof the score of a hit musical to their list of credits. They show no signs whatsoever of losing their great gift for sophisticatedyet accessible music that touches many generations and nearly all nationalities. On top of this they are delightful, relaxedgentlemen to create with. I hope CHESS will not be our only collaboration. I believe that the constant realisation thatI was workin g with such distingui shed c ompos ers (and Bjorn is also no mean English lyricist in wha t is still - just - hissecond language) acted as a great spur to me to come up with the very best lyrics I could muster. From time to timeI had enormous help such as Bjorn's 'nonsence' lyrics for a chorus of One Night In Bangkok which were so strong thatI had only to make minor alterations to produce a gripping lyrical hook for what turned out to be the biggest world-widehit single I have enjoyed to date.

Having had a few near-misses attempting to work with Trevor Nunn over the past few years, it is a joy to report thatat long last we became part of the same team with CHESS. This collaboration (which I believe Trevor was as keen toachieve as I was) nearly failed to happen this time around as well, but for once the gods relented and we got the chanceto co-exist in the same pressure-cooker. I will forever be grateful to Trevor for taking control of a directorless show justthree mont hs before a sold-o ut open ing - his achievemen t in brin ging tog eth er the many and vast elements of theproduction in such a short time, shaping them in his own style into a copper-bottomed smash is perhaps an even greaterone than are his many directional strokes of genius that distinguish the final production.

Then of course there are the singers and actors who have made such a great contribution, the enthusiastic supporters

from the world of real chess (Ray Keene and Bill Hartston himself in particular), the army of workers, on stage, off stageand backstage. (Whatever the odd geriatric critic may think of big contemporary musicals, he cannot deny that they dotheir bit for the unemployment problem). This is not meant to be a thank you note, but I do thank them all. Thanksto their efforts, I am almost thinking about writing another musical some day, I hope this book does not discourage othersfrom having a go too !

TIM RICELondon, July 1986

7



S E C T I O N O N E

M A K I N GT H E M U S I C A L



C H A P T

T H EC H E S S M E N

iiIt is only natural that men gifted, withintellectual abilities will favour a mental

pastime that exercises the highest qualitiesof mind. ))

W I L H E L M S T E I N I T Z , B O R N 1 8 3 6First Official World Ch amp io n 1886-94

Certified insane 1899Died 1900

IN 1962 THE EYES OF THE WORLD we re on th e isl andof Cuba, where President Kennedy and PremierKhrushchev were eyeball to eyeball over a littleconflict about nuclear missiles. The germ of anidea for a musical about East-West confrontationwas sown in the mind of lyricist Tim Rice. Therewere just a few problems in finding a way to stagea plot in which the major characters never meet.

In 1972 the eyes of the world had shifted theirgaze towards Iceland, where Bobby Fischer andBoris Spassky were eyeball to eyeball over a littleconflict about chess pieces. It was the US versusUSSR all over again, and Tim Rice knew it wouldmake a good idea for a musical. With many otherprojects demanding his attention, however, it wasanother eight years before Tim had completed aplot outline and was ready to think about lookingfor someone to write the music.

RIGHT Khrushchev shows Grom

how to thump a table.

FAR RIGHT Kennedy addressing t

nation after the 1962 Cuban mis

So the story really begins in a hotel in Adelaidein 1980 where Tim Rice first suggested the idea

of a chess musical to Andrew Lloyd Webber. Thepair were together for the Australian launch of Evita, but Andrew was too deeply involved inCats (directed by Trevor Nunn) to resume the oldpartnership, so the search began for a new col-laborator to compose the music for the proposedshow.

Over the next year, Tim Rice broached thetopic of CHESS with several composers, but theproject remained firmly stuck to the drawingboard until the end of 1981. The next move inthe game was played by New York theatre pro-

ducer Richard Vos, who provided the introduc-tion which wa s to lead to the whol e proje ct finallytaking off.

A t first, I did n't kno w what he was tal kingabout,' Tim Rice explains, 'when he asked me ifI'd heard of Arbour. I th oug ht it must be som esort of tree. But wh en he mentio ned 'Wat erlo o'and 'Dancing Queen' it all became clear.'

Whether you pronounce them with a long orshort A, it was intriguing news that A B B A wereinterested in composing a musical. Richard Vos,then Direc tor of Creativ e Affairs for the Nede r-

lander Organisation, had heard of their desire towrite for the stage, but the idea of couplingABBA with Rice was an inspiration he later des-cribed as 'Mi ner va flying out of the hea vens '. O nher return flight, Minerva had company, becauseTim Rice for once lost no time in setting off toStockholm to meet his potential collaborators.Several plates of smorgasbord and dried herringlater, the new partnership was forged.

At this stage, CHESS was only one of manypotential subjects for a musical on which Tim Rice

BELOW Two beards and a hat he

keep the writers warm in front of

Lenin's tomb in Moscow.

ABOVE RIGHT The other East-W

confrontation - Spassky and Fis

Reykjavik in 1972.

10



RIGHT An arbiter takes deta ils of the

position as the game is adjourned after

five hours' play.



wanted to work, but it was the idea whichmost appealed to Bjorn Ulvaeus andBenny Andersson. Logically explaining the fascination of this themeTim says, 'Chess is wonderfulbecause it's politicswritten small.' For Bjornand Benny, the attr acti on ^was more straightforward:

'It was really weird.'In No ve mb er 1982, wh en ABBAcame ove r to Engla nd to pr om ot e *their Gre ate st Hits alb um, the deal <bwas signed. A new compa ny, Thre e Knig hts <\,Ltd, was formed to handle the CHESS pro-

ject . All th at rem aine d to be done wa s to wri tethe musical, but that had to wait until other com-mitments were out of the way.

By this stage Tim Rice was already workingwith Stephen Oliver on Blondel. Bjorn and Bennywere still activel y invo lved with AB B A,

although the members of that group had effec-tively decided to pursue their solo careers.

So 1983 was a hectic year of commutingbetween Stockholm and London, writing songsfor CHESS while work had to continue with Blondel, publicity tours and any ABBA business.The CHESS moves had to be fitted into analready busy timetable. The Three Knights did,however, have time for one excursion toge ther- a trip to Moscow in order to sample the atmo-sphere of the world's chess capital.

Tim, Bjorn and Benny, accompanied by their

matchmaker Richard Vos, set off for Moscow inFebruary. As a fact-finding trip, it was of onlylimited success, but a good deal of excellent caviarwas consumed and a good time was had by all.And they did find out a little more about Soviet

bureaucracy and their taste in music.The problem with the bureaucrats con-

cerned Tim Rice's bed. Timothy is a tallman (6' 4") and likes to sleep com-

fortably. And with warm feet.Astutely guessing that the

standard Russian bedwas not built with him

in mind, he requested a

double bed when making hisr<0 hot el boo kin g. Either the Russian^ tourist boa rd suspecte d his moti ves

G or the y had nev er befo re encounte redsuch a bourgeois concept as single

^ occ upa ncy of a dou ble bed. Or do the y onl y letBishops and Queens sleep on the diagonals?

The other clash with authority occurred whenBjorn and Richard decided to take a walk roundRed Square. A perfectly normal thing for a touristto do, but Bjorn preferred to avoid the touristsand enjoy the calm of a Russian winter at three

o'clock in the morning. The air was cold, the snowwas crisp und erf oot , all wa s peac efu l. . . until, sud-denly, armed guards appeared from nowhere asan unexpected threat to the whole CHESS pro-

je ct . H o w does a Sw ed ish mu si ci an ex pl ai n to anangry Russian policeman that a solitary stroll inRed Square is in no way a threat to Soviet nationalsecurity? With great presence of mind, Bjorn pul-led a ph ot o of A B B A fr om his pocket andpointed himself out, saying 'Abba'. 'Abba, Abba,'replied the policeman, very impressed. It is theone word of Swedish known to all Russians. Forthe price of an autograph and a big hug, all wasforgiven.

'Nowhere in the world are we treated as suchVIPs as in Russia,' say Bjorn and Benny. It's likea get out of jail free card.

12

The opening moves had been made.



T H ER I C E G A M B I T

((This work has been carried through byProfessor Rice with a magnificent

perseverance and courage. »

Emanuel Laskeri The Rice Gambi t, 1910

E M A N U E L L A S K E R , B O R N 1 8 6 8World Champion, 1894-1921

Still a top player at age 66Died poor but happy 1941

J }

ROCK BRAIN OF THE UNIVERSE ('I' m n o t su re I

deserve the title — there was no bo dy from anotheplanet in the final'), Tim Rice would really haveliked to be a singing star or an international crick-eter. He is, in fact, lead singer of the 'deservedlyunknown' group Whang and the Cheviots, oneof whose recent performances led to a courtinjunction after a complaint about the noiseUnable to secure a regular place in the England

cricket eleven, he started his own team, TheHeartaches, for whom he still hopes one day toscore a half-century. Talking of his bowling, hequotes J. M. Barrie: 'I bowl so slowly that if I don'tlike it I can walk down the pitch and bring it backagain before it gets to the batsman.'

But he does have a pretty good batting averagewhen it comes to writing musicals.

Between 1965 and 1975, the names of Tim Riceand Andrew Lloyd Webber were inseparable.With originality of theme and musical style, andan equally revolutionary marketing method, they

re-wrote the history of the British musical. Theirfirst effort , how eve r, a sho w called The Likes oUs, based on the life of Dr Barnardo, was neverproduced. Their sights had been set too high, onthe West End stage. So when Joseph and the Amaz-ing Technicolour Dreamcoat foll owed, it beg an lifmodestly as a twenty-minute production at ColetCourt school in Hammersmith, London. Fromthese beginnings grew the later West End andBroadway success.

Jesus Christ, Superstar was the first musicawhich opened with the Rice Gambit. In the game

of chess, a gambit is a sequence of opening movesin which a sacrifice of material is made in orderto secure some other advantage, usually a quickattack. Tim's Superstar gambit was exactly thopp osit e: a me tho d of slowing dow n the openin gin order to minimise the possibility of materialloss. The trick is to launch the album of the showa year or so before it reaches the stage. In this waythe album both creates a demand for the showby whetting the appetite, and serves to test thewater before any decision to dive in with the hugeinvestment needed when going into the theatre.

The album of Superstar sold mo re tha n six milion copies. In 1971 it was the best-selling albumin the United States. After that, the stage showwas bound to succeed. In fact, it ran for more thaneight years in London, becoming the West End'slongest-running musical.

The same strategy was adopted for Evita: fithe album, then the show. And another hit wasborn. There, however, the Rice-Lloyd Webberpartnership came to an end as both men went theirseparate ways. Whatever the respective merits of

13



words and music, it had been And re w Lloyd We b-ber whose insistence on writing musicals hadsteered Tim Rice in the direction which was tobring him such success.

Then came Blondel, with Stephen Oliver ascomposer, which ran 'only' a year in the WestEnd. Tim still has faith in the show, which he feelshe allowed to outgrow its original intention: 'Iwas really trying to get back to the Joseph type

of show. I wa nt ed to do so me thi ng fairly light,not primarily intended for the West End. Asthings turned out, it did start its life in the WestEnd, which I think in retr ospe ct mi ght h ave bee na slight mistake. We would have done better todo what Joseph di d — to start off in schools. Nowit's back in schools and provincial theatres andis prospering very well.'

Having dealt with the Bible (twice), Argentinepolitics and a mediaeval minstrel, Tim turned forhis next inspiration to the world of internationalchess. ('I don't see why a musical can't tackle virtu-

ally any subject.') An avid follower of theintrigues and politics of recent matches for theworld championship, Tim is mod est about hisown chess abilities (though actually he's a muchstronger player than he pretends). His main chess-playing experiences go back to the days whenhe shared a flat with the pianist John Lill, whohad the habit of arriving home in the early hoursof the morning after a concert performance andchallenging his flat-mate to a chess game. Timclaims to have lost all but one of the dozens ofgames they played under such circumstances. But

you do not have to be a great player to appreciate

14



Scenes from earlier Rice shows with

Tim (bot tom middle) as the Rock

Pharaoh in a 1975 production of

[oseph.CENTRE Tim Rice makes the first move

(or Kasparov against Korchnoi in

London in 1984. (Kasparov lost the

game, but holds no grudge.)

the tensions involved when an Americanchallenges a Russian for a world cham-pionship which the Soviets have heldfor twenty-five years (as in theFischer—Spassky match of1972) or when a Russianmeets a defector fromthe USSR for the title (as ®in the Karpo v-Korc hnoi

matches of 1978 and 1981).'Chess is some thin g which b ringsother wise ordinar y peopl e tog eth er *in East-West confrontation' is howTi m Rice exp lai ns his vi ew of the politi cs <Vof chess as sport. This was the idea which N

sent him commuting between London andStockholm during most of 1984. By that time, hehad had the opportunity to add considerably tohis knowledge of chess and chessmasters. A tripto see the world championship match in Meranoin 1981 provided much of the material for the

opening Tyrolean scene of the musical. Whenworld champion Anatoly Karpov visited Englandin 1982 and 1983, he managed to fit Evita and Blondel into his busy playing schedule. Tim haddinner with him after the show on each occasion.Quite apart from this welcome opportunity to getto know more about the world's strongest chessplayer, these meetings provided an unexpectedbonus in the shape of Vladimir, general factotumand minder to Karpov. During his years as worldchampion, wherever Karpov went, Vladimir fol-lowe d, mana gi ng his affairs and maki ng sure thatthe champion had to concern himself only withproblems on the chessboard. Putting together the

grey, though caviar lightened, atmospherof his Moscow trip, impression

of the huge Soviet delegation Mer ano , and the stron g, silent figu

of Vladimir, Tim Rice created thcharacters we now see in th

Russian camp in CHESThe plot had taken for

sufficiently for Bjo

^ and Benny to wor k on th, ^ music for the songs. The^ principal concern of 1984 was to bthe production of a great record. Th

musical would come later. Working withBjorn and Benny, the Rice Gambit made grea

sense. 'They have this exquisite skill in threcording studio. They are masters of threcorded sound.' Despite the impressive credentials of all individual members of the CHESS triothey remained an unknown combination. Thougha stage musical remained the final objective,

mood of caution still prevailed. No further decisions would be taken until there had been timto judge the success or otherwise of the album.

In case you are wondering, yes, there is a cheopening known as the Rice Gambit. Invented byProfessor Isaac Leopold Rice (no relation), iwould never have been played in serious competition but for the professor's generous sponsorshipA rich industrialist, he paid the leading playerof his day to meet in 'Rice Gambit' tournamentarranged solely to test the validity of his ideaThe grandmasters took his money and humoured

the good professor, but after Rice died the gambiwas never seen again.

The Three Knights were out and ready to play.



T H E S W E D I S HV a r i a t i o n

BJORN ULVAEUS is the o ne wi th th e ro un de r fa ce,usually with the trace of a grin, and the cheerfullook of a brand n ew te ddy bear. Benny Ande rss onhas the more serious expression and morecultivated beard — he to o remin ds on e of a well-loved bear, but one of the older and wiser variety.Between them, Benny and Bjorn form half of oneof the most successful groups in the history ofpopular music. In the ten years of the 1970s,

ABBA sold more records than any other groupor single artist. The tot al sales of AB B A son gswritten by Benny and Bjorn exceeded 250 million.

Having performed together since 1971, theABBA quartet (Agnetha Faltskog, Anni-FridLyngstad and the two Bs) were little known out-side Sweden until their Eurovision song contestsuccess in 1974. Their winning song, 'Waterloo',shot to number one in almost every Europeancountry. The victory gave them instant fame andwidespread popularity, but also, particularly inEngland, seeme'd to carry the stigma of winning

a competition too Strongly associated in manyminds with banality of music and lyrics. It tookano the r two year s for AB B A to re-estab lish t heircredentials as 'serious' composers and performers,but, once having overcome the handicap of win-ning the Eurovision song contest, their career wasone of unparalleled success. After 'Waterloo'came a string of number one hits in England:'Mamma Mia', 'Fernando', 'Dancing Queen','Knowing Me, Knowing You', 'The Name of theGame', 'Take a Chanc e on Me', T h e Win nerTakes It All' and 'Super Trouper'. Only the Beatlescould have claimed a comparable record of groupsuccess in the UK charts. In addition to their charttriumphs, ABBA shared with Volvo cars theprestige of being Sweden's top foreign currencyearners.

By 1981, however, although the group was stilla highly successful and effective musical combina-tion, various strains had begun to weaken theirbonds. Bjorn and Agnetha were divorced, as wereBenny and Frida. All were still on good terms,but were perhaps already beginning to thinkabout pursuing their ow n careers outsid e AB BA .

