Pardon me while I get a bit pedantic, but in my many years of teaching, writing, and talking about theater, musical theater in particular, I've noticed a few common mistakes that people make. Some of them have to do with who did what on a particular show, while others are more about spelling and punctuation.

I know, in this age of social media, such concerns seem archaic, even quaint. Why, the very act of capitalization for some would seem laughable.

But when it comes to the correct spelling of someone's name, the precise title of a show, or the proper term for a particular component of theater, there's really not a lot of room for debate. To wit:

It's "Show Boat," not "Showboat" - My students get this wrong all the time, and I spend a considerable amount of time encouraging them to "embrace the space." Show Boat is two words. Who says? The guy who wrote the show says (the redoubtable Oscar Hammerstein II) not to mention the woman who wrote the novel upon which the show is based (the formidable Edna Ferber). Yes, I know, the actual boat itself, meaning the floating vessel upon which such shows were presented, is often spelled "showboat." And the annoying act of parading one's skills or prowess is called "showboating." But the Kern-Hammerstein classic show is, was, and always will be Show Boat. (Similarly, Side Show not Sideshow; Master Class, not Masterclass; Road Show, not Roadshow; and The Boy Friend, not The Boyfriend)

Stage shows have cast recordings, not soundtracks - When you're listening to the score of a Broadway show as performed by the original cast of the show, you're listening to a cast recording, or cast album.

If and when that show is made into a movie, and you obtain that recording, you would be listening to a soundtrack. So, as of this writing, Wicked has a cast recording, but no soundtrack. The Phantom of the Opera, on the other hand, has both: a cast recording from the stage version and a soundtrack from the movie. The word "soundtrack" is actually quite literal: it refers to the physical audio track that runs alongside the celluloid print of a movie. Ergo, "sound...track." Whenever people mistakenly call a cast recording a soundtrack, I invariably say, "Remind me when that movie came out again?" Yeah, annoying. I can live with that.

It's "Richard Rodgers," not "Richard Rogers" - I spend quite a bit of time in my musical-theater history course discussing the career of Richard Rodgers, both in his collaborations with Lorenz Hart and in his work with Oscar Hammerstein II. Which gives my students ample opportunity to make this mistake. It's understandable, given that the first name "Roger" doesn't have a "D" in it. Nonetheless, the late great Richard Rodgers had a "D" in his last name. As I continually say to my students, "Spare the 'rod,' spoil the musical." 

Andrew Lloyd Webber's last name is "Lloyd Webber," not "Webber" - Whether we like the man's work or not, we at least owe him the courtesy of getting his name right. Sir Andrew's last name is "Lloyd Webber" (no hyphen, two b's, if you please). How can you tell? Well, his father, the late noted musician, was named William Lloyd Webber, and his brother the cellist is Julian Lloyd Webber. See a pattern? So, when you're referring to Sir Andrew in the third person without his first name attached, you should use "Lloyd Webber." The web is full of discussion boards upon which people say "Webber does this" or "Webber doesn't do that." Well, whether you're praising or trashing the man, at least address him by his proper name.

Andrew Lloyd Webber didn't write Les Miserables - Oh, and while we're on the subject, Lloyd Webber didn't compose the music for Les Miserables. In fact, he had nothing to do with the show, other than the fact that he happened to own the theater where the show played its first West End run. I get lots of traffic on my blog from people searching for "Andrew Lloyd Webber Les Miserables." Sorry, folks. Sir Andrew has certainly produced is share of bloated blockbusters, but Les Mis wasn't his baby, but rather the work of Claude-Michel Schonberg and Alain Boublil. 

Kurt "VILE" and Leonard Bern-"STINE" - Two of the most important composers in musical-theater history are Kurt Weill and Leonard Bernstein. Mr. Weill's last name is pronounced "Vile," which of course isn't a very appealing word in English, but there you are. In German, a "W" at the start of a word is generally pronounced like the English "V." And Mr. Weill was decidedly German, although he fled the rise of the Nazis by coming to America. As for the redoubtable Leonard Bernstein, the way I remember that his last name is pronounced "Bern-STINE" and not "Bern-STEEN" is that in the Stephen Sondheim musical Merrily We Roll Along, Sondheim mentions Bernstein in the lyric of a songs called "Bobby and Jackie and Jack." Sondheim rhymes "Bernstein" with "Bechstein," which is also pronounced with a "STINE" at the end. And if anyone is going to know how to pronounce Mr. Bernstein's name, it's going to be Sondheim, since the two worked together on West Side Story.  

[Author's note: After I published this article, I was contacted by no less a personage than Michael Feingold, late of The Village Voice and an eminent Weill scholar. Michael tells me that, after Weill immigrated to America, he preferred to have his last name anglicized and thus pronounced like "while." This was partly because he wanted to distance himself from what was happening in his homeland, but also because, after he learned English, he wanted to avoid the negative connotations of the word "vile." I stand most humbly corrected. That's what I get for being pedantic. --C.C.]  

(See also "Is It 'Theater' or 'Theatre'?")