"Broadway Babylon: Glamour, Glitz and Gossip On The Great White Way"

[Patti LuPone FANatic]

Posted: 7/10/18 at 10:15am

by Boze Hadleigh.    Oh my,  this book has so many stories, anecdotes and quotes!   Here are some:

1.  "My grandmother always told me when I went into show business to be aware of the casting couch.  I realized six months into the road on this show that the girls didn't have to worry about it.  It was the guys who had a problem."  Terpsie Toon (Sugar Babies) later a director-choreographer

2.  "I'll tell you who I admire.  Not so much these movie stars who come to Broadway and get exhorbitant publicity and fees on a silver platter, milady, but women who run things and get in there and make it happen.  Imagine the guts and effrontery of a woman theatrical manager with her own troupe back in 1865-yes, that was happening, folks--at a time when no woman could vote or even own property in her own name.  That is to admire." Eileen Heckart     

3.  "I always heard that Noel Coward wrote that song "Mad About The Boy" because of his friend Cary Grant."  Douglas Fairbanks Jr. in his memoirs, explaining that it wasn't written about "him".

4.  "Oscar Hammerstein was a city boy and lyrics are not infallible.  In the song "Oh, What A Beautiful Morning", he wrote: "The corn is high as an elephant's eye, " unaware that Oklahoma is not part of the Midwestern corn belt. " Midwestern playwright William Inge

5.  "I was not turned off by Miss Merman's famous  belt nor her hard-as-nails demeanor.  I found her voice and personality occasionally refereshing.  No, what I found off-putting was her tendency to perform robotically.  In any given show, her performance on opening night was the same performance she'd given eight months later.  She didn't vary by a hair.  That's nonhuman!"  Wyatt Cooper (the same was said of Carol Channing)

6.  "Helen Hayes was so proud to have a theatre named after her.  Eventually, it was torn down...but then they named another one after her, and for the first time ever, she made me laugh when she said, 'Oh it's wonderful to be a theatre again!" theatrical producer Robert Whitehead

7.  "It's not true that (we) are no longer speaking.  I saw his last show.  At least I hope it was his last show." Tim Rice on former collaborator (Andre Lloyd Webber)

8.  "I enjoyed doing 'Pippin" (1972) and being in a hit.  I did not enjoy these critics who felt disapppointed that I didn't give them Granny from 'The Beverly Hillbillies'.  I'm an actress and there's all sorts of grandmothers in this world, and I'll whoop the tar out of anyone who wants to argue on that!" Irene Ryan

9.  "I see Miss Claudette Colberthas in her post-film, post-prime career returned to the stage.  She is interesting to watch, if not to work with.  Stubborn as a mule, I once, in a pique of frustration, told her that, I'd wring her neck if she had one."  Noel Coward

10.  "One reason I became an actor was because I heard you could meet queers in the theatre." Sir Ian McKellen

My fingers are tired.  There are so many others.  I recommend this book.  

                                     

 

Updated On: 7/10/18 at 10:15 AM