Increased business pressures had also added toABBA's problems. By 1982 the group was puton 'hold'. At that stage, they all still expected toreturn to performing and recording together, butthey felt the need for a break. Bjorn summed uptheir feelings: 'The reason we went in differentdirections was that in 1982 we decided the steamhad gone out of the group. It was not fresh anymo re . . . we all ne ede d som et hi ng new. '

For Bjorn and Benny, the idea of collaboratingon a musical was just the challenge they needed.

((Capablanca never took his eyes off thechorus. Alekhine never looked up from his

pocket set.

Christopher Ogle, after taking both champions to a show in London in 1922

J O S E R A U L C A P A B L A N C A ,B O R N 1 8 8 8

Defeated his father at age 4Beat the Cuban champion at age 13

World Champion 1921-27First Playboy of the Chess World

Died 1942

LEFT, TOP TO BOTTOM Murra

rehearsing with the writers;

Eljas with Benny at a recordi

session; ABBA in action.

RIGHT, TOP TO BOT TOM D

Quilley; ABBA; Tim, Bjorn

Benny with the album mas



From a career which had concentrated onrecorded sound and songs designed to standalone, their horizons had to be widened toencompass action on stage and a developingstory-line. All they needed was a lyricist/dramatist to provide the plot.

Just as Richard Vos provided the link in Tim

Rice's case, the go-between for Bjorn and Bennywas Shelley Schulz, of International CreativeMan age men t, who handled A BB A' s affairs in theUnited States. Between them, Schulz and Voswere the matchmakers who led to the Rice-AB B A com binati on.

When the collaboration began, the idea of analbum to be released before the show had animmediate appeal to Bjorn and Benny. 'For Bjornand myself, ' Benny explained, 'we wanted to havea grip on the whole project. We are very familiar

with the recording studio, so we wanted to hearit all first before it ended up on stage.' Bjorn wasequally attached to their proven medium: 'Therec ord ing stu dio itself is an instrum ent yo u pla yon.'

Of the music they wrote for the album and laterthe show, the composers insist that it is a naturaldevelopment of the work they had been doingfor ABBA. Tim Rice also confesses to a feeling

of some guilt on hearing the music which waswritten for CHESS: 'All through 1983 Bjorn andBenny wrote the principal themes, sending metapes containing tunes which could easily havebecome number one hits for Abba, making meacut ely awar e that I was helpi ng to exti ngui sh on eof the world's most popular groups. '

The music which Bjorn and Benny providedwas the result of long sessions with Tim in whichthe plot was worked out in more detail and it wasdecided where the principal songs should occurin the story and what emotions and plot develop-

ment they were intended to convey. Bjorn andBenny would then write music to follow the con-tours of mood and character which had beenagreed. As is normal in such collaborations, thecomposers would also provide dummy lyrics toemphasise the rhythmic patterns. But in this case,Tim Rice found Bjorn's dummy lyrics sometimesembarrassingly good. Perhaps the most famousline of the whole album, 'One night in Bangkokmakes a hard man humble', came straight fromthe pen of the Swedish composer, unchanged bythe English lyricist. And when Murray Head came

later to record 'Pity the Child', he admitted thatit was the imagery of Bjorn's original lyrics whichconveyed to him the poignant emotions of thesong. Bjorn's 'Pity the Child' was the tale of aboy's attachment to a Dresden china doll. MurrayHea d's mo vi ng first-night per for man ce of TimRice's 'Pity the Child' on the stage of the PrinceEdward Theatre still owed much to that china doll

Quite apart from the ABBA expertise in therecording studio, another bonus of producing analbum first was the greater choice of possibleartists. Singers of the highest calibre could be

interested in performing even the smaller partswhich they might never have considered doingon stage. Indeed, both Barbara Dickson and DenisQuilley agreed to appear on the album, thoughneither had any intention to take their respectiverole on to the stag e. 'At no time did I ever wanto be in the stage version,' Barbara Dickson laterexplained. 'I'd have had only a tiny role in moretha n thre e hou rs of actio n and I didn 't want tobe stuck in a the atr e for six mo nt hs . . . I like tbe doing lots of different things.'

17



From the end of 1983, when recordingsbegan, the centre of the CHESS worldwas the studios of Polar Records inStockholm. The facilities wereexcellent, as might be expected of the studiowhich had produced somuch of the ABBAsound, and the recordings

and mixing were master-minded, as for AB BA , byMichae l B. Tre to w. *

Onl y the Londo n Sym ph on y ^Orch estr a and t he Ambr osi an Sin gers *Vrecor ded their cont rib uti ons in Lond on. All \other parts, from vocals to rhythm section, fromrock choir to solo instrumentalists, were addedin Sweden. During this busy period Tim Ricemoved into a flat in Stockholm. It made moresense than commuting.

Another advantage of the Anglo-Swedish co-

operation was the additional choice of recordingartists. Elaine Paige, Barbara Dickson, MurrayHead and Denis Quilley from Britain were joinedby Bjorn Skifs and Tom my K orbe rg, bot h top pe r-formers in Sweden.

When putting together the different contribu-tions to such an album, it is no great problem tohave an orchestra recorded in London before thesingers add their voices in Stockholm, but it seemseven stranger that Elaine Paige and Barbara Dick-son sang their duet separately. When 'I KnowHim So Well' came to be recorded, the busy

schedules of both ladies did not leave them free

at the same time. Elaine Paige's track wasrecorded first and Barbara Dickson's added

later. Perhaps it was appropriate that thedistance between the singers in

recording should reflect thedistance between their

views of the man theyboth love in the lyrics.

Q> Sho rtl y aft er the alb um

was released at the end of 1984,Bjorn moved to England and now

^ lives outs ide Henle y, shari ng sixtee nO acres wit h his family, geese , chickens and

^ sheep. Englan d, he says, 'has alwa ys beenmy cultural home', adding, 'I like the idea of

going to the Henley regatta in a straw hat.'

Even as late as the beginning of 1985, had youasked anyone connected with ABBA whetherthey would perform together again, the replywould have been a firm 'of course'. By the startof 1986, ho wev er, wit h all hav ing success a way

from the group, with the two men split betweenStockholm and London, and CHESS looking likemaking increasing demands on their time, theanswer had dwindled to a hesitant 'perhaps'.

In Mar ch 1986, whe n C H E S S rehearsals wereat their most hectic, and technical problems attheir height, Bjorn Ulvaeus shook his head andsaid, 'No one in his right mind would undertakea thing like this.' Then he quickly added, 'Mindyou, when it does all come together, a musicallike this has to be the ultimate in entertainment.'

18

'Moves, to be intelligent, must carry the mark ofintelligence, which is Connection and Plan.' (Lasker's ChessPrimer, 1934)



L H A P I F R 4

T H E E N G L I S HO p e n i n g

{^Chess is a fight of the moment, and of the future - as soon as a move has occurred,the players are no longer concerned with

ivhat has gone before. J )

A L E X A N D E R A L E K H I N E , B O R N 1 8 9 2Lover of chess, women and alcohol

World Cham pi on 1927-35 and 1937-46Died undefeated 1946

THE RECORDING SESSIONS in St oc k ho lm h ad pr o-

duc ed e no ug h musi c to fill a triple album. Realis-ing, however, that it is possible to have too muchof a good thing, the directors of Three KnightsLimited, in conjunction with RCA and PolarRecords, all agreed that the music would belaunched on a double album. It was the Swedishconnection which enabled the launch to be accom-plished with an unp rec ede nte d concert tour - five

countries in six days, beginning in England andending in Sweden. With the whole of the LondonSymphony Orchestra, a rock ensemble, theAmbrosian Singers and all the soloists speedingthrough Europe, nothing quite like it had everbeen seen before.

'Without Saab we couldn't have done it,'explained Tim Rice. 'We wanted to hear therecord performed live before an audience, but thecost would have been too much. You can't reallymake money out of touring unless you're a one-man band or you're playing Vegas. '

In fact when Saab-Scania had been approachedby Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson, theywere already formulating plans for the launch oftheir new car, the 9000 Turbo 16. The C HE S Sconcert tour fitted in well with their plans andthey were impressed with the ABBA connection,Christer Skogsberg, managing director of Saab(UK) easily explained his company's enthusiasm:'When those two come up with something, it 'susually sensational.'

The cost of the tour was huge. Even if everyconcert was sold out (as indeed they were) the

loss would be around £425,000. For this invest-ment, the sponsors hoped that their associationwould help to reinforce Saab's up-market image.With Saab cars and Scania trucks used for alltransportation to and from the concerts, and withno other company advertising in the programme,their presence was strongly visible at each venue.Just as important, however, was the opportunityto impress the three or four hundred clients andcaptains of industry who were Saab's invitedguests at each concert and at the star-studdedreceptions afterwards. And it must have been dif-ficult not to be impressed, for the venues wereall top-class concert halls, chosen for comfort aswell as acoustics.

The first stop on this hectic European tour wason Saturday 27 October 1984 at the BarbicanCentre in London. On Sunday they would per-form in Paris at La Salle Playtel before movingon to the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, CCHHamburg and ending at the Berwaldhallen inStockholm.

From the start of rehearsals, it became gradu-

19



ally clearer that the whole venture was taking onthe magnitude of a major military operation. TheHenry Woo d Hall in Wan dsw ort h, normall y thevenue for restrained rehearsals of the LSO, founditself augmented by an extra generator outsideto provide the power needed for the newensemble. When Swedish conductor and Englishsymphony orchestra joined forces, there wereother areas of discrepancy in working practices.Only when the orchestra stopped suddenly in themiddle of a phrase did the conductor realise thatunion rules entitled them to a tea-break at thatmoment. But, mostly, rehearsals went smoothly. ;

The problems came with the move into the con-cert hall.

Nothing like this had ever happened before in

20



VS:ll : the , a, e>; tour

r'.ifar left) '.•'; ; [inrl'inin Centre

( l e f t ) the Aui^tenium

mcerl*>ek>iiu\ I' • • Beimiuuul

er c F/ii!> rehearse m London.

!0\1 the Fmbn^>u I.nnient in

rl

the Barbican. There was scarcely room onthe stage to fit orchestra and choir, anda proposal to remove the singersafter a choral item had to beabandoned as logisticallyimpossible. The alloca-tion of dressing-roomsbecame another matterof contention, only partly

solved by the decision thatthe female section of the Am-'brosian singers wou ld chan ge in *the lavato ry. Man oe uv ri ng all the ^part icip ants arou nd was finally sol ved only *Vby arming a team with walkie-talkies and syn-chronising movements around the building.

These and all other problems had to be solvedby tour promoter Mick Cater, to whom fell allthe most difficult tasks such as telling major starsthat they could not have their lyrics on autocue,or telling minor stars that there were no dressing-

rooms available, or, worst of all, telling Saab thattheir car would have to be left outside.

This last hea dac he beg an with a req uest fr omthe sponsors that a Saab 9000 be put on displayin the foyer of the Barbican Centre. Unfortu-nately, the door was 5 feet 6 inches wide whilethe car measured 5 feet 6\ inches. Various othermethods were examined to get the car inside, butnothing met with the approval of the Barbicanmanagement. When the cost of removing andreplacing a wi nd ow was estima ted at £30 ,00 0,Mick Cater finally decided that the sponsors

would have to be disappointed. He put through

call direct to a Saab board meeting inSweden to deliver the news with all appro-

priate apologies. There were stillthrongs of people in the foyer fight-

ing for ticke ts wh en T im Rice,Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny

Andersson came onto the^ stag e to launch the album

O of CH ES S. Unaccompan-

<c ied, th ey sang thes e peculiarly<> app rop ria te lyrics from the piece:

'Whether you are pro or anti

Or could not cure lest,

We are here to tell you

We are here to sell you chess.'

The mercha ndis ing of C H E S S had begu n andthey were still fighting for tickets when the firstinterval came.

After the triumphant debut of the concert fourat the Barbican, there were only comparatively

minor hitches at the other locations. When thetrucks carrying the musical instruments weredelayed en route to Paris by missing I fie crosschannel ferry, the concert simply had to proceedwithout the luxury of a preliminary sound check.The Amsterdam schedules were also a littlestrained when it became clear that the Saab girldrivers had been picked for their looks rather thantheir driving or map-reading abilities.

A week aft er it had all beg un, t he concert tourwas over. The album had been launched with abang and there was a change at last to relax and

await the verdict of critics and public.

When the Kings are no longer in the centre oj the hoard,

and all the pieces have at least been brought into }>la i/,

is tune for the midiilegaiiic to begin

21



S T R A T E G I CP L A N S

((Chess players are sensible people andhave the opportunity to work off their

bellicosity over the board, so that one mightexpect harmony to rule among them. Such

is not the case. })

Dr Max Euwe, 1935

M A C H G I E L I S E U W E , B O R N 1 9 0 1

Professor of MathematicsWorld Chess Champion 1935-37

President of FIDE 1970-78Died 1981, still sane

WHEN TIM RICE WROTE the plots of Joseph, JesusChrist and Evita, his task was to turn a historicalstory into a stage musical. Even with Blondel, afigure of doubtful historical authenticity, therewas an established legend on which to base theplot. C HE SS , howeve r, has been a new experi-ence for the librettist, because the characters arepure fiction. But, despite the oddness of the char-acters who appear on stage, this is fiction rootedfirmly in fact. The history of chess is a tale of somany social misfits, eccentrics and just plainloonies that the main characters in CHESS aretotally credible to anyone who has encounteredthe real-life wor ld cha mpio ns.

Even be for e official cont est s for the wor ld title,there were some strange characters who were thebest players of their age. There was HowardStaunton, an English Shakespearean scholar, whowas a master of the art of making excuses for los-ing. If he is to believed, he might never have losta single game had it not been for his frail health.

There was Paul Morphy, the American geniusand boy prodigy, who at the age of twenty-onedefeated all Europe's greatest players. Then, justas suddenly as he had appeared on the scene, hegave up chess, disillusioned with the wayeverybody else seemed to take it so much moreseriousl y th an he did. Later in life, he su ffere d frompara noid delusi ons, includin g a belief that barb erswere trying to kill him. Now he features in case-books on Freudian psychiatry in support of thetheory that an Oedipus complex is of advantageto a chess player.

When Morphy retired from chess, the unoffi-cial title of strongest active player reverted toAdolf Anderssen, the German soundly defeatedby Morphy. Anderssen was such a gentle andcheerful soul that he had been seen laughing withglee at his own helplessness when playing theAmerican. He was certainly far too pleasant a manto claim the title of world champion.

Wilhelm Steinitz, however, was not a pleasantman. He not only claimed the right to the title,but af ter he had officially wo n it, he emp hasi zedthe fact by back-dating his tenure of the chessth ron e by tw en ty years. Steinitz it was wh o firstcomplained about the colour of the squares ona chessboard provided for his use. And it wasSteinitz who always made a point of quarrellingwith the arbiters at tournaments. And it wasSteinitz who was accused of spitting at hisopponents.

Next came Dr Emanuel Lasker, kind andmodest by reputation, but very stubborn indemanding high fees before he would appear atthe board. Lasker is the only world champion to



of challenges. Now it was taken over by the Intenational Chess Federation (FIDE) who institutea formal series of qualifying contests to find a nechampion and official challengers.

During the war years, however, the Sovichess machine had been advancing. Chess habecome part of the grand communist desigMassive state support had ensured that the gamwas studied and practised as never before. I

1939, the United States had been considered thstrongest chess nation. In 1945, the young teafrom the USSR inflicted a massive 15^—4| defeaon the Americans. The balance of power hashifted and the achievement was hailed froMoscow to the Baring Straits.

Between 1948 and 1972, the World ChesChampionship became part of Moscowheri tage, a jewe l in the Kremlin's crown. Botvinnik, Smyslov, Tal, Petrosian and Spassky tooturns in upholding the honour of the USSR. Buthen came Bobby Fischer. Here was a grandmaste

of pure genius, a one-man factory of chess ideawhich could outperform the Soviet machine. Ficher ushered in a decade which transformed worlchess from a quiet game into a major media sporLet us look more closely at the recent history othe game, with Tim Rice's lyrics as commentary.

The magic ingredient which Fischer brought tchess was politics. When a Russian played a Russian nobody was interested; when an Americaplayed a Russian, it was news, particularly if thAmerican seemed to be making outrageous financial deman ds. (If it's East—West and the money's sky

high, they all come.) The showdown came in Rey ja vi k in 1972: Bori s Sp as sk y, the cu lt ur ed anurbane Russian champion, challenged by the kifrom Brooklyn who complained about everythinfrom the colour of the squares on the chessboarto the fact that somebody in Iceland had a biggecar than the one he had been given. FischeSpassky made headline news. Fischer did not turup for the scheduled start of the match. Medinterest doubled. When Fischer finally arrived (took a 'phone call from Henry Kissinger to hellure him into the open) he seemed pleased ththe world was finally taking notice of him. (Wa scene! What a joy! What a lovely sight. When mygame is the big sensation.) But by thi s tim e the Ilandic crowd were cheering for Spassky. Thewere annoyed by the American's supposed insulto the organisers with his constant demands fobetter condit ions and more money. (They want to see if the nice guy beats the bum.)

