Monday, July 26, 2010

REMINISCING … ETHEL MERMAN

REMINISCING …
ETHEL MERMAN
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Ethel Merman - an American actress and singer. Known primarily for her powerful voice and roles in musical theatre, she has been called "the undisputed First Lady of the musical comedy stage." Among the many standards introduced by Merman in Broadway musicals are "I Got Rhythm", "Everything's Coming Up Roses", "I Get a Kick Out of You", "It's De-Lovely", "Friendship", "You're the Top", "Anything Goes", and "There's No Business Like Show Business", which later became her theme song. 

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Anything Goes proved to be the first of five Cole Porter musicals in which Merman starred. In addition to the title song, the score included "I Get a Kick Out of You", "You're the Top", and "Blow Gabriel Blow". It opened on November 21, 1934 at the Alvin Theatre, and the New York Post called Merman "vivacious and ingratiating in her comedy moments, and the embodiment of poise and technical adroitness" when singing "as only she knows how to do."

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Merman and Berlin reunited for Call Me Madam in 1950, for which she won the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical, and she went on to star in the 1953 screen adaptation as well, winning the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy for her performance. The following year she appeared as the matriarch of the singing and dancing Donahue family in There's No Business Like Show Business, a film with a Berlin score. 

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What many consider Merman's greatest triumph as a stage performer opened on May 21, 1959 at The Broadway Theatre. Gypsy was based on the memoirs of Gypsy Rose Lee and starred Merman as her domineering stage mother Rose Hovick. Although Arthur Laurents, who wrote the book, was deeply unhappy with her interpretation of the role, she was lauded by the critics. In the New York Post, Richard Watts called her "a brilliant actress," and Brooks Atkinson of the New York Times said "she gives an indomitable performance, both as actress and singer." Despite the acclaim, Merman lost the Tony Award to her close friend Mary Martin in The Sound of Music and jokingly quipped, "How are you going to buck a nun?" 

Gypsy450 Sandra Church, from left, Ethel Merman and Jack Klugman in the original 1959 production of “Gypsy,” the musical inspired by Gypsy Rose Lee’s memoir.

Merman was featured in two films, the wildly successful It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and the flop The Art of Love, and made dozens of television appearances, guesting on variety series hosted by Perry Como, Red Skelton, Dean Martin, Ed Sullivan, and Carol Burnett, on talk shows with Mike Douglas, Dick Cavett, and Merv Griffin, and in episodes of That Girl, The Lucy Show, Batman, and Tarzan, among others.

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In 1979, she recorded The Ethel Merman Disco Album, with many of her signature show-stoppers set to a disco beat. Her last screen role was a self-parody in the 1980 comedy film Airplane!, in which she portrayed Lieutenant Hurwitz, a shell shocked soldier who thinks he is Ethel Merman.

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