Posted: 4/30/15 at 10:05pm
Anyone check it out over at Playbill?
Not the best, but no the worst. Better than Stritch, but not as good as Nancy Walker, Carol Burnett or Ann Miller.
What say you all?
Posted: 4/30/15 at 10:25pm
I LOVE It!!! I like a big belty version of the song, and Betty gave me that. I liked Elaine Paige and Karen Marrow too and quite a few others. Big and Belty! Betty is MUCH better then Carol Burnett and Stritch-who I strongly dislike. Yvonne DeCarlo will always own though.
Posted: 4/30/15 at 10:31pm
I loved this version.
Having said that I'll always have a special place in my heart for Shirley MacLaine's version from "Postcards from the Edge."
Posted: 4/30/15 at 10:41pm
To me, Betty kind of acted out the words too much rather than feeling them. But I'm willing to concede that it may have had a different impact had I seen it live.
I saw Elaine Paige to it live 10 times or so. Her belt was thrilling, but again she wasn't feeling the words.
Ann Miller, though not that great vocally, really seemed to have lived in the song, if that makes any sense.
I didn't mention De Carlo in my post because I figured it goes without saying that she is the gold standard.
Posted: 4/30/15 at 10:55pm
I love it.
A dandy link, for your convenience!
Posted: 5/1/15 at 12:56am
I'm not really fond of her acting with this song. It's just a bit overdone.
"...then you're camp"
Posted: 5/1/15 at 12:59am
To me, Betty kind of acted out the words too much rather than feeling them.
This is how I feel about her Gypsy clips. Way too mannered.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 4:24am
Eartha Kitt I believed-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwURi7utGg8
- this is her London costume btw.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 7:13am
Loved it!
Posted: 5/1/15 at 8:11am
She sings it thrillingly, but I could do without the footwork and the hand ballet.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 8:21am
It seems overly-staged and underacted, but she "sings out, Louise."
Posted: 5/1/15 at 8:25am
"To me, Betty kind of acted out the words too much rather than feeling them"
Agree. Surprisingly and disappointingly mechanical, sing-song and emotionally one dimensional.
All things I never associate with Betty Buckley.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 8:42am
whole production was wonderful, but this wasn't the stand out moment for me. Ruthie Henshall's Losing My Mind was.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 9:24am
Posted: 5/1/15 at 9:41am
You saw it, decast? How was Lorna Luft's "Broadway Baby"?
Posted: 5/1/15 at 10:56am
What’s great about the Yvonne de Carlo version is that undersung (like the Glynis Johns version of Send in the Clowns) when so many performers want to over sing it. I actually like Elaine Stritch version because she comes across as a slightly daft, eccentric old broad who may have actually lived that life. Performers like Betty Buckley or Elaine Paige may sing the song well, but they are too classy and sane. You don’t get the sense that they are a crazy old bird hollering “Hey, look at me baby, I’m still here!” (as with Stritch) or a more resigned “I’ve been through the wringer, and may be worn out, but I’m still here” feeling as with de Carlo.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 11:07am
It's odd, because this is the exact opposite of how she performed at Joe's Pub last fall. This feels over the top and very...big. And it's a big song, sure, but it ain't this.
It's mostly the "staging" if we can call it that, although I'll agree that it got mechanical at time. But her voice is still a glory.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 11:13am
"What’s great about the Yvonne de Carlo version is that undersung (like the Glynis Johns version of Send in the Clowns) when so many performers want to over sing it. I actually like Elaine Stritch version because she comes across as a slightly daft, eccentric old broad who may have actually lived that life. Performers like Betty Buckley or Elaine Paige may sing the song well, but they are too classy and sane."
I adore Betty Buckley but "sane" is not an adjective one usually hears ascribed to her.
Updated On: 5/1/15 at 11:13 AM
Posted: 5/1/15 at 11:26am
The definitive version is Nancy Walker's, from the Scrabble album--and this from someone who saw Yvonne de Carlo do it five times in the original production:
Posted: 5/1/15 at 11:32am
She sounds nice... I'm surprised that she showed no vulnerability in her performance. I saw Betty in concert a few years ago, and she cried like Bernadette Peters.
I think there's a transition in the song between "Anything else is a laugh" and "I've been through Reno." I think Ted Chapin describes it in "Everything Was Possible." Up until then, she sang the song for other people at the party. Then it becomes a song about survival. I think Betty missed the mark on that.
(From the clips available of the 85 concert, Carol Burnett makes that transition very effectively.)
Posted: 5/1/15 at 11:41am
Completely agree about Carol Burnett. Her "Reno-Beverly Hills" transition line is perfectly haunting.
No one seems to have explained that to Elaine Paige. Who, again, I loved watching, but... it wasn't the best.
To me Stritch's version is very specifically about Stritch. The jumping up and down at the end- stuff like that. It doesn't really have anything to do with Follies or Carlotta. And that's fine for what it was.
The version I saw Ann Miller do starts off like a lounge act, and then something happens. It becomes transcendent, and when she does the surprisingly strong belt at the end you're completely convinced.
I would love to see Patti's take on it sometime. Maybe Sondheim could write some Patti specific lyrics like the did about Debbie Reynolds and Barbra Streisand.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 11:51am
I think there's a transition in the song between "Anything else is a laugh" and "I've been through Reno.
Absolutely right! Listen to the Nancy Walker version. That transition is where the song gets real. The beginning of the song is clever, about trends and difficult things she makes fun of.
From Reno and Beverly Hills, it's all about things life slammed here with: divorce and drugs, alcohol, rehab and religion. The song is no longer just clever. It becomes about life-and-death matters, and she chooses--and celebrates--life.
Posted: 5/1/15 at 12:03pm
Have to give out a shout out for Polly Bergen's version.
