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| Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: DistantDrumming 11:03 pm EDT 06/29/20 | |
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| It's striking how much she sounded like Glynis Johns. Did you see the Original London production of Night Music? Any memories of the production? Was it as magical as the Broadway production? | |
| Link | Jean Simmons - Send In The Clowns |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: Circlevet 09:29 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - DistantDrumming 11:03 pm EDT 06/29/20 | |
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| I saw the touring production at the Schubert in Chicago with Simmons and Margaret Hamilton. I loved every moment of it. The Prince production was absolutely stunning and both Simmons and Hamilton were beautiful. I had seen Maggie Smith in Private Lives at a matinee that day at the Blackstone and Night Music was the cherry on top of what had already been an amazing day. It was without a doubt the best day of theater I have ever experienced. | |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: keikekaze 04:06 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - DistantDrumming 11:03 pm EDT 06/29/20 | |
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| I saw it in London in the summer of 1975--about three months into the run, I believe. All the original London cast were still in it. Jean Simmons was always wonderful in everything she undertook, and she was here, too. Simmons struck me as a more elegant Desiree, and a more guarded one, than Glynis Johns. She didn't have the frog-princess magic that was Glynis Johns--who else ever did?-- and may not have got as many laughs as Johns, but Simmons got both the underlying strength and the vulnerability when they were needed, especially in the second act. But the two moments I remember most from that production, 45 years later, are Diane Langton's Petra blowing the roof off the place with the sheer energy and gusto of her "The Miller's Son," and Gingold getting up out of "her" wheelchair and dancing a little jig down to the front of the stage for her curtain call as the place went wild. | |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: altonido 02:26 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - DistantDrumming 11:03 pm EDT 06/29/20 | |
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| I saw Jean Simmons as Desiree in the US "Night Music" national tour (Philadelphia, to be exact--caught pre-Broadway "Good News" there on the same day). This was prior to Simmons taking on the role in the London production. Simmons was as always a stunning looking, elegant lady, and gave an admirable performance. But she lacked the abundant comic earthiness, the lived-in quality of Glynis Johns. Indeed, I consider Johns as Desiree to be one of the most ideal pieces of casting of its day, comparable to Lansbury as Mame. Have seen many "Night Music"s since, and especially enjoyed the Desirees of Juliet Stevenson and Judith Ivey. But I doubt anyone will ever be as perfect a match for the role as Johns. I would also add that this degree of perfection in casting was common to all of the Hal Prince shows of the '70s. "Company" and "Follies" have never played as well and will never play as well as they did with their original companies. |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Last Edit: stryker94109 09:25 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
| Posted by: stryker94109 09:24 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - DistantDrumming 11:03 pm EDT 06/29/20 | |
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| I had the distinct pleasure of seeing her and Margaret Hamilton in ALNM, at the venerable Curran Theatre, in September 1974, under the auspices of the San Francisco Civic Light Opera. | |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: Cleveland 08:58 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - DistantDrumming 11:03 pm EDT 06/29/20 | |
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| I'm pretty sure that recording *IS* Glynis Johns from the OBC recording, even though the London cast album is shown. | |
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| That recording IS Johns. This is Simmons | |
| Posted by: whereismikeyfl 10:13 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - Cleveland 08:58 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| Yup! | |
| Link | A Little Night Music - London Cast |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: young-walsingham 08:40 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - DistantDrumming 11:03 pm EDT 06/29/20 | |
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| In her autobiography "How to Grow Old Disgracefully" Hermione Gingold comments on both Glynis and Jean. It's years since I read it (and can't find it right now) but the gist was Glynis was wonderful on her good days (not all were good days) and Jean was good but more consistent. I am paraphrasing but will find the book again, it's a good read. | |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 02:22 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - young-walsingham 08:40 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| I think Gingold was rather harsh overall about Johns, implying that she lacked professional discipline. She loved Simmons. It seems very clear that the London production would have Johns or Gingold but not both. And originally it was supposed to be Johns with Margaret Leighton, even though Leighton was less than 20 months older. Leighton was already in poor health, and a role mostly in a wheelchair may have seemed a good idea for her. But then there was a delay because they couldn't raise the money in the middle of an international recession. Then when the money was raised, Leighton wasn't available, perhaps because of her health. Still, it was going to be Johns, and then all of a sudden it was going to be Simmons and Gingold. |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: blfan 11:55 am EDT 07/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - AlanScott 02:22 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| When I saw "Night Music" in London, Leighton was performing opposite Alec Guinness in "A Family and A Fortune". | |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 12:13 pm EDT 07/01/20 | |
| In reply to: re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - blfan 11:55 am EDT 07/01/20 | |
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| Thank you so much for mentioning that. I should have found that when I was looking around for info, but somehow I missed it. In fact, I really should have found it because it was reviewed on the same page of the same issue of Variety as the London Night Music, and I even noticed the title yesterday and that it was an adaptation by Julian Mitchell of a novel by Ivy Compton-Burnett, but I didn't look at the cast list. | |
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| AlanScott: do you know any more casting ideas for the London production? | |
