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[0:00] Tim Rice: Hello, this is Tim Rice.

[0:01] Tim Rice: Welcome to episode 56 of my podcast.

[0:05] Tim Rice: Get onto my cloud.

[0:18] Tim Rice: On the 27th of January 2022, Andrew Lloyd Webber, or some bright spark in his office, tweeted that that very day was the 40th anniversary of the first ever performance of Joseph on Broadway.

[0:32] Tim Rice: Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, that is.

[0:35] Tim Rice: If Andrew hadn't posted that tweet, I'm afraid that the momentous significance of the date would have passed me by.

[0:41] Tim Rice: Partly because when one's been around in any business for as long as I have, significant anniversaries seem to crop up quite often.

[0:49] Tim Rice: Furthermore, a 40th celebration doesn't seem to have quite the cachet of a 50-year one.

[0:55] Tim Rice: And Andrew and I seem to have been assailed with quite a few of those lately, reminding us how youthfully active we were half a century ago, primarily with Jesus Christ Superstar and Joseph, including Joseph Wise, in 2018, the 50th anniversary of Joseph's first ever performance anywhere at Collic Court School, Hammersmith, London.

[1:16] Tim Rice: In 2019, the 50th anniversary of the release of the first Joseph album, and coming up later in 2022, the 50th of the first ever professional production, a masterful version directed by Frank Dunlop at the Edinburgh Festival, which, at a stroke, turned Joseph into a show for all age groups, without in any way affecting its appeal and super suitability for performance in schools.

[1:40] Tim Rice: So my first ungracious reaction to the tweet was an arrogant, metaphorical shrug of the shoulders.

[1:47] Tim Rice: I'll wait for the 50th Broadway party in 2032.

[1:51] Tim Rice: Except that on reflection, even though it wasn't a massive commercial hit, there were several aspects of the Broadway version that makes it well worth recalling.

[2:01] Tim Rice: Or at least makes me feel it's worth recalling now, rather than when time has marched on for another decade, and goodness knows where Andrew and I will be then.

[2:10] Tim Rice: For starters on Broadway, there was the wonderful Laurie Beachman, who was the first actress to play the leading role of the narrator.

[2:18] Tim Rice: Hitherto in all major productions, a part for a bloke, a chap, a guy, a fella.

[2:23] Tim Rice: I have to say actress here, as she was obviously not the first actor to do so.

[2:28] Tim Rice: And she was nominated for a Tony for Best Performance by a Featured Actress in a Musical for her work in Joseph.

[2:35] Tim Rice: Lori was terrific as the first feminine narrator, as you will now hear.

[2:50] ♪ Musical number: "Some Folks" — performed by Laurie Beachman ♪

[3:43] Tim Rice: You are who are what you feel.

[3:50] Tim Rice: But all of that I say can be told another way in the story of a boy whose dreams came true, and he could be way back many centuries ago, not long after the Bible began.

[4:25] Tim Rice: Jacob lived in the land of Canaan, a fine example of a family man.

[4:32] Tim Rice: Jacob, Jacob and Sons depended on farming to earn their keep.

[4:39] Tim Rice: Jacob, Jacob and Sons spent all of their days in the fields with sheep.

[4:46] Tim Rice: Jacob was the founder of a whole new nation.

[4:50] Tim Rice: Thanks for the number of children he'd had.

[5:00] Tim Rice: Jacob, Jacob and Sons, men of the soil of the sheep bankrupt.

[5:07] Tim Rice: Jacob, Jacob and Sons, a remarkable family in anyone's book.

[5:14] Tim Rice: Ruben was the eldest of the children of Israel, Simeon and Eli, the next line.

[5:21] Tim Rice: After the end of the car with Asphara Cham.

[5:31] Tim Rice: Benjamin and death, the totals are nine.

[5:31] Tim Rice: Jacob, Jacob and Sons!

[5:38] Tim Rice: Joseph Son.

[5:49] Tim Rice: Jake Ocean!

[5:52] Tim Rice: Jake All!

[5:54] Tim Rice: Jacob and Sons!

[5:56] Tim Rice: Jake Long!

[6:00] Tim Rice: Jacob.

