Well, dear readers, my pal Rick Waln e-mailed me yesterday to remind me that it was twenty years ago today (yesterday) that Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play. No, that’s not right. It was twenty years ago yesterday that my musical comedy entitled Together Again had its opening night. Mr. Waln was in the cast, along with myself, Alan Abelew, Joan Ryan, Udana Power, Debbie Tilton, Jeff Maxwell and Debbie Moradzedeh (now Gracie Moore). We all had a wonderful time doing the show, even though at that time there were still quite a few things that would get changed and rewritten by the time we moved the show to a theater in Burbank. In Burbank, we ran for a couple of months if I recall correctly – same cast except for two replacements – Penny Peyser for Miss Power, and Marsha Kramer for Miss Ryan. It seems like yesterday and it is quite hard to believe that twenty long years have passed.
Yesterday, dear reader Sandra asked for some help in solving a trigonometry problem – what is the sine, cosine and tangent of alpha/2. That sounded very familiar to me and with good reason – it’s also a song by Meltz and Ernest, and one of their finest, in my opinion. It’s got real logic and precision. I print it here for you now.
THE SINE, COSINE AND TANGENT OF ALPHA/2
Music by Hinky Meltz Lyrics by Ernest Ernest
Our love is complicated
Like trigonometry
No simple math here
Our twisted path here
Is the strangest thing you’ll see –
What is the sine, cosine and tangent of alpha/2
If I knew the answer then I might know everything that I should do.
I can’t figure you out
You’re very hard to solve
The square root of one
Is simply no fun
Yet the world continues to revolve
What is the sine, cosine and tangent of alpha/2
If the tan of alpha/2 equals one, does that mean that we are through?
The sum of what I feel
Is not a simple thing
Are we minus or plus
A one or an “us”
Will we drift apart or congeal?
Are we just a bunch of sines and cosines
Am I on a tangent?
Can you hear my heart break apart
With a sound that’s very plangent
What is the sine, cosine and tangent of alpha/2
Won’t you give me your answer, don’t make me wait, now before my tears accrue
The problem is at hand
We really mustn’t fail
We’re in quadrant 1
And believe me hon
This problem we’ve got to nail
So, what’s the sine, cosine and tangent of alpha/2
And will we find that the total equals me and you?
Isn’t that a lovely song? It only had one recording – by Professor Victor Wistwell and his Eight Minus Four Quartet. I believe it was a limited pressing on 78rpm, for students of Professor Wistwell, a higher mathematics teacher in Rye, New York, and I am ever hopeful of finding a copy
on eBay.
Well, the only thing that can follow that is to click on the Unseemly Button below.
Now I will let you in on a little secret. These days, most of the time I write the notes the previous night so I don’t have to rush, rush, rush (that is three rushes) in the morning. But, last night I’d only written the previous section, because I figured it wouldn’t take me long to do this section in the morning and frankly I was too tired to finish them last night. So, wouldn’t you know that my wake-up call came twenty-five minutes late and now I have to rush, rush, rush (that is three more rushes) to finish.
We had only two real winners and one fake winner (mostly complete answers – but I gave it to him anyway) for this week’s Unseemly Trivia Contest. Here is the question:
In the late 60s, a novelist and playwright had a hit comedy playing in New York, but he also wrote a notorious flop musical the same season that his hit comedy closed. In the hit comedy cast was an actor who who’d done several musicals, and who has recently been in a hit TV show (and still is, I think). Also in the cast of the hit comedy were two actors who went onto star in two hit TV comedy series. Also in the hit comedy was an actor who would soon star in a classic seventies comedy. The star of the notorious flop musical also went on to star in one of the most beloved TV series ever. Isn’t this convoluted? Of course, knowing you dear readers, you’ll come up with several different things that will work. In any case:
Name the playwright and his hit comedy and flop musical.
Name the actor who’d done several musicals, and who is now (I believe) still in a hit TV series.
Name the two actors who would go on to star in two hit comedy series, and name the series.
Name the actor who would go on to star in a classic seventies comedy.
Name the star of the notorious flop musical and name the beloved TV series they starred in.
And the answers are:
Bruce Jay Friedman – Scuba Duba and A Mother’s Kisses
Jerry Orbach
Conrad Bain and Judd Hirsch – Maude and Taxi (I also allowed Jennifer Warren)
Cleavon Little – Blazing Saddles
Bea Arthur – Maude
And there you have it. Our High Winners were Steve Gurey, Michael Shayne and our partial High Winner, Mark Rothman. And our Highest Winner, chosen at random by our handy-dandy Electronic Hat, is Steve Gurey.
Well, you see, now I have to scurry about like a chicken with its head cut off, because of the late wake-up call. I must take the day and do the things I do but in order to do same I must scurry about. I do not like scurrying about, and believe-you-me the perpetrator of the late wake-up call will be roundly bitch-slapped. Don’t forget, tomorrow is Ask BK Day, so be thinking of your excellent questions. Today’s topic of discussion: I don’t even have a fershluganah topic of discussion on account of all the scurrying about because of the late wake-up call – but here’s a quickie and if you don’t like it talk about something else – we’ve never discussed our favorite supporting performances of the musical theater (always the leads, damn them, damn them all to hell), so let’s right that wrong this very minute. I’ll join in the fun after I finish scurrying about because of the late wake-up call.