Let's Have Lunch Lyrics - Sunset Boulevard

Song Overview

I’ve always heard “Let’s Have Lunch” as Sunset Boulevard’s first real espresso shot. Joe Gillis hits the Paramount lot, and the number turns into a ricochet of handshakes, favors, and speed networking. It’s patter built for traffic - horns, chatter, the whole company weaving through a camera-lot maelstrom while Joe tries to sell a script and keep repo men off his tail. The track sits early on the 1994 Los Angeles cast album and, in later revivals, even got retitled and lyrically tweaked to fit the production’s updated frame.

Review and Highlights

This is the industry in miniature: everyone’s smiling, no one’s listening, and the chorus line doubles as a filing line. The music moves with swing-adjacent clip - bright brass hits, string swells, and a rhythm section that keeps nudging forward. Joe’s quips land like rimshots. Betty Schaefer’s entrance slices through the studio noise, and Sheldrake’s cynicism turns the scene into a pitch meeting where glad-handing is the only currency. I hear David Cullen’s and Andrew Lloyd Webber’s orchestration doing the heavy lift, threading ensemble chatter into a single onrushing line.

Creation History

“Let’s Have Lunch” appears on the American Premiere/1994 Los Angeles cast album, released September 13, 1994, produced for record by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Nigel Wright. The number was later reworked as “Let’s Do Lunch” in Jamie Lloyd’s 2023 West End revival and preserved on the 2024 live album. Orchestrations throughout the show are by David Cullen with Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Song Meaning and Annotations

Plot

Joe arrives at Paramount to see Sheldrake. Before he gets near a desk, he’s pinballed by actors, assistants, secretaries, and creditors. He dodges finance men repossessing his car, bumps into old friends, and pitches “Bases Loaded.” Betty Schaefer, the script reader who’ll matter later, calls his outline thin. The room smiles, the door closes, and Joe leaves empty-handed. All he’s picked up is a refrain that keeps boomeranging through the building: “We should talk... gotta run... let’s have lunch.”

Song Meaning

The hook is a Hollywood idiom. “Let’s have lunch” really means “I don’t have time for you right now.” It’s a satire of power without commitment. Joe tries to sell virtue and talent in a system that buys momentum. The message is razor simple: in this town, access beats art - until art bites back. Mood-wise, the number starts breezy, turns hectic, and ends with a wry shrug. Contextually, it sets up Joe’s desperation, the hunger that makes Norma’s later offer feel like oxygen.

Annotations

[SAMMY] Bless you, Joseph … [SAMMY] One learns to grin and bear ’em

The revival leaned into burnout. In the 2023 West End production the exchange was reset to admit gig-economy heartbreak, tightening the satire of hustling without exit.

[ANITA] Temple virgin … [DAWN] Handmaiden to Delilah

The same revival sharpened the joke, tweaking these lines to punchier, darker showbiz gags - the chorus is still selling holiness while angling for a close-up.

Handmaiden to Delilah

The reference lands because Sunset Boulevard’s source film stages Norma’s studio visit on a Samson and Delilah set, with Cecil B. DeMille himself at Paramount. That visual echo is baked into the musical’s lore.

It’s about a rookie shortstop. He’s batting .347.

Joe’s pitch hangs on an overachieving underdog. A shortstop with a .300-plus average is a rarity - which lets Joe project his own “undiscovered” myth onto the kid.

[JOE, spoken]

A cut line in the 2023 revival trims dated references and keeps the scene sprinting. The new script pares fussy exposition in favor of velocity.

But can you see Ty Power as a shortstop?

Tyrone Power was Fox’s matinée idol, prized by Darryl F. Zanuck for star wattage more than gritty drama. Joe’s wisecrack pokes at studio typecasting.

James Joyce? Dostoyevsky?

The name-drop draws a chalk line between “message pictures” and pulp. Betty’s later Joyce nod in “Every Movie’s a Circus” keeps that thread alive.

I expect you’d have turned down “Gone With the Wind” … No, that was me

Hollywood famously misjudged that property more than once. The joke lands because hindsight made the film a benchmark of box-office mythology.

Zanuck’s

Joe bluffs that Fox is hot for his script. Sheldrake calls it. Translation: take your “heat” across the street if you must.

Dietrich

Marlene Dietrich - Wilder’s collaborator - is shorthand for a certain flinty glamour. The line keeps the show’s film-history Rolodex spinning.

