BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — If you ever wondered who put the "bomp" in the "bomp ba bomp ba bomp," or "where that lovin’ feeling went," the guy to ask is Barry Mann. For six decades, he and his wife Cynthia Weil were the definition of hit-makers have the awards to prove it, the walls of their Beverly Hills home completely covered with BMI awards and other accolades.

“We stopped writing on purpose because we didn't have any room left,” Mann quipped.


What You Need To Know

  • Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil wrote hits including "You've Lost That Lovin' Feeling," "On Broadway," "Somewhere Out There" and "We Gotta Get Out of this Place"

  • The couple was married for more than 60 years before Cynthia Weil's death this year

  • Their relationship and friendship with Carole King is portrayed in "Beautiful: The Carole King Musical"

  • "Beautiful" is playing at La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts through Dec. 3

The show currently playing at La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts may be called "Beautiful: The Carole King Musical," but it’s just as much the story of Mann and Weil. The couple, along with King and her first husband Gerry Goffin, wrote songs in the office of 1650 Broadway, home of Aldon Music and a block away from the Brill Building.

“It was like a school,” Mann said. “We learned a lot about songwriting. And it was like a family.”

Like a family, there was also a lot of sibling rivalry, with the two couples constantly competing for who would have the next hit. The four would go on trips together, and Mann liked it that way because if King and Goffin were back in New York, he knew they’d be writing. Traveling with them, he said, meant “we had eyes on them.”

Mann and Weil were great supporters of the Tony Award-winning musical, which features some of their hit songs along with other chart-toppers from the era.

Weil passed away a few months ago, but Mann got to revisit their early years while seeing the production in La Mirada.

“It was wonderful,” he said. “It was wonderful just to see us up there.”

Mann thinks the show captured them pretty accurately. He insists he is not as much as a hypochondriac as the script makes him out to be, but he looks forward to the laughs it draws from the crowd.

Mann is played by Valley native Trevor James, who recently visited the songwriter’s home along with Sara Sheperd, who plays King — a role she also understudied on Broadway, which happens to be the name of another song Barry worked on. King was just 16 years old when she sold her first song.

“It's actually insane,” James said. “It just really shows you the scope of how embedded they are into American music culture. These four individuals, the cultural impact that they have had is really...you can't measure it.”

Standing in his office, the actors marveled at Mann’s awards, his openness and, of course, his relationship with his wife.

“It's such an honor to play out your love story with Cynthia,” James told Mann. “It’s such a beautiful template for true, passionate love.”

The musical ends with Carole King’s "Tapestry," which was released in 1971. But that was just the beginning for her and for Mann and Weil, who went on to write more hits than Mann can recall. Looking on the shelves in the room that was — and remains — “Cynthia’s office,” he spotted a Grammy Award and started singing quietly.

“Somewhere out there,” he sings, the first few notes of the Oscar-nominated song they wrote with James Horner for the film An American Tale.

While some couples might get sick of each other, working and living together for more than 60 years, Mann says that’s not how it was with Cynthia.

“Truthfully, for me and my wife, it's the writing that kept us together a really, really long time,” he said. “And I'm sure it would have gone on for another 100 years.”