Gypsy and me.
Got to talking the other day, and happened to mention my one and only appearance on the professional stage. Got to thinking on the way home it might be worth blogging about. Got to thinking about when I got home, and came to realise it linked to a few other memories, and the common link was "Gypsy."
Now any of you died in the wool music-theatre buffs will of course realise that "Gypsy" is one of the all-time greats of America's only truly original contribution to the performing arts - the Musical. Written back in the 'fifties by Jule Styne for the ubiquitous Ethel Merman, it quickly reached such legendary status that it seemed no would ever dare perform it again. Filmed not entirely successfully with Rosalind Russell, I figured for years that was going to be my only chance to see it. I loved it from the first time I heard I heard the drum roll and blaring brass at the start and end of what is arguably the best overture written for a musical.
Skip a few years. I've finished college, and am determined to work in the theatre. Somehow, anyhow. More for fun that anything else I'm taking dance classes, a bit out of my depth in the "modern" but loving tap, and it's there I meet the second love of my life. The tap classes are held in the old J.C.Williamson's rehearsal studio, high above the set construction workshop behind Her Majesty's Theatre. We borrowed tap shoes from the wicker baskets full of shoes left over from old JCW productions. Mine came from "No No Nanette" and belonged to Paul Wallace. He was the original Tulsa in "Gypsy" with Merman, and recreated the role in the film.
J.C. Williamson's announce they are producing "Gypsy," following the huge success of the first, belated, London production. More from sheer bravado than anything we decide to audition for it. On stage at Her Majesty's Theatre - a thrill in itself - in front of the legendary Betty Pounder ("Sparkle Darlings!") Well, I did my best to sparkle, but Scott got in, I didn't.
Time passes. I get a job stage-managing a small dance company. Scott goes into rehearsal. Opening night comes, I'm drinking with friends wanting nothing more than to go to the opening. One drink too many and I decide I will go, and I will get in. I somehow convince them to sell me a standing room ticket, so finally, from the back of the dress circle, I hear that amazing overture blaring up live from the pit of a real theatre. Gloria Dawn, one of our greatest performers, is a knockout. Technically the show is a disaster, the wonderful moment when Louise becomes Gypsy Rose Lee, the proscenium trucking downstage marred by it nearly falling over, pieces of scenery falling off, effects not working. I spend half the performance with Robbo, the Producton Manager, leaning on me in despair, patting his arm, reassuring him it will work. The show is a hit, that is obvious. Two weeks later word is out that Gloria Dawn is not well. Scott tells me the understudy is going on for the matinee. I go. She's good, but not good enough to carry the show. They announce that Toni Lamond is going into the show. Toni Lamond - Australia's favourite musical star. She steps in after four day's rehearsal. I see her second performance, different to Gloria's but another knockout, like she's taken all those difficult years she went through and channeled them into the performance of a life-time. The reception is an unforgettable welcome back and recognition of something wonderful happening up there on stage.
The show is a hit, and I see it a few more times, Toni's performance gets better all the time. Then it's time for it to go on tour. The dance company I'm working with is also going on tour. Tough times for the relationship with Scott, but they're going to Adelaide first, and we'll be there at the same time. Then they're off to Sydney. We do a tour of Queensland, and I stop off in Sydney on the way home. "Gypsy" is about to close, so I go to the last matinee. Toni Lamond's last moments on stage are chilling, real shivers down the back stuff. Seeing Scott is wonderful, but he gently and caringl breaks the news he is staying in Sydney, that's where the work is. Its a bitter-sweet few days, we know the relationship couldn't last at 1000km distance. Best of all possible ways for it finish though.
A few years (and a few relationships) later, and I'm having the time of my life Stage-Managing at the Last Laugh Theatre Restaurant. New show coming up and my boss bounds in announcing he has bought the set for it from the sell-off of old JCW sets. It turns out to be that false proscenium from "Gyspy" that wobbled its way downstage a few years earlier. It looks great, and winds up staying through the next couple of shows.
I decide four years at the Last Laugh is enough, and head off to London (and a few more relationships, concurrent this time.) Work is hard to find when I get back, but I wind up with a Christmas Pantomime at the Myer Mural Hall - a full-on traditional panto. I'm stage-managing, but part of my job is to appear on stage. My first (and last) professional appearance. I am to be Daisy the Cow. The front end mind you ! We go to pick up our costumes, and here the "Gypsy" connection comes full circle. The cow costume is a rather tired looking Caroline from - you guessed it - that production of "Gypsy."
4 comments:
Its amazing how a thought or a word can trigger such memories. You seem to have done a lot with your life D, things i would never have guessed.
This is why I keep pestering him to write more - he is just a book waiting to happen - but what do I know? !!!
Nice read S...
Sorry...The Gypsy proscenium wobbling and bits falling off it on opening night? that;s not how I remember it at all..and I was in that show. I watched it from out front during tech rehearsals and dress rehearsals while we weren't on stage and that thing was as solid as a rock. we're talking a fully professional show here..not an amateur thing where things are done cheaply. That false arch was huge and very complex at the back of it. It had 2 stagehands on either side riding back and forth on it, operating it and two sets of curtains that opened and closed. A gold set and a red set. The arch also travelled back and forth during act 1, so if it HAD wobbled..you would have seen it during act 1 as well, before and after the Baby June Let Me Entertain You and military sequence and the farm audition sequence. there is no way Williamsons would have risked ANYTHING with that set..it was heavy, huge and very safe. Your memory is not serving you right.
Gloria Dawn became ill a couple of months into the run, not 2 weeks and Toni had a good reheasal period. John Roberton being consoled by a standing room patron? really? again..that arch was structurally incredibly sound. It had to be. It would have been pulled had it not worked properly, the show would have stopped, most certainly during tech and dress rehearsals, let along opening night.
it's a fun story, but it's totally not true. Kevin.
Some years later and I've just stumbled upon this again. I actually relayed this story to the company Stage Manager, telling her how I read the most bizarre account of opening night. She was as stunned as I was when I first read this. "Technically the show was a disaster!" I shake my head in disbelief when I read this again. "Nearly falling over"... rubbish and as for John Robertson leaning on a total stranger in the audience.. absolute rubbish. Are you sure the set that became the pros for The Last Laugh was the Gypsy proscenium? It would have had to have been heavily, heavily cut down and by doing that, the curve and flow of the arch would have been drastically compromised. I very much doubt it would have been the Gypsy one...which never had the slightlest problem travelling back and forth..no lighting problems either. Things falling off it? Nonsense. Again..a cute story, but full of blatant inaccuracies and fanciful imaginings.
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