In 1976 Angela was staring a 10 year Reunion tour of MAME with many of the original cast. They were starting the tour in Dallas and I was a stage manager with the Dallas Summer Musicals. There were 3 other stage managers with DSM but they were all out in KC with GONE WITH THE WIND and as the bottom man on the totem pole I had to stay in Dallas. MAME had their own stage manager, lighting, and scenic designer with them but during the tech I was sitting in the audience with then DSM producer, the late Tom Hughes. There was much confusion on the stage and I said to Mr. Hughes that it looks like they're not ready to open, I'll go backstage and see if I can help. I go backstage and talk to the then head DSM carpenter, Bill Toon, and he says the crew has no idea what to set up. So I go to the MAME stage manager and get a script and run through it and do some quick scene change pictures and notes. I kept one scene ahead of where they were and they slowly got through the tech. There were 2 more techs before opening and I did even more detailed drawings and notes and gave copies to all the local crew heads. As things happened they opened without any glitches. Later that week Tom Hughes comes backstage and says to me: "Al, I have some good news and some bad news for you. I think: "Oh,Boy what have I done now?" I said:" OK, give me the bad news." Mr. Hughes says: "I don't think you'll be with DSM any longer." Well I just about died. Then I said: "OK, what's the good news?" and Mr. Hughes says:"Miss Lansbury wants to hire you to go out on the road with her tour of MAME." WHAT? WOW! She was right behind Mr. Hughes and welcomed me to the show. She told me she wanted me to be her official Man in the Moon is a Lady moon tester. That tour turned out to be be one of the best I was ever to be on. She was and still is one of my favorite people to have ever worked with.
Thank you for this warm, glowing bit of history. I teach young people theatre and will share your anecdote with them. It has all the appeal of a great theatre story, even with a bit of suspense, involving a heartening first hand account of a true theatre legend.
Wonderful story, it just proves that when we give freely with our very best we never know who notices but magic happens when it comes from an open heart.
I had the chance to briefly meet her about 20 years ago. I told her my mom had seen her in Mame in LA in the 60s, and she clasped my hand and said “I’m so glad she got to see it. That was a wonderful production.” I can personally attest that the many reminiscences of her being warm and gracious are absolutely true. May she Rest In Peace.
She is fabulous. I use the present tense because she is on film/video. Saw her in SWENNEY TODD twice, MAME revival before MURDER. . ., THE BEST MAN, and A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC. Such a gracious woman.
It was not ORIGINALLY a musical. The dramatic movie version starred ROSALIND RUSSELL. Lucy's was just a bad VANITY project and she was already 200 years too old for the role!
Well, she always considered herself primarily a dramatic actress, even when she became a star of Broadway musicals, which she only did well into her career, starting with Stephen Sondheim and Arthur Laurents' infamous flop Anyone Can Whistle in 1964 (which ran only for 9 performances) and finally breaking through in Mame in 1966, at which time she had been a professional actress for more than 20 years.
Besides "The Harvey Girls," she also was in "Till the Clouds Roll By," a biography of Jerome Kern. I can't remember what song she sang, but she sang it on a swing.
Thank you so much sharing! Angela Lansbury is just brilliant in everything she does! Please do upload me videos with Ms. Lansbury if you have any left.
It amazes me how the studio execs decided to choose Lucille Ball over Angela for the movie role. They claimed she wasn't well known enough 🙄 So a an aged tv actress with no singing talent was cast in the role
Jack Warner did the exact same thing with "My Fair Lady" when he passed over Julie Andrews for the role of Eliza Doolittle in favour of Audrey Hepburn even though Andrews was favourite for the role. With "Mame" there was a rumour they were going to have Lucille Ball's voice dubbed, but Lucy insisted on using her own voice. In her last interview before her death, co-star Bea Arthur called the film a disaster and said Lucy was "terribly miscast" in the role of Mame. In a 2009 interview with The Wall Street Journal, Angela said that she never really forgave Warner for snubbing her.
Ofcourse most of the musicals are written by gay people..alot of people don't know that..we are opressed and we write about how a better world might be possible
DXMX: Speak for yourself a**hole. Homosexuals write musicals because of talent. It has NOTHING to do with trying to write a better world because you’re oppressed. Plenty of heterosexuals write musicals that are happy and enjoyable like the Lerner and Loewe or Rodger and Hammerstein works. Grow up.
