The Last Five Years

The Last Five Years is a one act musical written by Jason Robert Brown and produced off-Broadway in March of 2002. It explores the five-year relationship between Jamie, a rising novelist, and Cathy, a struggling actress.

Jamie plays out the story from the start of the relationship to its end, and Cathy does so in reverse chronological order--their time lines converging and then diverging in the song "The Next Ten Minutes" which depicts their wedding.

Shiksa Goddess

• Jamie: If you had a tattoo, that wouldn't matter
  If you had a shaved head, that would be cool
  If you came from Spain or Japan
  Or the back of a van
  Just as long as you're not from Hebrew school
  

See I'm Smiling

• Cathy: No, Jamie, you do not have to go to another party
  With the same twenty jerks you already know
  You can stay with your wife on her fucking birthday
  And you could, God forbid, even see my show

You know I could never understand. How you could stand there straight and tall. And see I'm crying and not do anything at all.

Moving Too Fast

• Jamie: Some people analyze every detail
  Some people stall when they can't see the trail
  Some people freeze out of fear that they'll fail
  But I keep rolling on
  Some people can't get success with their art
  Some people never feel love in their heart
  Some people can't tell the two things apart

A Part of That

• Cathy: Then he smiles and where else can I go?
  I didn't know, the rules do not apply
  And then he smiles and nothing else makes sense
  While he invents the world that's passing by

The Schmuel Song

• Jamie: And sewn into the seams
  Were forty-one seasons of dreams
  Dreams that you could feel coming real
  And that very dress, so the papers swore
  Was the dress a girl in Odessa wore
  On the day she promised forevermore
  To love a young man named Schmuel
  Who only one day before
  Had knocked at her kitchen door.

Have I mentioned today? How lucky I am, to be in love with you.

A Summer in Ohio

• Cathy: I could shove an ice pick in my eye
  I could eat some fish from last July
  But it wouldn't be as awful as a summer in Ohio
  Without cable, hot water, Vietnamese food, or you

The Next Ten Minutes

• Jamie: Will you share your life with me
  For the next ten minutes?
  For the next ten minutes?
  We can handle that

• Jamie: And if we make it till then
  Can I ask you again for another ten?
  And if you in turn agree to the next ten minutes
  And the next ten minutes 'til the morning comes
  Then just holding you might compel me to ask you for more

• Jamie: Will you share your life with me
  For the next ten lifetimes?
  For a million summers
  Jamie and Cathy: 'Til the world explodes
  'Til there's no one left who has ever known us apart?

A Miracle Would Happen/When You Come Home to Me

• Jamie: Everyone tells you that the minute you get married
  Every other woman in the world suddenly finds you attractive
  Well, that's not true
  It only affects the kind of women you always wanted to sleep with
  But they wouldn't give you the time of day before

• Jamie: And in a perfect world
  A miracle would happen
  And every girl would look like Mister Ed

Climbing Uphill

• Cathy: Why is the director staring at his crotch?
  Why is that man staring at my resume?
  Don't stare at my resume
  I made up half my resume
  Look at me, stop looking at that, look at me
  No, not at my shoes, don't look at my shoes
  I hate these fucking shoes
  Why'd I pick these shoes?
  Why'd I pick this song?
  Why'd I pick this career?
  Why does this pianist hate me?

If I Didn't Believe In You

• Jamie: No one can give you courage
  No one can thicken your skin
  I will not fail so you can be comfortable, Cathy
  I will not lose because you can't win

Nobody Needs to Know

• Jamie: We build a tree house, I keep it from shaking
  Little more glue every time that it breaks
  Perfectly balanced, and then I start making
  Conscious, deliberate mistakes

Goodbye Until Tomorrow/I Could Never Rescue You

• Jamie: You never saw how far the crack had opened
  You never knew I had run out of rope
  And I could never rescue you
  All you ever wanted
  But I could never rescue you
  No matter how I try
  All I could do was love you hard and let you go.

External links

• The Last 5 Years on Jason Robert Brown's website