by Ted Chapin
She was also aware that there were photographers in the room. Martha Swope, reigning photographer for both ballet and theater, was on hand, snapping both candid shots of everyone gathering and milling about and a few posed shots to be used for promotional purposes until production shots of the finished show could be taken later on.
The creative staff—Hal, Steve, Michael, and Jim—arrived and huddled quietly in the stage managers’ office for a pep talk, not unlike a group of coaches about to face their team for the first practice of the year. People who were working on the show elsewhere came as well—the press agents, the music copyists, staff from Hal’s office, the hair and wig designer, the makeup designer, the advertising agent, and others. There was much joviality, greetings, laughter, all tinged with nervous expectation. It’s an exciting moment—a gathering of people, many of whom have never worked together before, who are about to embark on a creative journey together. When you see everyone in one place at one time, it means one thing: the clock has started ticking. Everyone in that room, no matter what his or her area of focus, had a lot to do to prepare for the first preview in Boston, which was now just six weeks away. Alexis quipped quietly to Ruthie, “This feels like a lousy cocktail party.” Not missing a beat, Ruthie shot back, “Without the booze.”
Surprisingly, Alexis and her costars were a little nervous, despite having had a head start. Their comfortable routine was now being invaded by what seemed like an enormous group of strangers. There was amusement as the actors portraying the four leads in their youthful past introduced themselves to, well, themselves. The young versions may not have had striking physical similarities to their elder counterparts, but the personalities matched. Playing Young Buddy was Harvey Evans, an ageless Broadway chorister with a cheerful outlook on life, full of smiles and goodwill. He greeted everyone like a long lost friend. Virginia Sandifur, the Young Phyllis, was tall, dark-haired, and slightly removed from the fray. Phyllis to the core. Kurt Peterson, the Young Ben, cast only last week, was personable and relaxed. He had piercing eyes, but a nice demeanor. He was living with Victoria Mallory, the actress hired to play Young Heidi Schiller. They had been in school together, had fallen in love, and played opposite each other in a production of West Side Story at Lincoln Center. It was nice to have a couple already in place among the company. Marti Rolph, Young Sally, was fresh and bubbly, just in from Los Angeles. She had a wide-eyed Sally-like enthusiasm for New York and everyone in it and seemed genuinely thrilled to be here.
The designers arrived. George Martin helped Boris Aronson and his wife, Lisa, carry in a large box containing the scale model of the set. Tharon Musser, the lighting designer, and Florence Klotz chatted quietly. There was also a large contingent of friends and family, including Hal’s wife, Judy, who was a particular friend of Steve Sondheim’s and had been a champion of The Girls Upstairs for years, and John Guare, resident friend and Follies fan. All told, there were about eighty people milling about.
At ten, the cast was called into the large room and everyone else was asked to stand by outside in the hallway while the Equity rules were read through. Once all union business was taken care of, the doors were open to the rest of us, as Terry Marone packed up her papers in one large briefcase and left.
The cast sat themselves around the table, positioned roughly by billing and size of role. Fifi D’Orsay, looking for the proper place to sit, said to anyone who would listen, “Zere is no place for me to sit . . .” to which Ethel Shutta, pointing to the seat next to her, responded, “Hey, squattez-vous.”
Sondheim was at the piano, surrounded by his music department: Hal Hastings, orchestrator Jonathan Tunick, head copyist Mathilde Pincus, and dance arranger John Berkman. Everyone else filled in around the periphery. Fritz Holt began the proceedings by welcoming everyone, introducing himself and the rest of the stage management staff, and offering a few pointers—“We’re here to help with whatever you need, to solve any problems . . .” etc. Then he introduced Hal Prince.
“Gee, the last time I did this there were fourteen people in the cast, so it’s a little different this time.” The Follies cast numbered forty-nine. “I won’t introduce you all; there are too many of you for that. Anyway, you can all introduce yourselves to each other over the next six weeks and in Boston.” He did introduce Jim Goldman, Michael Bennett, and Steve Sondheim. Boris and Lisa were fussing with the set model on top of the rolling table. He asked if they were ready to show it. “Still too early,” said Boris. So Hal continued: “What we intend to do with this show is to take somewhat of a trip, sort of a group nervous breakdown. Part of its style is in being big and brazen.” He explained that to help facilitate the necessarily complex staging, in three weeks’ time rehearsals would be taking place on the actual set, which was already under construction in a scenic studio in the Bronx. In order to give the studio time to complete the building of the set, however, we would be rehearsing from four in the afternoon until midnight. Boris announced that he was ready. He turned the model around; the actors got up from the table and crowded around, oohing and ahhing appropriately. Hal explained how the basic set would work. Then the set was turned back to the wall while Lisa and Boris fussed some more. When it was turned around again, the colorful Follies drops were all in place. Everyone was impressed. Realizing an oversight, Hal then introduced “the genius who thought this whole thing up, Boris Aronson. And that lady standing beside him is the only person who can deal with that genius, his wife, Lisa.”
