Is It Really Her?
Some musical theater divas — Barbara Cook, Chita Rivera, etc. — are savvy and talented enough to skillfully adapt their performance style and repertoire as they age, and are therefore able to delight audiences well into their 70s. But the last time I saw Carol Lawrence perform live, a few years ago at the Kaye Playhouse, her act was marred by her insincere stage persona, her lack of spontaneity, and a general whiff of unintentional camp. (Can camp ever be intentional? Discuss!) Happily, VAI’s new DVD release of Lawrence’s performances on the Bell Telephone Hour series in the 1960s shows us the lady doing her stuff when she was young, fresh, and in very good voice.
These selections were culled from videotapes of shows that were telecast between 1961 and 1967. All feature a full orchestra and chorus, conducted by Donald Voorhees. As is the case with VAI’s previous release of Barbara Cook’s Bell Telephone Hour appearances, the earlier tapes have deteriorated to an alarming degree; they’re full of video noise and the colors are faded, though the sound is okay. (The more recent material is in better condition.) Again, thanks to VAI for rescuing this stuff before it disintegrated entirely.
The disc begins with a “Valentine Medley” from a show titled Broadway Classics, originally aired on February 3, 1961. Lawrence begins by singing “I Feel Pretty,” a memento of her original cast performance as Maria in the Bernstein-Sondheim-Laurents masterpiece West Side Story. She sounds great and looks lovely, though she’s wearing far too much eyeliner. Lawrence then dances beautifully with someone named Kelly Brown in a sequence that combines “Love is a Simple Thing” and “Love is a Many-Splendored Thing.” (Aren’t those titles somewhat contradictory?)
In a clip from a 1962 telecast, Lawrence offers a persuasive rendition of the Gershwins’ “Someone to Watch Over Me,” though she derails the wonderful “man some” / “handsome” rhyme by taking a breath in the wrong place. Next, she gives us her take on “Something’s Coming,” Tony’s first song in West Side Story; she sings it very well in an exciting arrangement, flattered by excellent camera work and editing but hampered by silly staging that has her spinning a bunch of empty picture frames hanging from the flies. (This was a ’60s variety show, folks. We have to take the good with the cheesy.)
Lawrence performs “I’d Do Anything” from Oliver! (with an umbrella and a wide-brimmed hat), plus the gorgeous “Is It Really Me?” from 110 in the Shade and “Everybody Loves to Take a Bow” from Hazel Flagg, in a sequence from a 1964 show. Her superb dancing partner in the second of these numbers is Matt Mattox, whose credits include the film Seven Brides for Seven Brothers and the original production of Once Upon a Mattress.
Next up is a too-cute-for-words mini-musical titled Picnic in the Park, from a 1960 telecast. It’s a cloying little story about a guy who falls in love at first sight with a schoolteacher (Lawrence), much to the chagrin of the woman’s fifth-grade student, who has a wicked crush on her. Still, it’s worthy of attention because the kid is played by Eddie Hodges, who created the role of Winthrop in The Music Man, while Lawrence’s swain is none other than Howard Keel, with whom she had recently co-starred in the Broadway flop Saratoga. This sequence includes Lerner and Loewe’s “Almost Like Being in Love” (from Brigadoon), Rodgers and Hart’s “Have You Met Miss Jones” (from “I’d Rather Be Right”), and Moross and Latouche’s “Lazy Afternoon” (from The Golden Apple), along with other old favorites.
A turn of the century medley from a 1961 telecast is negligible, but excerpts from a 1964 show are notable in that they have Lawrence performing with Robert Goulet, her husband at the time. Together or separately, they sing “That Old Feeling” (Fain/Brown), “Let’s Get Away From It All” (Adair/Dennis), “The Very Thought of You” (Noble) — and they look as great as they sound. Two other Broadway babies, Bill Hayes and Matt Mattox (again), are featured in a Shall We Dance sequence from 1965; and Mattox and Lawrence waltz to music by Strauss in clips from a March 1963 telecast.
The most disappointing scenes on the DVD are of Lawrence performing songs from West Side Story with her original co-star, Larry Kert, in 1967 — 10 years after they originated the roles of Maria and Tony on Broadway. They start by dancing the cha-cha section of the “Dance at the Gym.” Then he sings “Maria,” and then they both sing “Tonight,” not in the original keys. All of this is preserved on faded, fuzzy film rather than videotape, like the rest of the material on disc, but the notes in the accompanying booklet don’t explain why. Kert seems fey and uninvolved throughout, in stark contrast to his ardent singing of “Tonight” with Lawrence in a famous black-and-white clip from The Ed Sullivan Show that is not to be found on this disc.
The DVD has a bonus feature that backfires: A 2004 interview with Lawrence, in which she comes across as terribly affected. At the behest of interviewer Ernest Gilbert, she goes on and on about her childhood and her Italian-American family before getting to anything that’s interesting. Even when she’s discussing things we want to hear about, the interview is a trial because Lawrence punctuates almost every phrase with some sort of hand gesture and/or an exaggerated facial expression, as if she were performing rather than speaking truth. It’s an off-putting addition to a video release that brings us back to a bygone era when TV shows featuring the Great American Songbook were abundant.
