If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances would you like to have seen? — Page 3

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#51

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/21/06 at 1:35am

I saw Merman in Gypsy as a kid ("she's loud, mom") and Julie Andrews in the world premiere of Camelot ("she sings real high, mom") but I'd give anything to go back in time to see Fred Astaire in "Funny Face" and Ray Bolger in "On Your Toes". Just to see what REAL tap danicing was all about.

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#52

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/21/06 at 6:14pm

Having seen most of the above mentioned people at least in something... ex.(Ethel and Mary in a compilation show filmed at the La Mirada Theatre many years ago), the two that I always wish I saw are:
-Al Jolson in anything!
-Judy at the Palace!

#53

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/21/06 at 6:29pm

Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera, and Jerry Orbach in Original Chicago. Jerry Orbach in The Fantastiks. Also, Timothy Scott in Cats. He was supposedly beyond amazing.

"Movies will make you famous; Television will make you rich; But theatre will make you good." -Terrence Mann

#54

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/21/06 at 6:37pm

Bessie Wynn and Mabel Barrison in BABES IN TOYLAND 1903
Helen Ford in DEAREST ENEMY and PEGGY-ANN
Ethel Merman in ANYTHING GOES (1934) and GYPSY (195

Helen Morgan in SWEET ADELINE
Fred Astaire in THE GAY DIVORCE
Mary Boland in JUBILEE
Ray Bolger in ON YOUR TOES
Gertrude Lawrence and Danny Kaye in LADY IN THE DARK
Mary Martin in ONE TOUCH OF VENUS and SOUTH PACIFIC
Alfred Drake in KISS ME, KATE
Julie Andrews in MY FAIR LADY
Barbara Cook in CANDIDE, THE MUSIC MAN, and SHE LOVES ME

Updated On: 8/21/06 at 06:37 PM

#55

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/21/06 at 8:19pm

Rent preview the night after Jonathan Larson died.

#56

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/21/06 at 9:39pm

Elmore3003, you and I think alike. Gay Divorce is my favorite Fred show BUT Funny Face is the best score. Hit after hit after hit AND Adele was in it. I've always wanted to see if she really was better than he was or if that was just adulation.

#57

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/21/06 at 11:16pm

Julie Andrews in anything

#58

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/22/06 at 12:27am

Two more I left out of my earlier post:
Jessica Tandy - A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE
Shirley Booth - COME BACK LITTLE SHEBA

TomMonster - I also feel old. I too, saw many of those previously mentioned performances!

#59

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/22/06 at 2:17pm

Allofmylife, I worked on THE GAY DIVORCE for the Cole Porter Trust and a complete BBC Radio 3 broadcast of the show. Since I prefer Cole Porter to Gershwin (gasp!) I like the score a lot:
"I've Got You on My Mind"
"After You, Who?"
"Night and Day"
It's not a first-rate Porter score like ANYTHING GOES, JUBILEE, or KISS ME, KATE, but I like this show a lot. The dance arrangements are often quite daring with bits of bitonaity. Incidetally, the non-Porter "Continental" scene in the film has a lot to do with "Begin the Beguine" in JUBILEE.

#60

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/22/06 at 2:22pm

Angela Lansbury - Gypsy

"Carson has combined his passion for helping children with his love for one of Cincinnati's favorite past times - cornhole - to create a unique and exciting event perfect for a corporate outing, entertaining clients or family fun."

"In Oz, the verb is douchifizzation." PRS

#61

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/22/06 at 4:57pm

I Would give SO MUCH to see Angela Lansbury, as Lovett, Gypsy or Mame.

Carol Channing as Dolly
Second Jerry Orbach in the Fantasticks

Rosencrantz: "Be happy - if you're not even HAPPY what's so good about surviving? We'll be all right. I suppose we just go on." - from Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

#62

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/23/06 at 10:29am

Elmore3003

Don't get me wrong. I love Gay D. I collect memorabilia of Fred pre movies and have some amazing stuff from the show, including original photos. I have every opening night program for his Broadway shows save for two (and of course, other copies of those) as well as programs for all his British shows. I nearly plotzed when a copy of the souvenir program for Funny Face came up - and went for a mere 400 bucks - on ebay while I was out of town. I had never seen THAT before.

I love the staging of Gay D, with a chorus of just girls and the sets for the New York production were fantastic (London, pretty mundane) and I love the trickiness of "After You Who".

All that being said, I'd still go back in time to see Funny Face because (1) Gershwin often dropped in and played one of the twin piano parts (2) Ira dropped by to visit a great deal and (3) Adele was in the show. I have no idea how good she really was and would love to know.

Now, if I WAS to go back to see Gay D, I'd have a tough time figuring out if I should see it when Clare Luce was playing the lead (I've seen her work. She was HOT!!!) or Dorothy Stone, another unknown vessel for me who is confusingly listed by some as Fred Stone's (of Stone and Montgomery) daughter of wife. Either way, soundls a little creepy.

Problems, problems....

#63

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/23/06 at 12:52pm

CARRIE!

...What happened next, was stranger still, a woman breathless and afraid, appeared out of the night, completely dressed in white. She had a secret she would tell, of one who had mistreated her. Her face and frightened gaze, my mind cannot erase...But then she ran from view. She looked so much like you...

