The Birth of a Broadway Show

"oh captain!" from initial notion to opening night

What goes into the making of a Broadway theatrical production? Recently, the editors of this magazine asked that question of themselves, then assigned me to write a day-by-day diary of a show's conception, inception and reception that would not only chronicle the birth pangs of one specific show, but also be, in a sense, a portrait of Everyshow.

We picked a musical that was, at the time, little more than a gleam in the eyes of novelist A1 Morgan and actor-director José (The Hose) Ferrer. The projected production was to be based on the clever and successful British film The Captain's Paradise, which starred Alec Guinness. Morgan and Ferrer, who had worked together on the screenplay of Morgan's best-selling novel, The Great Man, would do the script for the show, and Ferrer would direct.

In the film The Captain's Paradise, Alec Guinness played a proper English sea Captain with a tendency to behave most improperly. He had a small boat that ran between Gibraltar (where he kept a mousy English wife) and a mythical African port called Calique (where he was married to a French sexpot). To complicate matters, the mousy English wife longed for adventure and glamor, while the sexpot honed for hearthstone and hominess. The Captain was found (continued on page 51) out and somehow ended up before a firing squad, first taking the precaution of bribing the men. The squad shot their leader, and the Captain did a Fairbanks over a wall to freedom.

Ferrer and Morgan went to work on this basic story, changing the locales to London and Paris. Elaborating on the plot, they decided to reveal that the Captain's First Mate had once been the husband of the sexpot (she had left him because he had been too stodgy for her). They also decreed that the two girls would meet in Paris and become sympathetic toward each other, and that both would give the arrant Captain the air. Then the First Mate and the sexpot -- her name was Bobo -- would rediscover each other and go off, and the English wife would take the Captain back. In the finale, the four of them would turn the Captain's ship, the S.S. Paradise, into a nightclub. Not much of a plot in these days of the Serious Problem Musical, but it was enough to have some fun with -- and the producers began casting about for people to help. They got the famous Jo Mielziner (who has done the sets for 225 shows) and they signed Miles White, whose credits as a costumer included Oklahoma!, Carousel, and several circuses (he once designed ballet dresses for elephants). On the advice of Johnny Mercer, Jay Livingston and Ray Evans were signed to do the songs for the show. Livingston and Evans had written about 70 movie scores and had won three Academy Awards, but they had never done a Broadway show. Abbe Lane was signed for the part of the French girl, and immediately everybody began to wonder if it had been a good idea: from Spain, where she was making a movie, Miss Lane proclaimed that her cooch days were over. Henceforth, said she, she would concentrate on Dramatic parts. The producers shuddered and hoped she didn't mean it. With Miss Lane came, as though drawn by a ring in his nose, Xavier Cugat, her band-leader husband, to essay the role of the First Mate. About this time I began following the show like a hungry Airedale and keeping a diary of what I observed and heard. And here it is:

Oct. 17, 1957. New York. Producers Don Coleman and Howard Merrill, both in their late thirties, have been trying for so long to get this show on, they already feel like veterans. The two men are in Sardi's waiting to meet a kid who called them a few days ago. "He says he's raised $25,000 to put in a show," Merrill explains, "and he'll put it in ours if we let him be a production assistant. He's just out of Cornell."

"We've just about raised all our money," Coleman says. "About four years ago we began looking for a property. Thought of The Captain's Paradise, but just then the Theatre Guild announced that they were doing it with Danny Kaye. About a year later it was free again. Then began the goddamned-est negotiations -- with the company that made the original, with the writer, with stars, directors, and so on."

"They didn't think we meant business because we'd never done a show before," Merrill says. "Once we sent them a $10,000 check to show good faith. It came back -- the show still wasn't free. We heard that Don Ameche wanted to do it, and we talked to his agent. He helped us get the rights, but then Ameche couldn't do it. Sid Caesar wanted to do it, then decided to go back into TV. We considered George Sanders, Alfred Drake, and tried to get Guinness himself. No thanks. Then we tried like hell to get Joe Ferrer to play it, but no dice. Finally we signed Tony Randall -- he played the Mencken part in Inherit the Wind, Mr. Weskit on the Mr. Peepers TV show, did a few films, Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, No Down Payment, and so on -- and although he's never done a Broadway musical, he's one of the best young talents around."

"The English wife was even tougher," Merrill says. "We tried for Maureen O'Hara and Joan Collins but no soap."

