Carol Channing on Ethel Merman- Page 2
Carol Channing on Ethel Merman
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#25
Posted: 7/31/06 at 4:33pmLove you, too.
Broadway Legend Joined: 6/9/03
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#27
Posted: 7/31/06 at 4:45pmWho doesn't enjoy a good ear?
Joined: 12/31/69
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#29
Posted: 7/31/06 at 7:30pm
Ms. Channing is a lovely, sweet lady, but she's been pretty much off her rocker for years now. I would take any story she tells with a huge grain of salt. Or ear of corn, your choice.
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#30
Posted: 7/31/06 at 8:58pm
How can you not love Eth? Why, Stritchie's stories alone make me SOOO sorry I never got to see her live in person.
PJ, I've heard the Bird's Eye story, but how does it go again? And I've never heard the Jerry Robbins story, though if he fell into the pit during notes, I'm sure the cast applauded.
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#31
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:00pmI saw Carol Channing in the Polo Lounge at the Beverly Hills Hotel, and she said hi to me. (I don't know her, just randomly met her). My next brush with fame at the Polo Lounge was Pia Zadora. Noone notice her walking in, I felt bad and I went up to say helloooo. She ignored me and I didn't care. Who was the real "star"?
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#32
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:04pmHoney, nobody thinks Pia is a star except Pia.
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#33
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:20pm
Irving Berlin gave the cast of Annie Get Your Gun the lyrics to "Show Business" and told them that he was still working on a b etter lyric for the middle part of the song that goes "The costumes, the scenery, the makeup, the props."
Berlin felt that these lyrics were too obvious and predictable, but he couldn't think of a better line to rhyme with "flops" or an alternative quatrain.
A few days before the opening, Berlin rushed into Ethel's dressing room and said, "Ethel, I've got the perfect lines for the middle of that song!"
To which Ethel replied, "Call me Miss Birds Eye, Irving, but this show is frozen!"
(Also related as, "Call me Miss Frigidaire, but this show is frozen." You choose.)
The Jerome Robbins is usually told about a late-night onstage note session after a rehearsal or out-of-town tryout for Bells Are Ringing, although some of the members of the original West Side Story cast have claimed it, and gypsies who worked for him on other shows have sworn that it happened during their shows too.
Robbins was legendarily sadistic in his notes, usually focusing on a female dancer's supposed weight gain or a male dancer's sloppiness and lack of professionalism.
The night in question, Mr. Robbins (as he was always called by the cast, never "Jerry") was standing downstage center facing upstage, with the cast assembled in a semicircle facing him.
As he berated them, he kept taking little steps backwards, so that he could get more of the semicircle in his sight. Little by little, everyone in the cast started to realize that if he took a few more steps downstage, he would fall over backward into the orchestra pit.
No one said a word.
He had to be rushed to the hospital in an ambulance.
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#34
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:24pm
Oh! Like the Charleston contest in It's A Wonderful Life...
Thanks PJ--I appreciate you taking time off the 'hunt to answer me...:)
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#35
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:31pm
Moi?
I'm just chatting. With friends.
Like YOU.
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#36
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:31pm
Someone desperately needs to start an Apocryphal Broadway Anecdotes thread.
I'd start one myself, but my threads die - like Pacific Overtures. 
Joined: 12/31/69
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#37
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:32pm
i really love these stories!!!
i think thats the best part of BWW!!!!
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#38
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:33pm
"Someone desperately needs to start an Apocryphal Broadway Anecdotes thread"
Do they have to be verifiable?
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#39
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:33pm
Uh huh...sure we are....thank god for the advanced search feature is all I can say....
I also thought there was a good story about Jerry and Bea Arthur...
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#40
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:50pm
Do they have to be verifiable?
Not if you have the word "Apocryphal" in the thread title! The fake ones are some of the best!
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#41
Posted: 7/31/06 at 9:55pmThat sure takes the pressure off!
Joined: 12/31/69
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#42
Posted: 8/1/06 at 8:48am
i finished Carol Channing's book on the train this morning & i really didnt want it to end. i loved spending time with her.
i wish she had released an audio book of JUST LUCKY I GUESS.
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#43
Posted: 8/1/06 at 9:14am
A friend of mine did a production of South Pacific with Robert Goulet.
He begins the show in an all-white suit and, while the overture was playing, was in the wings. He turned to a stagehand in distress and really needed to relieve himself.
She led him quickly to a closet offstage and assumed he'd, you know, pee in a bucket or something.
He finished his business and ran onstage to be there when the curtain came up. The stagehand entered the closet, again expecting to pick up a bucket of Bob Goulet juice...and there was a nice steaming pile in the center of the floor.
Also interesting is how he managed not to mark his all-white suit.
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#44
Posted: 8/1/06 at 9:22amEeeeeeeeew. He started the show unwiped.
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#45
Posted: 8/1/06 at 9:24am
Two things -
1: CHARLOTTE RAE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
2: I suppose it really IS never too early for scatalogical anecdotes!
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#46
Posted: 8/1/06 at 9:25am
Wonderwaiter, go to your room. Mama needs a minute with Mr. Goulet.
Joined: 12/31/69
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#47
Posted: 8/5/06 at 9:17pm
in the interview included on the Deluxe HELLO DOLLY! OBCR, Carol Channing talks about recording JUST LUCKY I GUESS as an audio book!
was this ever released?!?!?
when i do a google search, i just find her reading of MADELINE.
Broadway Legend Joined: 5/15/03
re: Carol Channing on Ethel Merman#48
Posted: 8/5/06 at 9:47pmI don't think JUST LUCK I GUESS was ever released as an audio book. I'll ask Carol about it the next time I speak to her.
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