Fresh Air
- Program
- Fresh Air
- Producing Organization
- WHYY Public Media
- Contributing Organization
- WHYY (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
- AAPB ID
- cpb-aacip/215-74cnpffm
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- Description
- Description
- Filler: By policy of WHYY, this information is restricted and has Profile: Recently reissued Broadway cast albums
- Description
- DATE December 31, 2003 ACCOUNT NUMBER N/A TIME 12:00 Noon-1:00 PM AUDIENCE N/A NETWORK NPR PROGRAM Fresh Air Filler: By policy of WHYY, this information is restricted and has been omitted from this transcript * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Profile: Recently reissued Broadway cast albums TERRY GROSS, host: Not all the best Broadway songs come from the most famous shows. Some recently reissued Broadway cast albums help explain why some shows didn't succeed. But classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz says that some forgotten shows have numbers that shouldn't be. (Soundbite of music) LLOYD SCHWARTZ reporting: When I was a kid growing up in New York, I fell in love with Broadway. If a show looked good on paper, my family would get tickets before it opened. Every now and then, we'd get stuck with a clinker. One show, "Seventh Heaven," which was inspired by a famous silent movie, had a pretty score by Hollywood's Victor Young and a cast that included Gloria DeHaven, Ricardo Montalban and a remarkable young dancer named Chita Rivera, two years before "West Side Story" made her a star. But it got such bad reviews, it closed after only 44 performances. The cast album disappeared almost as quickly. It's been a collector's item. But it's just been reissued on CD, and there are some delightful numbers. Here's "Camille, Collette, Fifi," in which three Parisian hookers explain their philosophy. Guess which one is Chita Rivera. Unidentified Woman #1: (Singing) Camille. Unidentified Woman #2: (Singing) Collette. Unidentified Woman #3: (Singing) Fifi. Group of Women: (Singing) Three ladies of the boulevard are we. Our trade may be shady, but we do quite well. We have a very happy clientele. So please come up and see... Unidentified Woman #1: (Singing) Camille. Unidentified Woman #2: (Singing) Collette. Unidentified Woman #3: (Singing) Fifi. Group of Women: (Singing) For this, we charge a very modest fee. SCHWARTZ: Another show I saw that seemed to have even greater potential for success was "Fade Out Fade In." An affectionate satire of Hollywood in the '30s, it starred Carol Burnett and had music by Jules Styne, with book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, famous for another Hollywood satire, "Singin' in the Rain." During the run, Burnett was injured in a taxi accident and started missing performances. Then she signed up for a TV show. "Fade Out Fade In" actually closed, then reopened when Burnett was legally forced to return. But it never recovered its lost momentum. The long-out-of-print cast recording has finally been issued on CD. One song is a gem, "You Mustn't Be Discouraged," with Burnett and dancer Tiger Haynes imitating a nauseatingly optimistic number by Shirley Temple and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson. Ms. CAROL BURNETT: (Singing) When you think you've hit the bottom and you're feeling really low, you mustn't be discouraged. There's always one step further down you can go. When you're lying in the gutter feeling just a bit unsure, just wait until tomorrow. You may be lying flat-faced down in the sewer. Don't be afraid of a little raindrop. That don't mean nothing, bud. Just remember one of those raindrops started the Johnstown flood in Pennsylvania. When you're living... SCHWARTZ: Both "Seventh Heaven" and "Fade Out Fade In" are part of Decca's marvelous series of reissued cast albums. One new disc includes three musicals from the World War II era. Irving Berlin's "This is the Army" from 1942 features Berlin himself singing a song that he resurrected from a musical he wrote during World War I. Mr. IRVING BERLIN: (Singing) ...in the morning. I've been a soldier quite a while and I would like the state the life is simply wonderful, the Army food is great. I sleep with 97 others in a wooden hut. I love them all, they all love me, it's very lovely, but oh, how I hate to get up in the morning. Oh, how I'd love to remain in bed, for the hardest blow of all is to hear the bugler call, `You gotta get up, you gotta get up, you gotta get up this morning.' Someday... SCHWARTZ: In 1946, Harold Rome wrote a musical about the transition to civilian life called "Call Me Mister." The number I can't get enough of features the delectable Betty Garrett lamenting the recent craze for Latin American dances. Ms. BETTY GARRETT: (Singing) Take back your somba, aye, your conga, aye, your rumba, aye-yi-yi. I'm