Vivian Blaine...Guys and Dolls, 1955

Just in time?

Sydney Chaplin and Judy Holliday...Bells are Ringing!

Playlist for Sunday, June 2, 2013: Bushels, Pecks, and (Can) Cans

This week's playlist runs the gamut from Carribbean Isle paradise to New York grit to Never Land to down home fillin' station country.  Once On This Island, written by the team who brought us Ragtime and Anastasia, is our opening...then we mix in some Frank Loesser Bushels and Pecks...then Cole Porter's Can-Can, which starred Lilo, a French actress they thought would bowl everybody over.  Turns out Gwen Verdon, in the second banana role, stole the show, that and the Michael Kidd choreography!

Then a bit of Sally Kellerman, who YES is a singer of (mostly) jazz, performing a nifty bad girl song, "Good Girls Go To Heaven," from that questionable Breakfast at Tiffany's. She adds just the right amount of sleaze. And we close with some Mark Hardwicke country...just "Serve Yourself!"



We Dance (Ensemble, Once on this Island)
You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile (Ensemble, Annie)
A Bushel and a Peck (Vivian Blaine, Ensemble, Guys and Dolls)
I've Gotta Crow (Mary Martin, Peter Pan)
It's Me (Joan McCracken, Isabel Bigley, Me & Juliet)
Just in Time (Sydney Chaplin, Judy Holliday, Bells are Ringing)
Marry the Man Today (Isabel Bigley, Vivian Blaine, Guys and Dolls)
C'est Magnifique (Lilo, Can-Can)
Good Girls Go to Heaven (Sally Kellerman, Breakfast at Tiffany's)
At the Ballet (Ensemble, A Chorus Line)
On the Right Track (Ben Vereen, Pippin)
My Old Kentucky Rock and Roll Home (Mark Hardwicke, Ensemble, Oil City
                                     Symphony)
Serve Yourself (Mark Hardwicke, Ensemble, Pump Boys and Dinettes)

Momma Momma Momma....a better one of Elliot and "mom" in action.

Leslie Uggams...circa Hallelujah, Baby!

Elliot Gould and MOMMA MOMMA MOMMA

Playlist for Sunday, May 26, 2013

Playing a few brand new (to me) musicals this week...Hallelujah, Baby (a Jule Styne/Comden and Green creation) started out trying to chronicle the African American experience over the first half of the 20th Century, but a funny thing happened on the way to the theatre.  When Lena Horne split, and effervescent Leslie Uggams took over, it changed from edgy and intense and possibly REAL, back to sweet and fluffy Broadway-as-Usual. Despite that, it is still an interesting "piece of work" and I'm playing 2 selections, one a luscious Leslie ballad, called "My Own Morning." Breakfast at Tiffany's changed book writers, directors, and even its title, like underware and ALMOST made it to opening night, except David Merrick pulled the plug at the last moment, "rather than subject the drama critics and the public to an excruciatingly boring evening."  Well, it ain't that bad! 

Oh, and be sure to catch Elliot Gould singing a rather embarrassing "Momma" from I Can Get it For You Wholesale!  Listen, if you dare...



Who Will Buy? (Ensemble, Oliver!)
Be Our Guest (Gary Beach and Ensemble, Beauty and the Beast)
Abboundanza (Rico Froehlich, John Henson, Arthur Rubin, The Most Happy
                                   Fella)
Use What You Got (Sam Harris, The Life)
It Needs Work (Kay McClelland, City of Angels)
Bianca (Harold Lang, Kiss Me Kate)
Choo Choo Honeymoon (Sally Stark, Joseph Sicari, Dames at Sea)
Ambition (Nathan Lane, Heather Headley, Do Re Mi)
Slice (Robert Hooks, Hallelujah, Baby!)
My Own Morning (Leslie Uggams, Hallelujah, Baby!)
Who's Been Sitting in My Chair? (Elaine Stritch, Goldilocks)
If Mama were Married (Sandra Church and Lane Bradbury, Gypsy)
Momma Momma Momma (Elliot Gould, Lillian Roth, I Can Get it For You Whole-
                                   Sale)
Lament for Ten Men (Ensemble, Breakfast at Tiffany's)
The Movin' Uptown Blues (Adam Grupper and Stuart Zagnit, The Wild Party)

Original cast of Pump Boys and Dinettes...1982

Mark Hardwick and Debra Monk, back right...can't see their "drinkin' shoes" from here.

Springtime for Hitler...go figure!

Eartha and those chaises...New Faces of 1952

Playlist for Sunday, May 19, 2013

New Faces of 1952 was a review that introduced Paul Lynde, Alice Ghostley, Mel Brooks and Marvin Hamlisch to the world...and featured Eartha Kitt singing an incredible song, written specifically FOR her and ABOUT her.  She envisioned six on-stage chaise lounges, and herself crawling cat-like from one to the other, while singing it.  She had to settle for 3, but hey...the visual on that is pretty wild...the song: Monotonous, written by June Carroll and Arthur Siegel.  And that voice!

