I never said the danish line wasn't funny. I said it was a cheap laugh that interrupted a serious scene. And if the author doesn't take his story seriously, why should I?
(Sorry. I find I am repeating myself.)
Confidential to Buscee: thank you for the PM. I tried to respond but you have your logon set to refuse PMs.
^^^^ Except it wasn't. I'm all for dark humor, but TPOS continually interrupts its story with cheap gags, often unrelated to the plot. And yet it doesn't have the consistency of style of an ANYTHING GOES or any other classic of the "pure musical comedy" period.
Saw the original and was surprised that Lucie Arnaz never became a bigger star. It seemed for a time that she was unstoppable between this show, doing the movie Jazz Singer with Neil Diamond (ok, not anyone's shining moment) and she was in a TV movie at the time that was pretty good, too.
Also saw a touring company in the mid-80s with Richard Ryder and June Gable and thought they were as good as the originals.
I saw the 80s tour with Dick Latessa and Susan Anton. He was terrific; I'd never heard of him at that point and I really enjoyed his performance. Susan Anton was the billed star, and she really surprised me. She was this tall, leggy, blonde glamazon with a killer voice, best known as a Vegas-type nightclub performer. She even had her own variety show on tv for a brief spell in the 70s. But she and Latessa were wonderful together. The director and the actors had great fun utilizing their contrasting looks and the fact that she towered over him. This was right around the time that the movie "10" came out, and so they really capitalized on that Dudley Moore/Bo Derek thing. They were both very funny, and boy, could that girl sing.