dislocatin', aye, my verta, aye, bralumba. Aye-yi-yi. I've got more bumps here, aye, than on a, aye, cucumber. Aye-yi-yi. Though I like neighborly relations, all these up and down gyrations try my patience. Ole! I think it's time to call a truce. I'm telling you's I'm shaking loose my poor caboose. Ole! All of this goin' and this comin' to this fancy Latin drummin' numbs my plumbin'. Ole! South America, take it away. SCHWARTZ: Another Decca album has two shows with lyrics by the great Dorothy Fields. The highlight is "The Fireman's Bride," a surprisingly naughty number from up in Central Park with music by Sigmund Romberg. It's sung by Celeste Holm, who wasn't actually in the original cast, though it seems written especially for her. Ms. CELESTE HOLM: (Singing) Fireman John McGee(ph), who married in June, wants to be free. He bought a handsome love nest, but his high-flying spouse likes the firehouse. She wears a crimson skirt, a fireman's hat, red flannel shirt. `Clang' goes the bell and she's off, boys, in a cloud of confusion and dirt. Oh, the fireman's bride, the fireman's bride won't sit home by her fireside. From all accounts, she'd rather bounce in the fireman's nest. She leaps to the engine and clings to the hose. How she hangs on nobody knows. Out comes the net and then over she goes, high up they throw her while she hollers, `More!' The fireman's bride... SCHWARTZ: I really love listening to these old shows. Even the worst of them, with their combination of show-biz savvy and corny innocence, are a kind of unconscious history, revealing something about the time they were written. And then, if we're lucky, there's the one cherishable song that transcends all the foolishness that surrounds it. GROSS: Lloyd Schwartz teaches at the University of Massachusetts at Boston and is classical music editor of The Boston Phoenix. I'm Terry Gross. All of us at FRESH AIR wish you a happy New Year. This is NPR, National Public Radio.
- Description
- HALF: Margaret Whiting (R) TEN: Sammy Cahn (R) Lloyd (new Broadway releases)
- Description
- Fresh Air with Terry Gross, the Peabody Award-winning weekday magazine of contemporary arts and issues, is one of public radio's most popular programs. Each week, nearly 4.5 million people listen to the show's intimate conversations broadcast on more than 450 National Public Radio (NPR) stations across the country, as well as in Europe on the World Radio Network. Though Fresh Air has been categorized as a "talk show," it hardly fits the mold. Its 1994 Peabody Award citation credits Fresh Air with "probing questions, revelatory interviews and unusual insights." And a variety of top publications count Gross among the country's leading interviewers. The show gives interviews as much time as needed, and complements them with comments from well-known critics and commentators. Fresh Air is produced at WHYY-FM in Philadelphia and broadcast nationally by NPR.
- Description
- (1.) Singer MARGARET WHITING. Her father, Richard Whiting, wrote many of her most popular songs, including "Too Marvelous for Words," "My Ideal," "She's Funny That Way," and "On The Good Ship Lollipop." Jerome Kern, Johnny Mercer and other great songwriters of the day were like uncles to her. (original broadcast: 1/22/88) (2.) Songwriter SAMMY CAHN. He wrote many of the songs that Frank Sinatra recorded, including "Come Fly With Me," "Teach Me Tonight" and "High Hopes." He also wrote the scores for many Broadway shows including "Walking Happy" and "Skyscraper," and for the movies "Come Blow Your Horn," "Robin and the Seven Hoods," and "A Pocketful of Miracles." Cahn died in 1993 at the age of 79. (Originally aired 1985) (3.) Classical music critic LLOYD SCHWARTZ reviews a new series of original Broadway cast albums from shows that didnt succeed but which contained numbers that shouldnt be forgotten. (on DECCA).
- Media type
- Sound
- Duration
- 00:59:30
- Credits
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: Sammy Cahn
: Margaret Whiting
Distributor: NPR
Producing Organization: WHYY Public Media
- AAPB Contributor Holdings
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WHYY
Identifier: 2003 1231 Margaret Whiting_Sammy Cahn.wav (File Name)
Format: audio/vnd.wave
Duration: 00:59:30
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WHYY
Identifier: FA20031231_GCD (WHYY)
Format: audio/vnd.wave
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- Citations
- Chicago: “Fresh Air,” WHYY, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed May 7, 2025, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-215-74cnpffm.
- MLA: “Fresh Air.” WHYY, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. May 7, 2025. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-215-74cnpffm>.
- APA: Fresh Air. Boston, MA: WHYY, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-215-74cnpffm