Gwen Verdon: A Life on Stage and Screen (7 page)

It is said that Verdon’s part was cut down to keep the peace since it was felt that she outshone the show’s star, Lilo. Verdon knew just enough French to understand Lilo’s husband who was also her manager when he complained that she was in too many scenes. Her dialogue was cut, some say, until she had none left. Other sources claimed that Verdon was left with only eight lines. Verdon remembers that when the show opened, her only lines were “Oh, Boris!” which she said eight times, and “What’s on the menu?” Her numbers were reduced from seven to four and she only had two featured dances. Verdon said that they took her out of one dance before it ended and had Lilo come on. In the “Garden of Eden” number, she finished upstage and the star came out dressed like a peacock. Lilo also had Verdon offstage at the end of three of her dances so that there would be no applause, and Verdon’s stage name of “Gwenyth” was truncated to “Gwen” to take up less room on the theater marquee. Even her one song, the duet with Boris, initially had her vocal supplemented by seven others before she proved to Cole Porter that she could sing.

Shelah Hackett, who was one of the chorus dancers (and would later marry Kidd), reported that Verdon had threatened to leave the show in tryouts because of the reduction of her part. In his book on Cole Porter, William McBrien reports that at one point in the staging she was asked to duck behind a piece of furniture in order to make room for Lilo, something that Verdon refused to do. She gave her notice and arranged to leave after a four-week run. The producers supposedly accepted it and said she could leave once they had found a replacement. When the show came to New York, Verdon was looking forward only to getting out, but the reception she received changed the producer’s minds.

Tryouts were held in Philadelphia for six weeks before the show opened on May 7 at Broadway’s Shubert Theatre. In the
New York Times
Brooks Atkinson wrote that the spectacular dancing was the best thing in the show. He said that Verdon led the dancing “with impudence, recklessness and humor,” and that her spinning and grinning portrait of Eve in the “Garden of Eden Ballet” was brilliant. In a later article on the show, Atkinson wrote that Verdon’s “dancing and comic acting capture the spirit of festivity admirably. What she has to do is pertinent and uproarious.”

Verdon reportedly made no great impression with the “Quadrille” and “Garden of Eden Ballet” in the tryouts, and presumably not on opening night. But after “The Apaches,” the theater rocked with applause. The audience demanded her reappearance, and would not allow the show to continue otherwise. Verdon apparently was in her dressing room, having taken off her costume, and now only wore a robe. This is supposedly how she walked back onto the stage, led by Feuer. One source reverses the appearance of the Apache number and the ballet in the show’s running order, writing that “The Apaches” is in the show’s first act and not the second as otherwise described. The error implies that the audience would have been rewarded with Verdon’s return performing in the ballet, as opposed to just having her appear on stage to receive the applause before the show continued with its three final numbers.

Portrait of Verdon in the stage show
Can-Can
(1953).

According to another source, the applause came for Verdon after “The Garden of Eden Ballet,” which is somewhat more believable. The ovation for Verdon is said to have lasted for seven minutes, and had the audience chanting “We want Verdon! We want Verdon!” Shelah Hackett says that Verdon was in her bra and panties after she had finished “The Apache” and that it was Kidd who told Verdon that she had to go back onstage for another bow. Verdon apparently told him that she couldn’t go back because “I’m naked.” He threw a towel over her and led her out onto the stage. Verdon said that she was in her dressing room wearing opera-lengths with a zipper that didn’t work. When she was called to come on stage to answer the applause, she said she held her costume in front of her. She also apologized to the two actors whose act she had interrupted and claimed to have spoiled.

Verdon thought that the audience had determined that she was the underdog and reacted like that because they had initially been denied the opportunity to applaud. Verdon later told dancer Harry Evan that she hated getting standing ovations. The reason was that once, when her son Jimmy came to visit her when he was a boy, she sent him to a matinee of an Ethel Merman show. When he came back, Verdon asked him what he thought. He told her that he thought it was very strange that this old woman came out onto the stage and people stood up and she hadn’t even done anything.
Time
magazine also reported that Verdon’s experience only made her more humble, not allowing personal success to give her a swelled head. Her memory of being a girl in corrective boots made her self-conscious about attention and uncomfortable in public. It was said that she would rather walk through fish markets than sign autographs at Sardi’s, and was happy to remain backstage as part of the show.

The applause supposedly irked star Lilo since she had the first act’s final number, “Allez-Vous En.” In William McBrien’s book on Cole Porter, he wrote about Lilo’s jealousy of Verdon receiving the applause. Making her Broadway debut, the French star had been brought over from Paris by Cy Feuer, and Porter wrote the song “I Love Paris” specifically for her to sing in the show. Assuming that the leading lady should be treated like the star, Lilo reacted to what she saw as the misplaced reception as “The battle of Verdon.” In his review, Brooks Atkinson had praised Lilo but apparently this was not enough for her. As a result she had her costume in the show’s finale changed from what she saw as an inappropriate old calico dress to a beautiful white evening gown. Verdon was diplomatic enough to comment that Lilo was an extraordinary performer “who made some mistakes on opening night.” She would also comment that she didn’t really blame Lilo for her behavior when she was afraid that Verdon was stealing the show, since she
was
its star; “In the theater, that’s like another woman in a marriage triangle.” She would also comment that part of the problem was that Lilo came out of the French music hall where the star never had anybody around who was better than second-rate.