Hal went on to say: “There are many decisions which may not be made for a long time, but to help us get an idea of where we’re going, I want to get the show up on its feet fast. Seeing it all put together will help us see what it looks like. Now, when we start the read-through, please speak out. Read out, take chances, make mistakes, because that’s what we’re here for. Ruthie will read stage directions and push you along should anyone lag, and Steve will play the songs when we get to them. For those of you who know your songs, Steve will play them today for the last time. From now on they are yours. Steve also has a new song for Solange LaFitte which no one has heard, so that will be a first!”
Hal Prince shows off the set model. Jim Goldman,
Michael Bartlett, Fritz Holt watch.
And off they went. Ruthie began at the very beginning: “The curtainrises to the sound of pastiche music, as if recorded years ago, tinny, scratchy, full of ghosts.”
The cast read their lines, some timidly, some with gusto. Steve sang all the songs, in a somewhat hurried fashion but to affectionate applause each time. The new song for Solange was part of a three-song montage early in the show. “Rain on the Roof” was first, a throwaway for the husband-and-wife team the Whitmans—originally “the whistling Whitmans”—a short, sweet couple whose song was punctuated with kisses: “Listen to the rain on the roof go pit-pitty-pat . . .” etc. Then came “Broadway Baby,” the paean to showbiz, to be sung by old Hattie—“I’m just a Broadway baby, Walking off my tired feet. . . .” Then as he got to the new number, Steve said, “Don’t look—I’m going to miss a lot of notes,” and he began a vamp in time. He sang:
I have traveled over this earth,
From Quebec to Venice to Perth,
I’ve sailed down to Sydney
And up to Nome,
I’ve been to Rome
And I’ve done Stockholm.
I have seen the gardens of Kew,
I have been to Timbuktu, too.
But when I’ve returned,
The thing I’ve learned
Is what I always knew:
New York has neon, Berlin has bars,
But ah! Paree! . . .
He clearly didn’t have the song completely in his fingers, so he stopped and started. But the idea, as well as its cleverness, came through. Although several lyrics sung that day were soon changed, I thought these originals exemplified just how fertile Steve’s imagination is:
I’ve been North and South, East and West,
I have been to Buda-
and -Pest
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
I have seen Calcutta’s black hole,
I have even toured the South Pole,
But when there’s a moon,
I leave Rangoon,
And through Montmartre I stroll.
The atmosphere was relaxed. Quips were thrown around from time to time; when Steve got to “Who’s That Woman?” he yelled to Michael across the room to make the tap sounds, which Michael accomplished by pounding the table with his hands. Fifi D’Orsay stumbled over the word “nonpareil.”
Once they got to the beginning of the yet-to-be-finished Follies sequence, Hal interrupted: “All right, that’s all we can do for now.”
It was scary to have an entire sequence not yet completed on the first day of rehearsal. Those who had worked with Sondheim before knew that he was, by his own admission, a procrastinator, but that he thrived under pressure. Michael Bennett, who would have to stage each of the unwritten songs, was the most concerned. He knew that he already had his hands full with the older women, for whom he had big plans, and that he had a lot of movement to deal with in addition to the choreography. But, to be fair to Steve, there were also a handful of songs from The Girls Upstairs that had been cut over the past few months: “Pleasant Little Kingdom” and “All Things Bright and Beautiful” for Sally; “That Old Piano Roll” for Buddy; and “Bring On the Girls,” an opening number that Michael wanted replaced. He wanted a fresh start and Steve obliged, coming up with “Beautiful Girls.” All the cut songs ended up in the show as part of various incarnations of the Prologue, the final version of which was based almost entirely on “All Things Bright and Beautiful.”
Ooh, la, la. Miss Fifi D’Orsay.
A break was called. Everyone got up, milled around, Martha Swope packed up her cameras, the room got put back into shape for rehearsals to begin, and I was corralled into helping the Aronsons get back home with the set model.
So began the first week of rehearsal. In two weeks’ time there would be a stagger-through, although that was not on anyone’s mind at the moment. For the remainder of the day and for the next weeks, the show would be rehearsed in bits and pieces, over and over again, with as many sequences linked together as possible, and as early as possible.
Although Michael and Hal were codirectors, each had another hat to wear as well. Michael’s choreographic hand was needed throughout, since the line between direction and choreography was less clear than in a traditional musical. As the choreographer, he had a lot to accomplish in what now was starting to feel like not a lot of time. Hal had his producer responsibilities, although he infinitely preferred directing. He was bored by producing, and no longer enjoyed the challenge. But he was still brilliant at the job.
As soon as the break was over, Michael wanted to show “Who’s That Woman?” to the women who would be dancing it—Mary McCarty in the solo spot, with her backup dancers Alexis Smith, Dorothy Collins, Yvonne De Carlo, Ethel Barrymore Colt, Helon Blount, and Sheila Smith. He knew that in order for it to work, he needed the “old gals” to do some pretty substantial hoofing. He took over the large rehearsal room, gathered the young dancers on whom he had been setting the number, and showed the whole thing, jumping in and dancing the leading role himself from time to time, at one point placing himself in the middle of a blossom of dancers surrounded by dancing petals. He pointed to Mary McCarty and then to himself as if to say, “And this will be you.” She guffawed. When the number finished, Michael and Bob positioned the women out on the floor, spaced apart, and began going through the tap steps, slowly and patiently. “Looks like we’ll be seeing a lot of each other over the next six weeks,” Michael commented cheerfully, as he left them in the capable hands of Bob Avian and Mary Jane Houdina. The ten o’clock call the next morning, and for many mornings to follow, was devoted to learning and drilling the steps for this number. This would prove to be traumatic for some, but once the show got onstage, every minute of difficulty paid off—at least for the audience.
