1964 Tony awards

1964 seemed to be a year where there were two great musicals (Funny Girl/ Helloy Dolly) pitted against eachother (not to mention Channing and Streisand.) Do you all agree with Dolly having swept the TONYs and Funny Girl being shut out? What would you have voted for?

EDIT: not to mention that the glorious 110 in the shade AND she loves me were also in that year. 110 wasn't even best musical nominated.

Updated On: 7/18/09 at 04:58 PM

I think one of the reasons that Dolly has weathered the years better than Funny Girl is that the title role is more compatible with the talents and personae of so many different leading ladies: Channing, Rodgers, Raye, Diller, Feldshuh, Bailey, Merman, Martin -- the list goes on and on. With Funny Girl, however, Streisand made such an indelible impression, recorded both on record and on film, that there's no room to expand on the part. I know there have been some valiant attempts to do Funny Girl (with varying degrees of success), but it always comes back to Streisand.

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I don't have an opinion on Dolly versus Funny Girl but I do think 110 in the Shade was way ahead of its time.

FUNNY GIRL has clumsy book (much improved by the screenplay) - but I think it has the better score of the two.

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I would have voted for She Loves Me over both.

Carol Channing's performance was far more than a cartoon. Yes, she displayed impeccable comic skills, but her performance was also one of nuance, warmth and humanity. Her performance was superior to Streisand's, and "Hello, Dolly" was a much better show.

Nor do I think the voters felt, "hey Carol has been around 15 years and this is her peak so let's give her the award." I think they felt she gave the best performance that season, and they voted her the award. And she wholly deserved it.

Up until the early 70s Tony lead vs featured/supporting was done by billing. Bosley, Grimes and Bancroft were all billed below the title or in less-than-star billing.

Barbra and Sydney Chaplin were both star billed above the title.

In 1964 no one was tired of Barbra. She was the New Girl In Town with her face on major magazines like Time, Life and Look. Carol won because she gave a terrific comedic performance in a production that was worthy of her work.

Funny Girl has a terrific score, one of the best, but Dolly's production used its score better. Also Dolly had something else that Funny Girl didn't have--Gower Champion.

This was a really great season. No one has even mentioned High Spirits (flawed but fun and with the great Bea Lillie), Foxy (a failure but fun with the great Bert Lahr), The Girl Who Came to Supper (Noel Coward's last), the mediocre Here's Love, Mary Martin in her only bona fide failure, Jennie (with a good Dietz/Schwartz score), or What Makes Sammy Run? (good score, great star performance, otherwise so-so). And then there is Anyone Can Whistle, but so much has been written about that.

And the plays were good too: Luther, Chips With Everything, Dylan, The Rehearsal, After The Fall, Spoon River, Barefoot in the Park, Hamlet, Any Wednesday, etc, etc.

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"Also...if Barbra Streisand the only performer to win an Oscar for a role in which you DIDN'T win the Tony Award?"

Patty Duke?

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The score to "Funny Girl" is far superior, as "Dolly" is not Jerry Herman's best ("Mame" and "Mack and Mabel" are better, and even "Dear World" is more consistent). In fact, lesser songs were dropped for the film and two better ones were added, making that more listenable. However, Dolly's staging by Gower Champion has always been considered it's trump card. Dolly was the "Producers" of it's day and, while it and FG had book problems, Dolly was the juggernaut (remember how "Producers" swamped "The Full Monty" after it had successfuly debuted only a few months earlier). I personally prefer FG and I much prefer Streisand to Channing. However, it's been documented the Streisand frequently walked through her performance, and she was already building her rep as a difficult diva. I'd imagine these two things worked against her for the Tony.

I also think that, since Streisand's film performance was so powerful and her recordings of the key songs so ubiquitous, it's made a revival unlikely. FG was tailored to Streisand, whereas Dolly had Channing but was really about the show itself.

^ Merman was the original choice for the role, but at that point she said she was through with Broadway. I believe Channing was brought on before the show and score were completely written and the show was tailored to her talents. When Merman took over the role toward the end of the run, Herman wrote a new song specifically for her, which Streisand sings in the film version and Channing probably wouldn't have been able to do. It's called "Love is Only Love".

Patty Duke wasn't nominated for THE MIRACLE WORKER. It was nominated for Best Play, Best Director, Best Actress, Best Stage Technician, and Best Scenic Design, winning in the first four categories.

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No, ""Love is Only Love" was written for MAME and cut from the show early on and then added to the film of DOLLY.

Merman did not even want to hear the score of DOLLY saying that after GYPSY she was not looking to be tied down to another long-running show. (She generally stayed with her shows till closing...which with DOLLY would hav been 6 years!)

With Ethel out of the picture, J.Herman dropped "Love Look in My Window" and "World Take Me Back" and only restored the songs when Merman agreed to play Dolly for the a limited engagement at the end of the run. (It was supposed to be 3 months but was eventually extended to 9.) She recorded her songs as a single and they can be heard on the RCA Victor deluxe edition of HELLO DOLLY!

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I stand corrected. Frontrowcentre2 is right. "Love, Look in My Window" and not "Love is Only Love" is the song I was thinking that Herman gave the Merm. And I agree with madbrian that the Dolly score as sung by Streisand is terrific. Her versions of "Put On Your Sunday Clothes" and "Before the Parade Passes By" are classics. I also think the new opener for the film version, "Just Leave Everything to Me" is far superior to the stage show's "I Put My Hand In".