| Posted by: portenopete 05:34 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - AlanScott 02:22 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| There must have been a lot of actresses who would have been interested. Both Judi Dench and Maggie Smith were 40, which is old enough to play Desirée (I feel). And can you answer a question about the eventual NT Dench production in 1995 (?): was Ian McKellan not announced as Frederick? I seem to remember when buying my ticket expecting to see him, but by the time rehearsals got started it was Laurence Guittard (who was very good, I thought, and fun to see as Frederick after years of listening to his Carl-Magnus on the recording). Sîan Phillips was a very good Madame Armfeldt but of course seemed the same age as her daughter (she had played Desirée herself only a year or two earlier in Chichester, I think). I don't know who else would have played it. Ten years earlier Peggy Ashcroft might have done it, but she was dead by 1995. Pat Routledge is also not much older than Dench and act the height of her fame in 1995, but fitming Keeping Up Appearances might have prevented her. |
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| re: AlanScott: do you know any more casting ideas for the London production? | |
| Posted by: donnyboy 06:16 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: AlanScott: do you know any more casting ideas for the London production? - portenopete 05:34 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| Re: The National Theatre production. It was indeed originally supposed to be Ian McKellen as Frederick - and much was made of the fact - as the last time he'd worked with Judi Dench had been in Trevor Nunn's hugely acclaimed studio production of Macbeth at the RSC. A Little Night Music was also being directed by Sean Mathias, McKellen's long time collaborator and former partner. I believe he left because he got offered a film role and his departure was very amicable. Mathias had also worked with Sian Phillips in the past - and she had previously mentioned to him that Madame Armfeldt was a role she would love to play (She'd recorded Desiree but never played it - although that recording does include some members of the Chichester cast - and subsequent West End transfer - where Dorothy Tutin had played Desiree). When he got offered the chance to direct it at the National he approached Phillips, even though she was only a couple of years older than Judi Dench, and she said yes. |
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| Thanks to donnyboy and AlanScott for setting me straight on Sîan Phillips! (Has Sheila Hancock ever done a production of it as either Desirée or Madame?) | |
| Posted by: portenopete 08:25 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: re: AlanScott: do you know any more casting ideas for the London production? - donnyboy 06:16 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| She still seems to be roaring and I saw her one night in that Italian restaurant across from The Young vic and she looked stunning! | |
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| re: Thanks to donnyboy and AlanScott for setting me straight on Sîan Phillips! (Has Sheila Hancock ever done a production of it as either Desirée or Madame?) | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 12:01 am EDT 07/01/20 | |
| In reply to: Thanks to donnyboy and AlanScott for setting me straight on Sîan Phillips! (Has Sheila Hancock ever done a production of it as either Desirée or Madame?) - portenopete 08:25 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| If she ever played either role (or, for that matter, Charlotte), I don't know of it, and a search of periodicals did not bring up anything. | |
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| re: AlanScott: do you know any more casting ideas for the London production? | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 06:15 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: AlanScott: do you know any more casting ideas for the London production? - portenopete 05:34 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| I haven't heard anything about other casting possibilities for London. Yes, Ian McKellen was announced to play Fredrik in the NT production, and my memory is that the announcement that Guittard would be playing Fredrik came rather late. Phillips was not in the Chichester production or in the London transfer of the production. It was Dorothy Tutin. It gets confusing because there was the TER/JAY recording that is sometimes said to be a recording with the cast of that production, but it's mostly not the cast of that production. Just Susan Hampshire, Eric Flynn but in a different role (Fredrik on the recording, Carl-Magnus in the production), and the quintet. And the recording uses the reduced orchestration used in the Chichester production or something very close to it. I think one of Ethan Mordden's oddest opinions is that the TER/JAY recording is the best Night Music recording. I think it's perfectly respectable (well, mostly), but I'd rank it below the OBCR (one of the greatest of all cast recordings for me), the OLCR, the National (even though I have some big reservations about it), and perhaps even the Barcelona recording in Catalan. Some of it is because I don't know why anyone would rather listen to that orchestration, basically a reduction of Tunick, than the full Tunick orchestrations, and at least the fuller versions (if not as full as on the OBCR and the OLCR, with the former having additional strings) on the National and Barcelona recordings. And the performances are a mixed bag. It has its points but the best? To me that's a very strange opinion. |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: blfan 07:36 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - DistantDrumming 11:03 pm EDT 06/29/20 | |
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| I did and it and she were lovely. Angela "Mrs. Bridges" Baddeley was a surprising, but effective choice as Madame Armfeldt and Joss Ackland was my favorite Egerman. The Charlotte was not as good as Patricia Elliott but overall the production was wonderful and a bit more melancholy than the Broadway version. | |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Last Edit: Delvino 08:32 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
| Posted by: Delvino 08:30 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - blfan 07:36 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| I saw her rather early in the first national tour, at the Kennedy Center in DC. She was not the effortlessly comic Desiree of Johns, and I missed the humor, particularly in the first act scenes. Johns was unique in finding the theatricality in the character -- you could believe that she toured and took on these Rushmore-sized stage roles -- but Simmons had quiet authority in the second act, a vulnerability that she had concealed until then, an interesting take on the character's arc. You could feel the stakes for this woman. I saw her opposite Margaret Hamilton -- an odd duo, to be sure, the oddest until Peters and Stritch perhaps -- and loved the show every bit as much as I had on B'way. I saw the show in London in its final month, with the truly dreary Desiree of Virginia McKenna. She wasn't especially comic or glamorous in any way, beyond being an attractive actor who looked good in the famous Klotz costumes. The show needs a personality in the center, and without it, Desiree can disappear. She was barely there via McKenna. |
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| re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 01:50 pm EDT 06/30/20 | |
| In reply to: re: Any memories of Jean Simmons in A Little Night Music? - Delvino 08:30 am EDT 06/30/20 | |
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| Sorry to hear that McKenna wasn't better. Perhaps that contributed to the somewhat disappointing London run after the show had gotten raves there. And the death of Angela Baddeley can't have helped. Any memories of Irlin Hall, who took over in the latter role when Baddeley died? | |
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