Sunday in the Park with George

Inspired by George Seurat’s magnificent painting, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s soaring musical is itself an artistic masterpiece. The musical begins with the story of George and his model and lover Dot. As George struggles to find his artistic voice, he becomes more and more distant from the one woman who truly sees him for who he really is. Meanwhile, the characters that inhabit George’s painting have lives unto themselves, which George captures with his paintbrush. A century later, George and Dot’s descendants, themselves struggling artists, grapple with the same issues of artistic ingenuity, and a public who just doesn’t understand.Through melodic and heartbreaking music, poetic lyrics, and quick, jaunty wit, Sunday in the Park with George reveals universal truths about the nature of art, love, and passion, with the breadth and depth of art’s most enduring masterpieces.

Born in Paris in 1859, painter Georges Seurat became famous for his new styles and techniques of painting. As a post-Impressionist, he was more concerned with the use of color (rather than the naturalistic representations of light prized by Impressionists like Monet). Instead, Seurat created new techniques of mixing colors: pointillism (using small dots of color to create an image) and chromoluminarism (arranging contrasting colors in small dots to optically mix them). His most famous work using this technique is his 1884 painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. It premiered in 1886; Seurat died only five years later, at the age of 31. Today, the massive painting hangs in the Art Institute of Chicago.

In 1981, Stephen Sondheim, along with his friend and collaborator James Lapine, saw the painting in Chicago. He was struck with the technique--using small dots to create a large complete image. Two things stood out: There are dozens of people depicted, but no one looks at each other; and the artist himself is missing. These observations became the catalyst for Sunday in the Park with George, in which a fictionalized "George" Seurat searches for color, balance, and harmony as he composes his master work. In Act Two of the musical, his fictional great-grandson George has the same pursuit.

Sunday in the Park with George originally opened Off-Broadway in 1983. Starring Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters, the show was still incomplete. By 1984, the show was finished and opened at the Booth Theatre on Broadway, with Patinkin and Peters. The show was distinctive in that the character themselves create the painting of A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. Additionally, the show used new projection technology to bring the Act Two Chromolume #7 to life. The show won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, and was filmed for the series American Playhouse on PBS.

There have been several revivals both on Broadway and in London. In 2017, the show had a limited run on Broadway, starring Jake Gyllenhaal as George and Annaleigh Ashford as Dot. While the show was intended to transfer to the West End, the plans were halted by the COVID-19 pandemic. In January 2026, it was announced that Ariana Grande and Jonathan Bailey will appear in a London revival of the show in summer 2027, directed by Marianne Elliott.

ACT ONE

It is 1884, on La Grande Jatte, and painter Georges Seurat (known as “George”) is creating sketches for his new work. The stage is bare, a “blank page or canvas,” but as he works, a park along the River Seine appears. People begin to fill in the landscape, including his lover Dot, who is posing for him. She is hot and uncomfortable in her stiff dress, upset that she must stand in the sun as George admonishes her to concentrate (“Sunday in the Park With George”). In her imagination, she slips from her dress and dances, admitting that there are worse things than being in the park on a Sunday. More park patrons appear: an old fussy woman and her nurse, who is interested in a German coachman named Franz. The park is tranquil until some noisy bathers disrupt the peacefulness. George makes a sweeping gesture, and the bathers freeze into the painting Bathers at Asnières, his first major work.

Now the painting is on display at a museum. Jules and Yvonne enter, critical of the work (“No Life”). The scene shifts back to the island where George is sketching once again. The couple briefly talks with George, Jules (a successful artist) insisting that they “must speak.” They leave, taking Franz with them, and interrupt his flirtations with the nurse. Dot is still frustrated at standing so long in the sun, so George promises to take her to the Follies that evening. She leaves to get ready. George goes to the old woman—his mother—to draw her, but she refuses, and seems to not recognize who he is.

Later, at George’s studio, he is furiously working on the painting and developing his pointillism technique. At the same time, Dot is powdering herself, getting ready for the Follies and reflecting on her love for George (“Color and Light”). George takes a brief break to clean his brushes, and sees Dot, fascinated by the sight of her. But even though Dot is ready to go, George chooses to stay in the studio and paint. Dot leaves, furious.

A Sunday afternoon in the park again, and George is sketching new figures as studies for the painting. He is concentrating on a boatman and a dog as Dot enters with Louis, the baker. Two young women, both named Celeste, mock Dot and her new romance (“Gossip”). Jules and Yvonne, with their daughter Louise, enter. The couple again scorns George’s new painting technique. Dot sits on a nearby bench and opens a grammar book; she is teaching herself to read. The park patrons complain about others around them, whether a “slovenly boatman” or an unruly child. Eventually George approaches Dot. Their conversation is pleasant but uncomfortable; they clearly still love each other. Louis returns with pastries for Dot, and the couple exits. George is left with the boatman’s dog. He playfully sketches two dogs (Spot and Fifi), imagining how they must see the world (“The Dog Song”).

Another lazy Sunday: Franz the coachman, his wife Frieda, the two Celestes, the nurse, a soldier and his quiet companion enter. Franz wants the nurse’s attention, while hiding his intentions from Frieda. The Celestes try to attract the soldiers by clumsily fishing. Louise wants to play with Franz and Frieda. George continues to quietly sketch them (“The Day Off”). Two wealthy American tourists walk through the park—they hate everything about Paris, except the pastries, and decide that they should hire a French pastry baker to take back to the United States. Jules enters, and sees that George is still working. He jokingly admonishes his friend to take a day off; instead, George invites Jules to see the new painting. The boatman re-enters, and scorns the artists.

