The revival of Mame WAS after this one –by only 6 months, in summer 1983.
Between those two brief runs totaling less than 6 weeks combined, it would appear that for whatever reason, Lansbury had lost a lot of her drawing power… at the ripe old age of 57! lol)
No wonder she chucked it all to go do a TV show for the first time in her life… which of course, turned her into a household name and an even bigger star than she ever had been in any medium. (And led to her then triumphantly returning to Broadway 25 years later and doing an astonishing 4 shows in the span of 5 years, between ages 81 and 86, if my math is correct.)
(Sidebar: I’m glad they’re giving her a special Tony- quite apart from being so obviously deserving of it, and regardless of her having won for Blithe Spirit only a year earlier, her 2010 loss in the Featured Musical Actress category to Katie Finneran in the fairly misbegotten Chenoweth-Sean Hayes Promises Promises revival is one Tony decision that doesn’t hold up very well a decade later. Don’t get me wrong, Finneran was hilarious, and the role has always been a scene-stealer, but I remember Lansbury’s beautiful, haunting performance of Liasons more vividly than anything in the entire Neil Simon-Burt Bacharach revival. I wonder what wins/losses tomorrow night we’ll be saying the same thing about a decade from now.) |