Nov. 4. Jo Mielziner begins work on sketches for the sets. As he has seen it, the script moves from scene to scene like a motion picture. There has to be some way of getting scenery on and off without closing the traveler-curtain and forcing the characters in the preceding scene to step forward and finish on the forepart of the stage. Mielziner, scrawling absently on the paper pinned to his drawing board, remembers an earlier show wherein he used two parallel treadmills running in opposite directions. The stagehands set the furniture on the belts of the treadmills and it floated in neatly.

"But those things never work, do they?" Coleman asks. "They jerk when they start and stop, the actors lose their balance getting on and off, they---"

"They'll work," says Mielziner, quietly.

Nov. 5. Coleman and Merrill believe the name of the show should be changed so people won't think they've already seen it, and so the new version can be sold to the movies if it is a hit. Name changed to Paradise for the Captain.

Nov. 7. Name today is Anyone for Paradise?

Nov. 8. Now it is Paradise, Anyone?

Nov. 10. Ferrer suggests Tail of Two Cities.

Nov. 11. "Listen, for God's sake," says Coleman to Merrill, "we've got to get a title so we can get out the ads."

Nov. 13. Title changed, once and for all, to Oh Captain!

Nov. 14. Jay Blackton, a musical director with many Broadway shows behind him (Oklahoma!, Call Me Madam, Happy Hunting), picks the vocal chorus today -- eight boys and seven girls.

Nov. 19. Ray Evans and Jay Livingston are working in a room furnished only with a piano and a couple of folding chairs in a 57th Street rehearsal hall. There are crumpled-up pieces of music paper all over the floor, crowding the cigarette butts. Ray Evans, slight and wiry and prematurely gray, says, "We've got 21 songs -- counting the three numbers we reprise. This score's gone fairly well. We did it mostly in a couple of months ... Right now we're polishing, trying to make the lyrics better. Columbia is going to record the original cast LP, and Rosemary Clooney (Mrs. Ferrer) is going to record Surprise. Of course you can't tell, but we think it'll be a hit."

Nov. 21. Ferrer sits in a darkened theatre while nearly 300 pretty, talented actresses, all of whom can sing, dance, act and do a passable British accent, audition for the part of the British wife. None will do. One, Susan Johnson, he remembers from The Most Happy Fella -- he tells her she won't do for the wife, but he wants to see her later. Then up comes Jacquelyn McKeever, 22, blonde, an ex-schoolteacher, whose previous experience consists of a small part in The Carefree Heart (closed out of town) and some jobs in summer stock. She has a high, throaty voice; she moves awkwardly; she is attractive but no knockout. Ferrer picks her.

"She's an unknown," Merrill protests.

"She's got a quality that affects me like Deanna Durbin used to," Joe says. "She'll be great -- wait and see."

So they sign her. They send her for acting lessons, they send her for dancing lessons, they send her to brush up on her singing, they send her to Berlitz to learn a proper British accent. And they pray that Ferrer is right.

Nov. 22. Final auditions for the dancers are held at the Phyllis Anderson Theatre, lower Second Avenue. About 60 girls and boys are on the bare stage, their faces eager and apprehensive in the light from the single enormous bulb hanging from a ratty cord. The twittering boys are in tights or jeans; the girls are in old leotards with wrinkled knees, or blouses and pants -- all except one, who wears sheer black stockings and red pants that amount to little more than a G-string to show off her spectacular legs.

"We've already picked that one," Morgan whispers.

The choreographer, Zachary Solov, on leave from the Metropolitan Opera (this is his first Broadway show), points to an exotic dark-haired girl who resembles Sophia Loren. "There'll be spots where she'll be effective," he says to Ferrer.

"If you want her, pick her," Ferrer says. "I'm nuts about those four little girls over there." He gestures toward a petite quartet standing to one side.

Assistant stage manager George Quick calls, "Will everybody who's been eliminated please leave?"

"How do we decide on the remaining ones?" Morgan asks.

"We'll strip them to the waist," Ferrer says, winking. "Look at that one on the left, the blonde." She is wearing a white blouse, flesh-colored stockings, and black pants. She is not exceptionally pretty, but it is hard not to notice her figure. "Got class," he says.

"Character," Morgan says, sardonically.

"Whatever it is," Ferrer says, "she's got a quality I like." He turns to Solov. "Let's have her, Zach." To Morgan he adds, with a perfectly straight face, "She reminds me of my mother."

