Marry Me On Broadway...or not!

 Betsy's Getting Married!

From Honeymoon in Vegas, 

the work of Jason Robert Brown,

which launched on Broadway in 2015

and starred Tony Danza, Brynn O'Malley, Rob McClure,

and several Elvissssss!

 Jack Buchanan's up twice this Sunday...
but he's not walking down an aisle.
Just grabbing "A Cup Of Coffee, A Sandwich, and You"

(a duet with Gertrude Lawrence, below on the right)

and "Everything Stops For Tea".

(That's Beatrice Lillie on the left, who's maybe holding out for coffee!)

 Jo Sullivan as "Rosabella" in

The Most Happy Fella

(who was soon to become Frank Loesser's Wife #2).

Below, partner in crime Susan Johnson who played Cleo,

fellow waitress,

with Goddard Lieberson at a recording session.

 The 2 Barbaras of She Loves Me...

Cook and Baxley,

and below Barbara C., Hal Prince, Barbara B. and Daniel Massey.
"I Don't Know His Name"
but hey, he's the guy on the right, already!
Ask him!

 Josie de Guzman and Faith Prince

recording "Marry The Man Today"

in the 1992 revival of Guys And Dolls,

and in a celebratory hug (below)
 with Peter Gallagher and Nathan Lane. 

There exists out there in the "ether" a
documentary made of this recording session
(sort of like the infamous Company one),
which you can see clips of on YouTube...
It's called Guys and Dolls: Off The Record.
Definitely worth a WATCH!

 The real I Do! I Do!

with Robert Preston and Mary Martin...

and Al Hirschfeld's take on that long-time wedded couple.

We'll hear Robert with "I Love My Wife".

And then there's always the 

"I Do, I Do In the Sky"

version, from The Drowsy Chaperone,

with Trix, The Aviatrix flying the plane (and leading the number)...

that's Kecia Lewis-Johnson, front and center above.

And below, Troy Britton Johnson and Sutton Foster plighting their troths

(sounds a little painful, doesn't it?)

in the same show.

Best Book and Best Score Tony Awards back in 2006.

Playlist For Sunday, Jan. 26, 2020: Plighting Troths.

Nah, this isn't the Valentine's Day edition. I'll save all that syrupy stuff for February. And it isn't June, that month that supposedly attracts weddings like flies to whipped cream and baloney (tho experts NOW tell us October is THEE month for nuptials these days!). Nope, I just recently ran into a lot of "Getting Married Today" (or NOT!) songs and thought to string 'em together in a playlist, like Christmas lights (still) on the porch.

 They look pretty happy, right?

Cuz usually they're bright and chipper (like those leftover lights), just what we need in this Gulag-y time of the year. Hearts and flowers, shoes (ouch!) and rice (bird seed?), hope and huppahs, love springing eternal in Vegas, in Napa, on the lower East Side and Grosvenor Square, on airplane wings, next door, at tea time, or in the silhouette of a cigarette...all via Broadway.

And for those not inclined to walk down ANY aisle (despite my saving you a seat!), there'll be a Frank Loesser corner, with Frank doin' his own Guy/Doll thing...and a little Sondheim niche, with Stevie Anecdotes about Company. Plus our very popular Old Timey nook (corner, niche...nook!) with Mildred Bailey, Red Nichols, The Captivators, and Jack Buchanan stopping everything for that cuppa. So a little something for everybody! Except football fans. :)

 Jack can come to tea anytime!

So grab a hankie, it'll be by turns sentimental and snarky, so you'll want to prepare. I Do, I Do....on Broadway! 


