In the world of musical theatre, there are few legends from the "Golden Age" left and sadly we lost one of them yesterday. Arthur Laurents wrote the books for some of Broadway's greatest musicals, most notably West Side Story and Gypsy (considered by many as the best book ever written for a Broadway musical). He also wrote the script for the Hollywood blockbuster The Way We Were which starred gay fave Barbra Streisand as a Jewish communist. As if that weren't enough, Laurents was also a stage director -- sometimes of his own works -- including the recent Patti Lupone-helmed revival of Gypsy and he won the Tony Award for bringing to life La Cage aux Folles, a musical comedy about a gay couple. Laurents himself was gay and incredibly frank about sex until the day he died (as demonstrated in the video interview above).
It goes without saying that he will be missed.
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