David Kolowitz, The Actor!

I wanted to post these photos before yesterday's show, but time got away from me, apologies! So Long, 174th Street opened on April 27th, 1976, played 16 performances and POOF! Gone! 

So many GOOD people were part of its creation.  As Clive Barnes wrote in his NYTimes review, "The people involved are talented enough...So what went wrong? How did Enter Laughing end up leaving us yawning?" Enter Laughing was the Carl Reiner novel it was based on, ANNND it starred Robert Morse, Loni Ackerman, and George S. Irving. What the heck did go wrong?
Composer/Lyricist Stan Daniels, evidently! He was a producer of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, and had also written TV show theme songs. Guess that wasn't enough to create a successful Broadway musical. 

As Clive added, "[Stan] should stay where he is well off...when the music and lyrics do not work for a musical, the musical does not work."

Above, Robert and Loni...

and below, Robert doing the "David Kolowitz, The Actor" number with his fantasy fan base (which included Eleanor Roosevelt and the Pope)!

You can probably guess the plot. Young factory assistant has a dream of becoming an actor. He lands a part with a theatre troupe, imagines stardom, romantic dinners with starlets, penthouse apartments...well, he imagines A LOT! His parents and girlfriend want him to forget all those acting dreams, settle down, and be a druggist. Hmmmm...But despite a lousy opening night, which has David forgetting his lines and bumping into furniture, his parents and girl friend show up and finally understand his ambitions.

Happy ending. 

"Bolero On Rye" with (I believe) Robert, Arthur Rubin, and Patti Karr.

Frankly, none of the photos I could find are well labeled as far as the actors go!

 

The only song to transcend the show was "The Butler's Song" with George S. Irving doing the honors. 

A cast recording was done in 1981, five years after the production, with Kaye Ballard singing the Mrs. Kolowitz songs, like "My Son, The Druggist".

It was fearlessly revived (and renamed "Enter Laughing") at the York Theatre in 2008 and again in 2019.