Nov. 23. The front room of Ferrer's apartment, on West 57th Street, is more cluttered than usual. On either side of the fireplace, all the way to the ceiling, yellow sheets of paper are stuck to the wall with tape, each containing a word identifying a scene.

"First act's on the right, second on the left," Morgan says. "We've juggled the scenes every which way, trying to get the proper sequence."

"Break the story down this way," Ferrer says, "and the faults leap out at you."

"The way it goes now is roughly like this," Morgan says. "Open with the villagers singing This Is a Very Proper Town. The Captain comes on and joins in last chorus. Then a door floats in on a treadmill, he steps through it as it passes, and he's in his house, which is let down from the flies. Scene with his English wife to show how she longs for some glamor. He sings Life Does a Man a Favor (When It Gives Him Simple Joys). Then it's 10 o'clock -- beddibyes. They undress and go to bed and float out. Villagers reprise first song, and it's morning and Captain leaves. Next scene he's on the S.S. Paradise with his First Mate and his crew, singing Life Does a Man a Favor (When It Leads Him Down to the Sea). They sing a song about him and do a dance on the deck. Then the Captain, back in the cabin with the First Mate, sings a song about his three paradises -- England, the ship, Paris. Scene switches back to the cottage. A man comes and tells the English wife she's won a cooking contest and gets a free trip to Paris. She sings Surprise and then there's a dream-ballet in which some hobgoblins dress her for the trip. We got Johnny Brascia as the couturier -- he's terrific."

"You should see Miles' costumes for this one," Ferrer says. "Crazy."

"The Captain arrives in Paris," continues Morgan, "and he does the Favor (continued on page 72)Birth Of A Show(continued from page 56) song again -- this time, When It Puts Him in Paree. He meets a flower girl -- played by Danilova."

"You should see her dance," Ferrer says. "You know, she was trained in Russia. She must be over 50, but she's absolutely sensational. A gasser!"

"They dance," Morgan says. "Then the Captain goes to see his mistress, Bobo -- Abbe Lane. She's a stripper. She sings Femininity -- it ought to stop the show ... 'Why do I always end up on the tiger skin?' she asks. The scene switches back to the boat. To the great dismay of the First Mate, the English wife arrives. Her name in the show is Maud, by the way. She says she's been looking all over Paris for her husband. He offers to go looking for the Captain with her, and they get on a sight-seeing bus. A Spaniard gives Maud champagne and takes a chop at her. The Spaniard is Paul Valentine ... pretty good. They go to a nightclub, run by Susan Johnson -- we wrote in a part for her because she's got such a wonderful brassy voice. This is the same club where the Captain's stripper works, and the first act ends with the Captain and Maud confronting each other as the chorus girls are dancing and Susan's trying to sing."

"The second act's been giving us some trouble," Ferrer says, "but it's just about worked out -- the First Mate and Bobo get together, the English wife takes the Captain back, and they turn the Paradise into a bistro. Great, we think." He crosses to a coffee table and knocks on it solemnly.

"We open in Philadelphia January 11," Morgan says, portentously.

Nov. 26. The show has its first casualty -- Zachary Solov, the choreographer. He and Ferrer have been arguing since the end of auditions. "I know I don't know anything about staging dances," Ferrer says, "but I know what I want and what you're giving me isn't it." Furious, Solov resigns.

Nov. 27. Coleman and Merrill are going crazy trying to find a replacement for Solov. Ferrer has an inspiration. "Who was that kid who did the dances on the old TV Show of Shows?"

"Jimmy Starbuck," Merrill says.

Ferrer begins to pace, muttering to himself. "A guy who works in TV is used to getting numbers on and off fast. That's what we need."

Dec. 5. Singers and dancers go into rehearsal today, singers under Jay Blackton, dancers under Jimmy Starbuck.

Dec. 12. Oh Captain! is rehearsing in the Central Plaza, a meeting hall on lower Second Avenue ordinarily given over to Masons, Shriners, neighborhood weddings and, on weekends, jam sessions attended by college kids. Ferrer and his principals are in the main ballroom, a flowered-wallpaper horror, cluttered with artificial blooms, rickety lecterns and funeral chairs. The Hose is sitting on a chair tilted back against a wall, his cap pulled down over his eyes, feet up on a table; around him, in a semicircle, are Abbe, Jackie McKeever, Paul Valentine, Danilova and Susan Johnson. They are mumbling their parts aloud and Joe is interrupting from time to time with suggestions or comments. Co-producer Howard Merrill, impeccably dressed and emotionally disheveled, is surveying the scene happily. "The advance is up to $1,200,000," he says. "It's a combination of the property and Joe's name -- he's one of the biggest draws on Broadway."

