"Cool" is a song from the 1957

musical Musical is the adjective of music. Musical may also refer to: * Musical theatre, a performance art that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance * Musical film Musical film is a film genre in which songs by the Character (arts), charac ...

West Side Story ''West Side Story'' is a Musical theatre, musical conceived by Jerome Robbins with music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and a Book (musical theatre), book by Arthur Laurents. Inspired by William Shakespeare's play ''Romeo an ...

''.

Leonard Bernstein Leonard Bernstein ( ; born Louis Bernstein; August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American conductor, composer, pianist, music educator, author, and humanitarian. Considered to be one of the most important conductors of his time, he was th ...

composed the music and

Stephen Sondheim Stephen Joshua Sondheim (; March22, 1930November26, 2021) was an American composer and lyricist. Regarded as one of the most important figures in 20th-century musical theater, he is credited with reinventing the American musical. He received Lis ...

wrote the lyrics. This was the first song they wrote together, and Sondheim later recollects that Bernstein must have written the opening line ("Boy, boy, crazy boy") since he himself was not prone to writing melismatically. This song is known for its

fugal In classical music, a fugue (, from Latin ''fuga'', meaning "flight" or "escape""Fugue, ''n''." ''The Concise Oxford English Dictionary'', eleventh edition, revised, ed. Catherine Soanes and Angus Stevenson (Oxford and New York: Oxford Universit ...

treatment of a jazz figure, described by one writer as "possibly the most complex instrumental music heard on Broadway to date". In the 1957 musical, the song is performed by Riff as he advises the Jets to stay cool before entering the Rumble. This is however changed in the

1961 Events January * January 1 – Monetary reform in the Soviet Union, 1961, Monetary reform in the Soviet Union. * January 3 ** United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower announces that the United States has severed diplomatic and cons ...

and

2021 Like the year 2020, 2021 was also heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to the emergence of multiple Variants of SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 variants. The major global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which began at the end of 2020, continued ...

film adaptations.

Summary in the 1961 film

In the aftermath of the rumble and Riff (

Russ Tamblyn Russell Irving Tamblyn (born December 30, 1934), also known as Rusty Tamblyn, is an American film and television actor and dancer. Born and raised in Los Angeles, Tamblyn trained as a gymnast in his youth. He began his career as a child actor ...

)’s death, the Jets reconvene to hide from the police. When talk turns to taking the fight to the Sharks, Ice (

Tucker Smith Tucker Smith (born Thomas William Smith, April 24, 1936 – December 22, 1988) was an American actor, dancer, and singer who performed the role of Ice in the movie musical ''West Side Story''. Life and career Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ...

) takes charge, warning them all to keep their grief and anger in check if they don’t want police attention.

Summary in the 2021 film

Hours before the rumble, Tony (

Ansel Elgort Ansel Elgort (born March 14, 1994) is an American actor and singer. He began his acting career with a supporting role in the horror film '' Carrie'' (2013). He gained wider recognition for starring as a teenage cancer patient in the romantic d ...

) learns that Riff (

Mike Faist Michael David Faist (; born January 5, 1992) is an American actor. He is the recipient of a Grammy and a Daytime Emmy Award, with nominations for a Tony and a British Academy Film Award. An alumnus of the American Musical and Dramatic Academy, ...

) is planning to bring a pistol and urges him to call the off, attempting to confiscate the gun while the rest of the Jets play Keep Away with it.

In popular culture

In 2011, actor

Harry Shum Jr. Harry Shum Jr. (born April 28, 1982) is an American actor. He is known for his roles as Mike Chang on the Fox television series '' Glee'' (2009–2015), Magnus Bane on the Freeform television series '' Shadowhunters'' (2016–2019), and Dr. ...

performed the song as his character

Mike Chang Michael Robert Chang Jr. is a fictional character from the Fox musical comedy-drama series ''Glee''. The character is portrayed by actor and dancer Harry Shum Jr., and has appeared on ''Glee'' since the fourth episode in the first season, " Pr ...

from the TV series ''

Glee Glee may refer to: * Glee (music), a type of English choral music * ''Glee'' (TV series), an American musical comedy-drama TV series, and related media created by Ryan Murphy * ''Glee'' (Bran Van 3000 album) * ''Glee'' (Logan Lynn album) * Gle ...

'', in the third episode of

season 3 A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and pol ...

, "

Asian F "Asian F" is the third episode of the third season of the American musical television series ''Glee'', and the forty-seventh overall. Written by series co-creator Ian Brennan and directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon, it first aired on Fox in the ...

" (aired on October 4). An episode of ''

Animaniacs ''Animaniacs'' is an American Animated series, animated Comedy television, comedy Musical film, musical television series created by Tom Ruegger and produced by Warner Bros. Television Animation. It originally aired on Fox Broadcasting Company ...

'' features a parody version as "Coo Bird" sung by Bobby of The Goodfeathers. The song is also parodied in the

Flight of the Conchords Flight of the Conchords are a New Zealand musical comedy duo formed in Wellington in 1998. The band consists of multi-instrumentalists Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement. Beginning as a popular live comedy act in the early 2000s, the duo's c ...

episode "

The Tough Brets "The Tough Brets" is the third episode of the second season of the HBO comedy series ''Flight of the Conchords'', first broadcast in the United States on February 1, 2009. Plot The Conchords are playing a gig at a local public library. During ...

" with the song "Stay Cool, Bret". The ''

Castle A castle is a type of fortification, fortified structure built during the Middle Ages predominantly by the nobility or royalty and by Military order (monastic society), military orders. Scholars usually consider a ''castle'' to be the private ...

'' episode "Cool Boys" has

Richard Castle Richard Edgar "Rick" Castle (born Richard Alexander Rodgers) is a fictional character on the ABC crime series ''Castle''. He is portrayed by Nathan Fillion. The name Richard Castle is also used as a pseudonym under which a set of real books ...

and Detective Slaughter sing it to distract some criminals holding them at gunpoint. British sketch show ''

Horrible Histories ''Horrible Histories'' is an educational entertainment franchise encompassing many media including books, magazines, audio books, stage shows, TV shows, and more. In 2013, Lisa Edwards, UK publishing and commercial director of Scholastic Corpo ...

'' parodied this song as a song about the English Civil War.

References

{{authority control Songs with music by Leonard Bernstein Songs from West Side Story 1957 songs Songs written by Stephen Sondheim