Betsy's Getting Married (Brynn O'Malley, Honeymoon In Vegas)
Marry The Man Today (Faith Prince, Josie de Guzman, Guys And Dolls)
If Momma Was Married (Leigh Ann Larkin, Laura Benanti, Gypsy)
Don't Marry Me (Larry Blyden, Miyoshi Umeki, Flower Drum Song)
Getting Married Today (Beth Howland, Steve Elmore, Company)
I Don't Know His Name (Barbara Cook, Barbara Baxley, She Loves Me)
My Dear Rosabella (Jo Sullivan, Susan Johnson, The Most Happy Fella)
The Boy Next Door (Judy Garland, Meet Me St. Louis)
Fugue For Tinhorns (Frank Loesser, Milton DeLugg, Sue Bennett,
       An Evening With Frank Loesser)
Sue Me (Frank Loesser, An Evening With Frank Loesser)
Organization Man (Frank Loesser, An Evening With Frank Loesser)
The Company Way (Robert Morse, Sammy Smith, How To Succeed In
       Business Without Really Trying)
Marry With Me (Carol Brice, The Grass Harp)
I've Decided to Marry You (Lauren Worsham, Lisa O'Hare, Bryce Pinkham,
       The Gentleman's Guide To Love And Murder)
Get Me To The Church On Time (Stanley Holloway, My Fair Lady)
A Cigarette, A Silhouette (Mildred Bailey, Red Norvo and His Orchestra)
Puttin' On The Ritz (Phil Spitalny Orchestra)
Building A Nest For Mary (Red Nichols and The Captivators)
A Cup Of Coffee, A Sandwich, And You (Jack Buchanan, Gertrude Lawrence,
       Charlot's Revue)
Everything Stops For Tea (Jack Buchanan, Come Out Of The Pantry)
Marry Me A Little (John Barrowman, Putting It Together)
Multitudes Of Amys (Mathew Scott, Sondheim On Sondheim)
Happily ever After (Tom Wopat, Sondheim On Sondheim)
Being Alive (Dean Jones, Company)
I Love My Wife (Robert Preston, I Do! I Do!)
I Love My Wife (James Naughton, Lenny Baker, I Love My Wife)
An Old-Fashioned Wedding (Ray Middleton, Ethel Merman, Annie Get Your
       Gun)
Let's Have A Simple Wedding (David Christmas, Bernadette Peters,
       Dames At Sea)
It Shoulda Been You (Chip Zien,Tyne Daly, Ensemble, It Shoulda Been You)
I Love To Cry At Weddings (Ensemble, Sweet Charity)
I Do, I Do In The Sky (Kecia Lewis-Evans, Company, The Drowsy Chaperone)
Always A Bridesmaid (Jennifer Simmard, I Love You, You're Perfect,
       Now Change)
Me And My Girl (Robert Lindsay, Emma Thompson, Me And My Girl)

What Doc's cooking this Sunday!

 Random shots from some of the tunes

we'll be hearing come this Sunday (1/19/20)!

Here's Charles L. (Doc) Cook and his Dreamland Orchestra,

who back in 1926 recorded  

"Here Comes The Hot Tamale Man".

Doc (he was a Doctor of Music, earned from the "Chicago Musical College") started out in that town playing at Paddy Harmon's 

Dreamland Ballroom,

then moved to New York City in 1930,

to write orchestrations for Radio City Music Hall

and Broadway

(The Hot Mikado, The Boy Friend, and Shuffle Along).

 Called "Romeo and Juliet with cheekbones",

this French Romeo premiered in Paris in 2001,

with rock-ish music by Gerard Presgurvic.

Incredibly popular...surprising that it never jumped the pond to 

Broadway!

It's been translated into 20 some languages

and toured extensively.

 From that musical, we'll hear

"Les Rois du Monde"

which was released as a single 

by cast members
Damien Sargue, Phillipe D'Avilla, and Gregori Baquet (below).

 I admit to RARELY playing Les Miserable selections,

but let's try one!

"Bring Him Home" sung by the original Valjean (1985),

Colm Wilkinson.

Bernadette Peters and Tom Wopat

in the 1999 revival of Annie, Get Your Gun.

Amazing to think that Rodgers & Hammerstein were originally

asked to write this music,

as was Jerome Kern

(who actually died on his way to the first production meeting!)

(way to avoid!).

Finally they convinced Irving...

and we have that wonderful
 "Doin' What Comes Naturally" score!

(That song was one of the first 3 that Mr. Berlin wrote for the show.)

 What a great shot of Shirley MacLaine

on the set of Can-Can,

a Cole Porter musical revised for Hollywood...

the plot changed, some of Cole's music bit the dust,

and Frank Sinatra was "obliged" to participate

due to the fact that he walked off Carousel!

The film also starred Louis Jourdan and Maurice Chevalier.

We'll hear one of those lesser known Porter songs,

"Come Along With Me"

sung by Shirl.