Out in the hall, Tony Randall and Cugat are sitting side by side on a bench, earnestly reading lines to each other, holding the book between them.

Ferrer calls a break. "The big surprise is Cugie," he whispers to Morgan over coffee. "This morning he handled himself like he's been on the stage all his life. Abbe is a little stiff, but she'll be all right. Come on, let's go watch the dancers."

We go to a room on the floor below, where Starbuck is critically inspecting a line of girls as they go through a wild, abandoned dance. "The first act finale," Ferrer says. "How's it going, Jimmy?"

Starbuck shrugs. "I really can't do much more until I get the costume list from Miles White tomorrow. So far, though, fine."

"Crazy," Ferrer says. "I'll have the staging blocked out by tomorrow."

Dec. 22. At the stage door of the Alvin Theatre on West 52nd Street, a brown tweed blur shoots by us in a headlong rush for the knob, flings it open with a gasped "Excuse," and shoots inside like an Osborn drawing of motion. This is David Newburge, the kid who brought the $25,000 into the show, now a production assistant and known as The Gopher -- "Go for this, David," someone will say every minute or two; "Go for that, David." He accepts it with graceful resignation.

It is hard to believe that a musical comedy, a thing of light and gaiety, can be born in such gloomy surroundings. The seats of the Alvin are covered with huge spreads of muslin except for a few rows down front where the production staff sits during rehearsals. The place smells musty and damp, and the deep shadows seem deeper because the only illumination is from the "work light" -- the single bulb in the center of the stage. The rehearsal outfits of the participants give no hint that they are engaged in anything resembling fun. Actresses, to whom acting is not work but second nature, love to have the world believe that they work like sandhogs; they therefore rehearse in clothes the average suburban housewife wouldn't wear to a supermarket. Abbe, in an old blue fuzzy sweater and a disreputable black skirt, looks like an underpaid scullery maid. The chorus girls seem to be the molls of a gang of Brooklyn juveniles. Only Jackie McKeever, new to the theatre and therefore ignorant of the rules, has had the bad taste to come dressed neatly.

Today's run-through goes well enough, but Ferrer is dissatisfied. He sits in the third row, his cupped hand pushing his face into lugubrious lines. He says quietly to Howard Merrill, "We're replacing Cugie."

"We're what?"

"He won't do."

"Who'll we get?"

"I'm bringing in Eddie Platt from the coast."

"Who the hell is Eddie Platt?"

"You know who he is, for Christ's sake," Ferrer says. "He was with me in The Shrike and about six other plays."

"How much will he cost us?"

"Not any more than Cugie -- well, maybe a little more."

"Why don't you give Cugie another chance?" Merrill asks.

"He won't do," Ferrer says, stubbornly. "He doesn't react properly -- his reactions aren't an actor's. I thought they were at first, but they aren't. Abbe and Jackie aren't experienced, either, but they have instinctive reflexes -- they react like a prize-fighter or a bullfighter ... Cugie reacts like an orchestra leader. He's got to go."

"Who's going to tell him?" Coleman asks.

"I'm the director," sighs Ferrer. "I'll tell him."

Jan. 2, 1958. In the Alvin, Ferrer is rehearsing Tony Randall and Jackie in the scene where Maud confronts the Captain in Paris with her discovery of his infidelity. Randall is muttering his lines listlessly; he does not believe in turning on the full charge until he is before the footlights. Ferrer seems a bit displeased with him. McKeever is giving it the old college try. She seems semi-hysterical. Her principal dramatic gesture consists of clutching at the bottom of her girdle, through her skirt, which is provocative enough but not especially meaningful.

Ferrer is frowning. He is leaning on a ramp that leads from the stage down to the seats, bending his head so that he appears to be attempting to get an upside-down view of his navel -- as though his thoughts, conceived in his guts, are luminous enough to shine through. He starts to give the pair a direction and is interrupted by stage manager Jimmy Russo.

"They're ready to cut the belt for the treadmill."

"Will it make noise?"

"Quite a bit."