#64

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/23/06 at 1:14pm

-- Al Jolson
-- The opening night of the original production of 42nd Street
-- The opening night of Oklahoma!
-- Robert Preston and Bernadette in Mack and Mabel
-- Ethel Merman in Gypsy
-- Rex Harrison, Julie Andrews, and Stanley Holloway in My Fair Lady
-- George Rose, Kevin Kline, Rex Smith, and Tony Azito in Pirates of Penzance
-- David Carroll in Chess
-- The original off-bway Little Shop of Horrors
-- Jerrry Orbach in The Fantasticks and Promises, Promises
-- The OBC of 1776
-- The OBC of The Mystery of Edwin Drood
-- John Cullum in Shenandoah

....and probably many many more!

"You pile up enough tomorrows, and you'll find you are left with nothing but a lot of empty yesterdays. I don't know about you, but I'd like to make today worth remembering." --Harold Hill from The Music Man

Updated On: 8/23/06 at 01:14 PM

#65

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/23/06 at 3:00pm

Holy moly!

It startled me quite a bit reading those lists. I've seen about 95% of those cast(s) in those shows. I've been a huge theatre rat since I was 7 years old (1972 -- first show was the original cast of PIPPIN) and spent all my summers from that year on in NYC (I head to NYC several times a year still), so I've been quite blessed.

Heck, I even saw "Carrie" twice, as well as "Smile". Heck, I saw Chita and Gwen about 10 times in CHICAGO when I was 10 and the original cast of A CHORUS LINE about 5 times that same year. Loved that summer -- my favorite film JAWS also opened that summer.

1977 -- another handful of visits for ANNIE...and STAR WARS opened about the same time, too! New York was the best that year, too!

It's endless. I should write an Almanac.

#66

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/23/06 at 3:05pm

i'm with you, All_For_Laura. i just wanna hear Linzi Hately belt out "that's not my NAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAME" live on stage :)

#67

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/23/06 at 3:12pm

I'll sit in the Orch with you two.

Just to see Eve Was Weak, and the Pigs Blood Ballet.

I lived in NYC by then, but didnt get to the theater to see this...what an ahole.

#68

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/23/06 at 3:42pm

Dick Van Dyke in The Music Man
Dick and Chita in Bye Bye Birdie ( got to see them together in A Dancer's Life so that made up for it a little)
Any Carrie Performance
Julie Andrews in My Fair Lady
Opening night of the original 'Company' (aka Dean Jones' only broadway performance)

#69

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/24/06 at 7:01am

Jim Dale in Barnum
Jerry Orbach in anything
Bernadette Peters in Into the Woods

first ones to come to mind...

#70

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/24/06 at 11:48am

The shivers I get when I hear the title song, and And Eve Was Weak, are not even funny. Just to be graced with those two wonderful women dueting on stage. WOW! And I also would love to have seen the crazy choreography of "Do Me a Favor" Live! At least Charlotte got some dancing in!

#71

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/24/06 at 3:03pm

Chita Rivera in anything
Angela Lansbury and George Hearn in Sweeney
Original Broadway Cast of SITPWG
Original Broadway Cast of RENT
Original Broadway Cast of Avenue Q
Jerry Orbach in The Fantasticks
Julie Andrews in anything
Original Broadway Cast of A Chorus Line

"I am unfinished- I am diminished With or without you..."

#72

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/24/06 at 3:58pm

Patti in Evita
Cerveris as Tommy, Hedwig
OBC Passion
OBC Aspects of Love

Updated On: 8/24/06 at 03:58 PM

#73

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/24/06 at 4:11pm

OBC:
"Dreamgirls"
"Sunday in the Park with George"
"Carrie"
"Rent"
"La Cage Aux Folles"
"Once on this Island"
"Evita"
"West Side Story"
"Gypsy"
"The Wiz"
"Little Shop of Horrors"

"Cabaret" with Alan Cumming and Natasha Richardson
"Man of La Mancha" with Brian Stokes Mitchell
"You're A Good Man, Charlie Brown!" with Anthony Rapp
"Candide" with Kristin Chenoweth and Patti Lupone
"Wicked" with Shoshana Bean and Megan Hilty

que pasa calabaza...

#74

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/24/06 at 8:24pm

Re film stars onstage --

While I was lucky to have seen Ingrid Bergman, Barbra Streisand, Lauren Bacall, Anthony Perkins, Robert Preston, Melina Marcouri, Robert Goulet, John Kerr and Richard Dreyfus onstage, in the distant past, I wish I had also seen :

*Elizabeth Taylor (Little Foxes)
*Richard Burton ( Camelot, Hamlet)
*Yul Brynner ( King and I)
*Julie Andrews ( Camelot... and My Fair Lady in London)
*Audrey Hepburn ( Ondine?)

Updated On: 8/24/06 at 08:24 PM

#75

re: If you could have been there in the past, what performers/performances

Posted: 8/24/06 at 9:04pm

So many of you responded with so many of my same responses.

Taking a different tack, there were a couple of "odd" replacement castings I would have love to have seen. Such as, believe it or not, Susan Luccie in Annie Get Your Gun. Reba McIntyre in the same role. Liza taking over for Julie Andrews in Victor/Victoria. John Stamos in Cabaret. To name a few.

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