If Martin could have thrown away her (natural) desire to be warm and likable onstage, I think she could have made an interesting Rose--certainly sexier than most of the famous ones (though friends who saw Peters--I did not, timing was off--told me she made Herbie's attraction to her believable). It would have been fascinating to see her try, as she could belt and croon. Biographers have suggested she was a rather emotionally distant mother to Larry Hagman (neglecting him as she furthered her career--in fairness, she was herself still an adolescent when he was born)--if she could have tapped into any of that drive, she might have surprised us all. The charming monster--as the real Rose seems to have been--and, while it is not in play, having a closeted bi/lesbian actress play a (somewhat) closeted lesbian who knew nonetheless how to charm men would have been interesting to say the least. But I think, as Laurents said of Shirley Booth, Martin was pretty invested in being likable onstage (in ways Merman was not) that it would have needed to be a different moment in history (such as today, when Maria Bello writes frankly a column for the Sunday Times about coming out to her son as being not-simply-heterosexual) for any of that to happen. But, in watching Martin in some of the video clips on YouTube, it's clear she was very comfortable in her body onstage (in ways Merman never seemed to me to be, except when facing full front to deliver a song) and could have gotten some of that into Rose.
And she could have made a very different, but fun Sally Adams in "Call Me Madam."
Merman was more the dynamo, the sui generis, and we turn to her for thrills of a particular and extremely potent kind--there was no one like her. Martin perhaps followed in a tradition of American Sweethearts, but then made them sexy, warm, funny, and some of the work you hear on the I Do, I Do OBC (and the duet with Preston from it on the Tonys) showed her capable of a kind of acerbic, sly wit.
And I grew up wanting her as my fantasy mother, based on Peter Pan and the OBC of The Sound of Music. Yes, I'm sure she was far too old for Maria, but it is her voice I hear when I think of those songs. And her "Wonderful Guy" is probably my favorite song of realizing you've fallen in love.
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