 This is the movie that Nikita Khrushchev paid a visit to,
 while it was being filmed on a 20th Century Fox lot! 

He was supposedly shocked by what he saw, 

calling the dances 

"depraved" and "pornagraphic."

 Well, c'est la can-can!

Playlist For Sunday, January 19, 2020: Sort it!

"She needs to sort out her priorities."

Ron Weasley said that in the first Harry Potter, and OKAY so he was adorable and had an adorable English accent wrapped around "priorities", and he said it to an adorable Harry, about an adorable Hermoine, but it really is one of The 10,000 Truths (a book in development, at least in my mind).

Case in Point: I've "liked" a few of these homesteading women on social media, whose homes look like Parisienne farms or woodsy specimens from Country Life (without the tack)(without the white frickin' walls). Always the comfy throw artfully tossed across the comfy French-esque divan, always the quail eggs and einkorn sour-dough toast for that Instagrammable sunrise repast, always the bright red lipstick and bedroom hair in a crazy/artfully arranged bun! Damn. Priorities! With a lunge to Constantly Artful!

 French Country Kitchen

vs

Frenchy

(I know which one I'm prioritizing.)

 Me? I sit here in yesterday's eyeliner, a cat kneading my Walmart leggings (while ON), the wall-to-wall needing a Hoovering, and for breakfast, a stale "un petit morceau" of Little Debbie's. My priorities? Everything non-domestic.

Like this. :)

Like this week's edition of BROADWAY! The quail eggs and einkorn of my life, I guess. And speaking of food, this week we have our cheesy themes back (and no Velveeta this!)....We COME and GO. Yup, 2 simple yet effective verbs that'll bring a bevy of musical goodies together, like that box of assorted chocolates you're re-gifting from the holidays. Come Back To Me, Come Rain Or Come Shine, Go Into Your Dance, Anything Go(es)...that's the idea. Shirley, Bernadette, Judy, Brian, Randy, Sutton, so many we'll need name tags.

 So that's my priority. I wish I had other more aesthetic ones, but actions speak louder and all that. In this case, they SING louder. Tune in and leave the "artfully tossed" for another day. Get those damn priorities sorted, Hermoine!


Come To Me (Elaine Stritch, Ensemble, Sail Away)
Come Back To Me (John Cullum, On A Clear Day)
Doin' What Comes Naturally (Bernadette Peters, Annie Get Your Gun)
Here She Comes/East River Hoe Down (Ensemble, Two On The Aisle)
Love Will Come And Find Me (Laura Osnes, Bandstand)
Come To Me, Bend To Me (John Gustafson, Brigadoon)
Come Home (Audra McDonald, Nathan Gunn, Allegro)
When Mabel Comes In The Room (Company, Mack & Mabel)
I've Come To Wive It Wealthily In Padua (Brian Stokes Mitchell, Kiss Me, Kate)
When My Ship Comes Home(Christine Ebersole, Christine Ebersole
       Sings Noel Coward)
Come Along With Me (Shirley MacLaine, Can-Can)
Come Rain Or Come Shine (Judy Garland, Judy)
Close Every Door (The Crouch End Festival Chorus, Joseph And The
       Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat)
Bring Him Home (Colm Wilkinson, Les Miserables)
Les Rois Du Monde (Damien Sargue, Philippe D'Avilla, Gregori Bacquet,
       Romeo Et Juliette: De La Haine A L'Amour)
Come Up To My Place (Nancy Walker, Kris Alexander, On The Town)
Here Comes The Hot Tamale Man (Doc Cook and His Dreamland
       Orchestra)
Welcome To The Rock (Joel Hatch, Company, Come From Away)
Welcome To The Renaissance (Michael James Scott, Ensemble,
       Something Rotten!)
Welcome To Nowhere (Katrina Lenk, John Cariani, Etai Benson,
       The Band's Visit)
Welcome To The Night (John Lithgow, Sweet Smell Of Success)
Go Into Your Dance (Carole Cook, Wanda Richert, Ensemble, 42nd Street)
Gotta Have Me Go With You (Judy Garland, A Star Is Born)
Good Girls Go To Heaven (Sally Kellerman, Breakfast At Tiffany's)
Not A Day Goes By (Jim Walton, Merrily We Roll Along)
I Want To Go Home (Daniel H. Jenkins, Big)
Let's Go Home (Joanna Gleason, Barry Bostwick, Nick & Nora)
Gone, Gone, Gone (Lilli Cooper, Tootsie)
Gone, I'm Gone (Nabiyah Be, The Fates, Hadestown)
I Will Go Sailing No More (Randy Newman, Toy Story)
Anything Goes (Sutton Foster, Ensemble, Anything Goes)

