Hello from beautiful East Haddam, Connecticut. I鈥檓 here to host and music direct an event that is honoring Bill Berloni, Broadway鈥檚 animal trainer. He first trained Sandy for Annie back in 1976. Ever since then, he鈥檚 trained every animal you鈥檝e seen on Broadway, and they鈥檝e all been rescues!
While I was sitting at the table with Bill鈥檚 wife, Dorothy, before Bill鈥檚 award ceremony, she gave me some scoop on what he was going to receive. First, some backstory!
As I mentioned, all the animals that Bill trains are rescues. After their Broadway shows close, some of them get adopted (Orfeh adopted the doggie from Legally Blonde). If no one adopts them, they go to live on the farm Bill has with his wife Dorothy. I love that Bill keeps my SiriusXM Broadway channel playing all day so at some point, the doggies can hear 鈥渢heir鈥� song from the show they did, and it makes them feel good!
Okay, back to the Goodspeed award.
Dorothy told me that the original Sandy passed away in 1990 and was cremated. Bill had always wanted a bronze statue of Sandy that he could put the ashes in and when Bill鈥檚 mom passed away, they used the money she left to finally make that statue. Well, when Bill was brought onstage to be honored, they told him that instead of presenting him the customary award, they got him something special. They then showed a video of a brand-new statue of Sandy! Dorothy told them how much Bill loved his Sandy statue, so they hired the artist who made it, and he made a new one which will now also live at the front of the Goodspeed Opera House. Not surprisingly, Bill started weeping.
Of course, the evening was dedicated to Annie composer Charles Strouse who just passed away at the age of 96. I got some wonderful stories from him when I interviewed him at my Chatterbox and on my radio show.
Charles told me a great story about being a jingle writer in the '70s; He was hired to produce a jingle for a new drink called Razzle Root Beer. After they recorded the jingle, the advertising agency found out that they couldn't use the word "Razzle" because it infringed upon a copyright. Uh-oh. The song was already written! There was an awkward silence in the recording studio鈥nd suddenly Charles suggested they change the name of the drink to Ramblin' Root Beer. They gave him the O.K., he re-recorded the jingle with the singers who were still there, substituted "ramblin'" for "razzle" and the root beer became a big seller. I totally remember that root beer! I just looked up one of the commercials on YouTube and it features all different New York scenes鈥ncluding a shot of Sarah Jessica Parker as Annie! Subliminal advertising? Brava!
Watch!
Charles went to the prestigious Eastman School of Music as a composing major. After he graduated, he made money by accompanying singers as well as dance classes. Eventually, he got a gig playing rehearsals for a show called Saratoga. The stage manager said that he had an idea for a musical. The idea was about a new phenomenon called鈥eenagers. Of course, that show became Bye Bye Birdie. They went through five book writers (!) who eventually came up with the Elvis Presley character. The first song Charles wrote was one of my favorites, "An English Teacher."
I asked him about the phrase at the beginning: "Albert, Albert, A-a-a-albert!" He said that phrase stems from his classical training. He feels a straight-up pop composer wouldn't necessarily think to put four notes on the same syllable (See "The Glory of the Lord" from The Messiah鈥� which has 30 notes on the first syllable of the word, "glory").
Here鈥檚 my deconstruction of that fabulous song.
I love how Chita Rivera sounds as Rose in Bye Birdie, but it turns out the role was not written for her. Rose was not supposed to be Latina. All the jokes originally were about her being Polish, and the role was written for Carol Haney! If you don't know, she's the original Gladys from The Pajama Game who appeared in the film. However, she鈥檚 also the one who broke her leg during the Broadway run, allowing Shirley MacLaine to go on.
Unfortunately, around the time of Bye Bye Birdie, Carol started having vocal problems and couldn't do it, so Charles recommended Chita, with whom he had worked on Shoestring Revue. Her audition for director Gower Champion is detailed in Richard Seff's amazing book, Supporting Player and it is fabulous. Charles and his lyricist Lee Adams kept all the songs they wrote for Carol and added one for Chita, "Spanish Rose,鈥� which she did on The Ed Sullivan Show.
Watch!
I asked Charles about something that's always driven me crazy. Let me first say that I think Hair is a brilliant show and every song in it is phenomenal. But鈥 get annoyed when people say Hair was the first rock musical. I feel that Bye Bye Birdie was the first rock musical! I mean, it was the first show to have used actual rock music ("One Last Kiss," "Sincere") and an actual electric guitar. When I asked Charles what he thought, he told me that because the show satirizes rock music, people don't credit it with being groundbreaking (my word). What's funny is that he said they couldn't get any backers for it because of the newfangled score. The music was just too modern. Boy, was it! Think about it, they started writing those songs in the mid-'50s when rock literally first began. It's like writing a musical today in the style of (insert latest music trend here). I faded out on pop radio so long ago, the last trend I know about is a young upstart named Tiffany.
Speaking of Birdie! Turns out, the creative team initially thought Dick Van Dyke was not quite right for the lead role of Albert Peterson. They wanted Jack Lemmon or Steve Lawrence. But Richard Seff, who was not only Chita's agent but also Dick Van Dyke's, kept pushing for them to see Dick again and he finally got it! However, Dick鈥檚 big number, "Put on a Happy Face," was bombing so Charles set out to write a new song. Marge Champion, who was married to the director (Gower), thought that the number was great, but the staging wasn't right. It originally took place at The Ed Sullivan Show while they were setting the lights. Marge had the idea to set it in Grand Central and make it about two young girls who were depressed. Suddenly, the song became a huge hit.
Here is the original cast!