"Come on, kids, we'll go downstairs," Ferrer says, wearily. They go to the basement of the theatre. In the Ladies' Room, Livingston and Evans are polishing lyrics. In the Men's, Starbuck is drilling girls in a routine. Morgan, exhausted by constant rewrites, is asleep on a sofa. "The poor bastard's been getting no sleep at all," Ferrer says.

He turns back to Jackie and Tony. In this scene, Jackie seizes her austere Captain and bends him back in an old-time silent-movie kiss, to communicate the fact that a few days in Paris have let down her British tresses. Randall is to express astonishment at his wife's transformation, but he is not doing it properly. "Look, Tony," says Ferrer, "it's like the old English joke where the guy comes home and finds his wife in bed with his best friend. He says, 'Geoffrey, I have to -- but you!?' "

After a few more minutes, Joe calls a break. "We're coming along fine," he says. "I couldn't be more thrilled. Tonight we try a run-through -- we've invited some friends and we're going to run the whole friggin' thing."

7:30 p.m. Ferrer is onstage, addressing the invited audience. He says that it is his and the producers' notion that every play has two casts -- "Us, and you, the audience." He says that we would see quite a complete first act and about two thirds of a second. He begs our indulgence for the lack of costumes, lights, scenery, orchestra -- and for the incomplete book, lyrics and music. "We're constantly changing and polishing," he explains.

It is exciting as the piano begins and the singers roll in, jerkily and unsteadily on the precarious treadmills. The opening is pleasantly GilbertandSullivany. Then Randall and Jackie come on in their first scene, which is long and over-expository. The "beddibyes" scene, in which they take off their clothes and go to bed, drags and drags. So do all the musical numbers and dances. Randall has lost some of his afternoon's boredom and takes on a certain authority as he struts about in built-up heels. Jackie, alas, is as smalltown as ever; her high, throaty voice is too stiff, among other things. Abbe Lane is not much better. The Danilova dance seems to take hours.

An hour and a half later, the production staff is meeting in the basement lounge. Two bottles of Scotch stand on the refreshment bar. Instead of a grim conclave, with intimations of doom, everybody is manic with joy.

Ferrer is saying, "We're so far ahead it's amazing."

Somebody says that the opening dialog between Jackie and Tony is too long.

"Oh, crap," says Morgan. "A remarkable number of people have joined the Writers' Union during the past four days. People tell me everything is too long. Ok, they even say the strip tease is endless. Look -- we have to establish characters. Joe and I didn't blunder into this thing. We thought it out carefully beforehand, talked for days, thought it over ... "

"We had a hit show tonight at the end of the first act, I don't care what anybody says," Ferrer says.

January 5. Philadelphia. The show moved here today for several days of rehearsals, one invited-audience preview, the opening, and a two-week run.

Jan. 8. "My God," says The Gopher, rushing by with his arms full of costumes, "I don't know how we're ever going to get this thing on. We got a dress rehearsal with piano tonight, and these still have to be pressed." He rushes away; he is always in motion.

Nearly everything is in readiness. O'Connell has all his props, the treadmills and scenery are working smoothly, Mielziner is lighting the stage, Miles White has delivered all his costumes. Down in the pit the quiet, conscientious Blackton is working on scores by the light of a gooseneck lamp on the piano. Some of the cast are rehearsing at the Lu Lu Temple, a Shriners' hall across the street, but most of them are on hand. Ferrer is all over the place, leaping up the stairs to the stage, jumping down, shouting orders and hissing asides to his secretary. I copy down some of his memos and notes:

Make upstairs curtains same as downstairs in Capt. house. Cut second, kiss when Capt. enters. Bottle on table by his chair should be English beer. Lights out entirely at end of first scene. Pipe on table is wrong shape; get curved pipe. Tony looks hung-up when he goes to mantel to get cribbage set -- get him something to do.

Those are merely his notes on the first scene; by the time rehearsal is over, there are 57 more.

Jan. 11. Opening night in Philly is a sellout.

In New York, an opening demands black tie; in Philadelphia it is optional. Ferrer, Morgan and everyone else on the production staff turn up in dinner jackets, as though to express their respect for each other.

The villagers begin their stately procession across the stage. Tony comes on and gets a hand, but not a big one. He delivers the line designed to get the first laugh: "I love to see the pippets a-mating on the moor ... "

No one laughs.

Livingston and Evans look at each other glumly.

"It's because it's Philadelphia," Don Coleman says. "They never heard of pippets here."

