Ladies...and Cake.

 Tammy Grimes as The Unsinkable Molly Brown, 1960,

a role that gained her a Tony as Best Actress in a Musical.

Below, Tammy with Harve Presnell, as J.J. Brown.

When they made the movie, 4 years later,

Harve reprised his role, but Tammy lost out to Debbie Reynolds.

Spoiler Alert:

Yes, Molly and J.J. make it BIG;

they rise to the social scene in Denver and Europe.

No more pissant-dom for Molly! 

 And above, the real Molly: Margaret "Maggie" Brown, 

the stuff of Broadway heroines...

who rose from poverty to panache, thanks to 

a Leadville, Colorado silver mine.

She and her husband, J.J. Brown, became "new" money,

with Maggie a Denver socialite and do gooder.

She worked in France during WWI, 

and returned to the U.S. via the Titanic,

where she helped passengers until the bitter end.

She exhorted her life boat navigators to return to save survivers.

That sealed her fame...she died in 1932, 

made famous by a musical, a movie, and her legacy of philanthropy.

 The wonderful Barbara Harris (above with co-star Alan Alda

and below...with co-star "dress!")

in The Apple Tree,

a Jerry Bock, Sheldon Harnick show from 1966.

Barbara won a Best Actress Tony for her triple role.

We'll hear "Gorgeous" from Act III, "Passionella".

 

 Little Me, 1962, with music by Cy Coleman and Dorothy Fields

(above, an original Playbill, 

showing Sid Caesar's multiple characters).

We'll hear "Real Live Girl".

 The "wedding cake" scene from MGM's The Great Ziegfeld, 1936,

which in today's "money" would have cost almost $4,000,000

(and that's just 1 set!).

And below, the real Ziegfeld Girls this song was composed to spotlight

by Irving Berlin, back in 1919.

(Those headdresses in The Producers...got it!)