Born On This Day- July 10th.... Jerry Herman

As a little 10 year old musical comedy queen, I would practice kick stepping my way down the staircase at our house as my imaginary chorus sang my character’s name (I think sometimes they were actually just singing-Steve!). My parents had just been presented me with the Original Broadway Cast album Hello, Dolly! & I was having a difficult time recovering from the excitement of such infectious tunes. These hummable songs personified the “show tune”. They were tuneful, optimistic, & deceptively simple songs. I had been raised on Lerner & Lowe & Rodgers & Hammerstein, but this new guy was really getting to me. I didn’t know it in 1964, but Jerry Herman would be providing me with a musical number for descending a staircase for the next 4 decades.

Jerry Herman, who writes the music & lyrics, produced super successful & contagious tunes for the musicals: Hello, Dolly!, Mame, Dear World, Mack & Mable, & La Cage Aux Folles.

In these musicals our misunderstood leading lady would introduce a song early in the first act that stated her life philosophy: I Put My Hand In There, It’s Today, Each Tomorrow Morning, Look What Happened To Mabel, & A Little More Mascara.

The first act would end in her big soliloquy, where our heroine lifts her own spirits: Before The Parade Passes By, If He Walked Into My Life Today, I Don’t Want To Know, or I Am What I Am.

That brings us to the big “staircase” number, when the chorus celebrates how their lives have been changed by the mere presence of this woman with the title songs from Dolly & Mame, When Mabel Comes In The Room, One Person, & The Best Of Times. The song- One from A Chorus Line is a parody & homage to these songs.

Despite the formula, these shows & their wonderful & skillful songs make for superior theatre experiences. Some were super hits & others became cult favorites. Herman is the only songwriter to have 3 musical on Broadway at the same time. Many of his compositions have become pop standards. Louis Armstrong’s version of Hello, Dolly! outsold The Beatles in 1964. The movie versions of Hello, Dolly!& Mame are considered, by most fan of musical theatre, to be duds, but as a very young man I was thrilled by the film of Hello, Dolly!& saw it about 20 times. I still love Barbra (decades too young for the role) as Mae West as Dolly Levi. I was very touched that Wall-E discovered emotions from a dilapidated 20th century tape containing a loop of Put On Your Sunday Clothes.

Herman has stated that he will no longer be writing for the theatre:

“I think my style of musical has come and was very, very good to me, but is gone now. I think it's better to know when to leave than to end up with two or three shows that didn't make it. I left at my height."

Herman has long been openly gay, & was diagnosed as HIV-positive in 1985.  He is one of the fortunate ones who survived to see experimental drug therapies take hold & is still, as he turns 81 years old today, as one of his lyrics proclaims, “alive & well & thriving.”

Herman’s 1983 musical- La Cage Aux Folles was a critical & commercial smash, & also a political & social turning point.  Never before had a pair men held hands in a musical, or sung a love ballad to one another.

George Hearn’s star turn as Za Za, belting out what is probably the most dramatic Act One closer of all time- I Am What I Am, is a forceful call for dignity & acceptance, a surpassingly stalwart statement in the first days of HIV from a composer/lyricist who declared all along that he wanted only to entertain people.

I had the good fortunate to play Horace Vandergelder in Hello, Dolly! at Seattle Civic Light Opera in the late 1980s & during performances, of course I would close my eyes as the male chorus was singing the title number, & what I was hearing was “Hello, Horace!” or better yet- “Hello, Stephen!”& I was step kick-stepping down that large staircase.

Jerry's Girls

Doing their trade in stock.

Constance Craving

More Auntie Mame madness from SSUWAT's good friend, Stephen Marshal Jones!

Do Not Fold, Spindle, Mutilate or Mame

Very special THANKS

A Ghost Story

This is not a pre-surgery Joan Rivers...

Joan Rivers and Ed Sullivan, ca. 1968

...nor is it Florencia Bisenta de Casillas Martinez Cardona (a.k.a. Vikki Carr).