[6:06] Tim Rice: Wow, what a great voice.

[6:08] Tim Rice: So good was Laurie as the narrator that nearly all professional and most amateur productions of Joseph since have featured a lady in the role rather than a gent.

[6:18] Tim Rice: She made us realize a mere 15 years after we began writing it that the part of the narrator, which is important, as important in the show as that of Joseph, worked as well, if not better, for a woman as it did for a man.

[6:33] Tim Rice: It gave the show more contrast and balance.

[6:36] Tim Rice: Maybe if Lori had been less than perfect, we might not have realized this important fact for a further 15 years.

[6:43] Tim Rice: Laurie died in 1998, aged only 44.

[6:46] Tim Rice: So sad that such a memorable performer, actress, actor, is not with us today.

[6:52] Tim Rice: I know she would still be captivating Broadway and beyond.

[7:00] Tim Rice: Most recently in the UK, Lindsay Hatley, Alexandra Burke, and Sheridan Smith.

[7:06] Tim Rice: Back to Broadway, 1982.

[7:08] Tim Rice: The first important professional version of Joseph in the United States had been staged by Frank Dunlop, with David Carroll as Joseph and Cleavon Little as the narrator at the Brooklyn Academy in New York.

[7:20] Tim Rice: It played there as Holiday Fair, i.e., a Christmas time show, in both 1976 and 1977.

[7:28] Tim Rice: David Carroll was later to play Anatolian chess on Broadway.

[7:32] Tim Rice: That was in 1988 and did not take up too much of his time that year.

[7:36] Tim Rice: Cleavon Little, who had a long and successful film and TV career, is perhaps best remembered for his starring role as Bart in Mel Brooks' Blazing Saddles.

[7:48] Tim Rice: Joseph was well established in schools, colleges, and repertory companies around America by the early 80s, but despite Frank's Brooklyn shows, not so much as a fully fledged professional musical.

[8:00] Tim Rice: It was British director Tony Tanner, we have to thank for making the Broadway breakthrough, and two young lady producers, Gail Berman and Susan Rose.

[8:10] Tim Rice: Tony Tanner, born in 1932, began his long theatrical career in the UK as an actor with considerable success, including the lead taking over from author Anthony Newley in Stop the World I Want to Get Off in the West End.

[8:25] Tim Rice: He moved to America to play the lead in Half a Sixpence on Broadway and stayed.

[8:30] Tim Rice: He clocked up an impressive list of achievements as performer, writer, director, and choreographer, Joseph being one of five shows he directed and choreographed in New York.

[8:42] Tim Rice: Andrew and I first met Tony some 16 years before we teamed up with him on Broadway.

[8:47] Tim Rice: Our agent at the time, 1966, Desmond Elliott, had been attempting to stir up interest in our first ever musical work, The Likes of Us, with interest remaining stubbornly unstirred until he introduced us to Tony, then in his 30s and on his way to becoming a force in musicals.

[9:07] Tim Rice: We turned up for an afternoon meeting with Tony, organized by Desmond at the home in Barnes of the celebrated costume designer Honoria Plesh, who included the movies Brighton Rock and Pure Hellcats and Trinians among her film credits.

[9:22] Tim Rice: I can't remember very much about the gathering, but I think Desmond felt that in Tony and Honoria, he might be beginning to assemble a director-producer combo that would get the likes of us off the ground.

[9:34] Tim Rice: I do recall Honoria, who had then just directed and designed a film called The Yellow Hat, being a generous and flamboyant hostess, and Tony showing genuine enthusiasm for our totally unproven and unsuccessful abilities.

[9:49] Tim Rice: But that afternoon, in my favourite postal district of SW13, sad to say, that led nowhere.

[9:56] Tim Rice: It took a while for Desmond to abandon us and for us to abandon The Likes of Us.

[10:02] Tim Rice: We were reunited, however, with Tony Tanner in late 1981, via his off-Broadway production of Joseph at the Enter Media Theatre.

[10:11] Tim Rice: On the aforementioned 27th of January 1982, it transferred to the Royale Theatre on Broadway.

[10:18] Tim Rice: This was our third appearance on the Great White Way, following Jesus Christ Superstar, 1971, and Evita, 1979.

