ALPHABET SOUP (7) - FEATURING A RANDOM LETTER OF THE ALPHABET AND SOME SHOWS THAT BEGIN WITH THAT LETTER

ALPHABET SOUP (7) -

FEATURING A RANDOM LETTER OF THE ALPHABET AND SOME SHOWS THAT BEGIN WITH THAT LETTER

Happy 2016! For the first post of the new year, I thought I'd go to my blue London coffee mug and pick a letter and select the first few shows from that letter's pile of programs.

To kick off the new year, today's letter is ….

F

Here's some of what "F" has to offer… two all-but-forgotten plays and and two pre-Broadway tryouts. Let's begin.

FINISHING TOUCHES – Studebaker Theatre, Chicago

Way back then, it was no problem scurrying up to the upper reaches of the top balcony.

March, 1974. Jean Kerr was an Erma Bombeck-like essayist (or was Erma Bombeck a Jean Kerr-like essayist?) whose essays and books about her family and suburban life were like Bombeck's, but infused with a homey, but knowing, sophistication. Her most famous book, Please Don't Eat the Daisies, was adapted for the dated, but still very funny film of the same name starring Doris Day and David Niven. She was the wife of renowned theatre critic, Walter Kerr. As a playwright, her biggest hit was Mary, Mary which ran for over 1500 performances and for quite a while was the longest-running non-musical Broadway production. In Jean Kerr's world, nothing terribly heavy or serious happens. Oh, heavy and serious things threaten to occur, more or less, but with a few well-placed gags, those heavy and serious things disappear in audience laughter. A devout Catholic, she pretty-much toed the Church line, which makes her plays today play as dated, even a bit unbelievably naïve, period pieces. It's sort of like watching early Neil Simon. You still laugh, but perhaps not as often as you did when the work was new. In Finishing Touches, Kerr takes us to the well-designed home (courtesy of Ben Edwards) of the Cooper family. Mr. Cooper is a college professor suffering from a case of mid-life crises and student infatuation. Mrs. Cooper, his faithful and stalwart wife, in a bit of retaliation, dallies with the idea of having an affair with their handsome neighbor. The eldest son, a college senior, brings home his actress girlfriend and, the parents, not pleased that he's, gasp, slept with the lass, forbid that sort of activity in their house. No affairs happen, of course, because in a Jean Kerr play that sort of thing just isn't done, and everything ends happily and the audience leaves feeling satisfied. Directed by Joseph Anthony and featuring several of the original Broadway cast, I laughed a lot and was charmed by the performances given by celebrated stage/film/television actress Barbara Bel Geddes (in a body of work that included an Academy Award nomination and creating the role of Maggie in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, she is, somewhat perversely, best-known for her Emmy-winning role as Miss Ellie in the television soap, Dallas), Robert ("Twelve O'Clock High") Lansing, Gene Rupert and the wonderful Jill O'Hara. Never a smash hit, and perhaps too wholesome for 1973 New York audiences, the show did much better on the road. I liked it; I can't see anyone doing it today. – at the Studebaker Theatre, Chicago

From the Six Degrees of Separation Department: Gene Rupert appeared in the New York company of Promises, Promises with Jenny O'Hara, Jill's older sister. Jill O'Hara created the role that her sister played opposite Rupert, introduced "I'll Never Fall in Love Again" to the world, and won a Tony nomination in the process. I saw Jill in PP at the Muny in St. Louis and a year or so earlier had seen Rupert as Cliff Bradshaw in the national tour of Cabaret at Chicago's Shubert.  Want more? Janis Paige was Doris Day's nemesis in the film Please Don't Eat the Daisies. Janis Paige created the role of Babe Williams in The Pajama Game on Broadway. Doris Day played the role in the film. I'm not making this stuff up.

