Friday, February 9, 1973
In the morning, I practiced two hours at my residence for what
I thought would be “my debut” at the studio that night. I had never sung
better, but I was terribly nervous. Then, I waited in the library for my friend
Alice. She had promised to come and critique me, but called to say she was
sorry; her mother was going to drive her home to West
Covina
After Alice
 |
| The historic Prospect Studio as it appears today, corner of Prospect & Talmadge |
Arriving at ABC Studio’s Prospect
Avenue
“What? A telegram?”
They told me Rich was not going to be at the studio that
night. I felt both disappointed and relieved. After that, I went back and stood
in line for the show with everyone else. While I was waiting, I had a nice
conversation about acting with a lady who had her two teenage children with her,
a son and a daughter.
When it was time for them to start seating people, one of
the pages took me right down to the front and sat me directly in the front of
the producer’s station. He sat me next to an older woman, who turned out to be Julie’s
secretary, Joan’s mother. She told me, “I wanted the other girl to sit here,
but she was afraid they wouldn’t let her. Then, she moved to another seat.”
That statement put fear in my heart. I figured ABC (or
whoever didn’t want us there) was going to give us girls a hard time. I was
right. Just as Julie walked out onto the stage, one of the pages came down and
told me I couldn’t sit there.
“The man in the back will explain,” he said. As I walked to
the back, I realized “the man in the back” was my ‘friend,’ Bill.
“I don’t know who gave the order,” he told me, “but they
don’t want the “regulars” sitting in front.”
Well, I thought that was fair. People who had never see the
show should get a chance to sit up front. Still, I whispered in his ear,
“Can I move up as the audience leaves?”
“I guess so, “he said. “Sit up there next to the girl in the
pink. “
The girl in the pink was Patty.
“Oh, they put you up here too,” she said. “I was sitting
down there in a real good seat and they came and moved me up here.”
“They’ve got our pictures on file,” I joked. But it wasn’t
funny.
Once I sat down, Vivian came and sat next to me for a few
moments. She told me that Joan’s mother had asked her to sit with her, but Nick
Vanoff’s secretary, Carol, came and told her,
“You have to sit in the back or you will not be allowed on
the studio lot again.”
“She wouldn’t tell me who gave the order either,” said
Vivian.
While we were talking, Vivian confessed that she had told
the page on Patty, when she saw her sitting up front. She wasn’t going to be in
the back, while they were getting away with sitting closer. Hearing that, I
couldn’t help wondering if Vivian had told on me too, but I didn’t say anything
about it.
Meanwhile, Julie was onstage, wearing a gorgeous white
chiffon gown with green design on it. When she was introduced to the audience,
she said something like, “I’m really at a loss for words, so let’s begin.”
A little while later, someone in the audience asked her why
they have to pre-record the music, and Julie, who usually doesn’t speak to
people in the audience, went into a lengthy explanation.
“If we just did these songs, my voice wouldn’t be balanced
with the music… so every Wednesday night we go to RCA and record. It really
takes several hours…”
Julie was standing right on the edge of the stage, all by
herself, looking out and talking to us in the middle of the taping. “That’s a
first for her,” I wrote in my diary. I had only seen a few shows with an
audience, but on those occasions I had never seen Julie say more than a few
words to the audience. It seemed to me she was getting more comfortable with
the public.
***
For the beginning of the show, the entire Nelson Riddle
Orchestra was situated on stage in a “U” shape, with Julie standing on a
platform in the center. To be honest, I didn’t like the routine, or rather; I
didn’t like the resounding trumpet. Julie had to repeat portions of the song
over and over and over again. At first, this was because there were lines in
the picture. Then, they found that her lip-syncing with the pre-recorded
material was not matching. Later there was some static in the sound.
Meanwhile, I was sitting so far in the back, I felt I had no
part in the show, I was just a very distant observer. I was seated directly in
front of one of the cameras, which made me rather uncomfortable. I wanted to
move, but the cameraman said,
“You can’t move. I want your shoulder in the picture,” so I
had to stay there.
After they had done many takes of this number, Julie got
tired and sat down. The main music for the number was “Strike Up the Band,” with
a medley of songs joined to it. During the taping, there were a lot of breaks,
during which the audience talked and made a great deal of noise. As time went
on, they seemed restless; some people even got up and left.
After Julie had done the number over and over and over
again, I felt so bored sitting in the back, unable to see and so far from the
action, I actually thought about going home. It surprised me to have that
thought—something I’d never felt before at the studio, but I guess I was also
feeling hurt. I thought, “In my diary tonight, I’ll just write ‘I went to the
Julie Andrews Hour,’ and I won’t write anything else.”
During the taping of “The Strike Up the Band” number, I
noticed that at a certaom time in the music, Julie did some bumps, but when I
looked up at the monitor, the camera only showed the musicians. For the grand
finale, she mounted a platform in the center of the stage. Other than that, it
didn’t seem too exciting.
Then, at one point, I heard Julie say, “Tell Joan to come
here.”
She whispered something, and a little while later, went
behind the wings where she met Joan. I was surprised, however, to see that although
Julie had gone back there with the intention of being out of the audience’s
view, she clearly visible.
The interior of Studio C had been designed for The Julie
Andrews Hour, and part of that design included smoky mirrors along the right
and left walls, from the back of the studio all the way up on stage. Because of
where Julie was standing, her reflection was visible to the audience or at
least, those of us in the back of the studio. Joan had a box of powder and she
was dusting Julie so that she wouldn’t appear to be sweating on camera. It got
very hot up there under the studio lights. I wanted to tell someone that Julie
was visible to the audience, in case she wanted to move, but from where I was
sitting, it seemed impossible.
Julie and the band worked on this one musical scene for four
hours. Finally, they discovered the main cause of the problem (as I was given
to understand it.) There was a big animal on the show (one of the Muppets)
named Thog. Apparently, Thog’s pa system was the cause of the static and various
other problems during the taping.
© Michelle Russell
Coming
next …. Julie, Emma Kate and Thog
A list
of all Julie Andrews Hour blogs with links to this site can be found at:
Photos
are for entertainment purposes only.
No comments:
Post a Comment