ElainE Stritch struggles with recording "Here's To The Ladies That Lunch" for the Broadway cast recording of "Company" as Stephen Sondeheim and friends get more and more frustrated. I won't give away the ending .... just, check it out!
I love this woman, but it's sad that she never did get the recognition that she deserved and worst of all she didn't get the Tony award that she deserved for this role because she really killed it and it's only now that people realize what a great woman and a great talent she was and what we have really lost. R.I.P. Elaine, you were and still are one of the greatest Broadway stars to grace the stage. " I'll drink to that".🍸🍷
Listening to this guy saying it was better the next day because she had her hair and makeup done really burns me up. And she's like, NO DUDE: it's because I had a two show day ahead of me.
👀 I don't think he was saying she did better "because she had her hair and makeup done", I think he was saying having her hair and makeup done (among other things, including the time of day) put her into a better place mentally to do the song. On the second day she looks like the character, and looks are an important thing for a character like that.
R.I.P. Elaine Stritch. We have lost one of the greats of the Broadway Theater. In addition, she should've had a much-deserved Oscar nod for Woody Allen's 'September." I laugh out loud til I cry every time I watch it. You are missed.
As an actor myself, I know how she feels. When I perform, I often get frustrated whenever I can't get something right. (I can imagine that would increase tenfold when you're performing for someone like Sondheim, hehe.) And it's a great comfort to know that even the most seasoned Broadway veterans have those moments too.
Fantastic. Must try to find this documentary. Elaine Stritch is so open; and this is a really revealing insight into the singers' process. Very impressive, a great performance of a great piece.
I love this song. Growing up in Kansas I didn't get what she was talking about. Our local "Ladies who lunch" spent their time where few people could see them, at the exclusive country club, or each other's homes...
15 HOURS singing your heart out to a mic, let's see if any of YOU could pull it off. Also, it must be said that performers come alive onstage in front of a live audience. Cast recording sessions rarely get the magic & passion that a live performance garners, no matter how good the cast is. One thing I realized on a personal note, Elaine in her younger years here looks & sounds EXACTLY like my late mother-in-law. She had all the acerbic & sardonic qualities that Elaine had, so maybe that's why I adore her so much. A lot of people said she was difficult & demanding, which tells me that she cares deeply about achieving an unachievable perfection. She could be scary & confrontational, which rubbed a lot of people the wrong way. I would love to have been there to watch her dish out the treatment to everyone. Seeing her flawed & struggling like this just makes me appreciate her as a human being. Broadway stars don't just burst into brilliance at the drop of a hat- it takes a lot of hard work.
Come on, everyone's missing the point. Her voice was tired and hoarse the night of the recording. The more she tried the worse it got. It was brilliant of them to record the music and have her come back the next day. Much a do about not a whole lot.
Gosh, I this is crazy, I thought the song was only Streisand, but learned who it is for.....It is Elaine...............I just love her!!!!!!!!! RIP, Oh gosh she is great!!!!!!!
Omigod! I can relate! I felt like I was screwing up a scene for three other actors, but they were too nice to come out and tell me. The director was too nice to tell me, too.
OMG i never realized until this very moment, she was loaded for that first one ... poor dear. Either way, what a legend, an awesome, flawed beautiful woman.
She scares the shit outta me. But I can tell she's a real soul human being and probably a generous tipper of waiters and respectful after scaring the shit out of them.
Fabulous insight into the crazy process- but it's simply shear exhaustion that led to the misery-they should have just regrouped - but then this fascinating clip wouldn't exist.
LOVE Elaine Stritch - no one performs this song like her! Jane Russell replaced Elaine in Company in 1971 and did a a pretty damn good job -- its on here as Jane Russell in Broadway's Company.
I agree. I kinda like the roughed-edged beauty of her original. So this is my idea: A feature dramatic film about what they went through to get the cast album perfect. Call it "Recording "Company."" I see Meryl Streep, all boozy and blousy, as Ms. Stritch and Philip Seymour Hoffman as the genius Sondheim. What'd ya think ...?
She was drinking when she died, but that was her decision. She used to come into AA and could rock the house with her truth. A real babe and fabulous performer, 200% Elaine. RIP!
+ANDREW VAN I'm not sure your meaning. People almost never die from overdose of alcohol, compared to a large amount from drugs. She did negatively affect her health with booze, but also with tobacco. She lived a long fulfilling life, while drinking!
This poor woman. I always feel so bad for her when I watch her try to record this and I want to hug her. Elaine Stritch is awesome and I would marry her if she was younger.
CBS/Columbia's legendary 30th Street Studios -'The Church' had 100 ft ceiling - it was where Miles Davis' Classic 'Kind of Blue' was recorded as well. Look at all that smoking in the studio & control room = unthinkable by today's standards.