"It's because he didn't belt the line," Ferrer says.

A man sitting in the rear row turns around and utters a stern "Shhhh!"

This audience is singularly unresponsive, sitting on its hands except during the times when the scenery is going in and out on the belts.

"In Philadelphia, they applaud the sets," says Vinnie Donahue.

The dialog between Tony and Jackie still seems interminable, but then the pace picks up. We realize, with surprise, that the beddibyes scene, where they take off their clothes, has been cut.

"Joe cut it this afternoon," Don Coleman says. "He cut 20 minutes out of the show."

The Surprise ballet also has been cut. John Brascia, the star of that number, is standing in street clothes watching the proceedings onstage. His face is a dead white in the shadows; every sound from the orchestra in the pit seems to wrack and stiffen him. He has a run-of-the-play contract; he will draw his salary, which will enable him to study, practice or travel. But to contemplate that now is cold comfort; he has been cut in the hour before his great opportunity, and he is desolate.

"I don't think that Abbe Lane's so sexy," one woman says to her husband at intermission. He gives her a patient look.

"It's her clothes," another woman says. "In that Femininity song, she ought to wear something sexier."

Ferrer overhears this. "I've been arguing with Abbe for weeks," he says, angrily. "She ought to wear the costume Miles originally designed. Much sexier. But she thinks she's an actress, for Christ's sake."

The audience is more enthusiastic during the second act.

"I'll be damned," says Ferrer. "This is supposed to be the weak part of the show."

"It moves better, that's for sure," Morgan says.

Now the audience is hooked, and by the time the finale comes on, and Miel-ziner's ingenious moving sets transform the Captain's ship into a nightclub before the audience's eyes, everybody is ready to stand up and cheer. Howard Merrill dashes in from the lobby, where he has been listening to a Philadelphia radio reporter's commentary on the first three quarters of the show. "It's a rave!" he cries. "This guy says it's a smash!"

The noise in the theatre, with the people calling for curtain call after curtain call, is deafening. Someone sets up a cry for Ferrer, and others begin yelling for him. He goes onstage, tears streaming down his cheeks (in addition to his other accomplishments, The Hose can cry hose-style almost at will).

Jan. 12. "There's still a hell of a lot to be done," says Ferrer. "On the dances, especially. Starbuck needs help. It's been a tremendous job for him, putting this on singlehanded."

"Who'll we get?" Merrill asks.

"I'm bullish on Onna White," Don Coleman says. "She did The Music Man -- biggest hit in New York this season."

"Who'll tell Starbuck we're bringing her in?" Merrill asks.

"I'll tell him," says Ferrer. "Look, the only god around here is a hit show. Everybody's expendable, including me."

Jan. 14. The Philadelphia newspaper notices were sensational, but they were nothing compared to Variety. It says "Smash." It says, "Despite trade misgivings about the wisdom of trying to make a legit musical from a click picture, the transformation has been made not only with success but also with distinction."

"I wish I thought it's as good as they do," Ferrer murmurs.

Jan. 16. Rehearsals are still going on every day. The two collaborators are still trying to improve the book. A laugh is needed in the next-to-last scene.

Randall, rehearsing in T-shirt and jeans, calls down to Ferrer, "I've got an idea for a laugh. All through the play I've been saying, 'It's a good-sized ship ... I run a tight ship.' It just came to me -- how about if right at the end I say, 'A loose little ship'?"

"Try it tonight," Ferrer shrugs, without enthusiasm.

Randall tries it; it gets the biggest laugh in the show.

"That's the second line he's contributed," Morgan says.

Backstage, Jimmy Russo, the stage manager, is missing. Someone explains that he and Ferrer had several disagreements and Russo handed in his notice. George Quick has replaced him.

Jan. 17. Danilova's dance is cut at tonight's performance.

Jan. 18. "They didn't like it last night," Ferrer says at the production meeting.

"Let's put Danilova back in," Merrill suggests. "The show seems to get small without her -- that dance actually establishes Paris."

"Ok -- but we'll cut it in half," says Ferrer.

In the second act there is a song sung by the First Mate and the Captain, I've Been There and I'm Back. At the rehearsal later on, the reinstated Danilova, wearing an incredibly ancient pair of light blue warmup tights, is doing exercises in the wings. "I been dere," she says, "and I come back." Her number, restaged, has been put back in the show; so has a new version of the dance for You're So Right.

