Barbara Harris Has Passed Away

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 2:53pm

Very sad news today...

 

https://chicago.suntimes.com/?post_type=cst_article&p=1307882

[dramamama611]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 3:03pm

Awwwww......RIP

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 3:06pm

I was just listening to her last night.

[Flowerlovestage5]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 3:13pm

This really makes my heart hurt.  Truly.  An immensely talented woman and I hope that this current news will circulate her name so that younger generations will look into her brilliant work on film and album.  God Bless Barbara.

[markypoo]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 8:00pm

So happy I had a chance to see her - in a minor role - in the Chicago production of Prelude to a Kiss.

[markypoo]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 8:00pm

So happy I had a chance to see her - in a minor role - in the Chicago production of Prelude to a Kiss.

[NoName3]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 8:08pm

Ah, so sad.  What a wonderful, sublime talent she had.

I never tire of this:

 

[Sally Durant Plummer]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 8:25pm

I'm devastated. I never got to see Miss Harris live, but her performances through cast recordings, film and television, and these special live performances show just want a brilliant and singular performer she was. I've always held it out in my heart that I would one day get to experience her talent - even with her reclusiveness in her final years. In my wildest dreams, she would have come out of retirement to play Hattie in a film version of Follies. For some reason, Harris, who is such a charismatic and funny performer, always makes me a little sad. I can't seem to shake her Tony acceptance from my head. Hopefully whatever she was going through at that time passed and she had a wonderful 50 years. She will truly be missed.

[MichelleCraig]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 8:56pm

Barbara, taking the mic at the finale of NASHVILLE, was just amazing. I will never forget it.

[sing_dance_love]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 10:13pm

I’m pretty sure I was introduced to Barbara and her singular talents through this board. I’ve long loved everything I could find of her in the Apple Tree, but had never seen that utterly delightful clip posted above from On A Clear Day before. She was a one of a kind marvel. Sad day today.

[jewishboy]

Posted: 8/21/18 at 11:32pm

RIP

The OBC of On A Clear Day... has always been one of my most played cast recordings. What a voice and spirit.

[Jarethan]

Posted: 8/22/18 at 12:11am

This was such sad news for me.  I was fortunate enough to see her in The Apple Tree at least three times for the entire show, and at least four or five times for Acts 2 and 3.  Since I was 15 at the time, I much preferred Acts 2 and 3 to Act 1, and took advantage of lax intermission controls at the Shubert to sneak in for those comic acts.  Eventually, I realized that, without Act 1, the show would not have existed.  

Fifty-two years later, I still believe that her performance in The Apple Tree was arguably the greatest musical performance I have ever seen (IMO, her competition for the top slot would be Angela Lansbury for Mame and Gypsy, Glenn Close for Sunset Blvd, and Nathan Lane in The Producers (Patti Lupone would probably be on the list for Anything Goes, had the role of Reno Sweeney not been given such short shrift in Act 2).

The prior season, I saw her in On A Clear Day, and fell in love immediately.  

Those two performances provide an important  place in my personal theatre history.  I was devastated that she stopped performing live, at least in NYC.  I have always wondered what shows were not produced because her unique talents were not available, or what roles were played by people not as talented as her.  For example, (not to dis Dorothy Loudon), I think she would have been a great Miss Hannigan; I think she would have been a great Norma Desmond, a great Dolly Levi, a great Desiree Armfeldt, a great witch in Into the Woods, a great Reno Sweeney, and etc.  Based on some of her excellent film performances -- her performance in Nashville was wonderful low comedy, and the ending of the movie with her singing "It Don't Worry Me' remains one of the great movie endings of all time to me -- you could add a lot of non-musicals to the list as well.

i have never understood why she gave it all up, but I hope it was for good personal reasons, since it deprived  several generations of theatergoers of seeing one of the greats.

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 8/22/18 at 1:33am

My heart is broken.....

[John Adams]

Posted: 8/22/18 at 2:13am

Peggy Sue, you know what a penis is? STAY AWAY FROM IT!

[BWAY Baby2]

Posted: 8/22/18 at 4:37am

Saw her years ago in The Apple Tree- in the 60's- she was unforgettable- RIP

[SmoothLover]

Posted: 8/22/18 at 8:15am

Loved her. RIP

[daredevil]

Posted: 8/22/18 at 11:10am

She came to NY in the fall of 1961 in a revue brought in from Chicago called From the Second City. The evening was a series of extended skits, each around 20 minutes long. The highlight was Barbara and Alan Arkin in a scene taking place in a museum. She played a repressed young woman he a weird beat poet--their interaction was truly hilarious.