Well, dear readers, here it is, the blessed weekend. I do have to write these here notes quickly because the blessed cleaning lady is coming, but all I can say is, oh the peace, the blessed peace – oh, a Sondheim reference. I got a very good night’s sleep, too. Luckie isn’t coming until two o’clock, so I was not awakened early this morning. Well, let’s get on with it, because soon I will be given the evil eye by the cleaning lady – plus we’ve got excellent questions to answer, an Unseemly Trivia Contest, and so much more.
First of all, hie yourselves to the Unseemly Interview section and read Miss Donna Lynne Champlin’s unseemly interview, which is lovely. She holds nothing back. Of course, why should she hold nothing back, what did nothing ever do to her? Let nothing roam free the wild world. Wasn’t that poetic? Wasn’t that just too too? In any case, you will enjoy her interview, and there are many revealing things in it.
Tonight I must attend a birthday dinner which I really do not wish to attend, however I will attend it anyway because that’s the kind of guy I’m. I will, however, be bidin’ my time – oh, a Gershwin reference – counting the minutes until I can home and do nothing, which is what I prefer to do on these blessed weekends.
Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below, because that is the only way we’ll see the answers to your excellent questions. If you don’t click on the Unseemly Button below then you will be stuck here reading these same words over and over again until you want to rip the very eyes out their very sockets and then you will have big gaping holes in your face and no one will talk to you and you will be shunned, oh, yes, you will be shunned. So, click away.
I am so glad you all clicked away, because frankly the thought of you with big gaping holes in your face was not a pretty one. In any case, let’s get right to your excellent questions and, as always, I will hold nothing back because nothing must be allowed to roam free the wild world.
Jrand asks what is the best South Pacific CD to buy? Hmmm. Well, I suppose the OCR, even though the sound isn’t wonderful. I like parts of other recordings, including the recent Lauren Kennedy one, which no one else seems to like at all. But performance-wise, you can’t really do better than Mary Martin, at least for now.
Jose asks if I come from an artistic/musical family. Well, my mother enjoyed singing and my father, at one time, played the violin (yes, Virginia, he played the violin, he tucked it right under his chin – oh, a Sherman Edwards reference) and he enjoyed noodling at the piano. But during my childhood, I would have to say no, they weren’t artistic and/or musical to any great extent. Have I ever seen snow? But, of course. From 1993 to now, I have been in New York at least two or three times during the snow season. Do I like snow? I believe in snow – oh, a King and I reference. I do like snow. One of my fondest snow memories ever: I went to see Blood Brothers with Petula and the Cassidy boys. I was considering recording it and so after the show I was taken to meet Miss Petula Clark in her dressing room. After meeting, the two of us walked over to Sardi’s for dinner. The whole way, there was so much snow, that she just clung to my arm, and I thought, how cool is this – walking with Petula Clark in the snow and dining at Sardi’s? I didn’t end up recording it, but I did end up making an album with her and we became fast friends and I adore her. I saw her at the party for the last STAGE benefit and we just gabbed for a solid hour. Has there ever been a “take” during a recording session that I wish I could have used but that was unusable due to a glitch or problem. Not really, although early on, Vinnie used to sometimes just erase a partial take without asking me, and after four or five times of me casting a nasty glance his way, he learned to ask first – because there are sometimes one or two-line gem performances that are magic, and even though the take was aborted, I might be able to use those bits.
Philip Crosby asks me to cast a production of Follies using all the old MGM stars. Well, it depends on what era the film would have been made. Cheating a bit (she only did one MGM film), I bet Judy Holliday could have been a lovely Sally, and so would Jane Powell. Phyllis is much more difficult to come up with. Judy Garland could have done it, I suppose, and she could also have done Carlotta. I suppose the obvious would have been Howard Keel as Ben and Gene Kelly as Buddy. Jeanette MacDonald could have been Heidi. Marge and Gower could have done the Bolero d’Amour. Carlton Carptenter and Debbie Reynolds, Rain on the Roof. Twenty years ago, Betty Garrett could have really done Broadway Baby, especially with some direction.
