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Gregg Edelman
Brian D'Arcy James (Photo by Joan Marcus)
Lyricist Sheldon Harnick (Photo by Margaret Harnick)
Kate Baldwin |
Outtakes Luck Be a Lady Tonight Gregg Edelman (S80), actor (current musical, Les Misérables): "I was doing a show at Goodspeed Opera House in Connecticut called Georgia Avenue. And I was playing opposite an actress named Beth Fowler, who got a Tony nomination in 1990. It was supposed to be an older woman/younger man kind of a thing. "At the end of the first act, she steps back — my character has just finished remodeling her restaurant — and she's supposed to say, 'Oh, it's gorgeous. It's wonderful!' And then we start a musical number. "Anyway, one night, she totally got off her mark, and she's backing up, and it looks like she's about to totally walk off the stage. And I kept thinking, 'Oh, she's not going to walk off the stage. She's not going to walk off the stage. Oh, no, she stepped right off the stage!' Luckily, the pianist caught her. "But for months after that, I got remarks from people saying, 'What? You just let your leading lady walk right off the stage? You were looking right at her!' "But I kept thinking, 'Well, she's going to stop. She's going to stop. Oh, no, she's not!' We had to stop the show. I felt like a total idiot. Some leading man I am." |
| Hey, Not the End of the World
Brian D'Arcy James (S90), actor (current musical, The Wild Party): "I was recently asked to sing a couple of songs at a benefit. One of them was 'Tonight at Eight,' from She Loves Me, with lyrics by Sheldon Harnick [Mu49]. I had heard the tune before but didn't know the words really well. It's a patter song, which means every word counts. I started the song, and I just completely derailed. It was the first time that's ever happened to me. "So we went back to the beginning, and I completely derailed again. I was reaching into the abyss of my memory, and I couldn't remember anything. At one point, I just started dancing and making up lyrics, like 'I'm sorry, Mr. Harnick. Please don't hit me. ...' "The chorus to the song is 'Tonight at Eight' and, by the end, I had everybody just laughing and screaming the chorus. I looked like an idiot up there. It was one of those moments when the laughter was painful and funny at the same time. "The end of the story was that a few days later, I got a letter from Sheldon Harnick that basically said, 'My heart went out to you.' Yes, he had been in the audience. It made me feel like it wasn't the end of the world." |
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| Beware of Greeks Bearing Candelabras
Kate Baldwin (S97), actor (current musical, Finian's Rainbow): "Senior year, I almost set myself on fire. It was during the last production I did, which was the Greek tragedy Hecuba. There was a lot of stylized movement and stylized props. One prop was a candelabra with lit candles. It was being moved around throughout the show. I moved it. Anyway, in a Greek tragedy, you know, there's suffering and suffering. And then there's revenge. "So, as Hecuba, I said, 'I'm going to exact my revenge.' I set the candelabra down on the stage at my feet and proceeded to take off my cape, which was this magnificent thing that was gold on the outside, but blood red — symbolizing that everything's going to be bloody from now on — on the inside. "So, I'm looking out front with a fixed gaze, as though I was reliving the fall of Troy. And I'm taking off the cloak in slow motion, slow motion, raising my arms up, and all of a sudden, I hear a gasp from the audience. I thought, 'Uh-oh, there's something wrong here.' And there was. "I had knocked the candelabra over, and my dress was almost on fire. But I just knelt down and set it upright again and put it a little bit farther away from me. The audience didn't laugh, not that I heard. But if it had not been for that woman's gasp, I just might have been immolated." |