Jan. 19. "Even with the restaging, You're So Right is wrong," Ferrer says. "I wonder if we don't need a new---"

Livingston and Evans look stricken.

"Not a new---?"

"I'm afraid so," says Ferrer. "Get busy."

This is Sunday, but there are rehearsals all morning, afternoon and evening.

Jan. 20. Coleman and Merrill are aglow -- and with good reason. Several movie producers have expressed interest in acquiring the film rights, and today a New York syndicate has made an offer to buy out their producers' half.

At tonight's performance, Onna White's restaging of the sailor's dance is in, and Susan sings Jubilee in the finale of the first act.

Jan. 21. Ferrer is seriously thinking of cutting Jubilee. Coleman says he's got to make his mind up soon and freeze the show. Ferrer says he'll freeze it when he's ready.

Jan. 22. Bruce McKay, a baritone and one of the Captain's crew, is staring dispiritedly at the backstage bulletin board. "My God, another day of rehearsals -- from 11:45 a.m. to 7:45 p.m., tomorrow. I've never been in a show where they worked us so hard." A chorus girl, going by, gooses him and giggles. He catches her by the wrist and embraces her, and she rubs her body against him. It is clear now why the cast seldom complains about the rigorous schedule.

The weather has been miserable; nearly everybody has a cold. Abbe is out with laryngitis tonight. Her understudy, B. J. McGuire, goes on without a rehearsal and does a capable job. She looks sexier than Abbe because she is wearing the negligee that Miles originally designed for the star.

"That settles it," Ferrer snarls. "Abbe's going to wear that goddam kimono or else!"

Jan. 23. A new number, written in two days, goes in for You're So Right. It's called It's Not Too Late. "It's not too good, either," says Morgan, tonelessly.

Jan. 24. George Quick surveys his cue-script, now so changed, altered and scribbled upon as to be unintelligible to anyone but him. "This is an easy show to run tonight," he says. "We've done the whole thing this way once before -- first time that's happened for days."

Jan. 25. Closing day in Philly. Ferrer is in good spirits. "I feel like a jockey riding some great horse," he says. "He's 20 lengths behind, then he starts to gain, knocking off horse after horse -- pretty soon there are four horses left, then two, then one, then he's home. That's what we've done, we've knocked out the rough spots one by one."

Eddie Knill, company manager, reports that receipts up front have been phenomenal. "We broke the house record the first week, and we broke our own record this week," he says. The news seems to inspire the cast to greater efforts, and tonight's performance is the best so far.

"We're going to kill 'em in New York," says The Gopher, his thin face shining.

Jan. 26-30. New York. Rehearsals, rehearsals, rehearsals. Ferrer methodically puts back everything he cut in Philadelphia -- everything, that is, but the Surprise ballet and the beddibyes scene. You're So Right is back; so is Give It All You've Got. New costumes have been ordered for the You're So Right dance. Nearly all of Onna White's changes on Starbuck's numbers have been taken out and Starbuck's original movements put back in.

Coleman says, rather disgustedly, "We've spent $15,000 on new costumes, $7,500 on overtime rehearsals, and $10,000 on arrangements and copying for the musicians -- and the show is just about the same as it was opening night in Philadelphia."

Jan. 31. First paid New York preview -- and first disaster. As the curtains are about to open for the last scene, frantic shouts are heard backstage. The boat's counter-weights are too heavy to lower it from the flies -- it will not come down. Ferrer streaks for the door to backstage. The actors face the audience in bewilderment. Finally Tony steps forward. He says to the audience, "We were supposed to have the boat here, but something happened." This gets a laugh, and they do the finale without the boat.

Feb. 1. The boat is fixed, and drops nicely.

Feb. 3. The girls are livid -- rehearsals have been called for tomorrow, the day of opening night. "How'll we ever get our hair done?" they shriek.

Feb. 4. Curtain-time is 7:30 p.m. on opening night, in order to give the morning newspaper critics plenty of time to get back to their offices and write their reviews. At 7:00 p.m. there already are crowds of rubbernecks and autograph hunters flanking the entrance to the Alvin Theatre. A mounted policeman stands by to keep order.

The audience is streaming in. Harvey Sabinson, the show's press agent, is bobbing about frantically. "What an opening!" he cries. "Everybody in town wanted to come! Know who I turned down this afternoon? Bob Hope! Also Lollobrigida and Paulette Goddard! Couldn't find seats for them. I turned down Milton Berle, too, but somehow he got two seats up in the mezzanine. I let in Walter Slezak because he's got a big laugh. We'll need it."