Kander + Ebb = Roller Coasters, Cell Blocks, Communists and Jungle Rides

John Kander and Fred Ebb,

a musical theatre writing combo for the ages.

So many wonderful shows that I sorta wish we could

extend the Golden Age of Broadway (1920s to 1960)

to include them...

their feats, their foibles

and all that mishegass in between.

A young Liza readying for Flora The Red Menace

with Hal Prince, Flora's producer.

Liza wasn't the first to be considered for the lead

in this, K&E's first collaboration;

nope, Eydie Gorme and Barbra Streisand were both

in the running (if we can believe the mythology).

But they settled on 19 year old Liza,

who promptly won a Tony

in a flop that lost its entire $400,000 investment.

Below, more from that 1965 production.

Gwen Verdon and Chita Rivera,

the very first Roxie and Velma

of Chicago, 1975.

Fred wrote the book in a vaudeville style because 

"the characters were performers. 

Every musical moment in the show was loosely modeled on someone else: Sophie Tucker, Ted Lewis, Eddie Kantor, and Bert Williams"...to name a few.

The initial production ran for 2 years,

and the revival for a record-breaking...well, let's just say

it's still running (since 1996)!

 The Rink with Liza and more Chita...

K&E's 10th collaboration.

It began Off-Broadway, with Arthur Laurents directing,

moving to Broadway months later

(with Terrence McNally tweaking the book

and Arthur leaving the production).

Negative reviews closed it after 200 performances;

John Kander responded...

  "Up there on the stage were two of my best friends, Liza and Chita. 

It was an overwhelming experience; 

and when they weren't treated well, 

it was as if we had gotten attacked on the street.... 

 That show hurt me more than any show I've written.... 

 I felt that I had let them down."

 

Steel Pier, 1997,

with Karen Ziemba and Daniel McDonald (above)

ran for 76 performances.

Also starring were Debra Monk and 

Kristin Chenoweth in her Broadway debut. 

Ben Brantley of the NY Times labeled it

  "insulated by a fuzzy cover of blandness. 

For Mr. Kander and Mr. Ebb, 

devils obviously make better company than angels."

 70, Girls, 70...

a favorite of mine (well, 70 does LOOM!),

but not a favorite of many others.

Oldsters kickin' up there heels and stealing fur coats,

evidently for a very good reason.

Above, the stars:

Gil Lamb, Mildred Natwick, Hans Conried, 

Lucie Lancaster, Goldye Shaw, Lillian Hayman and Lillian Roth.

35 performances and POOF! It was gone.

Most agreed that it was an intimate, charming show,

ill-fitted to a big Broadway venue.

 In 2006, Encores! did a concert version with (below)

Tina Fabrique, Mary Jo Catlett, Anita Gillette, 

Charlotte Rae, Carole Cook,

and Olympia Dukakis.

And their first smasheroo,

Cabaret, an 8 Tony winner from 1967,

with Joel Grey (above), Liza, Lotte Lenya, and Jack Gilford!

It ran for almost 3 years,

and has been revived here and in London a total of 7 times.

Fred Ebb passed away in 2004, at the age of 76,

whilst the team was forging ahead with Curtains.

John Kander, however, is still with us.

Together they wrote 20 musicals,

and scores for 4 movie musicals.

Do the math = Lotsa songs!

Playlist For January 12, 2020: No skiis, no winter, just Broadway!

The 3 Month/90,000 Day Count Down has begun; January 1 to April 1, the dank gulag of WINTER. Damn, I hate this time of the year. People say, plan a trip for February! Take a cruise in March! Conjure up a Mardi Gras party! Take up skiing! Dear god. First of all, upstate NY doesn't like letting anyone leave. Plan an escape and the weather descends, trapping you at the Buffalo/Rochester/Toronto/fill in name of airport here Airport. Plan a party? Snap, an ice storm (with leftovers rapidly spoiling in your larder). And skiing? A hearty no there, but tubing...with my ass ON THE GROUND (or near it already) is something I do actually tolerate, tho those 5 year olds do get in the way!

