| Parallel observation: "Larger than Life" performers like Channing, Merman even LuPone. Do we still cultivate them? | |
| Posted by: Marlo*Manners 04:29 pm EDT 06/26/18 | |
| In reply to: re: "My parents took me to see the mid-60's revival of Annie Get Your Gun." - tandelor 01:56 pm EDT 06/26/18 | |
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| I saw Carol Channing as Dolly Levi on October 31, 1994. I was expecting something ghoulish but got something else. Yes Carol's voice was wobbly and she was singing at pitches lower than she had used in 1964. She was backphrasing and the conductor had his hands full just keeping Carol and the orchestra together. But Carol was (is??) a total performer in a style that was rare then and probably extinct now. She was a HUGE PERSONALITY with a style of performing that was totally her own and larger than life. She did insane comic business that was daring and surreal but which she made work through sheer daring and conviction. Her age didn't matter because she owned the stage and the part. It was like watching a great old time silent movie or early talkie comic - she had her own stylized persona that she impressed on the role and everything seemed to revolve around her. In "Dolly!" that can work as Dolly is the moving force in the farce. A Carol Channing wouldn't get through drama school today let alone be allowed onstage. When Carol left Dolly in the original run there were a raft of big-scaled personality old school divas of a certain age to replace her: Ginger Rogers, Mary Martin, Ethel Merman, Ann Miller, Phyllis Diller, Pearl Bailey, Yvonne De Carlo, Betty Grable, Martha Raye et al. Today you couldn't find such a deep bench of that kind of bigger than life star at any age. I think the reason so many of the current Dollys are older than 60 (and Mame has had this effect too) is that actresses who are younger than the baby boom generation aren't trained or aren't allowed to be larger than life eccentric personalities. I was looking at the pictures of Paige Davis as Mame at the North Shore Music Festival. She is probably an excellent actress and fine singer/dancer. But her personality needs to be larger than life and quirky for Mame Dennis. I didn't see that. She needs style and glamour too. I didn't see that. Davis seemed human size, naturalistic and normal. When we have our weekly "Let's cast the Broadway revival of "Mame" threads the casting suggestions have tended towards the septuagenarian actress. The late Debbie Reynolds, Cher, Liza Minnelli with all her ailments, Bernadette Peters, etc. Everyone else who is younger is too normal, too nice and too TV small scale. Angela Lansbury was just over 40 when she created Mame on Broadway. Carol Channing was about 43 when she created Dolly Levi. Yet I think the reason that we don't have say Sutton Foster as Mame or Dolly Levi is that she is too normal, too nice and too human sized. The divas are older. The one exception is possibly Kristen Chenoweth who I could see as Dolly. Kristen is turning 50 this year. Marlo Manners (Lady Barrington) Idiosyncratic old school diva who knows one when she sees one |
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| Previous: | re: "My parents took me to see the mid-60's revival of Annie Get Your Gun." - tandelor 01:56 pm EDT 06/26/18 |
| Next: | re: Parallel observation: "Larger than Life" performers like Channing, Merman even LuPone. Do we still cultivate them? - AlanScott 10:01 pm EDT 06/26/18 |
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