It鈥檚 so interesting how a song can be great but won鈥檛 work until it has the right set-up, is in the correct place in the script, or set in a different locale. There鈥檚 an amazing story about that kind of thing in the book Tell Me More, Tell Me More about the making of Grease. Even though everyone connected with the show loved 鈥淭here Are Worse Things I Could Do,鈥� the audience was not having it. It was completely bombing, and it was decided that they had to cut it. However, right before that happened, a friend of the director told him that when Rizzo thinks she might be pregnant, none of her friends care, so the audience also doesn鈥檛 care. The next night, they re-wrote the scene before the song where Rizzo reveals she might be pregnant and, this time, Rizzo鈥檚 friends offer her help. Even though she rebuffs them, it made the audience sympathize with her and suddenly the number completely worked!
Here is the original Rizzo, Adrienne Barbeau, who sounds fabulous.
Back to Maestro Strouse. Not suprisingly, I had to obsess to him about Annie. He told me that in the 1970s, Martin Charnin asked him to write the music because Charles had written It's a Bird... It's a Plane... It's Superman, which was another musical based on a comic.
If you don鈥檛 know that score, here鈥檚 my deconstruction of one his fabulous songs written with Lee Adams and performed by the fabulous Linda Lavin.
Side note: I just went to a beautiful memorial held for Linda at Birdland. So many fantastic stories were told showing what a great friend, stepmother, and artist she was. There were wonderful performances by stars like Megan Hilty (who worked with her on the TV show Sean Saves The World) singing 鈥淵ou鈥檝e Got Possibilities,鈥� Annaleigh Ashford (who worked with her on the TV show B Positive) singing the theme to Alice, as well as Billy Stritch, Christine Ebersole, Linda鈥檚 stepchildren and her loving husband Steve Bakunas, Charles Busch, and Julie Halston. The whole thing was hosted by Jim Caruso who told a hilarious story about the time Linda was on Broadway playing Mrs. Van Daan in what his mother accidentally called, 鈥淭he Diary of Ann Miller.鈥� I want to see that!
I got close to Linda after she recorded the song I put together in support of the hostages that were taken on October 7. Ever since then, she would text me, comment on my Instagram posts, invite me to dinner etc. She was such a warm and supportive person. You can see her singing in this video during the bridge.
Back to Annie! Charles thought the idea of it was awful, but liked Martin and book-writer Thomas Meehan so he went along with it. Charles told me that when it began, the concept was for Annie to be played by鈥� Bernadette Peters! It was the 1970s, but Bernadette wasn鈥檛 a child back then. She was full-grown adult! But that didn't stop Martin from mocking up a poster of Bernadette as Annie. See it below, plus a snippet from his book Annie: A Theatre Memoir (published by the Macmillan Company of Canada Limited, 1977), which also reveals that Bette Midler was also in consideration for Annie!
I think it was hard for people to comprehend that a young kid could lead a show. Thankfully, they found Andrea McArdle, who happened to be the very first kid to audition singing 鈥淛ohnny One Note.鈥� If you don鈥檛 know, she wasn鈥檛 cast as the title role. She was cast as the toughest orphan. Kristen Vigard was cast as Annie but Kristen had a very sweet demeanor and a very sweet voice. They soon realized they needed a tough kid to be Annie or, as Andrea says, they had cast Oliver but needed the Artful Dodger. Andrea wound up taking over the role and Kristen became her stand-by.
Speaking of Annie, I remember talking to Freddie Gershon, the CEO of Music Theater International, which licenses Annie, and he recalled licensing it to a school down south. But then he got all the material back in the mail just one week later. He called the principal of the school to see why it was returned. The principal said that Annie was Satanic.
Huh?
Freddie asked what was Satanic about it, and the principal said that the script mentions鈥ell鈥檚 Kitchen! Freddie explained the misunderstanding as follows.
FREDDIE: Hell鈥檚 Kitchen? Satanic? Hell鈥檚 Kitchen is the name of a neighborhood in New York City.
PRINCIPAL: I rest my case.
Oh, brother.
Anyhoo, the first song Charles wrote for Annie was "It's a Hard Knock Life," which was also the only song in that show that had the lyrics come first. Here鈥檚 Allison Smith, of Kate and Allie and The West Wing fame performing it as a solo with Charles Strouse on piano.
Charles told me that the fun of writing a musical is not knowing what's going to work and what isn't. For instance, there was a scene where Annie meets Sandy the dog for the first time and then Annie gets thrown back in the orphanage. There was a clever scene change with a sliding panel, but it needed time to get set up, so Charles wrote a song to cover it. When the change happened for the first time, the audience cheered, and Charles went to the back of the house to tell Martin that they really loved that clever scene change. He didn't realize until months later that the audience was actually loving the song he wrote to cover the change. It was, of course, Tomorrow!
Here is Andrea at 18 sounding fantastic on it!
Annie also started the career of the incredible Laurie Beechman. I do a show called Divas by the Decade, and I talk about how Laurie was a pioneer of high belting. We wouldn鈥檛 have songs like 鈥淒efying Gravity鈥� with belted E flats if she and a few other amazing women hadn鈥檛 started the high-belting Broadway trend. Brava!
Here鈥檚 my deconstruction of some of that Annie belting brilliance.
You can read all these Charles Strouse stories from the man himself in his wonderful book . So good!
James and I are going to salute Charles on this Thursday鈥檚 Stars in the House with lots of guests including Judy Kuhn. Judy starred in the show that I think has Charles鈥� best score: Rags! Tune in tonight at 8PM ET on .
Rags also has what I consider to be one of the best Tony Award performances ever.
Finally, the important question! When can you see my show next? Why, it鈥檚 going to be at the on July 19th.
I also just announced the special guests for my fall cruise to the Canaries and Portugal: Tony Award nominees Charlotte d'Amboise and Terrence Mann and Olivier Award-winner David Bedella! . Peace out!
