Alan Jay Lerner: A Lyricist's Letters by Dominic McHugh

Author:Dominic McHugh [McHugh, Dominic]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 9780199949274
Amazon: 0199949271
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2014-09-02T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 5

“Rise and Look Around You”

FROM CLEAR DAY TO COCO, 1965–1970

Lerner had toyed with the idea of creating a Broadway musical about extra-sensory perception as far back as the late 1940s, and the mystical flavor of Brigadoon was an indication of what was to come with On a Clear Day You Can See Forever. A draft for an article in the small collection of Lerner papers at the Library of Congress, excerpted below, explains the writer’s rationale for the musical:

What unknown forces are responsible for such phenomena as that of the inanimate flower pot that one day, for no natural or accountable reason, suddenly tumbled from its perch on a table and broke into piece on the floor? It happened in West Virginia in the home of an elderly widow. It happened at the exact instant her little grandson, who had given her the flower pot, was tragically struck down by a car on the streets of Chicago. And during each war, how many times have you read or heard of cases where a dog suddenly and seemingly without cause begins howling uncontrollably, and then you learn later that his master was killed at that precise moment on some distant battlefield?

The article goes on to list other examples of “clairvoyance, precognition, mental telepathy, psychokinesis” as well as reincarnation. Whatever the problems and critical reception of On a Clear Day, it is obvious that these subjects were of great personal interest to Lerner, and that he invested a lot of effort in his first post-Loewe musical.1

The Boston opening was set for August 1965, thereby putting the much-delayed Coco on the back burner once again.2 Robert Lewis (of Lerner’s Brigadoon) was now to replace Bob Fosse3 and Gower Champion, who had both previously been named as Clear Day’s director, and Herbert Ross was hired as choreographer. The show attracted widespread press attention for its record high ticket prices of up to $11.90.4 Rehearsals began on July 26 at the Mark Hellinger Theatre, where Fair Lady had found its home for most of its Broadway run, with the press in attendance. “Before the players began to read their parts, Mr. Lane sang the title song, which will be the overture, to his own accompaniment,” recounted Sam Zolotow in the New York Times. “The cast applauded. During a five-minute break, Mr. Jourdan observed that ‘On a Clear Day’ was more a play with music than the customary musical. When the script called for songs, Mr. Lane played them. Mr. Lerner sang ‘Hurry! It’s Lovely Up Here!,’ ‘Normal,’ ‘Domestic Champagne Waltz,’ ‘Marriage Contract,’ and ‘Tosy and Cosh.’”

Some of these numbers did not make it into the version of the show that ultimately opened on Broadway three months later, an early hint of how difficult the rehearsal and tryout period would turn out to be. As with Camelot, coverage of the trouble was widespread: “During the Boston tryout, Mr. Lerner made drastic book revisions. Boris Tumarin, Lois Holmes, Lucille Smith, Margaret Hall, Neil Fitzgerald and Joan White left the cast and Gerry Matthews was added.

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