Sandra asks if I won the eBay auction I was interested in last Saturday. No. Damn them, damn them all to hell.
William E. Lurie notes that I regularly report on DVDs, CDs, plays and tv shows that I see and hear, but feels I never talk about books. What book am I currently reading and what are a few of my favorite all-time books? Truthfully, since writing Benjamin Kritzer I have read no fiction at all (I’ve read the book on Sunset Blvd. and a large book about the Italian director, Mario Bava) – and, because I’m into the sequel quite heavily, I just don’t want to read any fiction while I’m writing. Some of my favorites (they’re pretty standard great books) – To Kill a Mockingbird, Lord of the Flies, Nineteen Eighty-Four, The Wanting Seed (by Anthony Burgess), The Chill by Ross MacDonald, Farewell, My Lovely by Raymond Chandler, The Night Has a Thousand Eyes by George Hopley (aka Cornell Woolrich), A Kiss Before Dying and Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin, The Midwich Cuckoos by John Wyndham, the short stories of John Collier and John Cheever and Ray Bradbury, The Shining, and many many more.
Steveg asks what kind of audio-visual system I have. I have a widescreen 55 inch Mitsubishi TV (HDTV ready), a nice surround sound system (5 speakers), a progressive scan DVD player. Do I have satellite or cable? Just plain old cable, which I rarely watch. How big is the room in which I watch my DVDs? It’s a very large den, perfect for viewing.
Laura asks what my opinion of Madonna is. As a singer and as a star? You know, there are certain things I’m just never going to “get”, and Madonna is one of them. I don’t like her voice, I don’t like her publicity-crazy persona, and I don’t like people who try so hard to be ever-changing and hip.
Craig asks using only one song from as many states or cities that I can – what are my favorites? California, Here I Come, Ev’ry Street’s a Boulevard in Old New York, I Left My Heart in San Francisco, Gary, Indiana, My Kind of Town (Chicago Is), Hooray for Hollywood, A Beautiful Day in Brooklyn, and of course the wonderful Meltz and Ernest song, Crab Cakes in Tarzana.
Kerry asks if there are any ad libs on any of the CDs I’ve produced, or did I know everything ahead of time? Oh, there are always little unexpected things that happen that are unplanned and unrehearsed, like the end of Jason Graae’s Strouse album, but mostly it’s all well-planned out in advance.
Ron Pulliam asks how I feel the fans of the types of recordings I produce ought to react or not react when posting to specialty sites on the Internet? On one site that Mr. Pulliam frequents, it has been suggested that fans get down on their knees and kiss the posterior of the producers of such albums. You know, I’ve said since the day I produced my first album, the buck stops with me – I take full responsibility for what I produce. If people respond to it and like it, great. If they have complaints, that’s fine, too. I have never minded criticism, if it’s well thought out and not whiny. I’ve also had people write me truly angry letters about this, that or the other, and instead of just tossing those letters or shining them on, I addressed their comments and gave the reasons why I did what I did, and in every one of those cases the people ended up writing a followup nice letter, because they’d had someone actually listen to them. I don’t always agree with criticism, but I always listen to it and give it thought. I can’t tell you the awful things people wrote because I’d let Dame Edna sing Losing My Mind. You’d have thought I committed some act of homicide and that I was the lowest form of vermin on the planet. It didn’t bother me that those people didn’t like the performance – I knew going in it would divide people right down the middle, some would “get” it and some would abhor it (Mr. Sondheim “got” it and loved it), and that’s why I did it. It wasn’t safe, and I think it’s fun to take chances artistically, even if you know some people will be offended by said chances. But no one has ever had to kiss my posterior, unless they’ve wanted to.
