“It made perfect sense that the man who was one of the original producers of the musical Annie was also the Broadway director of Hurlyburly, David Rabe’s cocaine-strewn drama about Hollywood hedonists. Or that after hitting box office gold with the musical spoof Spamalot, he switched gears and concentrated on dramas by Clifford Odets, Arthur Miller and Harold Pinter … He had tremendous instinct not only for what was funny but what could grab an audience, surprise them, wake their minds, move them to indignation or, better yet, tears.”