Fischer lost the first game of the match. Thehe lost the second by default when he refused tplay in front of cameras. But when Bobby cam

LEFT Howard Staunton.

BELOW AND RIGH T Karpov and

Korchnoi clash for the world title in

1978.

LOWER RIG HT J. R. Capablanca.

BOTTOM LEFT A fortnal handshake

between Spassky and Fischer.

have been accused of practising witchcraft toensure his victories, but he is not alone in beingaccused of smoking 'execrable cigars' in a deliber-ate attempt to disturb his opponents.

Lasker was champion for twenty-seven yearsbefore finally being dethroned by Capablanca, theCuban genius to whom chess seemed effortless.Like all great rivals for the world title, Lasker andCapablanca were for long periods not on speakingterms because of various petty squabbles. Theirnegotiations were marked by rude letters full ofreal and imagined insults.

But Lasker and Capablanca were bosom bud-dies compared with Capablanca and Alekhine.The great Russian champion Alexander Alekhinefound it more than he could bear even to sit atthe same board as Capablanca. He was the firstman to bring undisguised venom to the chess-board. He loved alcohol and several timesappeared drunk at the board, once reputedlyreliev ing himself on st age in full vi ew of t heaudience. He lost his title to the sane and logicalDutchman Dr Max Euwe, then sobered up andregained it two years later.

When Alekhine died in 1946, the world cham-pionship title became vacant. Until that time, ithad been decided by a rather haphaz ard syste m

23



back to slaughter Spassky in the third game, thefickle crowd changed sides. Suddenly the cheerswere 'Fischer! Fischer!' ( The re they go again, yourdeeds inflame them) and Spassky's composure wasshattered. Fischer romped home to become thefirst official Amer ica n worl d cha mpio n.

The Russians were not amused (We have neverreckoned on coming second. There's no use in losing.)Spassky had impressed with his behaviour and

dignity. All the world loved him as a good loser(despite the slight blemish on his record when hehad insisted that the players' chairs and light fit-tings be X-rayed for electronic devices whichmight be hypnotising him into playing badly). Butthe Russians had not come to Reykjavik to beloved. They were there to win. The Soviet ChessFederation set their machine into operation again.Those years of success had let it grow rusty. Theirplayers would have to be toughened up againwith more competitio n for those wh o wante d toenjoy the privilege of trips to the West. It wasthe western visits which had made them mentallyflabby.

Out of this new Russian regime came anothergenius to take the place of Spassky as championof the East. Anatoly Karpov, a thin young man,quiet and diplomatic to the point of blandness,but a Bjorn Borg of the che ssbo ard wh os edetermination and faultless technique had carriedhim straight to the top. When Karpov earned theright to challenge Fischer in 1975, the Americandid not want to play. Unable to agree terms forthe defence of his title, he lost it wi tho ut mo vi nga pawn. Indeed he had not played a single seriouschess game since his win against Spassky in 1972.And the chess world still awaits his return to theboard.

In Western Europe and the United States, chessclub memberships had trebled when Fischer tookthe title. With Karpov on the throne, the chessboom seemed bound to end. His play wasimpressive enough, but he lacked the charisma ofa Fischer, or even the charm of a Spassky. Butthe chess world stayed in luck because Karpov'schallenger in 1978 turned out to be Viktor Korch-noi, a Soviet-born gra ndma ster w ho had recentlydefected to the West. This was better even thanRussia versus America; a Russian against a defec-tor, and Korchnoi, ebullient, talkative and anexcellent self-publicist, attracted enormous inter-est for the match.

Anatoly Karpov faced Viktor Korchnoi in thePhilippines resort of Baguio City. ( Don' t you knowthai when you play at this level it's no ordinary venue.It's Iceland — or the Philippines — or Hastings — or— or this place.) The exotic venue seemed to

24



ABOVE Kasparov ( r i g h t ) about to

defeat Karpov for the world

championship.

LEFT AND BELOW three champions:

Garry Kasparov, Paul Morphy,

Emanuel Lasker.

encourage exotic happenings. Even morethan in Reykjavik, the journalists hada great deal to write about otherthan the chess. There was amysterious Russian, DrZukhar, who sat everyday in one of the frontrows and was accusedby Korchnoi of being a

hypnotist planted there tostare him into submission. Therewas Karpov's blue yogurt, accusedof being a colour -coded message. ^Ther e was even a kick-board constructed 1under the table to prev ent the players from nassaulting one another below the official battle-ground. And there were the orange-clad gurus ofthe Ananda Marga sect who came to meditateon Korchnoi's behalf. (If you're thinking of the kindof thing that we've seen in the past, chanting gurus,walkie-talkies, walk-outs, hypnotists, tempers, fists,not so fast.) From an apparently hopeless situation,Korchnoi fought back in the match and lookedlikely to bring off an impossible victory. With hislast gasp, however, an exhausted looking Karpovwon a fine game to retain his title. For that lastgame, the mysterious Dr Zukhar had reappearedfrom his exile in the back row to stare again atKorchnoi from a forward position. In the opinionof many bemused onlookers the whole match hadnot been so much a victory for Karpov overKorchnoi, as a win for the hypnotist against theesoterics, paranoids, hysterics.

Three years later Karpov and Korchnoi againmet for the world championship, this time at the

more accessible venueofMeranoin Italy. cheeked Merano, flourishing to a fault.)

was less nons ense and Karpov wo n cfortably. The Korchnoi camp

more depressed on this occby the knowledge tha

Ifl* son had bee n arrest ed^ imp riso ned in the U

C> for dra ft eva sion . His

^ to o had bee n refus ed ^ mission to emigr ate. Th ey

^ bo th fre ed event uall y, but only smonths after the defector had faile

capture that title.Since Fischer's time, politics and lunacy seem

unwritten condition of world championmatches, just as surely as they are written the plot of CHESS. Even when Karpov Kasparov in Moscow in 1984, this meebetween two good Soviet citizens produced sa clash of personalities and such bitter persrivalry that the politicians had to be calledAfter an exhausting and apparently intermincontest, during which a 5—0 lead in wins Karpov had gradually been whittled back to the President of FIDE stepped in to call the wthing off and order a replay. He had felt oblito save the contestants from their state of collapse. Even afte r Kasp arov w on t he replay,arguments continued about precisely who it wh o needed saving. Wha t is important , h oweis that it gave Tim Rice material for another vof the Arbiter's Song. (I control the match, I it, I can call it o f f , Kasparov found that out.)

A consolidating move before launching the a

25



C H A 1' 1 r R

P O S I T I O N A LP L A Y

dl sensed behind me the support of myivlwle country, the care of our governmentand our party, and above all that daily carewhich you, our great leader, have taken andstill take, to raise to unprecedented heights

our great motherland. ))

M. /V I Hot oinnik-from Ins telegram to Stalin on sharing first

prize at Nottingham in 1936

M I K H A I L M O I S E Y E V I C HII O T V I N N I K , B O R N 1 9 1 1

Engineer c ind chess sc ient is tWo r ld Ch am pi on , 194 8 - 5 7 , 19 5 8 - 60 , 196 1 - 6 3

Ret i r ed f ro m act iv e play 1970I r a i p e r a nd m en to r o f Ka r pov and Kas p a r ov

CHESS IN CONCERT had been an undoubted suc-cess. Every seat had been sold, the sponsors werewell satisfied, the audience enraptured. At thisstage of the whole venture, the success owedmost to the music of Benny and Bjorn. A concertperformance can at the best of times only givethe barest impression of the story-line into whichthe songs are interwoven. In this case even thatstory-line was still only a skeleton, but the musicwas easily strong enough to carry the showwithout any plot. The millions who later boughtsingles of 'One Night in Bangkok' and T KnowHim So Well ' were enjoying two more hits fromthe A B B A music machine. They neither knewnor cared that Murray Head was playing the roleof a deposed world chess champion watching hissuccessors fighting for the title; and though manywh o purchas ed 'I Kn ow Him So Well ' mus t ha veidentified with the situations sung about, fewcould have realised the full dram ati c in ten tio nbehind a duet in which Barbara Dickson and ElainePaige sing about the same man without (in theversion originally intended) coming face to facethemselves.

On the whole the critics were also full of praisefor the music. Concerts and album attracted ravereviews throughout Europe; the album wasexultantly received in the United States. Newsdaypraised the originality of score which 'breaks newground in symphonic pop'. Time magazine wasimpressed by the versatility of the score as wellas the concept of the plot which had given riseto it: '. . . it offers him [Tim Rice] a contemporarysetting for his favourite the me: t he pernicious lureof stardom, whether biblical, political or intellec-tual. Andersson and Ulvaeus' score ransacksmelodic styles from plainsong to Gilbert andSullivan, to Richard Rodgers to Phil Spector tohip-hop in a rock symphonic synthesis ripe withsophistication and hummable tunes. '

Oddly, it was the English critics who foundthemselves somewhat out of step, with their stillenthusiastic response strangely muted by anapparent unwillingness to acknowledge the orig-inality of the score. The London Times referredto 'the opening Tyrolean chorus, straight out ofWh it e H ors e Inn . . . the sub-A lbin oni ada gio . . .some sub-Lloyd Webber, a capable operaticqua rte t (S chu man n wi th a das h of Bach) . . . anda good deal that Liberace might look at.'

Other reviewers were convinced they heardthe influence of Novello, Sousa, Rodrigo, Gluck,Tchaikovsky, Pachelbel and Faure. The mosthostile voice was that of the Guardian, whosecritic wro te: 'The Lond on Sym ph on y Or ches tra

. . is was ti ng its time w ith m ost of the score

Two hanothing ' ivrong. • With rec

$ exceedi ng 220 m they w

FOR a decade; between 19and 1^82,''' Abba . could

$ 'ivroimales eeasily the fnost commerciasuccessful group everywhere the world except for the USTheir healthy • image ahummab le tunes - "DanciQueen".; "Money , MonMoney", 1 "Waterloo**, "SupTrouper", "Fern ando^ ' seemed unmatcha ble. . \

NoW, however^, afte r,-tgro up' s dem ise , an "Abba."*tunwithout , the Abba label *surp asi thd sales of any of thosingle hits. Th e c ompo sers the mat e contin gent of AbBenn y Andersson* and BjoUlv aeu s, the lyr icist is ., TRice, and the, song is "ONight,' in Bangk ok", a 'di srap" single (as the jarg on has whic h has shot past the mark worldw ide and, havicracked the US top 10. loo ks to reach 4m.

There are all kinds curiositiei here. The piecebeen N o I in atcountries, i:TQ \SC

LOI*. ^

OAustralia,many more, v" r a S

only twdfth pe a ^By contrast .team s songs, 1 ^ MulWell" , was No 1 ^ j bmont h and hasn \ , A further odditjnear-million Britissong is a better fifc '_ Tlf-iiv* any Abba single in t

The common fac,songs is, of course , come from the musi created by Rice, AndtUlvaeu s, "Chess" - existing only on a fa dou ble alb um hut altdouble album, but ah

A stage prod '~''der consid<

Michael U

(

S o/ , * f i , '' On ^ ' t h ,

Acclaim, achievement and awards

for album and singles.



ferent countries, the increasing momentum of thwhole project was fast making the show certainty. In fact, 'One Night in Bangkok', sunby Murray Head, reached the top of the hit paradin West Germany, Austria, Israel, South AfricaAustralia, Sweden, Denmark and Holland. Worldwide it sold over three million copies. Two versions of the song were hits in the United Stateone reaching the top ten. And even after 'On

Night in Bangkok' had been banned in Bangkoitself, becaus e it was th oug ht t o project the w ronsort of image of Thailand, it continued to bpla yed in the city .. . in the bars and the mass agparlours, if not the temples.

Again it was Britain which refused to join ithe general triumph, with 'One Night in Bangkok,' reaching 'only' number twelve in the chartAny feeling of disappointment, however, waquickly overtaken by the elation of the succesfor Barbara Dickson and Elaine Paige of 'I KnowHim So Well'. That song gave Tim Rice his firs

British number one hit since Julie Covington habeen there with 'Don't Cry for Me, Argentinaway back in 1977. By remaining four weeks otop of the charts, 'I Know Him So Well' becamTim Rice's most successful British single ever. FoBjorn and Benny, the experience was equallpleasant, though less unusual. It was already thetenth British number one.

As co-author of The Guinness Book of Hit SingleTim Rice naturally also noted the other recordbroken by 'I Know Him So Well' in the UK hiparade. Paige and Dickson had become the firs

chart-topping female duo since Althia and Donnin 1978, and the disc the best-selling female duof all time in Great Britain. They were also tholdest female duo ever to appear in the chartsand Elaine Paige was the shortest adult numbeone since 1976.

During this period, the only move Tim Ricwould have liked to be able to take back was thdecision to launch the single of 'Nobody's Sideat the same time as 'Bangkok'. It made no impression on the charts, but he feels that it might wehave been very successful if saved as an immed

ate follow-up to 'I Know Him So Well'. 'But itterribly easy to be wise after the event witsingles,' says Tim.

The two hit singles and the album began taccumulate silver and gold discs in recognitioof their outstanding sales figures and, in Februar1985, 'O ne Nigh t in Bangkok' added to the trphy cupboard an award for the best British videof a male solo single. At a reception to celebratsome of these successes, the guests were treateto canape s display ed in a ches sbo ard array - th

which is he av y with flatulent orche stral writi ng,cinematic schmaltz and second-rate Lloyd Web-ber recitative.' Perhaps he was sitting too near the

wind section.Whatever the reservations of the British

review ers, thei r criticisms were to be firmlyanswered by the public response to the releaseof the CHESS double album and the singleswhich followed.

When the album from the very outset sold fas-ter even than had that of Evita, it began to lookincreasingly probable that CHESS would indeedreach the stage. By the time two of the singleswere number one hits in a whole collection of dif-

27



white squares were topped with smokedsalmon, the black squares with caviar.

Delighted with his first numberone hit for eight years, TimRice declared that recordswere just as importantas th ea tr e: 'Af te r all, e>records mean far more tomore people than theatre does. e>

but the mo me nt um for a stageproduction was now unstoppable.The question was already not whether,but when CHESS would be seen in thetheatr e. The re was still, how eve r, a ma jo r ^piece missing from the C H E S S board. The Nshow had as yet no director.

The initial success of the album had arousedvery strong interest across the Atlantic. Thepowerful Shubert Organisation wanted to pro-duce the show on Broadway. Their President,Bernard Jacobs, had been impressed enough to

praise the music in no uncertain terms: 'Very fewscores prior to production have excited me asmuch as this one. Non e in fact since My Fair Lady.'Some thought was even given to the possibilityof a Broadway opening before London's WestEnd saw the show. With both sides of the Atlanticso eager to see CHESS on stage, the choice ofa director became even more urgent. All that wasneeded was an internationally celebrated figure,with a brilliant record of stage successes behindhim. And he had to be ready to drop everythingand join the CHESS set.

First to be appr oach ed was Tre vo rNu nn , butdespite grea t enthusiasm for the project his

commitments to the Royal Shakes-peare Company, the filming of

Lady Jane and the staging of Les Miserables were keeping

him too busy to let him^ play C H E S S as well. It

0> see med that the sh ow

<<• wo ul d ha ve to wa it until 19 87 ifit was to be directed by Trevor^ Nunn . The appr oach to Tre vor

Nunn had been made in March 1985.The following month Michael Bennettflew into London to discuss the job of

directing CHESS. He had conceived, choreo-graphed and directed A Chorus Line, which hadwon seven Tony awards and a Pulitzer prize fordrama; he had followed it with another hit in

Dream Girls ; now Michael Bennett was availableand wanted to work with Tim, Bjorn and Benny.He arrived at Tim's Shaftesbury Avenue office inLondon and bounced into the meeting singing alyric from A Chorus Line: 'I really need this job;please Go d, I nee d this job'.

Michael Bennett 's infectious humour, energy,enthusias m and appet ite for work soo n spread toev er yo ne in the office. Pape rs relatin g to plot,characters, lyrics and music were spread overdesk, tables and floor, and were shuffled aroundas everybody approached the task of turning asuccessful albu m into a hit musical. C H E S S ha dfound its director.

The exciting phase of the game was just beginning.