[10:27] Tim Rice: Tony had assembled a pretty good cast, in addition to the peerless Lori, Bill Hutton was a winning Joseph, and Tom Carter, a dynamic Pharaoh.

[10:36] Tim Rice: Another Joseph cast member, I recall enthusiastically, was David Ardeo, who made a mighty good job of the role of Potifar.

[10:43] Tim Rice: I've attempted to find out what David's been up to in the past 40 years, but without success.

[10:48] Tim Rice: Maybe he's left the theatrical business.

[10:51] Tim Rice: If so, it would seem to be the theatre world's loss, judging by his interpretation of Joseph's all too brief employer.

[11:09] Tim Rice: What if I had made a few years?

[11:13] Tim Rice: I was one of Egypt's millionaires, having made a fortune buying shares in Pyramids.

[11:24] ♪ Musical number ♪

[14:25] Tim Rice: Joseph's Broadway debut was produced by Gail Berman and Susan Rose. This was also their Broadway debut. They were both 26 years old at the time. I was 37 and Andrew 33, positively ancient. We'd been used to the business end of showbiz being run by characters, usually blokes, senior to us, so this was a kind of innovation. But Gail and Susan, although they never made much, if anything, out of their first Broadway venture, were enthusiastic, supportive, and efficient producers during the show's 747 performance run. Incidentally, 36 shows more than the original Superstar managed 11 years before. Both women, then the youngest to have produced a Broadway show, have gone on to greater things. One of Susan's most recent triumphs was her ten-time Tony-winning production of The Band's Visit, including the Tony for Best Musical in 2017.

I truly enjoyed that marvelous show, which tells the story of an Egyptian police orchestra appearing at the wrong venue in an obscure Israeli town. She's produced movies such as A Cooler Climate and the Emmy-winning Jack, and musicals such as The Last Five Years, which I saw recently during its season at the Garrick in London. Gail has had a stellar career in movies, having been the first female executive to hold top posts at both major film and television networks, at Fox and Paramount. She was president of both at different times. So, all in all, we had a pretty good team at Joseph on Broadway on and off stage. Listening to the album again for the first time in many a moon, I must say it sounds extremely energetic, with a driving rhythm section and the vocals consistently on the money.

The show paved the way for many other Joseph productions in North America. David Cassidy and Andy Gibb both appeared as Joseph on Broadway, and best of all, Donnie Osmond has been Joseph all over North America. The first time I saw him in the part was in his home state of Utah. He went down pretty well. And of course, he also starred in the 1999 filmed version, made in England, with Maria Friedman as the narrator and legends, including Joan Collins, Richard Attenborough, and Christopher Biggins, adding lustre to the cluster. There's a possible new Joseph movie in the works, which may give Andrew and I a chance to write a new scene or two, a mere 54 years after we started the whole thing by writing way, way back many centuries ago.

And I think the new film is bound to have a lady narrator. The spirit of Lori Beechman lives on. Probably not a Lady Pharaoh, though. It has been mooted. I produced the cast album for the Broadway Joseph with my friend Roger Watson, with whom I made a few insane flop pop singles in the 70s. Understandably, I haven't featured many of them in Get Onto My Cloud yet. Another standout performance back in Joseph 82 was that of Tom Carter as Pharaoh, aka Elvis. Tom did some wonderful ad libs every night, and when we were in the recording studios, he threw in a reference to Memphis, as you will shortly hear. I thought this was a gag too far until Tom tactfully reminded me that Memphis wasn't just Elvis's hometown, but a former capital city in ancient Egypt.

So his brilliant reference stayed in. And I had to shamefully admit that yet another connection between Elvis and Egypt, other than kings on a capital E had passed me by. Anyway, here is Tom as Pharaoh as Elvis. If anyone who ever took part in Joseph on Broadway in any capacity ever hears this podcast, thanks so much for what you did. Far too many of the key contributors have left the stage, but they are not forgotten.

[18:23] ♪ Musical number ♪

[22:21] Tim Rice: That was episode 56 of my podcast, Get Onto My Cloud. Written and presented by me, Tim Rice, and produced with deft skill by Peter Hobbs.