FATHER'S DAY – Ivanhoe Theatre, Chicago

November, 1973. I don't know what motivated producer George Keathley to mount a production of Oliver Hailey's 1971 one-performance Broadway flop, Father's Day, at the Ivanhoe, and I'm sure by the time the endeavor was over, he was wondering that exact thing. I know what motivated me…the opportunity to see Chita Rivera for the first time. Mind you, this is 1973 Chita Rivera, already a bankable star, but not yet the iconic legend she is today. In fact, her program bio states, "Miss Rivera looks forward to the new musical Chicago being written especially for her and co-star Gwen Verdon…," a show that would premiere some 18 months later. Broadway flop or not, Time magazine's T.E. Kalem, usually an astute critic, chose it as one of the year's ten best plays. Here's the thing, though. I remember nothing about this play. Zero. Nada. Zip. And for a production, that's not good because it means it was neither good enough nor awful enough to register in the memory bank. William Leonard's review in the Chicago Tribune implied that it was predictable and messy. And despite Mr. Leonard's claim re: directorship of the play, the program doesn't list a director. Anywhere. Not on the credits page, not in the bios. You know the thing didn't direct itself, but when a director doesn't want it known that he/she was responsible for the goings-on onstage, well, that implies it was indeed a very rough haul to opening night. According to Chita Rivera's webpage, she considered Father's Day an "exquisite experience in the theater" and based on the success (??) of the Ivanhoe engagement, was produced to better reviews and a longer run off-Broadway in 1979. I'll take your word for it, Chita. Lest it be thought that Mr. Hailey was a hack, he achieved great success as a writer for television and wrote for several leading series of the day. He just couldn't crack the playwriting code and all three of his Broadway tries were one-performance wonders. Samuel French holds the rights, if anyone's interested. – at the Ivanhoe Theatre, Chicago

FOUR ON A GARDEN – Palace Theatre, Milwaukee

I love it when I find intact old-school tickets.

My first visit to 1776 was in Milwaukee and Uihlein Hall. Hair was coming to the Palace and Gloria Swanson was ready for her closeup in the innocuous Butterflies Are Free, a wildly popular show back then.

An undated picture of the Palace's interior. I suspect this was taken during the theatre's heyday as a movie palace. I don't remember it being this grand.

The original poster co-starring Barry Nelson. The design tells you nothing about the show, but implies Channing will be playing an older Lorelei Lee.

December, 1970. Well, shades of Plaza Suite, but, instead of taking place in a hotel suite, the (in)action of the Broadway-bound Abe Burrows' adaptation of a work by French théâtre de boulevard masters Pierre Barillet and Jean-Pierre Gredy (Cactus Flower, Forty Carats) took place in a garden apartment in Manhattan. And it was Four on a Garden in name only. Somewhere along the way from New Haven, where the tryout started, to Milwaukee's Palace Theatre, one of the playlets got dropped, presumably for rewrites and other such tryout-y things, and the title really should have been Three on a Garden. The missing playlet would be restored in time for its New York opening a few weeks after the Milwaukee run. Four, three, it didn't really matter. The show was a dog. And this was a play that had Oliver Smith and Martin Aronstein and William McHone on the design team, Abe Burrows as the director, David Merrick as the producer and Carol Channing and Sid Caesar as its stars. How could this go wrong? Well, for starters, the play just wasn't funny. Oh, there were funny, very funny, bits and bobs throughout the evening, but anything remotely humorous was due to the comedic skills of Channing and Caesar, who both could wring a laugh out of a stone. The two stars both worked their asses off and used every trick in their considerable arsenals to breathe some life into the proceedings and we loved them for it, but it was like beating the proverbial dead horse. No amount of comic genius or star presence could save this despite the skill and professionalism of the folks involved. It looked great and was directed with a crisp pace, but it was a lost cause. Broadway vet George S. Irving was in the cast, though I can't remember him. Also, a young Tom Lee Jones (now known as Oscar-winner Tommy Lee Jones) who back then was very hot. I do remember him. The Milwaukee critics loved Channing and Caesar, hated the play. I pretty much felt the same way. – at the Palace Theatre, Milwaukee

Meanderings and related Garden thoughts:

 o The Palace Theatre was demolished in 1974 to make way for a hotel.

