A couple of weirdos this week! A couple??? (Just can't help myself...)
First, I found Bravo Giovanni, a 1962 flop, starring Cesare Siepi (an opera star) and Michele Lee, that survived 76 performances. All about a restaurant owner who decides the restaurant next door is better, and tunnels into the basement of said kitchen to steal its food and sell it as ... well, you get the idea. In fact, the idea seems awfully familiar. Didn't Woody Allen...well, I guess not. The only song I found worth sharing is "Steady Steady" sung by Miss Lee, so BRAVA Michele!
Second, I unearthed (okay, enough tunneling) Subways are for Sleeping, and found "Subway Directions - Ride Through the Night" with Sydney Chaplin (yes, Charlie's son) giving pretty plausible instructions on how to get "uptown," and Carol Lawrence rather romantically viewing her future train ride. "Subways" had a very rocky start back in 1961, as the IRT/BMT refused to run ads in their trains, thinking that "sleeping" in their subway cars wasn't a great thing to advocate. David Merrick (The Producer) then decided to find people with the same names as the important theatre critics of the day, and publicize their "opinions" in ads, billboards and the like. No one was fooled (for long), but it meant the show WENT ON to run over 200 performances.
I've rambled too long, but be sure to listen for that Vivien Leigh number from Tovarich! She's no Janis Paige, but then neither am I. :)
Prologus, Invocation, and Instructions to the Audience (Nathan Lane,
Roger Bart, The Frogs)
I'd Do Anything (Georgia Brown and company, Oliver!)
Veronique (Madeline Kahn, On the Twentieth Century)
Subway Instructions - Ride Through the Night (Sydney Chaplin, Carol
Lawrence, Subways are for Sleeping)
Christopher Street (Warren Galjour, Wonderful Town)
The Glamorous Life (Audra McDonald, A Little Night Music)
You Could Drive a Person Crazy (Ensemble, Company)
Lady's Maid (Ensemble, Titanic)
We're Alive (Ensemble, Juno)
Steady, Steady (Michele Lee, Bravo Giovanni)
I Know the Feeling (Vivien Leigh, Tovarich!)
The Beguine (Tamara Long, Steve Elmore, Dames at Sea)
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