28



C O M B I N AT I O N S

((Chess is the constant quest for better

concepts, a better plan, the most powerfulmoves, the discovery of concealed, clever

ways to achieve a goal. ))

V A S I L Y V A S I L Y E V I C H S M Y S L O V ,B O R N 1 9 2 1

Opera singer and chess GrandmasterFailed audition for Bolshoi opera 1951

World chess champion 1957-8Still a title candidate in 1984

MICHAEL BENNETT brought to the project notonly his own talents, but those of many of theproduction team with whom he had worked on

A Chorus Line and Dreamgirls. In particularassistant director and co-choreographer BobAvian and designer Robin Wagner were enlistedto join the C H E S S team. Ne w York quickly

joi ned London and St ock hol m as re gu la r st ops onthe itinerary of CHESS commuters Tim, Bjorn

and Benny, and what had started as an Anglo-Swedish company now began to look like a multi-national. The task of co-ordinating the businessside of the enterprise fell to Judy Craymer, whohad grown from being Tim Rice's personalassistant into his general manager and was nowthe fourth director of Three Knights Ltd andExecutive Producer of CHESS. While MichaelBennett was thinking about arranging the dance-steps, Judy choreographed the contracts with acast of lawyers.

For a project of this complexity, a single con-

tract lawyer is not enough. There was anotherlawyer to handle matters specific to the album;there was a specialist lawyer for the stage show;a fourth legal brain was needed for clauses relatingto any future film that might be made of the show.Then there was Tim's lawyer and Bjorn's lawyerand Benny's lawyer (and should we be talking totheir Swedish lawyers or their English lawyers?).And Michael Bennett's lawyer and a lawyer forthe Shubert organisation. Even the simplest busi-ness decision seemed sometimes to turn into thenightmare of a legal symposium, with the 28-year-old Miss Craymer in the chair.

'Until now,' said Judy Craymer in February1986, ' the only people to have made any moneyout of this show have been the lawyers.' At theend of that same mont h, howeve r, the C HE S Salbum moved into profit for RCA. The originaladvance of $1.1 million had been recouped inunder eighteen months. Most importantly forThree Knights Ltd, that money had provided theworking capital needed to continue their effortsto stage the show without yet having to seekother investors.

When Michael Bennett arrived in London inApril 1985, there was a huge amount of work tobe done before the show could reach the stage.The plot had by now been worked out in detail,though most of the linking material, some spokendialogue, some sung, still remained to be written.For the time being, however, Tim, Bjorn andBenny could relax a little and share the back seatas consultants while Michael Bennett assumedoverall control of the next phase of operations.As Tim Rice had already said six months earlier:

29



'For two years, our number one concern was tomake a great record. It will be the director's jobto make it a great show.'

The second half of 1985 was a time of constantactivity as the set and cast for the musical werepatiently assembled. The choice of theatre hadsettled on the Prince Edward, where Evita was nolonger making worthwhile profits after eighthighly successful years. One show with lyrics by

Tim Rice was to be taken off to make room foranother, as Evita moved on to further success inManchester.

The bulk of the auditions took place betweenAugust and October 1985, at the Prince of Walesand Lyric theatres in London. During that period,over 700 hopeful applicants were given theirchance to impress Michael Bennett during a seriesof almost 1,300 auditions. The procedure waslong and painstaking, with artistes called backfour or five times as numbers were reduced, Thesingers had to be able to dance, the dancers hadto sing, and everyone tired of hearing 'Don't Cryfor Me, Argentina', 'I Don' t Kno w Ho w to LoveHim' and, less appropriately, 'Memory'. The threewriters of the show dropped in occasionally, par-ticularly when the major roles were being dis-cussed, but they usually found excuses to leaveearly as the relentless march-past of singers anddancers continued hour after hour and day afterday.

Only one role had definitely been cast: as onthe album, Elaine Paige would play the part ofFlorence. Murray Head and Tommy Korbergwere also front runners for the roles they hadplayed on the album, but at this stage neither wascertain. From the hundreds of applicants, aroundforty had to be found to join Elaine Paige in thecast.

As each performer left the audition stage.Michael Bennett and Bob Avian went into a briefhuddle, with Bennett doing most of the talking.'Great voice, good range, but she's too tall. Thinkof her st and ing ne xt t o Elaine.' . . . 'He h as a nicecharacter, fine actor, fun to work with, but hisvoice doesn't have the range. Never mind, 'I'llcancel the score!' Bob Avian took detailed notesto help decide who would be invited back for thefinal rounds of auditions.

Three months later, as the exhausting processreached its end, only the irrepressible MichaelBennet t still seem ed full of ene rgy . While wai tin gfor the next performer to appear on stage, he wasable to dance between the rows of stalls at thePrince of Wales, singing 'I Know Him So Well',and demonstrating how he might stage it as aminuet. Then he would concentrate on the next

act. 'Her timing's wrong, but it's no real problem.She'll just need a bash on the head.'

The final stage on the very last day of auditionswas a last assessment of those already selectedfor parts in the singing chorus to judge whetherthey might be suitable to understudy the leadingroles. 'I'd like to explore his opera range becausehe might be a Wa lt er . ' . . . 'I 'm han gin g on to thisg uy — he may be a Molok ov. '

As they prepared to leave the Prince of Walesfor the last time. Bjorn complained from the backof the stalls: 'W hy did n't I get audit ioned? '

The cast was complete. The only thing that hadbee n left to chance was that nob od y had re mem-bered to check that the men could whistle.Merano would not be the same without thewhistling.

The chosen cast could now relax. October1985 was nearly over and rehearsals werescheduled to begin early in February. In the mean-time there was still a great deal of work to bedone before the show could take its final shape.

RIGHT: ABOVE Experiments with

design on the model stage.

RIGHT: BELOW Bjorn translates a

Swedish magazine for Judy Craym

Its something about Joseph and an

Amazing Technicolour Raincoat!

30

ABOVE Writers and principals at

launch of the musical, March 19



Conductor and arrangerers Eljas. Designer Robin Wagner.

White still seemed to he in control, but was his own

position really as safe as it looked ?

In collaboration with Robin Wagner,Michael Bennett had created sets whichwould provide some stunning visualeffects. Six hydraulic lifts wouldbe needed to power themovements of stage andother elements of theset. A video-wall ofsixty-four moni tors wou lddominate the back of thestage, while two more video-walls of thirty-two monitors each s

would be available at the side ofthe stage. The videos for these wallswou ld be pre -rec orde d on laser disc. Th e nwhole operation, expanding images to cover asmany of the 128 screens as required, would becontrolled by computer. This part of the showwould be a triumph of video technology ifnothing else.

When the different sets and scene changes hadbeen worked out in detail, a model was madeunder Robin Wagner's supervision in New Yorkand flown over to London. It must have been themost impressive dolls' house in the world. In factit was £40,000 worth of miniature set, with allmoving parts, including a stage which could liftand rotate. Every detail was there, down to cut-out furniture, including chess table, and scalemodels of the actors. The show was taking trulyimpressive shape. Perhaps this ought not to besurprising; since Michael Bennett had arrived, theproj ected bu dge t for C H E S S in Lond on h ad risen

f rom £2 million to £ 4 million.

Th e final mo nt h of 1985 was spent worki ng inthe basement of 196 Shaftesbury Avenue,

where the model set was installed. Everyaction to take place in the show was

first tried out in miniature. Eventhe lighting changes could

be accommodated on- this wo nd ro us toy. But

^ th ere wa s still no final script.^ Early in Dec embe r, Tim Riceha d left for a trip to t he Far East a nd

^ Australia , whe re he wou ld per for m in'Tim Rice and Friends', a cheerful review

of songs with his lyrics. The opportunitywas too good to miss, even though he might

be missed in London. It even gave him the chanceto sing 'One Night in Bangkok' to an Australianaudience. His only worry was the occasionalexasperated telegram or telex message fromMichael Bennett, pleading for a script so that hecould complete his work on the staging of the

show.In the middle of December, Michael Bennett

flew back to the United States for Christmas. Inthe previous six months of frenetic activity, hehad assembled a cast and taken the design andstaging of the show as far as possible. When heleft, a silence des cen ded o n the Shaft esbu ryAvenue office such as it had not experienced fora long time. The chill would have been far greaterif anyone had thought it possible that Michaelwould not return.



MICHAEL BENNETT had been expected back inLondon during the first week of January 1986.When he said he would be delayed, nobodysuspected that anything might be wrong. TimRice, armed now with a full script, was happy tofly out to New York for a weekend's work onthe show. Everything still seemed to be in orderwhen he returned, but shortly afterwards camethe devastating news: Michael was seriously ill

with heart trouble. His doctors insisted that heremain in New York, first for tests, later for com-plete rest followin g a diagnos is of angina pectoris.There was no possibility of his being fit enoughto cope with the strenuous period of rehearsalswhich awaited him in London.

When news of Michael Bennett's withdrawalbecame public, there was much press speculationthat 'artistic differences' had arisen between Ben-nett and Rice or between Bennett and ElainePaige, that the illness was just an excuse to backout. But Tim reported that he and Michael had

not had one cross word since day one, andMichael had only met Elaine briefly twice, onneither occasion discussing t he sho w in any detail.

The mood at Three Knights Ltd was one ofgrief, worry and panic in about equal measures.The anxiety was partly for Michael's health,partly for the future of the whole p roject. The taskwas not simply to find a new director, but to findone who could take on a show which had alreadybeen fully cast and of which the designs werealmost complete. Not only that, but rehearsalswere scheduled to begin on 3 February, which

was less than three weeks away.Tim Bjorn and Benny were back where they

had been almost a year before, looking for a direc-tor. As on the previous occasion, the first manthey approached was Trevor Nunn, but the situa-tion had changed. Before, they had needed some-one to oversee the whole show over a period ofa year. Now the task was to complete the stagingof the musical in four months of intense work.

By a remarkable coincidence, Tim Rice had metTrevor Nunn on Concorde when flying to NewYork to deliver the final script to Michael Bennett.

Trevor had been on his way to see Bernie Jacobsabout staging Nicholas Nickleby in Los Ange les .They talked about CHESS on the flight, neverdreaming that within days they would be work-ing on it together.

When he had first considered the prospect ofdirecting CHESS, Trevor Nunn had declaredhimself 'absolutely bowled over' by the musicalscore. Only his other commitments had preven-ted him accepting the job. Now he was again freeenough to do so. After two long days with Tim,

E X C H A N G I N GP I E C E S•

((When we appear on the stage, we areartistes. The only difference is that chess

has its own specific form. You yourself arethe composer of the 'song', you are the

singer, and you are the critic. ) )

M I K H A I L N E K H E M Y E V I C H T A L ,B O R N . 1 9 3 6

Feared for his hypnotic glareFamed for his attacking genius

World Champion 1960-61

TOP Choreograph er Molly M

ABOVE Director Trevor Nunn



RIGHT (TOP TO BOTTO M)

What's on at the Prince Edward?

Trevor Nunn rehearsing with Tommy

Korberg. Trevor Nunn with John

Turner.

Bjorn, Benny and a piano in Shaftesbury Avenue,and further consultations about design with RobinWagner in New York, Trevor Nunn was readyto take charge.

In purely practical terms, the essential changeswere that the rehearsal period was delayed by amonth and cut from thirteen to nine weeks, and

the number of previews was also reduced frtwenty-one to fourteen. But the date of the fnight would remain unchanged as 14 May. It hto be. Over £1^ million of tickets had alrebeen sold.

In artistic terms there were more modificatioThe staging of the show would have less techlogical wizar dry an d special effect s than had benvisaged in Michael Bennett 's version. Plewould remain, including the 128 video screebut five of the six hydraulic lifts, designedpermit dramatic movement of stage and swould be dispensed with. Those whose job it wto worry about the cost of staging the extraganza breathed a sigh of relief, but a very smsigh. The costs were still astronomical.

The technical changes were explained Tre vor Nun n to a meet ing of the whole prodtion team, excluding the cast, on 6 February 19three days after rehearsals should have begThe mood was less than totally relaxed, w

many of the team feeling frustrated after a mospent thumb-twiddling, waiting to discover wthe new director would require of them. Thwas a tension at the start, as if adoptive childwere being introduced to their new step-fathTrevor Nunn himself saw it as a different sort relationship: 'We have been shot-gunntogether. ' Over a long evening, he explained view of the plot of CHESS as a show about cflict, be tw ee n ideologi es, nat ion s and indi viduwith, at its centre, a romance as unlikely delightful as Ninotchka. Sung at the beginning

a prologue to the dramatic tale, the 'Story Chess' would establish the metaphor of a chga me to depict the them e of conflict. The ope nlines would recur right at the end to complete fine geo met ry of the whol e show.

With the aid of Robin Wagner and the moset, the new director went through the plans the whole show-, scene by scene, with particureference to the technical requirements for thbuilding the sets. The whole performance watour de force which lasted considerably lonthan the show itself. By the end of the even

the new CHESS family knew more or less whthey were all going, though some who had bpart of Bennett's crew on several previous shofelt the transition to a different director, even of Trevor Nunn's calibre, was bound to presteething troubles.

The next day, Trevor Nunn began a thweek Caribbean holiday. It was the last of commitments before he could give himself futo CHESS. Not only was the holiday a promwhich he was unable to break, but he felt it

33



essential to recover sufficiently from recentendeavours before embarking on therehearsal period. 'If I don't have thisholiday, CHESS will soon loseanother director.' Rehearsalsbegan on 3 March at theProduction Village inCricklewood. Until thenthe director had met many

of the cast only in a series offive-minute interviews rushedinto his crash course of acclimatisa-tion with the CHESS project. Onlyonce before had Trevor Nunn workedwith a comp any which he had not personally \auditioned. As if feeling it necessary to estab-lish his credentials, he emphasised that he wascoming to the material from the opposite extremeof the original director. 'But twenty-fourShakespeare plays in twenty years is the bestpossible preparation for directing a musical.'

The morning was spent in introductions, withTrevor Nunn emphasising his faith in the cast andthe future of the show. 'Michael has the reput atio nfor putti ng toge ther s ensationally brilliant com-panies,' he said, and this one had an added advan-tage 'It is one of the ver y rare musicals in hist orywhich is starting off with a script.' The objectiveof them all was to produce a show to attract thesophisticated, intelligent adult. In the afternoon

the Nunn—Wagner duet was in action again,performing on the model set with another

complete run-through of the show.Some new scenes had been written,

including the Russian scene to endall Russian scenes, incorp-

orating the Russian song* to end all Russia n song s.

^ Some mo re ne w scenes still

* remai ned to be writ ten but theshow was already taking on a new^ vitali ty. By the end of the day, inwhich the cast had done nothing but

listen - and shiver in the unheated rehearsalroom — there was great eagern ess to get do wn

to business . In his final add res s to the co mp an yTrevor Nunn began with the words: 'I may havegive n you the impression that I kno w what I'mdoi ng. I'd like to correc t that impr essi on. . .. ' Bythe end of his speech, however, CHESS was wellon its way to becoming Trevor Nunn's show. Histhorough outline of the staging intentions hadsucceeded in communicating to the cast a clearview of their aims. It was to be a.show that hadto be taken seriously. Yet it had to appeal to 'acoachload of chess players from Hastings or acharabanc from Wigan who have never playedanything but darts.' The bare bones of the showwere certainly there, but a great deal of fleshingout remained to be done.

Sometimes you can give up what seems to be your strongest

piece and still win by a direct attack.

34



c h a p r i- R y

T I M E - T R O U B L E

((in chess as in any form of sport, only fighters can win. Fighters must be forged,not baked in a warm oven.

T I G R A N V A R T A N O V I C HP E T R O S I A N , B O R N 1 9 2 9

Profound chess strategistAt his best, invincible

At his worst, mind-numbingly dullWorld champion 1963-69Died far too young 1984

AS A SPECTATOR SPORT, chess has been com-pared with watching paint drying or waiting forgrass to grow, but time-trouble is one feature ofthe game which can be guaranteed to excite anaudience. In any serious chess competition theplayers' moves are timed by chess-clocks. Eachplayer's clock runs only while it is his turn tomove. The limitation on thinking time is not astandard allowance for each move, but an allottedtime for a specified number of moves. In worldchampionship play, each grandmaster must makeforty moves in two and a half hours. But a playercould think for two hours on one move if he wasprepared to play the remaining 39 in just half-an-hour. Often, because of the complexities of thegame, or more simply because of sheer indecisive-ness, one or both players will have to rush thelast few moves in order not to forfeit the gameby overstepping the time limit. It is in such time-trouble that tension rises and blunders mostfrequently occur. Some world championship con-tenders, such as Victor Korchnoi for example, aretime-trouble addicts and will think nothing ofleaving themselves with only a minute or two fora dozen or more moves. Others dread the ideaof having to rush and will make quick decisionsearly in the game just to avoid having to do solater.