Cukor

George Cukor’s name screams prestige. In this world, a director’s surname is a calling card.

Zukor

Adolph Zukor, Paramount’s founding mogul, turns the punchline. From A to Zukor - that’s the studio alphabet and the joke.

Genre and rhythm

It’s Broadway patter welded to dance-band punch. The groove keeps time with quick exchanges and overlapping lines, mimicking a backlot hallway where everyone talks at once.

Emotional arc

Start: chipper. Middle: cornered. End: brittle humor. Joe’s voice grows drier as the chorus keeps pep at a boil. It’s lipstick on a foreclosure.

Production and instrumentation

Bright brass, tight reeds, busy strings, and a drum kit that leans forward. Orchestrations sharpen the comedy by underlining each wisecrack with a rhythmic wink.

Key phrases and idioms

“Let’s have lunch” works as a social lubricant - and a dodge. “We should talk” translates to “you’re not useful to me yet.” The baseball brag is code for “I’m marketable.” The Tinseltown name-drops are a map of power.

Key Facts

• Artist: Andrew Lloyd Webber, Judy Kuhn, Alan Campbell
• Composer: Andrew Lloyd Webber
• Lyricists/Book: Don Black, Christopher Hampton
• Producers (recording): Andrew Lloyd Webber, Nigel Wright
• Release Date: September 13, 1994
• Album: Sunset Boulevard (1994 Los Angeles Cast)
• Track #: 2
• Length: ~3:30
• Label: A&M Records in the U.S. market; Really Useful/Polydor in some territories
• Genre: Stage musical, patter song with swing inflections
• Instruments: Orchestra with brass, reeds, strings, percussion, rhythm section
• Mood: caffeinated, sardonic, hustling
• Language: English
• Music style: fast conversational ensemble, tightly orchestrated
• Poetic meter: mixed prosody typical of patter writing - quick stresses, internal rhyme

Questions and Answers

Was “Let’s Have Lunch” ever released as a commercial single?

No. It has circulated on cast albums and streaming services, not as a standalone single.

Why did the 2023 revival call it “Let’s Do Lunch”?

The revival adopted several lyric updates and a modernized title to fit the production’s concept, which leaned into a contemporary media frame.

Where does the number sit in the story?

Early Act 1 at Paramount, right after Joe’s narrated prologue. It’s the studio gauntlet he has to run before the plot kicks him toward Norma.

What’s the musical engine of the piece?

Patter writing over brisk, syncopated orchestration - bright brass cues and percussive punctuation that mimic hallway chatter.

Does the song quote or mirror the 1950 film?

It riffs on the film’s studio-visit energy and film-history name-drops, including DeMille’s world, which the movie staged on a Samson and Delilah set.

Awards and Chart Positions

No dedicated single-chart history for the song. The show around it did the winning: the original Broadway production took the 1995 Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Score, and Best Book; the 2023 West End revival won seven 2024 Olivier Awards including Best Musical Revival; and the 2024 Broadway transfer won the 2025 Tony Award for Best Revival of a Musical, with Nicole Scherzinger taking Best Actress.

Preservation notes: the number appears on the 1994 American Premiere recording and on the 2024 live album from the Savoy, where it’s retitled “Let’s Do Lunch.”

How to Sing Let’s Have Lunch

Diction first. Treat it like controlled patter. Consonants should “click” without getting percussive. Keep vowels narrow so the ensemble locks together.

Breath strategy. Mark quick snatches between name-drops and jokes. If you’re Joe, plan a breath before each punchline so the sarcasm sits on air not muscle.

Tempo and feel. It lives brisk. Ride the subdivision rather than pushing on top of it. Think “forward lean” rather than “fast.”

Balance. In ensemble passages, treat the refrain like underscore for the plot beats. Step out only when the line advances story.

Acting note. Smile with your teeth, not your eyes. The number only lands if the politeness reads as currency.

Additional Info

1994’s album credits the recording to the American Premiere cast, produced by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Nigel Wright, with Paul Bogaev conducting and orchestrations by David Cullen with Lloyd Webber. The 2024 live album from the Savoy documents the lyric updates and the new title. In the 1950 film, Norma’s Paramount visit was shot on a reconstructed Samson and Delilah set under Cecil B. DeMille - a detail the musical’s studio banter keeps winking at.