A wow opening: Springtime for Hitler, from The Producers...and a great closer (hope we have time for it!): Why? Cuz I'm a Guy, from I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change.  Hope you can join me...this Sunday at 3pm!

Springtime for Hitler (Cast, The Producers)
Iowa Stubborn (Cast, The Music Man)
The Farmer and the Cowman (Cast, Oklahoma!)
Bye Bye Baby (Carol Channing and Cast, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes)
Monotonous (Eartha Kitt, New Faces of 1952)
Mary (Jennifer Alloway, George M!)
Can't Help Lovin' that Man of Mine (Anita Darian, Show Boat)
The Road You Didn't Take (George Hearn, Follies)
Being Alive (Dean Jones and Cast, Company)
If You Could See Her Like I Do (Joel Grey, Cabaret)
I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face (Rex Harrison, My Fair Lady)
Simple Joys (Ben Vereen, Pippin)
Drinkin' Shoes (Mark Hardwick and Cast, Pump Boys and Dinettes)
Kind of Woman (Jill Clayburgh, Pippin)
Why? Cuz I'm A Guy (Robert Rosnowski, Jordan Leeds, I Love You, You're      
                                            Perfect, Now Change)

Bobby Short...definitive interpretor of the Gershwin boys!

Ethel, trying to get a man with that gun!

Fred and Adele...a s'wonderful shine on their shoes.

Playlist for Sunday, May 12th, 2013

Top favorites this Sunday are..."S'Wonderful," which actually hails from an old (1927) show called Smarty (which failed, then succeeded after it was re-named Funny Face. And they ask, what's in a name?) sung by Bobby Short... and "The Woman's Dead," from Curtains (let's laugh at Death for as long as we can, right?)...I'm also adding in a selection from Pippin, which is making such a stir on Broadway presently, although back in 1979 they couldn't GIVE tickets away.  Huh.  Anyway...another 1970's goodie is from The Me Nobody Knows (and nobody DOES know about this show!), "Light Sings." And catch Avon Long singing "Nobody," from Bubbling Brown Sugar...he played Sportin' Life in a Porgy and Bess revival in the 40's.  What a voice!

Hope you can join me!

We Are What We Are (Ensemble, La Cage Aux Folles)
Bloody Mary (Ensemble, South Pacific)
Luck Be A Lady (Robert Alda, Guys and Dolls)
Come To Me (Elaine Stritch, Sail Away)
Is It A Crime? (Judy Holliday, Bells Are Ringing)
S'Wonderful (Bobby Short, Smarty)
Shine on My Shoes (Mel Torme/George Shearing, The Bandwagon)
My Corner of the Sky (John Rubenstein, Pippin)
Light Sings (Kevin Lindsay, The Me Nobody Knows)
Nobody (Avon Long, Bubbling Brown Sugar)
How Ya Baby (Ensemble, Ain't Misbehavin')
You Can't Get a Man with a Gun (Ethel Merman, Annie Get Your Gun)
All Er Nothin' (Celeste Holm, Lee Dixon, Oklahoma)
The Woman's Dead (Ensemble, Curtains)

J. Pierpont Finch...whatever you do, don't get stuck in the mail room!

Julie Andrews...as Guinevere in Camelot.

Maybe that's how they hula hooped in those days!

Playlist! Sunday May 5, 2013

Tis May, finally...that Lusty Month that Julie sings about...and that calls for a couple of seasonal selections!  Love "What A Game" from Ragtime, all about that American pastime of baseball, but man, did I have to do some editing!  Don't worry, I kept all the "spitting" in.  A couple of new (to me) musicals, Chess and The Mystery of Edwin Drood, will be showing up for the first time.  One of the writers of Chess, Bjorn Ulvaeus, was part of ABBA (!) and that explains EVERYTHING! 

And then there's the Brotherhood of Man...from How To Succeed.  Rudy Vallee expected to be able to sing some of his old "hits" in the production.  They nixed that!  And the little book that J. Pierpont reads ("How to Succeed") actually exists...written by Sheppard Mead, still in print (for a hefty sum on Amazon), and subtitled "The Dastard's Guy."  New favorite word. 

The Lusty Month of May (Julie Andrews, Camelot)
Six Months Out of Every Year (Shannon Bolin, ensemble, Damn Yankees)
What A Game (Mark Jacoby, Alex Strange, Ragtime)
With Every Breath I Take (Kay McClelland, City of Angels)
Maybe This Time (Liza Minelli, Cabaret)
Bosom Buddies (Angela Lansbury, Bea Arthur, Mame)
Brotherhood of Man (Robert Morse, ensemble, How to Succeed)
Merano (Ensemble, Chess)
Moonfall (Patti Cohenoor, The Mystery of Edwin Drood)
I'm Not a Well Man (Barbra Streisand, Jack Kruschen, I Can Get It for You
                                       Wholesale)
Old Folks (Ensemble, 70 Girls 70)
Mr. Goldstone, I Love You (Ethel Merman, Gypsy)
Officer Krupke (Russ Tamblyn and Ensemble, West Side Story)