That was really interesting - thanx for that after Angela Lansbury - Elaine Stritch is my woman - love them both and both actress's do Sondheim really well
After seeing her one-woman show at age Elaine Stritch - At Liberty, I can understand that she was drunk here. Of course, at the time she was in denial and couldn't let it be known publicly or she'd lose face. That's why they can't look at her - they're disgusted that she would be unprofessional and waste time and money on an inferior performance when she's capable of so much more.
Stritch was a consummate and honest artist. Her natural love for performance is apparent in everything she ever did. These guys were rough on her, but in the long run, this number is one of the most popular punches in show music. That says something. They believed in her and she brought it front. I think if she was sober then, it wouldn't be as powerful.
I truly believe that no matter how long the day was, no matter how talented these people are, no matter how much you will love the work of Sonheim and how he understands women, no matter how Elaine overcomes her demons and adversity to reach your soul, the most important thing to gain from this particular footage is that (whether gay or not), there are only men in the room. As a male myself, I don't think that would be true today.
Its from D.A. Pennebaker's 1970 film, ORIGINAL CAST ALBUM - COMPANY, that follows the marathon recording session, and the creative process, of both Sondheim, and Stritch.
and thus, you see Elaine as a victim more than a worker, an actor, a performer... she's a damsel and Sondheim is a bastard for treating her like an equal or expecting more from her than to be just a dame.
I've produced/directed several hundred audio sessions (spoken not sung) for commercials & documentaries. So many times I've wished that studios had 2-way (switchable) mirrors between the artiste area & the control room with (usually) far too many surplus individuals gawking/lounging. There were times (particularly for dialogue sessions) where I'd go and sit on a high stool with the artistes in their 'tank' so that they'd perform for *me* and not for the distracting fish in the aquarium next door. It paid off well.
Sure, the immense power of Genius can, and does, misfire. But you know damned well that it'll correct, and fire straight and true again- because that's what it does: it never, ever really fails you, much less anyone else. By whatever miracle, or whatever, you've just been pulling it out of your ass time after time, right on cue, all your Life. Because you and your Art have only each other ... and that neither of you could ever, never have a more superb lifelong lover. A toast to you, Elaine.
She a phenomenon, she didn't expect any better from another person that she wasn't willing to do. To the haters she told people to do their jobs, because they weren't.
I would have more compassion for her if EVERYONE I know who has worked with her didn't have an "Elaine Stritch is meanest person I've ever known" story.
MrMalibupj maybe they just didn't appreciate her realness. She was intense, loud, crass, a perfectionist, and an alcoholic who told it like it is. My guess was she was being herself, thinking she was funny, and people didn't get it or respond to it.
Havng seen the original production several times, I can guarantee you the best version EVER of this song was done by Stritch's (second) replacement, Vivian Blaine. Still the greatest Joann.
Anyone else is better than Stritch, honestly!! It must be an American thing to love Elaine...but as an outsider to your country, she sounds godawful! Elaine doesn't sing, she screeches! I love this song...but prefer any other version that Elaine's! Carol Burnett does an amazing version...
You know how Hitchcock bullied Tippi Hedren in The Birds "to coax the performance" when he actually had some psychosexual stuff himself dealing with the star? It makes me wonder if these "men" in the studio didn't get some sort of perverse satisfaction in terrorizing Elaine, she herself a stand-in for many of their mothers, esp. Sondheim. I think they were sadistic bullies, they knew they had a lamb in the lion's den.
"look as glamorous...as she...can." ROFL Prince nails it. Stritch is a one-off. Love her, hate her, love AND hate her... there will never be another like her.
I've seen the Doco, where is this COMMENTARY coming FROM?! Was this a bonus on the DVD? Was this from a program on TV? Is this an entirely different disc than the original? I NEED TO FIND THIS COMMENTARY FOR THE ENTIRE DOCO NOW!! Any help here is appreciated!
Poet2916 her performance would have been more melodramatic and sad, she would have milked that song. Judy was no society matron. She would have victimized the hell out of that character. The subject matter might have been too real for her. Sorry, I don't see it.
to know what kind of pressure a performer experiences in a role you need only look at this. look at "Moon Over Broadway" as well. to see how precise one needs to be in remembering the lines and staging and all of the many changes. it is a very hard yoke to carry for a perfectionist in the acting field.
To me. To me, the challenge here is that ES can sell the SHIT out of a number, but she can’t sing to save her life and the playback confirms this. Her talent works when it’s here and gone, but not when one has the opportunity to analyze it.
haha - somehow i doubt it she says in an interview about this session she left the studio in such a state of despair that to this day she can't remember where she went
that wasn't what the post you responded to was about at all My post refers to the nightmare of being filmed on top of having to deliver a definitive version of the number for an album
No, but experience tells me that it is impossible to maintain a drunk over 18 hrs-the recording session began at ten o'clock Sunday morning and ran until four-thirty in the morning, early Monday. That's the word from the man who produced the album. Do you think they allowed her to drink all through the entire recording session?
I think the problem was they DIDN'T GIVE HER A DRINK. When you drink, you need to titrate and if she was without it for 18 hrs, that could have caused her agitation.