From the start of rehearsals, CHESS the musi-cal was in time-trouble. The move from MichaelBennett to Trevor Nunn had effectively takenalmost two months from the time allotted. Thenew director was content with a rehearsal periodof nine weeks as far as the cast were concerned,but nobody could have predicted the technicalproblems which would have to be faced.

Part of the legacy left by Michael Bennett hadbeen the hardware for a show heavily dependenton the latest technology. Dave Clark and CliffRichard could boast a hologram of Lord Olivierin Time, but CHESS had everything else. Therewere the 128 video screens, which could displayhuge images of action on stage, off stage or pre-recorded. Robin Wagner had designed a stagewhich could lift, rotate and tilt at such an angleas to be a convincing mountain-side. It was tobe constructed in a chessboard pattern of 64squares, each of which could be underlit, white,black or red. The lighting would all be controlledby computer. Another computer would be pro-grammed to operate the hydraulics for the com-plex stage movements. A third and fourthcomputer would control scene changes andsound. An d t hose 128 video screens wouldrequire yet another computer.

As soon as Evita had closed at the Princ



Edward theatre, the designers and builders movedin to begin the massive reconstruction workwhich the new show demanded. The stage areawas effectively gutted in order to install themachinery for the new set. What had been a tightschedule even under the Bennett regime becametighter still with the delays and uncertaintycaused by a change of director. The building workprogressed more slowly than had been hoped, the

computers always seemed uncooperative, andconstruction of the sets took longer than anti-cipated. Rehearsals had originally been plannedto move into the theatre in the first week of April1986. Gradually this date became later and later.But delays in construction were completely insig-nificant when it became clear what a major prob-lem the computers were going to cause.

Meanwhile, back in Cricklewood (the Bennettloyalists still followed his lead and called itCrinklewood), all was going much moresmoothly. Whether through his natural inclina-

tion or because of an inherent distrust of the tech-nology, Trevor Nunn was putting together ashow which would be considerably less reliant onthe mechanical gadgetry than had at first seemedlikely. His quietly spoken, calm and authoritativeair had a way of drawing the very best out ofevery member of the cast. Like him, they wereall taking the plot and characters seriously andthis produced real dramatic effect in their actingand singing. Tim, Bjorn and Benny were usuallypresent at rehearsals, modifying or adding tomusic and lyrics whenever it was thought necess-ary. Anders Eljas and John Owen Edwards sharedthe tasks of musical direction, conducting, arrang-ing and the tedious chore of producing new ver-sions of the score each time any modification wasmade.

Throughout the five weeks' rehearsal period inCricklewood, the mood was optimistic, cheerfuland highly motivated. The only negative factorwas that Elaine Paige kept having her car stolen.On the very first day of rehearsals her Porschedisappeared from the car park opposite the Pro-duction Village. The following day came thegood news from Stoke Newington police that thecar had been found and could be picked up froma street near their station. Miss Paige went toStoke Newington, but the Porsche had beenstolen again by the time she arrived.

Towards the end of the scheduled period ofCricklewood rehearsals, the cast was ready for afirst run- thro ugh of the entire show. Alt hou ghlines were often forgotten and sometimes evennot yet written, everything was beginning to fittogether. Even on the bare boards of the rehearsal

rooms it was starting to look good, and it wasclear that Trevor Nunn had devised a show whichcould work without heavy dependence on theelaborate and expensive special effects whichwere still causing headaches and depression backin the theatre.

There was, however, one aspect of the stagingwhich was beginning to add to the problems.Trevor Nunn is a director who likes to keep his

options open and who also pays meticulous atten-tion to detail. In the matter of stage furniture, thisresulted in a different design of chair for almostevery scene. There were, in fact, eighty differentchairs waiting to add to the clutter of props andscenery backstage at the theatre. Some of the castwere even beginning to call the show 'Chairs'instead of 'Chess'. When the show eventuallymoved from rehearsal rooms into the theatre,nineteen chairs, among other items of furnitureand scenery, had to be abandoned simply to leaveenough room to move backstage.

In the second week of April, the cast packedtheir bags and said goodbye to Cricklewood. Thefirst pre vie w was schedu led for 30 April, and ther ewas already little enough time to adapt the les-sons learnt in rehearsal rooms to a performanceon the stage itself.

Within a few days, however, they were backagain in Cricklewood, or at the Old Vic, or anyother London rehearsal room which could be

Phases of construction at the Prince Edward with Vidiwall and revolving

stage.



The sacrifice of material can gain time for the rest of one's pieces to join theattack.

ordinatmg the errorts ot all those involved setting up the staging of the musical, on bosides of the Atlantic. Now the final decision cancel previews had to be his.

On Saturday 26 April, Trevor Nunn gave ultimatum to the computer programmers. Th

would be given another twenty-four hours to gthe stage working. If there was still no joy, thwould revert to old- fashioned manual operatiand work out a way to run the show without t

hydraulics.Experts in the computer system flew in from

Ger man y for more all-night pro gra mmi ng ses-sions to try to coax co-operation from the beast.Days went by with no apparent progress as the30 April deadline approached. Without the

hydraulics working, it was impossible to conductthe all-important technical rehearsals for scenechanges, lighting and everything else which con-tributes to the smooth running of a performance.

All this time, with the situation in thetheatre getting ever more desperate andnerves growing ever more frayed, thepublicity machine for the show continuedto gain mom ent um. Some report s appea red ;about 'problems with a computer' but onlythose involved with the show fully appreci-ated the seriousness of those problems.

computer. The cast applauded their diretor when he announced an end to thtours of the rehearsal rooms of Lond

The unending technical problems hwrec ked their plans - 'But frMonday, we fight back.'Realistically, though, there was nno hope of things being ready in ti

for 30 April. Some cons idera tion wgiven to the suggestion of a concperformance of the show for the eapreviews, but such a limp solut

would have only added furtproblems to the reheaschedules. With great regret,

first four previews were ccelled. The ticket office m

valiant attempts to contall who had bought se

but inevitably a crowd

disappointed customturned up to learn that thwas no sho w. Cancetions had earned five mdays of rehearsal tiThere was still no guatee that it would be enou

obtained at short notice. The technical was looking increasingly less likely that tsh ow wo ul d be rea dy for 30 April, b

preview tickets were sold out and problems in the theatre had becomeworse and worse. Severe problemswere affecting the computerwhich was mean t to opera te ^

second preview was even scheduto be a royal charity performan

Nobody wanted evenconsider cancellation any performance unl

there was really no alter

five. Urgent meetings wheld each evening, with produ

^ Rob ert Fox discus sing the state play with Judy Craymer and Trev

> Nun n. Rob ert Fox had had the difficult jthroughout the whole enterprise of

No bo dy seemed to kno w why , but the *Vcomputer did not want to talk to the

all-night sessions working onthe computer, a 'major com- 61

patibility problem' was diagnosed.

plished in weeks of patient

programming. After several

the stage. Little morethan a lurch had beensuccessfully accom-



C H A P T H R 1 0

S A C R I F I C E S

((We were like bishops of oppositecolours. )J

Boris Spassky, talking of the breakdown of his first marriage

B O R I S V A S I L Y E V I C H S P A S S K Y ,B O R N 1 9 3 7

Cultured, athletic, gentlemanlyWorld junior champion 1955

World Champion 1969-72World famous 1972 for a match he lost

COMPLETE INCOMPATIBILITY ha d b ee n th e

grounds under which the stage hydraulics hadbeen granted a divorce from the computerintended to operate them. The next computer tobe accused of unreasonable behaviour was the onewhich controlled the Vidiwall.

The Vidiwall that was designed to be incorp-orated into the set of CHESS is the last wordin video technology. Three walls of video

monitors, 128 screens in all, are controlled by acomp uter t o enable a bewil dering var iety ofimages to dominate the visual horizons of theaudience. Sixty-four of the screens form theprincipal wall, which can be lowered until ithovers above centre stage like a giant chessboard.The remaining screens are in permanent position,framing the stage to right and left, in banks eightscreens high and four wide. The whole techno-logical caboodle is operated by a computer whichcan accept nine separate video inputs and sendeach image to single screens or blown up over

a bank of screens in almost any desired manner.With computing power equal to that of 32 IBMPersonal Computers, the potential of the systemfor producing visual extravaganzas is almostunlimited. As we were all to discover, however,it came equipped with one of the most user-hostile pieces of computer software ever exper-ienced by those who had to deal with it.

Any such new technology, of course, needstime to evolve into an easily operated system.The Vidiwall itself was far from untried, but thearray of 128 screens for CHESS was consider-

ably greater than anything previously assembled.The haste with which video material had to bepre-recorded also added to the problems.

Perhaps if the original plans had not been hitby a chan ge of director, eve ryt hing wo uld hav egone smoothly with the Vidiwall. The plan hadbee n to com ple te all the filming and grap hicsneeded for the wall during January 1986, toensure that everything was in hand by the timerehearsals were due to start at the beginning ofFebruary. There would then have been sufficienttime for editing and programming to completethe presentation of the video material to berehearsed with those sections of the show whichneeded it.

Effectively the two mon th hiatus in pro duct ionat the start of 1986 scuppered any hopes of sucha leisurely schedule. Even when Trevor Nunnbegan rehearsals in March, his concerns withstaging, getting the best out of the cast, and evermore meetings about the increasing technicalproblems back in the theatre all combined to pushvid eo plans later and later. Rec ord ing s finally

ABOVE Murray Head and Tomm

Korberg as chess grandmasters

Trumper and Sergievsky.



began on 15 April, with the scheduled firstpreview just over two weeks away.

The schedule for recordings was to includemock newscasts and TV chess commentaries ineight different lang uages in order to conv ey theimpression of massive worldwide media interestin the Trumper/Sergievsky/Viigand matches inMerano and Bangkok. There were also to berecorded sequences of the last Sergievsky-

Viigand game to fill the screens during the'Endgame' sequence in Act 2, and a more romanticmontage of scenes from the past lives of Florenceand Svetlana as they reminisce about their happiertimes with Anatoly in 'I Know Him So Well'.

After two days working in a studio in Wand-sworth, the film crew flew to Innsbruck, thenceto go by road to Merano in Italy ( the spa no con-noisseur of spas would miss) to complete the record-ings. Producer Nick Maingay, directors DavidHillyer and Ken Warwick, a dozen film techniciansand cameramen and three actors would all play

their parts to bring back a whiff of the therapeuticair of Merano to the London stage. And not onlyM e r a n o — for the exoti c plants in the gr ou nd s ofthe Grand Hotel in Merano were also enlisted toprovide a setting for the Bangkok newscasts: andthe old town of Merano gave a fine location forSvetlana's flat in old Russia. The actors (StephenKlonis, Samantha Carr and Julie Dean) had beenselected to act as doubles for Tommy Korberg,Elaine Paige and Siobhan McCarthy for the 'IKnow Him So Well' sequences. To allow for per-formances in which understudies might take theseroles, or for future cast changes, their faces werene ve r to be seen in th e rec orde d mater ial - butwigs in the styles of McCa rt hy a nd Paige had be encreated to help make the appearance convincing.

The final pieces of material for the videos werat her differe nt. The re was a go od deal of archifilm (much from Movietone News) from the timof the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 and tHungarian uprising of 1956 and anything elwhich it was thought might contribute to convan impression of East-West confrontation. Lastlthere were the chess graphics, to show positionand results of the games being played during th

worl d champ ionshi p matc h scenes .on stagThese proved to be yet another infuriatingtedious technical problem.

Having installed an array of 64 video monitorit seemed reasonable to hope that fitting a cheposition to it, one square on each monitor, ougno t to be difficult. O n th e contrar y, it turn ed oto be a task demanding the ultimate precision. ThVidiwall computer can blow up a single imagto fill all 64 scree ns, but unle ss the d im ens ioare exactly calculated on the original imagnothing can be done to ensure that the lines divi

ing the chessboard squares would coincide withe boundaries round the edges of the monitorEven when preliminary calculations appeared corect, some stages of the editing and copying prcedures appeared to shrink or expand pictures anlose the intended effect On ly repeate d trbetween editing suites and the Vidiwall in ththeatre itself finally ensured an acceptable fit. Twhole operation had dragged on for day after daand was only satisfactorily completed in the earhours of the morning of 27 April with the firpreview three days away.

That Sunday morning saw the completion the first batch of edited material to be turned inlaser discs for the Vidiwall computer. Svideotapes were flown to Holland to be trancribed on to permanent laser discs. It was still onthe material for Act One of the show, but tpressures to produce something were urgent. Thcancellation of four previews then gave a sligbreathing space but only another week of anight editing sessions enabled all the material be prepared in time for the Act Two set of lasdiscs. Only when the discs arrived could the prgramming begin and allow Trevor Nunn to viethe fruits of the film team's labours on the Vidiwaitself. Sadly, man y of these fruits wer e soo n be declared sour.

The programming of the computer was onone ingredient which was to reduce the role the Vidiwall. Perhaps the main problem was iow n domina tin g impact whe nev er it was useWithin Trevor Nunn's tight direction of the actoand a musical score that ran unint err uptthroughout the whole show, the danger w



that the Vidiwall would distract from ratherthan enhance the action on stage. Hadall the material been prepared inJanuary as originally intended,the show could have beenbuilt round it, but nowmore often than not,the Vidiwall materialseemed obtrusive.

As each cut was made inthe Vidiwall material, moreprob lems wer e creat ed for the *programmer. T he cumbers ome ^syste m seem ed des ign ed onl y to pr og ra m *Vthe screens according to precisely definedstory-boards, with everything decidedadvance as to which pictures should appear onwhich screens at which moments. Even the smal-lest adaptations were liable to take hours of pro-gramming time even to try out.

The discs had arrived with a day to spare before

the postponed first preview on 5 May. An allnight session by programmer Alan Cox enabledonly a few minutes' worth of material to be shownduring the performance in the evening. And thatwas only after a desperate last hour beforecurtain-up spent recovering a day's work of com-puter files which the machin e had mal evo len tlytried to delete from its memory. (Fortunately

Trevor Nunn was too busy with other techni-cal problems during this hour to have any

time to learn of this additional panic).Programming of the Vidiwall

computer continued throughoutthe preview period until the

morning of the firstnight. Each evening's

audience saw a different* sho w on the 128 screens. But

^ as fast as furt her materi al wa s^ being progr am med in at one end,other sections were being cut by the

^ director or othe rwise ame nde d becausethey did not have the desired effect.

By the time the programming had to stop,there were no videos to accompany 'Endgame'or 'I Know Him So Well', and most of the news-caster sequences had also been dropped. Therewas simply no room in the show for the magnifi-cent cacophany of commentaries in eight langu-ages. But what remained on the Vidiwall stillcreates a breat htaki ng impact on the audience.The gods of technology had accepted our sacrifi-ces; their earthly prophets stopped bemusing usall with tales of problems with the RS-232, theI-triple E and the matrix switcher; and the finalresult was visually stunning.

It's not the pieces you sacrifice that matter, it's the effective-ness of the ones left on the board.



E N D G A M ET E C H N I Q U E

Russian control of chess has reached a point where there can be no honest

competition for the WorldChampionship.

Bobby Fischer, 2962

R O B E R T J A M E S F I S C H E R ,B O R N 1 9 4 3

United States Champion at 14Grandmaster at 15

World Champ ion 1 Septe mber 1972Retired from active play 2 September 1972

Lost title by default 1975

VERY LITTLE ha d g o ne ri gh t si nce re hea rsa ls ha dfirst tried to mo ve into the theatre. Amo ng othermisadventures, Trevor Nunn had torn a calf mus-cle when clambering on to the stage at the PrinceEdward and spent the second half of April limpingpainfully through his long days. A physiothera-pist was added to the ent oura ge of CH ES S,ready to give a healing massage to the director'sleg whenever Trevor Nunn could spare it for ten

minutes. During such moments, as at any othertime when the director allowed himself to sit still,a queue of people with problems always built upquickly, demanding his attention.

On Monday 5 April, the delayed first previewfinally arrived. The dress rehearsal had struggledthrough most of the show: the stage had clunkedand jerked its changes of orientation and incline,instead of gliding smoothly; props had crashedto the floor; an unwanted image had remainedfor two minutes on the Vidiwall while its oper-ators went through the cumbersome procedure

required to turn it off; the radio mikes gave thesound men unending problems. Then, just a fewminutes before the end of the show, after singinghis triumphant 'Endgame' song, Tommy Korbergleft the stage and collapsed.

Throughout rehearsals, Tommy had estab-lished himself as a marvellously professionalsinger/actor. Perhaps of all the performers in theshow he had always seemed the least likely toforget his lines or to give anything less than fullcommitment to a performance. Now, with the firstpublic performance only a couple of hours away,he was being taken to hospital in an ambulance.A combin atio n of over-e xerti on and a bad reac-tion to some medical treatment he had receivedat lunchtime had caused him to faint after the addi-tional efforts of the dress rehearsal.