Dot tries to approach George, but he quickly exits before she can speak to him. Hurt, she describes her new life with Louis—trying to convince herself as much as anyone else that she is happy (“Everybody Loves Louis”). After everyone leaves the park, George returns and is alone. He flips through his sketches. He misses Dot, and knows he loves her, but decides that he must finish his work, and that his artistic impulses will always come before any chance of happiness (“Finishing the Hat”).

Many months later, Dot is seven months pregnant. She visits George’s studio to ask for a painting that George did of her, saying that he once promised it to her. But he refuses, noting that she will marry Louis, even in her condition (George knows that the baby is his). Dot admits that while Louis is not necessarily what she wants, he is what she needs. Before they can argue, Jules and Yvonne arrive to see the painting. While the men go into a separate room to look at the art, Yvonne and Dot start to talk, and realize that although they have disliked each other in the past, they have the same heartbreak of being neglected by the men (and artists) that they love.

At the same time, Jules is examining the painting and doesn’t quite understand George’s new technique—and especially why George would spend so much time with a technique that doesn’t make any sense. Jules is frustrated, and knows that George would like his work to be included in the next exhibition. Yvonne interrupts and sweeps Jules away to a previous engagement. Dot returns to George, and tells him that she will be leaving for America, with Louis, after the baby is born. George is unimpressed, and even angry, believing that she will not like America. Dot accuses George of not caring about people, only things, and using them for his art. The pair argue about their relationship, and Dot tells him that she needs more from life than George’s art (“We Do Not Belong Together”).

Back in the park, the Old Lady reminisces about George’s childhood as he sketches her. She is upset at how Paris is changing, and he tries to encourage her to see the world as it is, and find the beauty in it (“Beautiful”). The patrons of the park swirl around them, including the soldier and one of the Celestes, the boatman, the American tourists, and finally Louis and Dot. Dot is holding her infant daughter, named Marie. George refuses to acknowledge that he is the baby’s father. Dot begins to leave; as she walks away, George stops her: “I am sorry.” She leaves.

More patrons arrive. Jules and Frieda look for a quiet spot to pursue their affair. The other Celeste and her soldier enter. Franz enters to meet the nurse, but is stopped by Yvonne, who is looking for Jules. Louise comes in, declaring to her mother that she saw Jules and Frieda kissing. The park grows noisier, even chaotic, as the various characters are fighting. George is ready to leave, overwhelmed, but the Old Lady declares, “Remember, George.” Everyone freezes. George takes control of the people in front of him, turning them into the subjects of his painting, arranging and posing them as they sing together, and become the final tableau of A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte (“Sunday”).

ACT TWO

The lights rise on the painting A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. The characters are still in tableau, stuck there forever (“It’s Hot Up Here”). It is now 1984, and they each give a short eulogy for George, who suddenly died when he was only 31 years old. The stage becomes a blank white canvas again.

In an American art museum, George—the great-grandson of Dot and George—wheels on his grandmother Marie. She is 98 years old, and will assist him in premiering his newest work, Chromolume #7, a postmodernist light machine commemorating A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. Marie assists George in his speech as film projections show pictures of Seurat, Marie’s mother, and other topics of the presentation. Marie sporadically ad libs, and shares her family’s history; notably, her mother Dot is pictured in the painting, and that she is actually the daughter of Georges Seurat (revealed in Dot’s deathbed confession). Marie also has Dot’s grammar book, which she says proves the confession. George starts the Chromolume, but the surge of electricity causes a short. Assisted by Dennis (a technician), Greenberg (the museum director), and Naomi (a composer), they finally start the machine, which bathes the auditorium in dots of color and light, similar to pointillist paintings.

At a reception following the unveiling, gathered patrons compliment George. However, George is consumed with the frustration of creating new and innovative artworks, all while many people don’t understand them (“Putting It Together”). He darts around between various conversations, but he realizes that he isn’t actually creating anything new anymore, as pointed out by one art critic. After the reception, the patrons leave, but Marie is left alone with the painting. She looks at the image of her mother, wishing that George could have known her, and that George and his ex-wife Elaine could have had a child. When George returns, Marie tells him about Dot, and how he would have liked her (“Children and Art”). Marie falls asleep; Elaine enters and wheels her away. George, left in meditation, realizes that he has no connection anymore. He leaves.

Several weeks later, and George is at La Grande Jatte in Paris—although it barely resembles the original painting. Marie has died, and now George is there at the invitation of the French government in order to present Chromolume #7 in commemoration of the island. George admits to Dennis that he has turned down his next commission, as he feels so lost in what to do next. He shares that he brought Dot’s grammar book, which was left to him by Marie. After Dennis leaves, George begins to flip through the book, reading both the lessons and Dot’s notes, and he wonders about how similar he might be to his great-grandfather (“Lesson #8).

Dot appears. She mistakes George for his great-grandfather, and is pleased he has her book. George admits to her that he is unsure of what to do next, uncertain about his purpose in art and life. Dot tells him that he must keep moving forward with honesty, inspired by what comes from himself (“Move On”). George reads some words in the back of the book—words that Dot explains he always spoke to himself while he worked: “Order. Design. Tension. Composition. Balance. Light. Harmony.” As he reads, the figures from the painting appear again, recreating their tableau (“Sunday”). They slowly leave, and a white canvas drops over the stage. As Dot disappears behind the canvas, George reads, “White. A blank page or canvas. His favorite. So many possibilities …”