Ruminations on HELLO, DOLLY!

If anyone knows the answers to these questions, it's you.

Hello Dolly...............cannot remember all of your questions...........but Horace spent a lot of time in NYC trying to find a "mate" and of course he went there to see Irene and "seal the deal" perhaps. Tomatoes: those kind of shops sold all kinds of things. All that luggage: mostly a gag, and it is funny. Forgot the rest of the questions. I, too, saw Dolly many times..........it was my date show in college.........and it was cheap to see........maybe $4.00 for a seat and much less for standing room when I was alone. Bibi Osterwald went on a lot for the different Dollys.........and she was wonderful. Merman, at the end, was Merman..........and a force of nature. I danced down 44th. Street after the show one night, with my new

boyfriend, thinking I was totally in love. It had snowed; there was no traffic at all. Lovely memories.

Merman

Jay Williams said: "Hello Dolly...............cannot remember all of your questions...........but Horace spent a lot of time in NYC trying to find a "mate" and of course he went there to see Irene and "seal the deal" perhaps. Tomatoes: those kind of shops sold all kinds of things. All that luggage: mostly a gag, and it is funny. Forgot the rest of the questions. I, too, saw Dolly many times..........it was my date show in college.........and it was cheap to see........maybe $4.00 for a seat and much less for standing room when I was alone. Bibi Osterwald went on a lot for the different Dollys.........and she was wonderful. Merman, at the end, was Merman..........and a force of nature. I danced down 44th. Street after the show one night, with my new

boyfriend, thinking I was totally in love. It had snowed; there was no traffic at all. Lovely memories.

Merman"



Yes. Lovely memories, indeed.

Dolly asks Ambrose to buy her train ticket and lunch because she's an insufferable egoist who's only interested in her own well-being regardless of how it may impact chief clerks or starving artists.

(This sounds tongue-in-cheek, but honestly my husband who had never seen a production of HELLO DOLLY before the Donna Murphy performance we saw last year had that exact reaction to her machinations onstage. When the show was over, he was truthfully flummoxed how anyone could justify that woman's actions that had resulted in the ruin of Vandergelder's business and reputation and the arrest of the 4 younger characters. And what did Dolly do? Kept munching on her dumplings. He even complained specifically about her forcing Ambrose to buy her train ticket! For folks not won over by the singing and dancing or charisma of the star, this show has a lot of problems making the title character likable.)

Updated On: 5/27/18 at 10:35 PM

Dollypop said: "I urge you to keep your husband far away from me at all times. Remember, I taught high school English for 36 years and know every part of the human body that doesn't leave marks."

Death threats over a musical?

poisonivy2 said: "Dollypop said: "I urge you to keep your husband far away from me at all times. Remember, I taught high school English for 36 years and know every part of the human body that doesn't leave marks."

Death threats over a musical?"

Updated On: 5/28/18 at 12:26 AM

Dollypop said: "poisonivy2 said: "Dollypop said: "I urge you to keep your husband far away from me at all times. Remember, I taught high school English for 36 years and know every part of the human body that doesn't leave marks."

Death threats over a musical?"



No, not death!!!!! Just undetectable physical harm.....you know, like a sprained ankle or diarrhea.

"

I’m hearing a certain refrain from Chicago: “He had it coming...”

Regarding the hay and feed question, the staging for Dolly and the references throughout the musical (and The Matchmaker) make me think that at some point Vandergelder branched out into owning a general mercantile establishment, rather than just agricultural supply (or maybe even started that way, but marketed hay/feed most aggressively because of Yonkers' location/farm town origins). That would not have been uncommon for the era. But since he started in hay and feed, there was no need to change the name of the store; everyone knew what Vandergelder's was and who he was (he is, after all, "the first citizen of Yonkers"!).

Remember what he says in the prelude to "Penny in my Pocket" about a million dollars being made by selling something people need every day; I'd imply from that that a half-million is made selling something people need frequently but not daily. That'd fit a general store in my mind, where you can buy essentials you might need now and again (canned food if the pantry runs bare, say) or seasonally, like hay.

msmp said: "Regarding the hay and feed question, the staging for Dollyand the references throughout the musical (andThe Matchmaker) make me think that at some point Vandergelder branched out into owning a general mercantile establishment, rather than just agricultural supply (or maybe even started that way, but marketed hay/feed most aggressively because of Yonkers' location/farm town origins). That would not have been uncommon for the era. But since he started in hay and feed, there was no need to change the name of the store; everyone knew what Vandergelder's was and who he was (he is, after all, "the first citizen of Yonkers"!).

Remember what he says in the prelude to "Penny in my Pocket" about a million dollars being made by selling something people need every day; I'd imply from that that a half-million is made selling something people need frequently but not daily. That'd fit a general store in my mind, where you can buy essentials you might need now and again (canned food if the pantry runs bare, say) or seasonally, like hay."



Still, would you buy tomatoes (even canned ones) which have been sitting on a shelf next to sheep dip?

My wise husband actually snorted at the contrived deus ex machina strings pulled to make that last scene come out the way it did. He found none of it fairly earned by what had come before.