Vikki Carr, ca. 1965

No, this lovely lady is our latest Mystery Guest: the deliciously throaty thrush, Miss India Adams!


Miss Adams is, of course, best known as the "ghost voice" employed by MGM for Cyd Charisse and Joan Crawford in the 1953 pictures, The Band Wagon and Torch Song, respectively. In the former, Adams dubbed Charisse for "New Sun in a New Sky," as well as the ensemble finale, "That's Entertainment."

Oscar Levant, Cyd Charisse, Jack Buchanan, Fred Astaire and Nanette Fabray perform "That's Entertainment!" in The Band Wagon (1953, MGM)

Charisse actually filmed another solo spot, dubbed by Adams, for The Band Wagon, entitled "Two Faced Woman." It was ultimately cut from the film, but when Adams was assigned to supply the singing voice for Joan Crawford in Torch Song, the number was resurrected -- only to be staged, inexplicably, in a "tropical" setting, with Crawford and her chorines made up like refugees from a minstrel show.

Joan Crawford is a "Two Faced Woman" in Torch Song (1953, MGM)

The other numbers recorded by Adams-as-Crawford included the already well-known pop hit, "Tenderly"; "You Won't Forget Me," which was apparently considered memorable enough for popular jazz starlet Helen Merrill to include on her With Strings album two years later; and "Follow Me," which Crawford herself recorded (in hopes of providing the vocals for her entire characterization).

Re-edited video of "Follow Me" from Torch Song with Joan Crawford's own vocal

Interestingly, Adams would later recall her experience with Crawford quite fondly, while remembering Cyd Charisse as cold and unfriendly. Unfortunately, Adams' friendship with Crawford -- which lasted beyond filming -- came to an abrupt end when MGM released a recording of the numbers from Torch Song, giving Adams full credit for the vocals -- something which was rarely done at that time, with the studios (and the stars themselves) preferring to let the fans believe that the actors were doing the actual chirping. MGM had expressly told Adams not to let Crawford know about the record until its release, and the perceived deception hurt Crawford deeply. Still, to this day, Adams has nothing but praise for Queen Joan.


Following her brief run as a celebrity ghost at MGM, Adams relocated to New York, where she performed in theatre (including Can-Can and The Most Happy Fella); toured nightclubs, such as the famed Latin Quarter; and recorded a highly sought after album for RCA, Comfort Me with Apples (1959), which is a masterpiece of the "sex kitten chanteuse" genre popularized by the likes of Eartha Kitt, Abbe Lane and Lola Albright.


The next stop for India Adams was England, which she made her home base from 1965 until 1981. In 1969, she was the stand by for Ginger Rogers when the latter starred as Mame at the Drury Lane Theater; in true old trouper fashion, Rogers never missed a performance, even when ill, so Adams never had the chance to make her West End bow.

Ginger Rogers and India Adams


Newsreel footage of Ginger Rogers as Mame

She may have made a career out of singing, subbing or standing by for superstars, without ever becoming one herself; but among the discerning few, India Adams is a fondly remembered talent -- and she's still going strong, having performed most recently in Hollywood this past January. We think she's just sensational!


We're sorry we've been so ghost-like ourselves of late, but we hope to be back to our normal pace very soon. As always, thanks for playing, darlings!



Official website HERE.

And We Wonder...

...how did Gyp and Annie elude the casting agents?

And So Are They

To paraphrase another Jerry Herman show, look at the old gals now, fellas!

But, Darling...

...they're your Auntie Mame!

Miss Arden appears courtesy of Stephen Marshal Jones

We'd Like to Propose a Toast

"She was drunk. She showed up at ten o'clock in the morning for the first read-through, and she was bombed. She was drinking straight vodka from this silver flask, and she was drinking it in front of the kids. She was saying all the words, but it was like she was a robot. About lunchtime, Joan passed out cold, and that did it. As soon as she woke up, I fired her." - Lucille Ball on Joan Crawford

Dance Your Shoes Off

It's Miller as Mame time!

Collect Them All

Who Knew?

Buy it HERE