So maybe these doldrums are just an excuse to play more Liza, but on the other hand, I don't think I've done a John Kander/Fred Ebb salute EVER, so 'tis THAT season! And they did a ton of shows, over 20...so I have lots of material. Okay, waaaaay too much material. Smash hits (like Cabaret and Chicago), their share of bagels (Flora, The Happy Time, 70, Girls, 70), some also rans (Curtains, The Rink), but all in all, a Broadway lifetime full of incredible tunes and great performances. Unfortunately,  Fred Ebb left us in 2004, mid-way thru Curtains, but John Kander is still revving his engines at age 93 and probably humming a newly-composed Act 1closer, if not strategizing Another Opn'in', Another Show for Broadway as we wheeze.

And they loved Liza...created whole shows for her, even stole songs back for her (yup, just ask, Kaye Ballard, if you could, how they yanked "Maybe This Time" right out of her hopefully-bejeweled, tastefully-manicured hands, all for Ms. Minnelli to do in the movie version of Cabaret!). They also loved inflecting their shows with politics (fighting the Nazis, joining up with the Communist Party, unions) and wrote feisty female leads, ladies who had no trouble standing up to the men in their lives (if not put a hole, or 7, in 'em). Sexy, powerful women who sang sexy, powerful songs, didn't pull punches, or stop just because they got old and gnarled. (They just put on their stolen fur coats and carried on.) Kander & Ebb empowered the Misses in the Mezz!

Of course, this will be just the tip of the Kander & Ebb iceberg. Whole musicals must go unexposed (apologies to Spiderwoman, et.al.), cuz these 2 hours fill up fast, especially when La Bacall does 10 verses a la Jerry Herman, when 4 would suffice (well, she WAS the Woman of the Year!). But I'll try to smush as many K&E songs and minutiae into our time together as poss.

So pardon me, while I inflate that tube. And cross off another day! ;)

Sing Happy (Liza Minnelli, Flora The Red Menace)
Wilkommen (Joel Grey, Cabaret)
Two Ladies (Joel Grey, Ensemble, Cabaret)
Married (Lotte Lenya, Jack Gilford, Cabaret)
Mein Herr (Liza Minnelli, Cabaret)
All That Jazz (Chita Rivera, Chicago)
We Both Reached For The Gun (Jerry Orbach, Gwen Verdon, Chicago)
My Own Best Friend (Chita Rivera, Gwen Verdon, Chicago)
Tomorrow Morning (Robert Goulet, Michael Rupert, The Happy Time)
Wallflower (Diane Langton, The Rink)
70, Girls, 70 (Company, 70, Girls, 70)
Sara Lee (Bob Cuccioli, And The World Goes 'Round)
The Grass Is Always Greener (Lauren Bacall, Marilyn Cooper, Woman
       Of The Year)
Second Chance (Daniel McDonald, Karen Ziemba, Steel Pier)
Everybody's Girl (Debra Monk, Steel Pier)
Lovebird (Karen Ziemba, Adam Petty, Ensemble, Steel Pier)
Steel Pier (Gregory Harrison, Ensemble, Steel Pier)
There Goes The Ball Game/How Lucky Can You Get (Ensemble,
       And The World Goes 'Round)
A Quiet Thing (Marin Mazzie)
Go Back Home (Audra McDonald, Go Back Home)
All I Need (Is One Good Break)(Liza Minnelli, Flora The Red Menace)
Hello, Waves (Bob Dishy, Liza Minnelli, Flora The Red Menace)
The Woman's Dead (Debra Monk, Ensemble, Curtains)
A Tough Act To Follow (David Hyde Pierce, Jill Paice, Curtains)
Colored Lights (Liza Minnelli, The Rink)
But The World Goes 'Round (Liza Minnelli, New York, New York)
Maybe This Time (Kaye Ballard)
Isn't This Better? (Ensemble, And The World Goes 'Round)
Life Is (Lorraine Serabian, Ensemble, Zorba)