As concern for Tommy mounted and news wasawaited from the hospital, a series of urgent meet-ings took place. Though totally unrehearsed inthe role, Leo Andrew, Tommy Korberg's under-study, was prepared to play the part of Sergievskyif necessary. As Bjorn and Benny went to seeTommy in hospital, Trevor Nunn, Tim Rice andRobert Fox discussed the unpalatable choicebetween cancelling yet another performance orgoing on stage with a cast which had already hadmore than its fair share of problems now havingthe added element of an insufficiently preparedunderstudy.

The show, of course, had to go on. But at 7.30,half an hour before curtain up, it was still notknown who would play the part of Sergievsky.Wh en T om my h ad been carried off, it seemedinconceivable that he could be fit again within a



few hours. Yet news from the hospital had notruled out the possibility. At 7.45, Bjorn and Bennycame back to the theatre with Tommy, amazingly,ready to perform. It was the first piece of goodnews that the show had heard for a long time.

At eight o'clock, the curtain went up for thefirst time to a full theatre. Hundreds of theaudience had come from Sweden, determined tobe the first to see this ne w page in the A B B A

history. The stage still gave the occasional clunk;there were still a few sound problems; but overall,the whole performance was remarkably smoothand relatively trouble-free.

Tommy Korberg, despite his ordeal of the earlyevening, gave a fine performance. Nobody in theaudience who had not known of the problems ofthe past few hours could have suspected that any-thing had been wrong at all.

When the curtain went down just after 11.15,the show had been outstandingly better thanmany had believed possible after seeing the dressrehearsal. The audience, Swedes and non-Swedes,had clearly enjoyed it, though the unexpectedlength of the performance had resulted in a few

42



AR LEFT Elaine Paige.

EFT (TOP AND BOTT OM) The romantic

ot develops between Paige and

orberg.

ENTRE Tom Jobe as the Arbiter.

ELOW If you want to get a Head . . .

people leaving before the end. It was a reliefto hear that their complaintsdirected against train timetablesThey were by no means dis-satisfied with the show. Themain emotio n a mongthe cast and cre w was ^one of pr of ou nd relief. ^Despite all the problems,

the first major hurdle hadbeen surmounted. All sightswere now set on the first nightitself, still nine days away, but thereremained a great deal of work to be done.

The period of previews for a show ought,in an ideal world, to be an opportunity for finetuning and minor technical changes, sharpeningup the production to a state of perfection on thefirst night. The strategy should be like that of achess endgame, where only a few pieces remainon the board, the finish is in sight and all becomes

a question of absolute precision and the smallestfineness of calculation. On t he C H E S S chess-board, however, there were still cruder problemsto be tackled. When Murray Head pushed

^ To mm y Korb erg against the board during* 4 a a the ir 1 fight, the pieces wer e liable

bounce down the tilted stage and enup in the orchestra pit. The first tas

during these prev iews was simplto find a way of ensurin

that the position woulhold together - the pre

0> cisi on an d fine t un in

^ wou ld hav e to wait.The little problem of ches

^ pieces in the orche stra pit, incidence tally, nev er was prop erl y solved. Des

pite using a specially constructemagnetised board to encourage the chessmen

not t o fall off, the Hea d-K orb erg fights werealways liable to send a few pieces bouncingamong the musicians. The intrepid musical director, John Owen Edwards, even bravely conductedon during one preview when all the chessmen andthe chess clock hurtled about his head after tum-

bling from the stage. For a man who had just hadto cope with the disaster of someone spilling coffeeon the synthesiser, an unprovoked assault by afull chess set and clock was all in the day's work.

Victory was at last in sight, but the attack was runningout of time.

43



T H EF I N A L AT TA C K

((Apart from his marvellous works ofchess art, Fischer also introduced into the

chess world such commotion and confusionthat suddenly diplomats, orators and

lawyers became required.

A. Karpov, Ch es s Is My Life, 1980

A N A T O L Y Y E V G E N Y E V I C HK A R P O V , B O R N 1 9 5 1

Cool, taciturn, diplomaticStamp collector and gran dmas ter

World Cham pion 1975-85Probably the first chess millionaire

'WHAT IS the derivation of the word "jinx"?'Trevor Nunn was taking the latest setback withhis usual self-control. Previews had been runningfor a week, each time a little better than the onebefore. It was Saturday morning and two per-formances were scheduled that day. Trevor had

ju st bee n gi ven th e news th at Doug Harr y ha dbeen taken to hospital in the early hours of themorning with a collapsed lung. Doug was the

only man could operate the complex hydraulicswhich moved the stage. In the frantic days afterthe stage computer had been abandoned, therehad been no time for anyone else to learn the job.And most of the scene changes were totallydependent on the stage revolve.

Once again, everyone waited for hospital bull-etins. The good news was that he was not indanger; the bad news was that the hospital wan-ted to keep him in for twenty-four hours' observa-tion. Robert Fox had already likened the task ofproducing a musical to running a major military

campaign. Now once again the whole show founditself relying on the sense of duty of a woundedman. Despite the fears of colleagues and director,Do ug dec lared himself fit, pro mis ed to take thi ngseasy, discharged himself from hospital and tookcharge of the stage operation as usual for bothSaturday performances.

That was to be the last of the major panicswhich threatened to throw preparations com-pletely off balance. But there was still much tobe done in the few days which remained beforethe first night. The audiences were still not enjoy-

ing the show quite as much as they ought to havebeen. The applause was still appreciative ratherthan ecstatic.

Throughout all the months of problems: thechange of director, recalcitrant computers and all,ticket sales had been unaffected. The public clearlyexpected a great show. Advance bookings total-led more than £2 million, enough to fill thetheatre for almost six months. Finally capitalisedat £4 million, the London production was attract-ing more potential investors than it could accom-modate. With people queueing in such numbersto buy tickets or to risk capital in the show's suc-cess, something more than appreciative applauseshould have been coming from the audience.

Trevor Nunn was clearly worried by their reac-tion. Something was not right, but he could notdiagnose the problem with any certainty. Never-theless, during the first week of previews, nodrastic changes had been made. Several minuteshad been cut, partly to tighten up some dull sec-tions, but more because three and a quarter hourswas far too long, particularly for a show which

The principal CHESS pieces in Endgame scenes: John Turner, Jobe, Kevin Colson, Elaine Paig Murray Head and Siobhan

McCarthy.

C H A P T E R 1 2



rberg, Siobhan McCarthy,

ge and Murray Head as

ers and their mates.

started at 8 p.m. The sound problems too hadlargely been solved during the previews. Bjornand Benny had often been seen helping out inthe sound booth and the right balance wasachieved between vocal and instrumental sound.Now the words could be heard above the orches-tra without the music fading too much into thebackground. (One performance, which had giventhe singers too great a prominence over a mutedband, left Bjorn and Benny bemoaning the lossof their glorious sound: 'This is meant to be amusical, not an underscored play!')

Despite these improvements, the audiencewere still leaving in less than rapture. Until theinterval, the show always went well. When thecurtain rose on Theoni Aldredge's magnificentstone and ivory chesspiece costumes, the reactionwas exactly the stunned admiration expected.They laughed at the jokes during 'Merano', theyapplauded the chill intensity of 'Pity the Child',they giggled at the British bureaucrats, they

cheered Tommy Korberg's 'Anthem'. But thesecond act just was not working.

Each afternoon of the preview period, Tim,Bjorn, Benny and Trevor held councils of war todecide on the changes to be made. It was clearthat many of the audience had not been able to

follow all the twists and turns of the plot, particu-larly during the second act, 'The Deal' sequence,when everyone is trying to manipulate everyoneelse for his or her own purposes. Both there andin other obscure places, extra lines of dialoguewere added, or existing lines re-written in orderto explain things better. Only in the last 48 hours,however, were the changes made which broughtabout a real change to the audience's appreciationof the show.

The Great Re-Write began on the afternoonof Monday 12 May. That was the only time, rightat the end of a highly stressful and exhaustingten weeks, when Trevor Nunn showed any signof losing his composure or raising his voice toa mezzoforte. The object of his displeasure wasnot a member of the cast, nor one of the crew.It was not even a computer (though there weretimes when the director must have been temptedto take an axe to one of these brutes). What reallyhad the power to irritate Trevor Nunn was a

security officer with two sniffer dogs who hadcome to check the theatre before a royal charityperformance. Through no fault of his own, he hadarrived at a particularly tense moment in rehearsalwhen the cast were looking less then enthusiasticabout yet another change in dialogue and staging.Just as things were beginning to grow worryingand needed some urgent sorting out, in came thesecurity man demanding that the theatre becleared, stage and orchestra pit too, so that hisdogs could have a good sniff.

Trevor's attempts to plead to be allowed to

continue with his rehearsal met with stonyinsistence. His arguments that the Princess wouldnot be coming up on the stage seemed to enragethe security man. 'If the Princess wants to go onto the stage, you can't stop her!' The dialoguedeveloped into an open row, until the securityman laid down the law. 'I've made my decision.You must clear this cinema.' Trevor tried toexplain that it was a theatre not a cinema, butrehearsals had to stop.

So it was Tuesday 13 May when the final ver-sion of the show was eventually put together. The

last half-hour of the show was to be completelyre-structured in order to ensure that it ended ona climax rather than, as before, trickling to a finishafter three or four false endings which had hadthe audience prematurely reaching for their coats.

The original concept of 'I Know Him So Well'was completely sacrificed. Far from being a songfor two women separately singing their feelingsabout the same man, the new version had themmeeting face to face apparently discussing (withcommendable lack of hostility to one another)

45



what was best for the future of the man theyboth loved.

The motives of Anatoly in thisdrama were also changed. Hisreasons for returning to Russia at the end had orig-inally been dominatedby selfi shness and disil- ^lusionment. Now they wereto be more dictated by asense of loyalty to his family.

Just as Tommy Korberg's'Anthem' had provided such a 3 i m u . 6 ,finale to Act 1, th e sam e so ng wa s n o w *Vto be brought back at the very end of theshow, but sung by Elaine Paige.

All these changes were instigated by TrevorNu nn himself. It was hard to find any one wh oagreed with him. The actors seemed not to likethe new lines being put into their mouths. TimRice thought that all the above changes detractedfrom the message of the whole piece. In the orig-inal version the theme of political and economiccorruption spread throughout the whole story,finally afflicting eve n the noble Sergie vsky. Th enew ending was too optimistic and he did notlike it. But having given Trevor Nunn the respon-sibility for directing, he was not going to inter-fere. Tim sat th ro ug ho ut the rehearsal on 13 May ,letting the director get on with his job, while him-self looking rather pained at the way things weregoing. 'We can try it Trevor's way this evening.If it doesn't work we can always go back to the

old version.'They tried it Trevor's way at the evening per-

formance. And it worked. The audience at theend went wild with joy, standing ovation

and all. On this the very last preview,suddenly everything had gone right,

^ r Nob ody qui te unders tood whatTrevor Nunn's magic

y i ^ ing red ien t had been , buthe had transformed the

^ sh ow in a wa y tha t 24

hours earlier had^ not seem ed possible.

^ Th e final adj ust me nt to the sh owf ^ was some thi ng Tre vor did only with

the utmost reluctance. Right at the end,after Elaine Paige's 'Anthem', and after the

standing ovation, the cast had taken their placeson the che ssbo ard st age to put the final tou ch tothe geometry of the show by repeating the open-ing lines:

'Each game of chess

Means there's one lessVariation left to be played.

Each day got through Means one or two Less mistakes remain to be made.'

Elegant, theatr ically effect ive, a rem ind er of theformal start to the whole show, it gave a finestructure to the proceedings. And it killed theapplause stone dead. Shaking his head regretfully,Trevor Nunn cut this piece of action, saying,'I nev er belie ved I wo ul d see myself doin g this.'But the audience clearly wanted the opportunity

to applaud and the director felt obliged to let themdo so, even at the expense of his geometry.

Another couple of moves and the game will he won.

46



C I I A P T F. R If

C H E C K M A T E

((The chess world is going through hardtimes; a battle is taking place for the purity

of the ideals of chess. ))

G. Kasparov, 1985

G A R R Y K I M O V I C H K A S P A R O V ,B O R N 1 9 6 3

USSR under-18 Champion at age 12World Junior Champion and Grandmaster at age 17

World Champion in 1985At 22 years of age, the youngest ever

AFTER THE last prev iew , smiles at last bega n tobreak out on the faces of all those who had beenworking so hard for so long. Besides the forty-four cast members and the twenty-seven in theband, there were twenty-three stage hands, six-teen lighting and sound engineers, a wardrobedepartment of seventeen, four people in the wigsdepartment and by the time we have added othertechnicians, produc tio n staff, man age men t and

bo x office the size of the army has moun te d toaround 150 people. And they all lookedexhausted but happy in the knowledge that theshow was at last heading in the right direction.

What little time remained before the first nightperformance was not meant to be wasted. At lastthe fine tuning could begin. The morning of 14May was allocated for technical rehearsals ofscene changes and Vidiwall. The computersstaged their last act of defiance and again nothingwas accomplished before lunchtime. The after-noon was better spent as Trevor Nunn had a long

session with the principals in one room of thetheatre, leaving the stage for Moll y Moll oy toput the final touches to the choreography of theBangkok numbers. At around five o'clock therehearsals finally stopped, leaving just two hoursfor everyone to prepare themselves for the firstnight performance.

The culmination of five years of effort had tobe a very special occasion. The Prince Edwardtheatre that evening, and the Belvedere restaurantin Holland Park after the show, must have beenthe largest exclusive party of the year. Even the

press photographers at the theatre seemed over-whelmed at the number of stars rushing pastthem. One was heard replacing his lens cap dis-gustedly and complaining, 'What a cock-up. AllI got was a bird from Abba.' Whose picture hewas trying to catch remains a mystery. It couldhave been Samantha Fox or Sarah Brightman orPamela Stephenson. Or he might have been chas-ing David Gower, Rod Stewart, Michael Parkin-son or Billy Connolly. They were all at the showwith a host of other famous names.

The party at the Belvedere began as an intimate

sit-down dinner for six hundred close personalfrie nds and relat ions of the comp oser s, lyricist andstars. After the food had been eaten, a fresh influx— t he second e leven — of gue sts kep t the r evelriesgoing well into the following morning. And allnight the champagne flowed freely.

Some had labelled CHESS the musicalextravagant . Compared with CHESS the party,it looked rather modest. And all the time the partycontinued, the newspapers were preparing their

, mor nin g edi tion s with t he first of the revie ws.

47



They were to greet the new show with mixedacclaim, taken as a whole, though all shades ofopinion could be found reflected in the writingsof the various reviewers.

The quality press was about equally dividedon the merits of CHESS. The Daily Telegraphcalled it 'gift-wrapped and gorgeous'. The Timeswas even more more enthusiastic: 'A fine pieceof work that shows the dinosaur mega-musical

evolving into an intelligent form of life'. TheFinancial Times and the Guardian did not ent hus e:'Extremely theatrical but, paradoxically, lacks atrue sense of theatre'; 'Little connection withobservable reality or dramatic sense'. Perha ps thatlast comment might also be an apt description ofthe last fifteen years of the real life world chesschampionship.

The general tone of the other reviews, varyingas they did from 'the catchiest new score I'veheard in years' to 'shallow, improbable storymasquerading as a serious musical', averaged out

as the description in Today: 'Nearly a majortriumph'.

There was less disagreement about the highquality of the performers' contributions: ElainePaige ('fantastic', 'vocally blazing', 'glorious tohear'), Tommy Korberg ('outstanding', 'thrillingrecruit to musical theatre'), Murray Head ('realtalent', 'star quality'), John Turner ('dominates thestage whenever he is on') and indeed everyprincipal performer and every aspect of the pro-duction attracted outstanding praise in somereview or other.

Whatever the reservation of the critics, the firstnight audience had applauded the show withgenuine joy rather than just a statutory standingovation. And after the first night the theatre con-tinued to echo with the applause of delightedaudiences at every performance. After a periodto recover from their exertions, Tim Rice, BjornUlvaeus, Benny Andersson, Trevor Nunn and theothers involved at the highest levels of the pro-duction of CHESS will begin to turn theirthoughts to staging the show on Broadway, orStockholm, or perhaps first in Australia where Timcould catch up on his cricket watching. The les-sons from the London production will doubtlessresult in some changes which may eventually findtheir way back to the Prince Edward theatre.

The first game of CHESS, after a hard strug-gle, had ended in victory. It was time to lookforward to future battles.

