I may be old, but I was able to see....- Page 2

[jayinchelsea]

Posted: 11/28/11 at 10:33pm

Merman in Happy Hunting (oy) and Gypsy
Judy Holliday in Bells are Ringing
Lena Horne in Jamaica
and yes, i remember them all, and proud of it!

[luvcaroline]

Posted: 11/28/11 at 10:45pm

...Gwen Verdon and Chita Rivera in Chicago
...Stephanie Mills in The Wiz
...Jerry Orbach and Lorna Luft in Promises, Promises
...Doug Henning in the Magic Show (hey, I was a teenager and I thought it was a fun show!)

[Owen22]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 12:49am

"I Love My Wife" with the Smothers Brothers!~

[goldenboy]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 12:59am

Sweet charity with Gwen Verdon ( I was 10 and fell in love0
Fade Out Face in with Carol Burnett ( I was 8 and was sure Carol Burnett winked at me)
How to Succeed with Robert Morse and Michelle Lee ( I was 6)
Angela in Mame
and I went back (mistakenly) to see Jane Morgan in Mame ( i was 10 and 11)
Oliver with Georgia Brown, Paul O Keefe, Clive Revill and Davie Jones ( i was 8
zero mostel in Fiddler
The Rothchilds
Minnies Boys
70 Girls 70


I missed Dear World and Henry Sweet Henry and boy was I sorry. My parents wouldn't take me because they heard they weren't good.

[Idiot]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 5:56am

Lauren Bacall in WOMAN OF THE YEAR at The Palace.

[marcslope]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 11:50am

Merman in the Annie Get Your Gun revival, at the National in D.C. I was seven. What I remember most of all is "Old Fashioned Wedding." She and Yarnell kept encoring it, and every time, she did it bigger. The audience couldn't get enough.

First show ever was "I Married an Angel" in stock, with Don Ameche, Taina Elg, and Margaret Whiting. A good start.

[Dollypop]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 12:16pm

Barbara Cook in SHE LOVES ME
Bea Lillie in HIGH SPIRITS
That Streisand Woman in FUNNY GIRL
Zero Mostel in FIDDLER
Julie Harris in SKYSCRAPER
Ethel Merman in ANNIE GET YOUR BUN (revival) and HELLO DOLLY! (closing cast)
Mary Martin in HELLO DOLLY! (tour) and DO YOU TURN SOMERSAULTS?
Richard Kiley and Joan Deiner in MAN OF LA MANCHA
Virginia Capers in RAISIN
Angela Lansbury in MAME and DEAR WORLD
Bernadette Peters and Robert Preston in MACK AND MABEL
Angela Lansbury in GYPSY
Patti luPone in EVITA and ANYTHING GOES
Pearl Bailey in HELLO DOLLY!
Lauren Bacall in CACTUS FLOWER and APPLAUSE
and... Carol Channing in HELLO DOLLY and LORELEI

[justafan2]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 1:16pm

Peter Palmer in "Brigadoon". It was my first Bway show and it hooked me for life---

[Dollypop]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 1:46pm

Oh yes, Gwen Verdon in SWEET CHARITY and CHICAGO

[uncageg]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 2:05pm

The original productions on Broadway of:

The Wiz
Annie
Dracula w/Frank Langella
Bent w/Richard Gere
Dreamgirls (The day after Jennifer left. Ugh!)
Sweeney Todd
A Chorus Line

[Gaveston2]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 2:56pm

"I saw Merman in the Annie Get Your Gun revival, at the National in D.C. I was seven. What I remember most of all is "Old Fashioned Wedding." She and Yarnell kept encoring it, and every time, she did it bigger. The audience couldn't get enough."

She and Russell Nype did the same thing with "You're Just in Love" when they played CALL ME, MADAM on tour the following year. (You may recall that Merman was supposed to take ANNIE on tour, but changed her mind when the NY reviews said she was too old for the part.)

They did 7--count 'em, 7--encores of "You're Just in Love" for a Saturday matinee audience of Fort Lauderdale senior citizens (most of whom stood for all the encores). And damn, if Merman and Nype didn't earn each and every repetition!

[Finch]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 10:46pm

I guess I am the oldest of these posters!

My first show ON Bway was The Music Man w/Preston and Cook. Last row / right side of Orchestra, Saturday matinee. I think I paid $4.50 [a hell of a lot more than a 25¢ movie] I was about 13.

Before that, my first touring show was Auntie Mame w/Sylvia Sidney
[bus and truck touring co.]

And, I have seen a lot more since then!

