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[0:00] Paul Lazarus: Hi, this is Paul Lazarus. In the 1980s, I produced and hosted a radio series called Anything Goes, a celebration of the American musical theater. Now, the Broadway Podcast Network is bringing back these shows. This is the first of a three-part program examining the Roaring Twenties on Broadway. My guest is noted musical theater historian Alfred Simon. This program originally aired in November of 1980, and featured songs by Jerome Kern, Eubie Blake, and George Gershwin in a celebration of Broadway in the early 20's. Please note that the recordings in this program are products of their time, and some contain offensive material.

[0:46] ♪ Musical number: "The Songs of Long Ago" — performed by Unknown performer ♪

[2:06] Paul Lazarus: Good afternoon, and welcome to Anything Goes. I'm your host, Paul Lazarus. And you're listening to the songs of long ago from the scandals of 1920, George White's scandals of 1920, performed by an original cast member, Lester O'Keefe, and a song that was written by George Gershwin and Arthur Jackson. And we feel that that's an appropriate song to begin what is going to be a four-part examination of Broadway in the 20's. And my guest and co-producer for this entire series is noted musical theatre historian and friend, Alfred Simon, who's been on the program many times before. Welcome, Al.

[2:47] Alfred Simon: Thank you, Paul.

[2:48] Paul Lazarus: You know, Al, before we started today, we were discussing what we both felt were, I suppose, the fundamental aspects of the 20's on Broadway, and we mentioned many things. For example, the proliferation of the kind of review show, the Ziegfeld Follies, the George White Scandals.

[3:09] Alfred Simon: Yes, well, lots of costumes and scenery.

[3:13] Paul Lazarus: Right, and not a lot of book.

[3:15] Alfred Simon: Not a lot of book. A lot of beautiful girls.

[3:18] Paul Lazarus: Right. And as well, I think, a facet of the 20's that can't be overlooked is the fact that operetta, which at that point, especially the Viennese operetta, at that point had been the real stronghold on Broadway, was starting to ease out.

[3:37] Alfred Simon: Romberg sort of helped to continue it into the 20's with New Moon and so on.

[3:46] Paul Lazarus: Of course, and as you were saying, it was, I guess, the beginnings of the book musical, or what has come to be called the book musical.

[3:55] Alfred Simon: Although the 20's are primarily known, the books were just to support the songs that were being written. They were really frameworks for songs, wonderful songs and dances, which were not too inspired, but helped.

[4:10] Paul Lazarus: It was also a time where many of the composers of the 30's, I suppose, were really spreading their arms and trying out their material. The George Gershwins, I suppose, in the latter part of the 20's, Cole Porter.

[4:25] Alfred Simon: The Silverbell and Henderson.

[4:27] Paul Lazarus: And certainly, Rogerson Hart.

[4:29] Alfred Simon: Yes, of course.

[4:30] Paul Lazarus: And this very first part of this, what is going to be a four-part series looking at the 20's on Broadway, is primarily focused on the very early years, 1920, 21, 22. And certainly, one of the major contributors at that time and an already well-established composer was Jerome Kern.

[4:54] Alfred Simon: And one of the very first shows that we're going to hear some selections from is Jerome Kern's show, The Night Boat.

[5:01] Paul Lazarus: That was a good, solid, not very inspired, but a good, solid show.

[5:07] Alfred Simon: With a fine score by Kern, which is not heard too much. Two of them were used in the revival of Very Good Eddie, which was done a few years ago.

[5:18] Paul Lazarus: Right, and that was Left All Alone Again Blues, right?

[5:23] Alfred Simon: And Good Night Boat, which was the opening song. And this is a Victor recording made at the time when the show was on Broadway, in 1920.

[5:53] ♪ Musical number: "Good Night Boat" — performed by Unknown performer ♪

[9:38] Paul Lazarus: From the Night Boat, a show by Jerome Kern and Anne Caldwell, you heard Goodnight Boat, I Love the Lassies, Whose Baby Are You, the hit that emerged from the show, and Left All Alone Again Blues, and that was a Victor recording on 78. Al, two writers that made big waves in the 20s were, of course, Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, and I guess their first professional stab or their first attempt on Broadway was a show called Poor Little Ritz Girl in 1920, and it wasn't that much of a success, really.

[10:17] Alfred Simon: It ran 119 performances, but it wasn't really until five years later with their first Garrick Gaieties that they established themselves.

[10:24] Paul Lazarus: That's right. And though we don't have any songs from Poor Little Ritz Girl, we do have a kind of interesting number, and it's a little bit complicated how this applies to Poor Little Ritz Girl, but before they wrote for Broadway, Rodgers and Hart had written a varsity show for Columbia called Fly With Me.

[10:45] Alfred Simon: A 1920 varsity show.

