My father was a tall guy. He talked on the phone a lot, and used words like "obfuscate", "differential", "ambivalence". He had a walk-in closet, he could drive cars (slowly), and he loved caviar of a specific kind-I've forgotten the kind. But I haven't forgotten how kind he was to me, when he was around. You see, he flew on planes by himself ("Your father is out of town") and held meetings "on the coast". He was a grownup.
   I was twelve, with year-round hay fever. I was short and mystified. I know that I felt that this childhood stuff had gone on far too long. if only I was a tall guy I could drive cars (fast) to the coast to visit my father and share in his meetings.
   The movie BIG italicized the consequences of such a transformation. The show does the same job in a different way. While it lacks the scope of film, it enjoys its access to music and dance and to the paraphernalia of the theater. Its libretto by John Weidman is as kind as my father. The songs, as in any really good musical, emerge from the story itself. They are neither serendipitous nor opportunistic. They are of a character and of a plot, so that the show proceeds as a drama of theater rather than a variety program on television.
   Most-not all, but most-American standard songs were written to story, regardless of how flimsy some of those stories were. The best of them, let's say THE KING AND I, CAROUSEL, MY FAIR LADY, can permit their songs to roam free, away from the shows, far from home. Performed (hypothetically in order of appearance, they would be able to tell their tales without any dialogue at all.
   Such is the case with BIG. Richard Maltby Jr. and David Shire, a collaboration whose past work has spoken as honestly as Sondheim's about the perplexing and under-addressed corners of the heart, have supplied BIG with genuine melody and candor of lyric that such a tricky conceit as Kid-Becomes-Big requires. It is a beautiful score, one that will grow inside of yourself as time goes by. It is a crafted score, unslothful, and on several occasions (both words and music) terrifically funny. BIG and its songs are filled with wisdom. No ambivalence here.