The role of the Emcee is not fakeable, but the roles of Rebecca in Rags and Valere in La Bête are fakeable. OK. (It may be that Tom McGowan had done some rehearsals since Ron Silver was, according to reports at the time, terrified of the role during rehearsals.)
Btw, it is verifiable that MacLaine went on less than two weeks after The Pajama Game opened. Other details of the story that she has told are also verifiable. They may not all be true, but at least some of them are true. And since we all seem to agree that rehearsing an understudy before the Broadway opening is rare — though I don't understand why people seemed to be suggesting earlier that it's unheard of, which simply is not true — MacLaine is not likely to have had much rehearsal. But she surely watched rehearsals closely, and perhaps occasionally got to run through some of the dances with someone. Otherwise it really does seem impossible that she could have gotten through such a dance-heavy role.
Anyway, I guess that I'm going to have to tell a friend of mine that he's been "embellishing" when he's told me about the time he went on in a major role very shortly after he had been hired as an understudy and before he'd rehearsed the role. He had been watching performances, of course.
You wrote, "As I said, my real issue is not how true these individual things are but what this sort of thing prompts when it is suggested it is how we do things."
I don't think anyone is suggesting this is the preferred way to do things.
"To me, it is the way people get in trouble and get hurt and I don't want to see either of those promoted."
Who is promoting people getting hurt? I am deeply sorry to hear of the experience you relate in your response to MikeR below, but obviously no one should go on in a potentially dangerous role without extremely thorough preparation.
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