 o Carol Channing is one of those performers who more or less owes their entire career to a signature role. In Channing's case, it was two signature roles: Lorelei Lee and Dolly Levi. Four on a Garden was only Channing's second non-musical role on Broadway, the first was a forgotten flop long before Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. After the quick closing of Garden, Channing went back to more familiar, and safer, fare, reprising Lorelei Lee in a "new" version of Blondes called Lorelei (it was entertaining, but not terribly good and Channing was far too old to be playing the role) and bringing Dolly! back to Broadway in two revivals. But just because she built her career on two roles, it would be foolish to underestimate Channing's talents. She's justly acclaimed for her razor-sharp timing, her inimitable voice that can go from basso profondo to squeaky soprano in two seconds flat, and for her dead-on impressions. She could read the phone book and have you weak from laughter. (And before anyone starts on about her role in Thoroughly Modern Millie, her performance was a mix of Lorelei Lee and Dolly Levi. I felt she was wrong for the part and the Academy Award nomination was her consolation prize for the loss of the film of Hello, Dolly! to the woefully miscast Barbra Streisand.) Carol Channing is old-school pro and she's earned her legendary status.

o Four on the Garden started off in New Haven with Barry Nelson as the male lead. By the time the show reached Pittsburgh, one week before the Milwaukee engagement, he was out of the show, either by choice or by request, and replaced by Sid Caesar.

o Four on the Garden arrived in New York immediately following Milwaukee's run. It played a very long preview period, opened to terrible reviews and closed after a short, unprofitable run. I tried reading the play a few years ago and couldn't get through it.

FIRST WIVES CLUB – Oriental Theatre, Chicago

The oddly-designed marquee.

An audience survey form which I diplomatically did not fill out.

See what I mean? What is with this design? This inattention to detail was, sadly, present throughout the production.

February, 2015. On its second pre-Broadway shakedown, "First Wives Club" was definitely not ready for Broadway and needed to return to the musical hospital for some more surgery. Stat! The three talented leading ladies, Faith Prince, Carmen Cusack and Christine Sherrill, deserved a better book, a better director, and, most importantly, a better score. Loaded with either power ballads that all sound alike and ear-splittingly amplified or filler songs that were just not good, the show, remarkably, and in spite of itself, was entertaining and enjoyable. The book by Linda Bloodworth Thomason often reminded me of an episode of "Designing Women" and sometimes pushed too hard for a laugh. Sorry, Linda, no laugh track in the theatre. The choreography by David Connolly was not terribly inspired and was still being executed with some trepidation by the mostly extraneous ensemble. (Not their fault; there was just no real reason for them to be there.) The husbands were all professional and competent, but forgettable. Patrick Richwood as the gay BFF was cringe-worthy…all stereotype and offensive; the type of portrayal I thought died a long time ago. The first act was definitely better than the second. The second started off with an embarrassingly bad production number and things sort of lurched towards the finale from there. Missing and greatly missed was the movie's iconic finale of "You Don't Own Me." Final thoughts: For the most part, this was fun and one should never miss the opportunity to see Faith Prince chew some scenery. The modestly-sized audience seemed to enjoy it, though there was a fair share of interval departees. Is it Broadway material? No. Could it do well in regional and amateur theatre circles? Absolutely. - at the Oriental Theatre, Chicago

Sidebar: The show's logo/marquee confused me. One of the wives appeared to be African-American, yet the wives in Chicago were all very white and, with one exception, so was the rest of the cast. Odd design. However, on further research, I may have solved the mystery. The show had its first tryout in the summer of 2009 at San Diego's Old Globe Theatre in Balboa Park and starred Barbara Walsh, Karen Ziemba and Sheryl Lee Ralph, hence the design with two Caucasian and one African-American first wives.  The male leads, such as they are in this show, included Brad Oscar, John Dossett and Sam Harris. The Chicago casting, while using talented folks indeed, was, with the exception of Prince, less "starry" than the San Diego cast. My question to the producers is this…you spent all this money mounting another production of a show that didn't get terribly good reviews the first time out, but you couldn't spend a few lousy bucks to redo the logo? Really?

Next week…a BONUS Alphabet Soup featuring "F"!!. See you soon!

© 2016 Jeffrey Geddes