Bring Out Your Dead

You know how I resolved a while ago to revisit some of my cabaret/nightclub favorites - those wonderful, witty, wistful tunes that mean so much when sung by Marcovicci, Akers, Mayes, et al?

Yeah, well, this is definitely not one of those. What it is is "(You Bring Out) The Lover in Me," the big Ladies' Room Raveup number from truly one of the least fondly remembered films of the '80s, Voyage of the Rock Aliens. It stars, of course, Pia Zadora, a singer I find fascinating because her voice sounds off-pitch even when, technically, its not. Remarkable. And she's just as talented a dancer, so she's got that going for her, too.

Joining her is someone I think is rather underrated, Alison La Placa (who may here actually have the worst hairdo of the decade, beating out even Stevie Nicks). She later found a kind of fame as Rachel's nympho boss on Friends, but never seems to really have landed in any substantial way. Pity. She's easily the best thing in this number, but that's mostly because she's in so little of it.

Those who were there will remember that VotRA was one of those pictures that was going to be coming out any day now for something like six years; when it finally did, in 1987, it looked even then practically Mesozoic, which didn't help its chances of resurrecting la Zadora's career even as it managed to diminish Ruth Gordon's, despite the fact that she'd been dead for two years.

The telling thing about this song? It's quality is such that apparently it wasn't included in the film's soundtrack album. Imagine how it must feel to have written a song that isn't good enough for the Voyage of the Rock Aliens album - and immediately feel infinitely better about any creative activity you've undertaken lately!

The Call of the Open Road

Well, darlings, just like our dear Miss Ruth Gordon here, we're going to be taking a little hiatus, as Mr. Muscato and I running off on a mid-March mini-break, heading up the Gulf a tad to see what is and isn't true about this Year of Living Dangerously in former boomtown Dubai: are there really abandoned cars gathering dust at the airport? Is it true that you can drive uninterrupted across town at mid-day in 30 minutes? Is is possible that prices might actually come down a tad on the occasional shirt or jacket at Harvey Nicks?

We shall see, and tell, all. But in the process, things may be a little quiet. A thousand pardons, and watch this space.

The Actress and the Existential Crisis

Miss Ruth Gordon on the streets of a vanished New York City. I believe her little friend looks so apprehensive because he's just discovered that she's wearing his predecessor.

Let's face it: after Rosemary's Baby, it's hard not to impute sinister motives to Miss Gordon, harmless soul though she may have been. Cool shoes; have to give her that.

Ladies on Stage

Once upon a time, you went to a Broadway play to see Broadway stars: not to see scenery, a Disney story, or a Name vaguely associated with a half-forgotten TV series or last year's "reality" show.

More than that, being a Broadway star was, in some existential way, being a Real Star (the last gasp of this fleeting situation is seen, of course, in All About Eve), one that could land you, say, on the cover of Time.

And in such good company.

The first of these three formidable profiles was at the time the greatest star and is today perhaps the least remembered. In her devotion to the stage, Katharine Cornell made only one film, as Herself, as if being Katharine Cornell were in itself such an all-consuming experience that it could be subsumed into character only on stage.

She was the quintessential Great Lady of the Boards, the ultimate expert at Entrances, Exits, Gracious Acknowledgement of the Audience, the Doubting Pause, and other necessities of her trade.

The lady in the middle is Dame Judith Anderson, so indelible as Mrs. Danvers in Rebecca that her decades of triumph on stage are rather overshadowed. A little girl from Adelaide who made her way halfway 'round the world to New York and stardom in classical and modern drama, Anderson dabbled with more variety in films serious (Cat on a Hot Tin Roof) and less so (Lady Scarface).

As this superb portrait demonstrates, she had full command of all the trappings of Great Lady status, from beauty-marking to fur-wrangling. Where has such deft handling of Glamour gone?

Last but hardly least, and looking uncharacteristically swank in this portrait by Beaton, we have Miss Ruth Gordon, avocationally Mrs. Garson Kanin, who parlayed her years on stage into a late in life run as Beloved Oldster in films like Harold and Maude. Many of her coevals felt she rather overdid her Gleeful Granny shtick, but she clearly had a marvelous time, so what's the harm? She'd worked hard for it.

Oh, and why are these three amazons gracing the cover of Mr. Luce's little magazine? They were not only on Broadway - the were on Broadway together, in Chekhov.

Which makes the latest Mamet revivals seem a little bland, no?