Arnold M. Brockman thinks that Mr. Stephen Sondheim is the very best lyricist ever. His second choice would by E.Y. Harburg. Who are my favorite lyricists, and why? The why takes hours, but I love Ira Gershwin for his facility with language and cleverness with rhymes, I love Mr. Sondheim for everything, the subtlety, the depth, the word-play, the emotion, the humor and his view of the human condition, I love Miss Dorothy Fields for her wonderful sense of language and clever way with a phrase, I love Miss Sylvia Fine for the same reasons. I am quite partial to Mr. Frank Loesser, he, in fact, is usually very underrated, but he’s just a wonderful wordsmith. And many many others.
Michael Shayne asks if there’s an instrumental version of a song (like Maria by Sondheim and Bernstein), does the lyricist get royalties or just the composer. Whoever is listed on the composition gets royalties – so both lyricist and composer get them. On the CD Out at the Movies the final track is Theme from an Unknown Movie. Is it really an unknown movie, and have I collaborated with anyone else musically. I normally don’t collaborate, but at one time, when I was going to do (and I still may) a revue of my What If songs, I wrote the lyrics to a title song called What If, and I had Claibe Richardson write the music, which he did a wonderful job on. Maybe I’ll print the lyric here one of these days. What was the process of composing the song with Grant Geissman? I seem to remember that I came up with the chord structure and part of the melody first (I was really just noodling at the piano). He joined me and we just improvised until we had something we liked and then we did one take of it and that was that. Of all the albums I’ve produced are there any that I wish I hadn’t produced and which would be my top ten favorites? Oh, I suppose there are a couple I would rather not have done – a singer or two, and a show or two, but you know they’re all my children. As to favorites, I’m partial to Liz Callaway’s The Story Goes On, Lost in Boston 1 and 4, Unsung Musicals, Prime Time Musicals, The King and I, A Broadway Love Story and oh who can choose?
JMK asks if I’ve ever had an incredible idea only to have found out someone else had done it? Oh, certainly I’ve pitched film ideas that I thought were wonderfully original, only to be told they had something similar in development (of course, they say that – but then I never ever see the end result, so maybe they’re lying). I once wrote a spoof of Ray Harryhausen films, called The Seventh Voyage of Howard (which came very close to getting made with Cannon Films) – early on, we heard that someone else had a totally similar film to it. It turned out to be my script, with a different name on it and a different author. Needless to say, we could never find out who or where the “author” was, but we put a stop to that pronto.
And now, Dino at the piano – oh, a Kathryn Kuhlman reference (how obscure, even for me). And now, our Unseemly Trivia Contest question for your mental delectation.
This unsuccessful musical by authors who were accustomed to success, had in its ensemble a player who would go on to win an Academy Award. Also in its cast was a fine jazz/cabaret performer. Also in its cast was someone who would go on to become a major soap opera star. Also in its cast was someone who would go on to star in a smash hit musical a couple of years later, a role they would later recreate on film. That person would also star in a TV series.
Name the musical.
Name the ensemble player who would win an Academy Award
Name the fine jazz/cabaret performer
Name the person who would go on to soap opera stardom
Name the person who would soon star in a smash hit musical on both stage and screen, and name the TV series they later starred in.
Remember, DO NOT POST THE ANSWERS TO THE SITE. Send them to me at bruce@haineshisway.com or by simply using the unseemly Ask BK Button located on our unseemly home page. Good luck to one and all and also all and one. Answers accepted until midnight Monday.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, like nothing I must roam free the wild world, and I must get the hell out of here because I am being given the evil eye by you-know-who. Today’s topic of discussion: Every time we do these favorite songs of a composer topics, I end up replaying albums I haven’t heard in a long time – for example, I pulled out all my Michel Legrand albums yesterday, and have been loving them all over again (I was especially taken with Peau d’Ane, which I hadn’t heard in years). So, what are your favorite Beatles’ songs? I haven’t taken out my Beatles albums for years, and it’s high time I did. Not only what are your favorite Beatles Beatles’ songs, but what are your favorite other interpretations of them, as well – for example, I love Judy Collins’ In My Life, and several instrumental jazz versions, too, like Wes Montgomery’s A Day in the Life. I’ll chime in with my choices later today.