Michael had reconceived the number from what Steve had originally intended. It was designed as a challenge tap number from the old Follies that five of the ex—Follies girls at the reunion decide to perform once again. As they line up, they realize that one of the girls has died. That, however, won’t stop them, and they proceed with the dance, while maintaining a gaping hole in the middle of the lineup. As the show evolved, with a general shift away from a linear story and into a mood piece that moved between the past and the present, Michael’s idea was to make it a dance between the present and the past in musical-comedy terms. With the advent of the ghost figures as characters, and with a song whose lyrics turn on the motif of looking into a mirror, Michael created a number with a clear sequence of memory-play: it starts in the present, then conjures up the past in a distant mirror image, then the two come together and coexist side by side, finally merging into one. After the verse and first chorus, during which the backup girls are mainly just posing, they start into a charmingly simple shuffle tap routine, lining up across the stage for a light series of variations, some with individual poses, working down the line. Then they dance around the center, ending up back in a line downstage, but now we see the mirror image of them way upstage: it’s their ghosts, young and as they were in the Follies, all dressed alike, in tap costumes flecked with mirror chips catching the light. The two groups continue dancing as mirror images of each other—the reunion gals in their miscellaneous party dresses and the ghosts in identical Follies tap tutus. Then the two groups come together in one big circle, alternating present-day character and ghost figure. They dance together, but, of course, don’t relate to each other at all. They are in separate times, though they’re actually touching. At the very end, each present-day woman ends up standing in the same position as she did at the beginning of the number, only now she is posing opposite her own ghost figure, mirroring her youth.
It was ambitious. It was also clear from the get-go that it was going to be a lot of work for everyone, since for it to work properly the older gals would have to get their steps down. Michael wasn’t interested in having them forget their old routine.
Word had gotten around before rehearsals began that the principal ladies would do well to take some tap lessons. Some did, others did not. Yvonne didn’t, and she was having a hard time. “Once I learn them I’m okay, since I am a dancer, but I just can’t get the steps.” So Dorothy Collins went to Fritz Holt to see if Bob Avian couldn’t do some extra work with Yvonne on the side, quietly, so she wouldn’t feel bad. “Why don’t you say something about the other girls having had some tap lessons—but don’t make it sound like that is what you’re saying.” Bob, who had worked with Michael on every one of his shows, was a model of tact and diplomacy. He invited Yvonne to come with him off in a corner, where he took her through the steps patiently and slowly. Monday night she appeared on the Tonight Show and told Johnny Carson that things were going well with the show, “but I’m having a lot of trouble with tap.” In truth, all the women were having trouble learning the number, but most of them suffered silently.
Hal was responsible for the book scenes. The show was episodic, so what he had to rehearse was either scenes among the principals or short bits and pieces involving party scenes with one or two people drifting through clumps of other partygoers. He wanted to stage the show in chronological order, so he began with the opening monologues. Only Phyllis, Ben, Sally, and Buddy had monologues, but other characters had specific entrances that would be coordinated with music. “Make your entrances as if you’ve been having a conversation with the person you’re arriving with. Your speech should be sort of a continuation,” he told the room. He had a distinctive way of working: he took small sections of scenes, went over them repeatedly, blocked out some staging, and often gave the actors line readings if they didn’t get one instinctively right off. “I’m not good at talking or verbalizing the printed page. I am not the kind of director who can talk, talk, talk about a scene. I have
to see it.” Since the party scenes continued throughout the whole show, he spoke about the need to “orchestrate the party.” He kept a careful eye out for focus, so the emphasis would always be on the right place and on the right characters. “You take a drink from this waiter here, and come down this way, wave hello to those people over there, and come dancing over here and stop.” He kept on rehearsing party vignettes all week, devising almost cinematic cross-fades as a waiter, a guest, or one of the black-and-white showgirl ghosts wandered in front of a scene as it ended. Some of this looked stagey and clumsy, but without everything else going on around, it was clearly too early to make a judgment. Sometimes Hal would jump up, grab an actor by the arms and pull him through to where he wanted him. Sometimes he seemed oddly preoccupied, and would talk to Ruthie or whoever was sitting next to him while scenes were being run. Perhaps he was discussing new ideas, but it didn’t look as if he was paying attention to the actors. Since everyone in the scenes he was staging was also needed by Michael and the music department, he would grab anyone available to stand in. On a couple of occasions, I stood in for a waiter. It felt odd—sort of fun, but I felt as if I really didn’t belong. I was much more comfortable at any of my other tasks, which were beginning to become more numerous and varied.