For any chessplayers reading' this book, an expla-nation may now be given of the sequence of chesspositions at the end of each chapter. They may

48



all be considered as snapsh ots of de vel opin gstages of the same game. It might wellhave been the last game of theSergievsky-Viigand match inBangkok. The moves, inalgebraic chess notation,are as fol low s: ^

Whi te: Sergievsky ^

Black: Viigand

1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 e6 t*3 d4 cxd4 4 N x d 4 N f 65 Bd3 d6 6 c4 g67 Nc3 Bg7 8 Be3 0-09 f3 Nbd7 10 Qc2 Nc5

11 0-0-0 e5 12 Nde2 Qa513 Kbl Ne6 14 Qa4 Qc715 Rcl Qd8 16 Bc2 Ne817 h4 a6 18 Nd5 b519 cxb5 Bd7 20 Qa3 axb521

Qd3 Nc522

Qd2 Ra623 Nec3 Nc7 24 Nb4 Rb625 Bdl N7e6 26 Nbd5 Rb72 7 Be2 Qa5 28 Bh6b429 Ne7+ Kh8 30 Bxg7+ Kxg731 Ncd5 Bb5 32 h5 Ra733 Qh6+ Kxh6 34 hx g6 + Kg535 Rh5 + Kxh5 36 f 4 + Bxe237 Nf6+ Kh6 38 Rh l + Kg739 Ne8+ Rxe8 4 0 Rxh7+ Kf64 1 Rxf7 mate.

involved the choreography of a chess gamas part of the plot. All the actors a

singers would turn into chess piecwhile plotting their deals - and

was necessary for the whqueen to make seve

moves near the front * st age (mo ves 14, 20,

& 22 above ).

^ The gam e remaine d useuntil an additional scene came

^ be writ ten with Freddie Trum poffering to help Sergievsky in the Ban

^ kok templ e. He has spo tte d som eth ing Viigand's King's Indian Defence (One of

lines he keeps playing doesn't completely make sense).But the game above is in the opening known the Sicilian Defence. (And Sicilian has too mansibilants to sound good when sung). So here the definitive version of the last SergievskViigand match game in Bangkok:

White: SergievskyBlack: Viigand

That game might have been Sergievsky's brilliant

last win, but for a change of plot and dia-logue. The whol e gam e was inven ted at an ^early stage of the story of C H E S S when 3Michae l Benn ett had an idea whic h ^

13579

11

13151719

d4 Nf6Nc3 Bg7f3 0-0Bd3 a6Qd2 e5Nxd5 Nc5cxb5 axb5Nb4 Rb7Bh6 Nd7Nc3 Bd7

21

2325

c4 g6c4 d6Bg5 c6Nge2 Nbd7d5 cxd50-0-0 b5Kb I Rb8Rcl Ne6h4 Ndc5

2468

10121416182 0 Be2 Qa5

As long as you reach a winning

position, it does not matter how you

arrived there.

Nbd5 b4Bxg7+ Kxg7h5 Ra727 hxg6+ Kg529 f 4 + Bxe23 1 R h l + Kg 733 Rxh7+ Kf6

22

24Ne7+ Kh8Ned5 Bb5

26 Qh 6 + Kxh628 Rh5 + Kxh530 Nf6+ Kh632 Ne8+ Rxe834 Rxf7 mate.

First-nighters enjoying the show even

more than the reviewers.

49



S E C T I O N T W O

C H E S ST H E S O N G S



I The invention of chess

Each game of chess means there's one lessVariation left to be playedEach day got through means one or twoLess mistakes remain to be made

Not much is known

Of early days of chess beyond a fairly vaguereportThat fifteen hundred years ago two princes

foughtThough brothers, for a Hind u throne

Their mother criedFor no-one really likes their offspring

fighting to the de athShe begged them stop the slaughter with her

every breathBut sure enough one brother died

Sad beyond belief

She told her winning sonYou have caused such griefI can't forgive this evil thing you'v e don e

He tried to explainHow things had really beenBut he tried in vainNo words of his could mollify the queen

And so he asked the wisest men he knewThe way to lessen her distressThey told him he'd be pretty certain to

impressBy using model soldiers onA chequered board to show it was his

brother's faultThey thus invented chess



THE PROLOGUE

II The early history of chess

Chess displayed no inertiaSoon spread to Persia, then westNext the Arabs refined it,thus redesigned, it progressedStill further yet

And when Constantinople fell in 1453One would have noticed every other refugeeIncluded in his bags a set

Once in the handsAnd in the minds of leading figures of

the RenaissanceThe spirit and the speed of chess made swift

advanceThrough all of Europe's vital lands

Where we must recordThe game was further changedRight across the boardThe western touch upon the pieces ranged

King and queen and rookAnd bishop, knight and pawnAll took on the look

We know today, the modern game was born

With such successWe see a game that started by mistake in

HindustanAnd boosted in the main by what is now IranReach every corner of the globe with nationSquaring up to nation to determine, no holds

barred,

Who owns, who made, who will paradeThe champion of chess



A match for the World ChessChampionship has been announced forthe city ofMerano in Italy. The citizensand mayor ofMerano are ready togreet the arrival of the Americanchampion, Freddie Trumper, in fullcivic splendour.

C I T I Z E N S

0 light the heartThat lingers in MeranoMerano! The spa noConnoisseur of spas would missSo healthyHighly recommendedIs this sweet metropolisMental and physical bliss!

The gods have smiledAnd bless-ed is MeranoMerano! There are noFitter burghers to be foundSuch vigour!Take the time to taste usWe'll give you a welcome that's typically

TirolFor then we are sure of our groundRight now we're Italian — we used to be

GermanThe border keeps shifting around

M AY O R

Speaking as one of the patriac hs1 don 't mind ta king your lira or mar ks

C I T I Z E N SOh I get high when I saunter by the

mountain of MeranoRosy-cheeked MeranoFlourishing to a faultThe sparkling streams, the bracing airThe therapeutic saltI'd have to be carried away to call a halt!

Oh I feel great in this bounding stateO hail to thee MeranoHearty hale MeranoAny objections? Nein!Where breathing in will turn you onWhere water tastes like wineGet out your get up and go and get in lineIt's living your life in a show by Rodgers &

Hammerstein!

O sad the soulWho passes by MeranoMerano! So far noSoul has ever passed us byThey love usWhy not stay forever?Oh so many reasons why

All those in favour say "Aye "Aye!

So sing our songLet's hear it for MeranoMerano! SopranoAlto, tenor, bass agreeWe're wholesomeWhat a happy havenThis is a place where your arteries softenCholesterol hasn't a chanceFrom mountain to valley the natural

goodnessIs fighting pollution's advance

M AY O R

So come to us and feel the forceAll major credit cards take n of course

MERANO



Freddie arrives and snubs the awaitingreception committee, leavinghandshakes and apologies to be madeby his second, Florence Vassy, andother members of his delegation. Hisbehaviour is a calculated attempt toraise interest and ensure that there is

Standing Room Only at the match.

What a scene! What a joy!What a lovely sightWhen my game is the big sensation!Has the mob's sporting tasteAltered overnight?Have they found new sophistication?

Not yet! They just want to seeIf the nice guy beat s the bu mIf it's East-WestAnd the money's sky-highThey all come

You can raise all you wantIf you raise the roofScream and shout and the gate increasesBreak the ru les — break th e bankI'm the living proofThey don't care how I move my pieces

I know I'm the best there isBut all they want is a showWell tha t' s all right — I'll be glad to obligeS.R.O. S.R.O.

T R U M P E R ' S A R R I VA L



T H E C R A Z Y W H E E L

We are now in the Russian camp ofchallenger Anatoly Sergievsky, wherethey have been discussing the latestoutburst by Freddie Trumper at a pressconference. The sinister KGB man,

Molokov, has explained his ideas foroff-the-board tactics. Anatoly prefersto play chess and escape from the

pressures of politics and his so-called friends.

Who needs a dream?Who needs ambition?Who'd be the foolIn my position?Once I had dreamsNow they're obsessionsHopes became needsLovers possessions

Then they move inOh so discreetlySlowly at firstSmiling too sweetlyI opened doorsThey walked right through themCalled me their friendI hardly knew them

Now I'm where I want to be and who I wantto be and d oing wha t I always said I woul dand yet I feel I haven't won at all

Runni ng for my life and never look ing backin case there's someone right behind to

shoot me down and say he always knew I'dfall

When the crazy wheel slows downWhere will I be? Back where I started

Don't get me wrongI'm not complainingTimes have been goodFast, entertainingBut what's the pointIf I'm concealingNot only loveAll other feeling

Now I'm where I want to be . . . etc.



THE US VERSUS USSR

Russian and American delegates meet inthe Arbiter's Chambers for friendlydiscussions — but the undertones oftheir veneer of sportsmanship are farfrom friendly.

It's the US versus USSR

Yet we more or less are—No-one can deny that these are difficult

times

— to our credit putting all that asideWe have swallowed our pride

These are very dangerous and difficult times

It really doesn't matter who comes out on topWho gets the chopNo-one's way of life is threat ene d by a flop

But we're gonna smash their bastardMake him wanna change his name

Take him to the cleaners and devastate himWipe him out, humiliate himWe don't want the whole world sayingThey can't even win a gameWe have never reckone dOn coming secondThere's no use in losing

It's the red flag up aga inst stars and stripes

But we're peace-loving types

No-one can deny that these are difficulttimes . . .

It's a sweet hail-fellow-well-met affairFor both eagle and bear

These are very dangerous and difficult times

To those that say that this is not a friendlyclash

Don't be so rash!I assure you comrades that is balderdash

What a load of whingeing peasants!Thinking they can win — they can't!What an exhibition of self-delusionThis one's a foregone conclusionBut enough of all this beatingRound the bushes of detenteWe intend to collarThe Yankee dollarWe shall trash themThrash them

The value of events like this need not bestressed

When East and WestCan meet as brothers, ease the tension over

drinksThrough sporting linksAs long as your man sinks



THE ARBITER'S SONG

T/ze rules of the match are clear: the firstman to win six games will be declaredthe new world champion; drawn gameswill not count. Now the Arbiter assertshis authority.

I've a duty as the referee

At the start of the matchOn behalf of all our sponsorsI must welcome youWhich I do — there's a catch

I don't care if you're a championNo-one messes with meI am ruthless in upholdingWhat I know is rightBlack or whi te — as you'll see

I'm on the caseCan't be fooledAny objectionIs overruledYes I'm the Arbiter and I know best

From square one I'll be watching all 64

If you're thinking of the kind of thingThat we've seen in the pastChanting gurus, walkie-talkiesWalkouts, hypnotists,Tempers, fists—not so fast

This is not the start of World War ThreeNo political ploysI think both y our con stitution s are terrific soNow you know — be good boys

As you settle down behind your pawnsPower passes to meYou may play like Fischer, Capablanca Tal

combinedI don't mind

Please feel freeThey all thought they were the big fromageBut they don't have my cloutI control the matc h, I start it, I can call it offKasparov found that out.

He's impartial, don't push him he'sunimpressed

You got your tricksGood for youBut there's no gambitI don't see throughOh I'm the Arbiter I know the score



T H E M E R C H A N D I S E R S

No sooner have the players and officialsdeclared their dedication to the pureand noble spirit of the game of chess,than the stage is taken over by themarketing men determined to make a

financial killing by exploiting the match.

Whether you are pro or antiOr could not care lessWe are here to tell youWe are here to sell you chessNot a chance of you escaping from our wilesWe've locked the doors, we've blocked the

aislesWe've a franchise worth exploitingAnd we will — yes we will!When it comes to merchandisingWe could kill

When you get up —When you get up in the morningTill you crash at nightYou will have to live your lifeWith bishop, rook and knightClean your teeth with chequered toothpasteWear our vestsOur kings and queens on bouncing breastsYou could even buy a setAnd learn to playWe don' t mind we'll sell you some thin gAnyway

We've done all our market researchAnd our findings showThat this game of chess could be a rou ndA month or soMaybe it's a bit confu singFor a gameBut Rubik's Cubes were much the sameIn the end the whole world bought oneAll were goneBy which time we merchandisersHad moved on

By which time we had moved



Q U A RT E T

The match begins and Freddie wins twogames quickly. The next game, however,ends in uproar after the players,irritated by each other's disturbingmannerisms, and even a kick under thetable, come to blows and upset theboard. Freddie storms out, leavingFlorence, Molokov and the Arbiter tosort out the mess with Anatoly.

M O L O K O V

We wish, no must, make our disgustAt this abuse per fectly clearWe're here for chess — are the US?If so, why foul the atmosphere?

F O R E N C E

I mus t prote st — our dele gation h as a host ofvalid points to raise,

Our player's sporting attitude's beyond all

praiseAs any neutral would attestBut we concedeThe fact his master s bend the rules is not a

player's faultWe'll overlook their crude political assaultAnd under protest will proceed

M O L O K O V A R B I T E R

If your man's sosweet

Then why hisfighting talk?

If he's not a cheat

Then why on earthDid he go take awalk?

Why let him loose?He'll soon reduceThis great eventTo a brawl

It's very sadTo see the ancient

andDistinguished

game

That used to be

I call this tuneNo-one's immuneTo my pow erIn this hall

F L O R E N C E

I am not surprisedHe want ed fre sher airOnce he realisedThere was no hopeOf your lot playing

fair

How sad to see

What used to beM O L O K O V & F L O R E N C E

A model of decorum and tranquilityBecome like any other sportA battl egrou nd for rival ideologiesTo slug it out with glefe

A N A T O L Y M O L O K O V

Through theelegant yelling

DisputeComes the ghastly

suspicion

We wish, no mustMake our disgustAt this abuse

perfectly clearWe're here for chess

My opposition'sA fruit

F L O R E N C E

I don't supposeYou understand

the strain andpressure gettingwhere he's got

For then you'dsimply call himhighly-strung andif not

Imply that he wasone of those

— are the US?If so why foul the

atmosphere?A R B I T E R

I must insistThat you desistIf you valueYour livelihood



A N A T O L Y M O L O K O V A N A T O L Y

But how can youWork for one whoTreats you like

dirt?Pay must be good

A R B I T E R

F L O R E N C E

I'm not getting richMy only interestIs in something

whichGives me the

chanceOf working with

the best

It seems to usThere's little point

in waiting he re allnightfor his return

And since apeaceful matchas our soleconcern

We won't make anofficial fuss

In short we riseAbove your guy'sTantrums, dramas,Dirty tricks

I can only sayI hop e your dr eam

comes true

Till that far-off dayI hope you copeWith helping

number two

Get this straight, IWill not stand byWhile you play at

Politics

A N AT O L Y, F L O R E N C E , A R B I T E R &M O L O K O V ( T O G E T H E R )

A model of decorum and tranquillityBecome like any other sportA battleground for rival ideologiesTo slug it out with glee



N O B O D Y ' S S I D E

Florence has arranged a meeting with Anatoly in a mountainside inn. Freddiehas also not been idle, but hasnegotiated improved financialconditions for a resumption of play. Heis annoyea that Florence, a former

Hungarian, is doing business with the

Russians. The two row and Freddieleaves Florence alone to review theirrelationship.

What's going on around meIs barely making sens eI need some explanations fastI see my present partnerIn the imperfect tenseAnd I don't see how we can lastI feel I need a change of castMaybe I'm on nobody's side

And when he gives me reasonsTo justify each moveThey're getting harder to believeI know this can't continueI've still a lot to proveBut I don 't have th e nerve to leave

Everybody's playing the gameBut nobody's rules are the sameNobody's on nobody's sideBetter learn to go it aloneRecognize you're out on your own

Nobody's on nobody's side

The one I should not think ofKeeps rolling through my mindAnd I don't want to let that goNo lovers ever faithfulNo contract truly signedThere's nothing certain left to knowAnd how the cracks begin to show!Never make a promise or planTake a little love where you canNobody's on nobody's sideNever stay too long in your bedNever lose your heart use your headNobody's on nobody's side

Never take a stranger's adviceNever let a friend fool you twiceNobody's on nobody's sideNever be the first to believeNever be the last to deceive

Nobody's on nobody's sideAnd never leave a moment too soonNever waste a hot afternoonNobody's on nobody's sideNever stay a minute too longDon't forget the best will go wrongNobody's on nobody's side

Better learn to go it aloneRecognize you're out on your ownNobody's on nobody's side



M O U N TA I N S I D E D U E T

Florence and Anatoly meet at the inn.For some time they both wait forFreddie, not speaking to each other. Inhis continuing absence they finallytalk, admit their attraction for eachother, and end in an embrace. Themood is broken by Freddie's entrance;

he accuses Florence of plotting withthe very country which deprived her ofher father in Hungary in 1956

F L O R E N C E

This is the one situationI wanted most to avoidNothing I say will convince him it

isn't a trick

A N AT O LY

A walk on a clear moonlit night — I relax, shesmiles

There's something peculiar going onF L O R E N C E

So, through my own stupid fault I'm stuckhere to carry the can

Embarrassed, deserted, maroonedA N AT O LY

Now she can't be working for them — I meanus —

She seems so very straightforward — butwhere is he?