[10:47] Paul Lazarus: Right.

[10:48] Alfred Simon: They wrote two. There was one in 1921 also.

[10:51] Paul Lazarus: Uh-huh, and also I think in the 1921, Oscar Hammerstein was involved, so that was almost anticipating 20 years later when Rodgers would work with Hammerstein after he had finished working with Lorenz Hart, and the song we are going to play is titled Peekin' Peekin', and that's from the Fly With Me show in 1920, the varsity show, and later ended up in Poor Little Ritz Girl with a new lyric by Lorenz Hart, and the title of that song was...

[11:23] Alfred Simon: Love's Intense Intense.

[11:26] Paul Lazarus: Using the typical wordplay of the time, Love's Intense Intense.

[11:30] Alfred Simon: It's like a Larry Hart trick.

[11:34] Paul Lazarus: Yeah. One thing I neglected to mention, which I think is rather interesting, is that Hart and Rodgers were so unestablished at the time of Poor Little Ritz Girl that producer Lou Fields didn't trust them to write the whole score. They were supposed to write the whole score, and then Lou Fields got cold feet about using two unknowns, so he hired Sigmund Romberg, who had nothing very distinguished in that score.

[12:01] Alfred Simon: He didn't help.

[12:02] Paul Lazarus: By the way, I saw that original varsity show in 1921. 12-year-old, and I don't remember much about it, but I remember loving that song Peekin' Peekin'.

[12:13] Alfred Simon: And the version that we're going to be featuring is a recording made of the revival earlier this year at Columbia of the 1920 varsity show Fly With Me, and keep in mind that the song Peekin' Peekin' ended up as the song Love's Intense Intense in Poor Little Ritz Girl of 1920.

[12:35] ♪ Musical number: "Peekin' Peekin'" — performed by Unknown performer ♪

[14:59] Paul Lazarus: You are listening to Anything Goes with a look at Broadway in the 1920's.

[15:22] Paul Lazarus: The next number is a song called Wedding for the Sun to Come Out from the Sweetheart Shop in 1920. Nothing very distinguished about the song itself, except that it was an early Gershwin song with music by George Gershwin and a man named Arthur Francis, which was his brother Ira, who didn't want to trade on George's name. Incidentally, I think you'll hear some influence of the music of Kern in this early song.

[16:18] ♪ Musical number: "Wedding for the Sun to Come Out" — performed by Lambert Murphy ♪

[18:38] Paul Lazarus: Lambert Murphy sang Waiting for the Sun to Come Out from the Sweetheart Shop, a 1920 show written by George and Ira Gershwin as their first song to be published together. Two months later, a show opened at the Knickerbocker Theatre with a one-word title, the title Mary, and it was produced by George M. Cohan, and until George M. Cohan had come into the picture, the show had been called The House that Jack Built, but as you may or may not know, Cohan was very fond of the name Mary, and one of the songs he interpolated into the score was the song Mary's a Grand Old Name. The show had music by Louis A. Hirsch and lyrics by Otto Harbach. It's typical of a 20s show. It's got a pleasant, obvious, tuneful score, the most popular of the songs being The Love Nest, and I guess if you had to define it, it's just a very, very solid example of what a typical 20s show was like, and though we look back on it as being immensely popular, it wasn't as popular at the time as one supposed.

There are many shows that had longer runs, but it has emerged as one of the definitive 20s musicals, and this is a Victor recording of Mary, made at the time when the show was originally on Broadway in 1920.

[20:24] ♪ Musical number: "Mary" — performed by the original cast of Mary ♪

[22:26] Paul Lazarus: From Mary, one of the quintessential shows of the 1920s, you heard several selections, including We'll Have a Wonderful Party, the title song, Mary, Waiting, Anything You Want to Do, Dear, and the hit from the show, The Love Nest. One of the last shows of 1920 was a show with a score by Jerome Kern and produced by Florence Siegfeld, a show entitled Sally. When Alfred Simon and I produced our three-part tribute to Jerome Kern last summer, we featured many of the well-known songs from the score, including Wild Rose, Whippoorwill, and looked for The Silver Lining. And today we thought we'd play the title song, Sally, also known as Dear Little Girl, performed by Gregory Stroud and in the original London cast version.

[25:12] ♪ Musical number: "Dear Little Girl" — performed by Gregory Stroud ♪

[28:51] Paul Lazarus: You're listening to Anything Goes with Paul Lazarus and guest Alfred Simon with the first part of what is going to be a four-part series examining Broadway in the 1920s. You've been listening to the 20s Part 1, the first of a three-part series. Anything Goes Backstage with Broadway's Best is produced and hosted by Paul Lazarus. For more information, visit anythinggoespl.com. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to rate and follow us. Thanks for listening.