JPF

[noradesmond]

Posted: 11/29/11 at 10:57pm

Carol Channing, First National Tour of HELLO,DOLLY 1966-ish
Lauren Bacall, APPLAUSE
Yul Brynner, THE KING & I (one of the many tours)
William Daniels, Howard da Silva, Ken Howard and many other members of the original cast, 1776
John Raitt, CAROUSEL (okay it was Summer Stock and he was waaay too old, but . . . )
Pat Suzuki, FLOWER DRUM SONG (remember her? she was fabulous)
Angela Lansbury, GYPSY

[justafan2]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 10:15am

Yul Brynner "King and I" (revival)

[PottstownTeacher]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 11:08am

Mary K. Lombardi, Norwood Smith and Ruth Kobart in ANNIE (1st National Tour)
Valerie Perri in EVITA (1st National Tour)
Anita Gillette and Dick Latessa in THEY'RE PLAYING OUR SONG (1st National Tour)
Andrea McArdle in GREASE (City Line Dinner Theatre)

[Hank]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 12:37pm

Patti, Mandy, and Bob in the origional Evita, and looking forward to the revival.

[Ed_Mottershead]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 12:48pm

I too saw Sylvia Sidney in Auntie Mame at the old Lambervtille Music Circus. Apparently, she was a real bitch all the way down and every year thereafter, at the end of each season, the company awarded a "Sylvia Sidney" award for the person who was most difficult to deal with.

[wonkit]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 1:48pm

Pat Suzuki in FLOWER DRUM SONG (she was fabulous)
Burton, Andrews and Goulet in CAMELOT
Alfred Drake in KEAN (short lived musical but he was wonderful)
Albert Finney in JOE EGG
Sam Davis, Jr. in GOLDEN BOY

[daredevil]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 3:12pm

Born 1n 1943; first musical, 1948 (Brigadoon) Some memories;

December 1951; at a matinee of the original King and I; the second balcony entrance was then located at a small door slightly west of the main entrance of the Saint James. My dad and I walked up what seemed like an interminable flight of stairs, right out of a tenement, until we reached a small room which lead to the second balcony. On a chalkboard was a sign; "Gertrude Lawrence is ill this afternoon. The role of Anna Leonowens will be played by Constance Carpenter." It was my first experience with a major understudy---we all rooted for her, and she was excellent, worked very well with Yul Brynner. After Ms. Lawrence's untimely death she assumed the role.
November 1958: the fledgling New York Shakepeare Festival presented a production of Richard III, at the Hecksher theater, with an unknown actor playing Richard:
and intense, bulky man named George C. Scott. It was amazing!
June 1961: Off Broadway The Connection is just finishing up its run at the Living Theater. At the end of the first act, Ernie, one of the junkies, has a break down. I watched an actor I had never seen before explode on stage. I could not believe it. After the act was over I looked at the program. His name; Martin Sheen.

[westender]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 3:16pm

Patti and Mandy in Evita
Terri Klausner in Evita
Bebe Neuwirth touring in A Chorus Line
Gregory Hines, Phyllis Hyman and Terri Klausner in Sophisticated Ladies
Sandy Duncan in Peter Pan
Liv Ullmann in I Remember Mama

[GatorNY]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 4:12pm

This is pitiful, but all I got (since I grew up in Ft Lauderdale and we were more likely to go to a Miami Dolphins game) is a vague recollection of seeing Lorna Luft in a tour of "They're Playing Our Song" at the Parker Playhouse on Federal Highway. I think I went by myself or took my 8th grade "girlfriend." I was 26 before I ever saw a show that was actually playing on Broadway.

[uncageg]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 4:58pm

In Philly:

The Bed Before Yesterday - starring Carol Channing
Robeson - starring James Earl Jones
Platinum - starring Alexis Smith
Private Lives - starring Elizabeth Taylor & Richard Burton

[iluvny04]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 5:23pm

On a similar note, what productions do you think we'll all be bragging about seeing in fifty years?


Mamma Mia!- with the orginal cast one of the first shows to open post 9/11 and I saw when the it was the Cadillac Winter Garden before it back to just Winter Garden

Les Mis when it was at the Imperial- Alice Ripley was Fantine, Megan Lawrence was Eponine

Wicked- Kerry and Kendra

Chicago revival when it was at the shubert- Sharon Lawrence was velma and charlotte was supposed to play roxie, but she was out so we got Belle Callaway instead.

Annie Get Your Gun- Saw Reba (enough said)

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 5:26pm

Okay, so I didn't see my first Broadway show until 1988, so I can't compete. BUT...when my mother was young, she had a HUGE crush on Robert Morse from the film version of How to Succeed. I worked at the theatre where he stopped for his national tour of Tru. So as a surprise, I took my mother to the show and then took her backstage and introduced her to Robert Morse. That was so much fun! I don't think I ever saw her so giddy in my life. I had a VHS of Tru when it aired on PBS, but lost it years ago.

[iluvny04]

Posted: 11/30/11 at 5:30pm

My parents saw Chicago- Gwen, Jerry and Lenora Nemetz

A Chorus Line

The orginal grease

and a play they hated called Da