F L O R E N C E

He has to turn up — it's not just the money— perh ap s it is!

A N AT O LY

Maybe he's scared — just as scared as he wasin the game

F L O R E N C E

Oh I just couldn't care lessHe can go right ahead, go and wreck his

career,I know I've done my bestA N AT O LY

Well at least she's a good-looking spyF L O R E N C E

What if our Russian friend thinks that myplans

Have nothing to do with the chess?If I don't say something and soonHe'll go — Nobody's on nobody's side!

A N A T O L Y

Listen, I hate to break up the moodGet to the point, begin the beguineHaven't you noticed we are one character

shortIn this idyllic, well-produced scene?



F L O R E N C E F L O R E N C E & A N A T O L Y

He couldn't wait to join you up hereMaybe he walked, cable-cars scare himA N A T O L Y

Never mind him — I haven't missed him sofar

F L O R E N C E

Maybe it won't do any harmTo struggle on without his charmA N AT O LY

Funny how all at once I feel that he can go ju mp off th e mo un ta in I wo n't care

F L O R E N C E

This is the one situation I wanted most toavoidA N AT O LY

My dear opp one nt — I really can't imaginewhy

F L O R E N C E

So I am not dangerous then? — what ashame!

A N AT O LY .

Oh you're not dan ger ous — wh o could thinkthat of you?

You — you are so strange — why can't youbewhat you ought to be?

You should be scheming, intriguing, tooclever by half —

T H E R U S S I A N

I have to hand it to youFor you've managed to make me forget why I

ever agreed to this farceF L O R E N C E & A N A T O LY

I don't know why I can't think of anythingI would rather doThan be wasting my time on mountains with

youF R E D E R I C K

Who'd ever think it?Such a very pretty settingTell me what's the bettingVery pretty plotting too?No ma tter — I've done all your wor k for youWho'd ever guess it?Daughter in collaborationWith the very nationGave the father third degree!Where's daddy? Dead or in the KGB?



mim



The match between Trumper andSergievsky is resumed but the Americangoes quickly downhill. Five-two downand with a hopeless position in anunfinished game, he is on the verge oflosing his title. To add to his troubles,Florence finally deserts him. Left alone,

Freddie remembers the unhappychildhood which led to his present stateof emotional isolation.

Left with a whimper not with a shoutI didn't miss him he made it perfectly clearI wa s a fool and probably queerFool that I was I tho ugh t this would bringThose he had left closer togetherShe made her move the moment he crawled

awayI was the last the woman toldShe never let her bed get coldSomeone moved in — I shut my doorSomeone to treat her just the same way as

beforeWhen I was nine I learned survivalTaught myself not to careI was my single good comp anionTaking my comfort thereUp in my room I planned my conquestsOn my own, never asked for a helping handNo-one would understandI never asked the pair who fought belowJust in case they said no

Pity the child who has ambitionKnows what he wants to doKnows that he'll never fit the systemOthers expect him toPity the child who knew his parentsSaw their faults, saw their love die before his

eyesPity the child that wiseHe never asked did I cause your distress?Just in case they said yesWhe n I was twelve my father move d out

I took the road of least resistanceI had my game to playI had the skill, and more — the hungerEasy to get awayPity the child with no such weaponsNo defence, no escape from the ties that bindAlways a step behindI never called to tell her all I'd done

I was only her son!Pity the child but not foreverNot if he stays that wayHe can get all he ever wantedIf he's prepared to payPity instead the careless motherWhat she missedWhat she lost when she let me goAnd I won der doe s she knowI wo ul dn 't call — a crazy thing to doJust in case she said who?



E M B A S S Y L A M E N T

Sergievsky is proclaimed the newchampion-. The Russians rejoice buttheir mood changes to anger whentheir hero of the moment breaks fromtheir ranks and runs off with Florenceand the Americans. The news comesthat he is applying for political asylum

in the West. At the consulate, however,the civil servants sound less impressedthan they might be.

Oh my dear how boringHe's defectingJust like all the othersHe's expectingUs to be impressed with what he's done hereBut heHasn't stopped to think about the paperworkHis gesture causesWe've an embassy to run here

If these people can't strike blows for freedomWith a valid visaWe don't need 'emIf we seem offhand then please rememberThis is nothing very specialYou're the fourth we've had since last

November

Who do these foreign chappies think theyare?

And when he's safely in the WestHe'll be the hero to discussThe media will lionise himFame and fortune plusNo-one will recall

It's thanks to usHave you an appointment with the consul?If you don't we know what his response'llBe, he will not see you, with respect itBuggers up his very taxing schedulePushing peace and understandingLet us hope this won't affect itFar too many jokers cross the borderNot a single document in orderRussia must be empty, though we're all forBasic human rights, it makes you wonderWhat they built the Berlin wall forWho do these foreign chappies think they

are?And when you've filled in all the formsAnd been passed clear of all diseaseDebriefed debugged dedrugged disarmedAnd disinfected, pleaseDon't forget the guys who cut your keys



HEAVEN HELP MY HEART

As the formalities for Anatoly'sdefection go through, Florenceanticipates the problems of her newrelationship.

If it were love I would give that love everysecond I had

And I doDo I know where he'll lead me to?Did I planDoing all of this for the love of a man?Well I let it happ en any howAnd what I'm feeling nowHas no easy explanation, reason plays no

partHeaven help my heartI love him too muchWhat if he saw my whole existenceTurning around a word, a smile, a touch?

One of these days, and it won't be long, he'llknow more about me

Than he shouldAll my dreams will be understoodNo surpriseNothing more to learn from the look in my

eyesDon't you know that time is not my friend?I'll fight it to the endHoping to keep that best of momentsWhen the passions startHeaven help my heartThe day that I findSuddenly I've run out of secretsSuddenly I'm not always on his mind

Maybe it' s best to love a stra ngerWell that's what I've done — heaven help my

heartHeaven help my heart



A N T H E M

Anatoli/ is surprised to be ambushed byreporters, tipped off by CIA manWalter, seeking to make politicalcapital from his defection. He deniesthat he is leaving anything.

No man, no madness

Though their sad power may prevailCan possess, conquer, my country's heartThey rise to failShe is eternalLong before nation's lines were drawnWhen no flags flew, when no armies stoodMy land was born

And you ask me why I love herThrough wars, death and despairShe is the constant, we who don't careAnd you won der will I leave her—bu t how?I cross over borders but I'm still there now

How can I leave her?Where would I start?Let man's petty nations tear themselves apartMy land's only borders lie around my heart



O N E N I G H T I N B A N G K O K

The second Act begins in Bangkok, one year later, where Sergievsky is nowdefending his title against the newSoviet challenger, Leonid Viigand. Ex-champion Trumper is there again, butthis time apparently only as a TVreporter.

Bangkok! Oriental settingAnd the city don't know what the city is

gettingThe creme de la creme of the chess world in aShow with everything but Yul Brynner

Time flies! Does n't seem a min uteSince the Tirolean spa had the chess boys in

itAll change! Don't you know that when youPlay at this level ther e's no or dinary ve nue

It's Iceland — or the Philippines — orHastings — or — or this place!

One night in Bangkok and the world's youroyster

The bars are temples but the pearls ain't freeYou'll find a god in every golden cloisterAnd if you're lucky then the god's a sheI can feel an angel sliding up to me

One town's very like anotherWhen your head's down over your pieces,

brother

It's a drag, it's a bore, it's really such a pity



To be looking at the board, not looking atthe city

Whaddya mean? You've seen one crowded,polluted, stinking town, you've —

Tea, girls, warm, sweetSome are set up in the Somerset Maugham

suite

Get Thai'd! Your talking to a touristWhose every move's among the purestI get my kicks above the waistline, sun shin e

One night in Bangkok makes a hard manhumble

Not much between despair and ecstasyOne night in Bangkok and the tough guys

tumbleCan't be too careful with your companyI can feel the devil walking next to me

Siam's gonna be the witnessTo the ultimate test of cerebral fitnessThis grips me more than would a

Muddy old river or reclining BuddahAnd thank God I'm only watching the game— controll ing it —

I don't see you guys ratingThe kind of mate I'm contemplatingI'd let you watch, I would invite youBut the queens we use would not excite you

So you 'd be tter to back to your bars, yourtemples, your massage parlours

One night in Bangkok



T H E S O V I E T M A C H I N E

The Russian camp are showing signs ofworry. Molokov puts them at their easeby extolling the virtues of theirautomaton-like champion, Viigand, andexplaining his plans to disconcert

Anatoli/ by arranging a confrontationwith his wife. Cheered by the plotting,

they drink themselves into a stupor.

M O L O K O V

Just in case you feel a traceOf doubt or even nervous tensionLet me draw the latest scoreTo your attent ion

Not the score the witless corpsOf commentators are debatingcome, admit — who gives a shitFor Elo rating?

No I prefer and I'm sure you concur

To see who 's ahea dPsychologicallyFor example:

We have on ta p an inscrutable chapWhose thoughts never strayFrom the state of the play

Whereas —It's so difficult to concentrate ifYou have left your nativeCountry for a woman who has plans of her

ownIt's not easy for a chap to excelFeeling guilty as hellHaving left his wife to face the music alone

But even worse, imagine if his ladies metWell then I betThe atmosphere round here would be a little

strainedAs he explainedHow he could do what he's done to those

twoMost wonderful girls"Yes I love you both!"

Most amusing!

Starting from scratch they'll torpedo hismatchHis horse-power deadOn the board and in bed

Bit by bit the pieces fitThe Soviet machine advancesNot one move that won't improveOur nation's chances

We predict a stu nni ng victoryBoth on the board and off it

This will show the traitor no-oneRats with profit

Oh we're gonna smash that bastard!Make him wanna change his nameTake him to the cleaners and devastate himWipe him out, humiliate himWe don't want the whole world sayingThey can't even win a gameWe have never reckoned on coming secondThere's no use in losing

We can feel the flam e of tri ump h bur ningOur people's pride returning/Bit by bit the

pieces fitThe Soviet machine advancesNot one move that won't improveOur nation's chances

From Mos cow to the Baring StraitsCitizens will hail our victoryIn Arctic circles frozen statesWill join with warmer climes in revelryAnd I can say of this affairI was there, did my share, played my partAnd Russians all will be awareI was there, from the start



I K N O W HIM SO WEL L

Svetlana, Anatoly's wife, arrives in Bangkok. She and Florence sing abouttheir very different impressions of theman they both think tney know sowell.

Won a few more moments, who can tell?But it took time to understand the manNo w at least I kno w I kno w him well

Wasn't it good?

S V E T L A N A

Oh so good

F L O R E N C EF L O R E N C ENothing is so good it lasts eternallyPerfect situations must go wrongBut this has never yet prevented meWanting far too much for far too longLooking back I could have played it

differently

Wasn't he fine?S V E T L A N A

Oh so fineF L O R E N C E

Isn't it madness



F L O R E N C E & S V E T L A N A F L O R E N C E

He can't be mine? Oh so fineF L O R E N C E S V E T L A N A

But in the end h e nee ds a little bit more tha nme

More securityS V E T L A N A

He needs his fantasy and freedom

F L O R E N C E

I know him so well

S V E T L A N A

No-o ne in your life is with you consta ntlyNo-one is completely on your sideAnd though I move my world to be with himStill the gap bet wee n us is too wideLooking back I could hav e play ed it

differently

Learned about the man before I fell

But I was ever so much younger then

Now at least

F L O R E N C E & S V E T L A N A

Isn't it madness


He won't be mine?Didn't I knowHow it would go?If I kne w fr om the startWhy am I falling apart?

S V E T L A N A

Wasn't it good?Wasn't he fineF L O R E N C E

Isn't it madness


He won't be mine?

F L O R E N C E

But in the end he needs a little bit more thanme —

More securityS V E T L A N A

I kno w I kno w him well He needs his fantasy and freedom

S V E T L A N A F L O R E N C E

Wasn't it good? I kno w him so well

F L O R E N C E S V E T L A N A

Oh so good It took time to understand him

S V E T L A N A F L O R E N C E & S V E T L A N A

Wasn't he fine? I know him so well



E N D G A M E

The pressures mount on Anatoly as hismatch with Viigand reaches its climax.

He must win the last game to retain histitle, but he is encouraged to throw in thegame in order to ensure the freedom ofFlorence's father, now discovered to bealive in the Soviet Union.

A N A T O L Y

They all think they see a manWho doesn't knowWhich move to makeWhich way to goWhose private lifeCaused his declineWrecked his grand designSome are vicious, some are foolsAnd others blindTo see in meOne of their kind

Anyone can beA husband, loverSooner them than meWhen they discoverTheir domestic bliss isShelter for their failing

Nothing could be worseThan self-denialHaving to rehearseThe endless trialOf a partner's rather sadDemands prevailing

S V E T L A N AAs you watch yourself caringAbout a minor sporting triumph, sharingYour win with esoterics,Paranoids, hystericsWho don't pay attention toWhat goes on around themThey leave the ones they love the way they

found themA normal person mustDismiss you with disgustAnd weep for those who trusted you

A N AT O LY

Nothing you have saidIs revelationTake my blues as readMy consolation —Finding out at last my one true obligation!F L O R E N C E

Since you seem to have shut outThe world at large then maybe I should cut

outMy tiny inessentialWorld, inconsequential



In the kind of games you're playingHow do you do it?I tried to be that cynical but blew itI only changed your lifeYou left you r hom e, your wi feOr maybe that had slipped your mind

A N A T O L Y

Nothing you have saidIs revelationTake my blues as readMy consolation —Findin g out at last my one tru e obligation!

S V E T L A N A & F L O R E N C E

Listen to them shout!They saw you do itIn their minds no doubtThat you'v e been thro ugh itSuffered for your art butIn the end a winner

We have never heardSuch an ovationWho could not be stirred?Such dedicationSkill and guts a modelFor the young beginner

They're completely enchantedBut they don't take your qualities for grantedIt isn't very often

That the critics softenNonetheless you've won their heartsHow can we begin toAppreciate the work that you've put intoYour calling through the yearsThe blood and sweat and tearsThe late, late nights, the early starts

There they go again!Your deeds inflame themDrive them wild, but thenWho wants to take them?If they want a part of youWho'd really blame them?A N A T O L Y

And so you're letting me know —F L O R E N C E

And you're the only one who's neversuffered anything at all

A N A T O L Y

How you've hated my success —S V E T L A N A

Well I won't crawl —And you can slink back to your pawns and to

your tartsA N A T O L Y

And every poisoned word shows that younever understood

S V E T L A N A F L O R E N C E

Liar!A N A T O L Y

Liar!A N AT O LY

Never! Never!

A N A T O L Y, F L O R E N C E , S V E T L A N A

Nothing you have saidIs revelationTake my blues as readMy consolation —

S V E T L A N A & F L O R E N C E

Findin g out that I' m my only obligationA N A T O L Y

Is the re no -one in my lifeWho will not claimThe right to stealMy work, my nameMy success, my fameAnd my freedom?



YO U AN D I

Anatoly has won the final gamebrilliantly. Now he realises that theonly solution to his other problems is

for him to return to the Soviet Union. He and Florence sing of the unhappyend to their romance.

A N AT O LY

Knowing I want youKnow ing I love youI can't explainWhy I remainCareless about you

F L O R E N C E

I've been a fool to allowDreams to become great expectations

A N A T O L Y

How can I love you so muc h yet make nomove?

A N AT O L Y & F L O R E N C E

I pray the days and nightsIn their endless weary processionSoon overwhelm my sad obsession

A N AT O LY

You could not give meMore than you gave meWhy should there be something in meStill discontented?F L O R E N C E

I won't look back anymoreAnd if I do — just for a moment

A N AT O LYI'll soon be hap py to say I kne w you whe n

BOTH

But if you hear todayI'm no longer quite so devotedTo this affair, I've been misqu oted

You and IWe've seen it allChasing our hearts' desireBut we go on pretendingStories like oursHave happy endings



When CHESS opened to huge acclaim at London's Prince Edward Theatre, it was the

culmination of five years' work by lyricistTim Rice and composers Bjorn Ulvaeus and

Benny Andersson of ABBA. Here is the storyof the making of that musical, from Tim

Rice's first idea of a show based on the oftenbizarre world of championship chess, to the

final frantic days leading up to the first night.Written with the full participation of the

principals, this book follows the chequered

chess - the making of the musical (gnv64).pdf

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