The new star was reportedly mobbed by fans when she left the theater and had to ride with a policeman on the back of his horse to get to the Hotel Astor opening night party.
Can-Can
was a huge hit, running for over two years on Broadway, up until June 25, 1955, with Verdon replaced in the role by Joan Holloway and Ronnie Cunningham for some performances. An original Broadway cast recording, released by EMI Records in 1990, includes “If You Loved Me Truly” as performed by Verdon, Hans Conried and chorus.

The show was Verdon’s big break, making her a Broadway star at twenty-eight; it was a little older than usual for a dancer to do so. She partly attributed her success to the fact of her few appearances in the show but those were enough to win her the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. Another Tony was given to Michael Kidd for Best Choreography. Verdon’s success raised her salary from $175 a week to $500 and she stayed with it for over a year. However she continued to feel uncomfortable with the situation and offered to resign. The producers wanted her to stay, promising her better billing, but she refused because she felt the part didn’t warrant it. Instead, she asked for, and got, more money. Verdon said that she wasn’t planning a star career and just wanted to survive. She was uncomfortable with the idea of stardom, which saw the street where she was living blocked off to traffic after the paparazzi discovered her location. In the beginning she said that it scared her and it landed her in analysis. “I knew something was expected of me, but if you’ve come from the wrong side of the tracks, you think, ‘I ain’t got it.’”

Verdon’s interview with Murray Schumach of the
New York Times
appeared on May 31, 1953. He described how for the interview that took place in her hotel room she wore a gray-tailored suit with a yellow rose beneath her collar. Verdon commented that the poise she gained from dancing protected her from the public stares she received, particularly from women, after
Can-Can
. They looked at her goulou hair that she said had the cruller look that belonged on a Toulouse-Lautrec poster. Verdon felt they thought her hair must be phony because it was unbelievably red. Then when they saw her freckles, they weren’t so sure. The article reported that Verdon had received offers for movies, television, and other stage musicals, none of which she had accepted. She was apparently concerned about what she thought was a neglect of her dancing. She recalled some advice she received when she was younger: Never be so active that you look unattractive. Schumach wrote that her legwork in the show seemed to call for a new definition of active and he ended with the comment, “She seems to have done for dancing what the jet did for flying.”

The
Life
magazine edition of June 1, 1953, featured an article on the show entitled “The Old Oo-La-La in
Can-Can
,” with pictures in its theater section. It called the show a dancing triumph and claimed that Verdon was the best thing in it. Accompanying photographs showed Verdon dancing as Eve, doing the cancan for a chorus of laundresses, and in the background of the finale with the chorus dancers.

While she was performing in
Can-Can
, Verdon went back to Cole. She briefly assisted him in New York on the dances and musical numbers for the stage musical
Kismet
before its Broadway opening on December 3, 1953, at the Ziegfeld Theatre. For its story with a Middle Eastern setting, Verdon is said to have reminded Cole of the things he had done with East Indian dance. On October 8, 1953, she appeared in a color-TV CBS special shot at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, “Eye Opener.” It involved a demonstration of a new color picture tube, developed by CBS, that could be received on sets as black-and-white pictures.

Verdon made the first of seven appearances on the comedy-musical variety show
Toast of the Town
(aka
The Ed Sullivan Show
) on October 11, 1953. She was presumably on to promote
Can-Can
, but not known if she performed. In his book
Right Here on Our Stage Tonight!: Ed Sullivan’s America
, Gerald Nachman writes that Verdon was banned from again appearing on the show after this episode. Apparently Sullivan had been displeased by her blasting New York columnists like himself when she spoke on a Walter Winchell newscast at the Friars Club that year. As a result Verdon would not be seen on Sullivan’s show again until 1966 to promote the stage version of
Sweet Charity
.

She was interviewed by Earl Wilson in an article entitled “The Girl Who Showed ’Em How’” published in the February 1954
Silver Screen
magazine. The interview took place at New York’s Sardi’s and Verdon talked about
Can-Can
and Hollywood. She described the famous title dance of the show as “the way you can see how much underwear you can show in the hardest way.” Of her experience in Hollywood, Verdon was cynical, saying that all you could make there was money. She preferred the Broadway life. “I know the race out there that they call their life, and it’s a life I couldn’t live and a race I couldn’t run.” Verdon reported that she had made eight films and even now, when she got a call from Hollywood, she didn’t get too excited. She said, for one thing, it was probably Mother calling. And if it was somebody trying to get Verdon to come to Hollywood, she still wasn’t excited. That’s because she was born there. In three photographs, Verdon was in her
Can-Can
costume. She had her skirt alternately over her head with one leg raised, being held up with her legs spread, and being held up as her left leg rests on her right upper thigh. The fourth photo showed Verdon in a black sleeveless top and tied pants, barefoot. In a dance pose, her hands were held at an angle from her arms and her left leg was on toes while her right was flat.

Verdon appeared as Shirley Kochendorf in a drama on NBC’s
Goodyear Television Playhouse
entitled “Native Dancer.” It was filmed in New York and broadcast on March 28, 1954. Directed by Vincent J. Donehue, it was the story of an undiscovered, talented ballerina whose agent cooks up a hoax which backfires. But eventually the dancer’s luck changes. Verdon next starred as Cathy, a dancing glow-worm, in the CBS made-for-TV production of the musical
Once Upon an
Eastertime
(1954), broadcast on April 18, 1954. It had songs by Victor Young and choreography by Eugene Loring. Directed by Byron Paul, the film centered on a small town boy named Pell who eats a forbidden Easter egg and is transported into a magical kingdom where he learns the difference between good and evil. A
Variety
review praised the “dancing, singing and clowning” but said that the story fell apart and described the program overall as “a miserable failure.”