The celebrities begin to arrive: tiny Billy Rose, with the gorgeous Joyce Matthews towering over him; Cugie, with Jayne Meadows (Steve Allen, her husband, is in Cuba); Jim Backus, distinguished in a ruffled shirt and bowler hat; the director Otto Preminger, erect as a Prussian general; Rosie Clooney arrives, wearing a white gown and an apprehensive expression. Here and there come the critics: the mousy, pipe-sucking Atkinson of the Times; the genial Watts of the Post; the debonair McClain of the Journal-American; Gibbs of The New Yorker, aloof and reserved. They and their colleagues are the only members of the audience who are not excited; this is just another job, their attitude seems to say.

The overture commences. Ferrer rushes up the side aisle from the door to backstage. A radiator-cover runs along the rear wall of the theatre -- he boosts himself up to sit on it.

"Now," he whispers to Morgan, "the agony begins." Morgan nods.

They are wrong. There is no agony. This is the best audience they have ever had. They begin laughing -- which no audience has done before -- when the English villagers sing, "We ship our oldest movies overseas to Channel 9." They roar at Tony's "I love to see the pippets a-mating on the moor." Danilova's dance nearly stops the show. The entire first act goes sensationally well, and the finale gets a great burst of applause.

In the lobby, Martin Gabel says, "Very good, I'm enjoying it." His wife, Arlene Francis, nods agreement.

Coleman and Merrill have lost their nervousness. "They love it!" Merrill whispers. That appears to be the case throughout the second act, as well. The cast takes 11 curtain calls, and there are cries of "Authors! Authors!"

Backstage is crowded with hundreds of friends, well-wishers, relatives and hangers-on, bumping into scenery, knocking over props, generally driving the doorman and the house manager out of their minds.

It is obligatory for the show's brass to put in an appearance at Sardi's after the opening. The rest of the company and staff show up at a pseudo-Polynesian restaurant on East 57th called Luau 400. One by one the cast members drift in, some in twos and threes, some with wives or husbands or dates, and settle in the fake huts that line the walls and serve as booths. Now that the opening is past and the backstage celebrations are behind them, they are ready to relax -- but they are expectant. The Herald Tribune, with Walter Kerr's review, will be on the streets within an hour. Kerr is tough, and this season he has been tougher than usual for some reason. Atkinson will follow an hour later; Atkinson is getting crotchety. These two have been known to kill a play with their reviews.

The management of Luau 400 apparently has instructed its waiters to take their time serving the liquor. Tension mounts. A Hawaiian-oriented trio is methodically working its way through the score of the show, but nobody is dancing; for that matter, nobody is listening.

The Gopher runs up, harried and stricken. "Oh, God! I know Kerr is going to give us a bomb -- I saw his face as he left the theatre, and he looked sore." He puts his fists to his forehead. "What will I tell all those people I raised the money from?"

Fifteen minutes later the suspicions are confirmed. Word comes from Sardi's that Kerr's review is a blast. Ray Evans, who preferred to be with the company rather than go with the brass, comes in slowly from the telephone, his long, lined face even sadder than usual.

"He hated it," he says, simply.

The word runs through the room, and even the fact that the booze at last has begun to arrive cannot stir a hum out of the silence that has fallen.

The Tribune arrives. Kerr's closing lines are, "Mr. Randall ... keeps bucking everybody up with a cheery 'Good show.' It would be nice to be able to echo him this morning."

"Well, there's still Atkinson," singer Stanley Carlson says. "He liked Jamaica -- if he liked that, he'll surely like us!"

When the Times finally comes, we see that Atkinson has written not only a rap but a personal attack on Ferrer. He says, "... Mr. Ferrer has substituted leers for wit and generally debased the style to the level of the old-fashioned varsity show. Mr. Ferrer has been away from Broadway too long. New York is a big town now."

Coleman and Merrill arrive, looking haggard. Morgan follows them. "What happened?" he says, unbelievingly. "What the hell happened? Is this Hate Ferrer Week for those guys? The audience loved it--what got into the critics?"

Nobody can answer: nobody knows. Ferrer arrives and waves, smiling sheepishly. But the party is over.

Feb. 5. Some notices are such out-and-out raves that it is hard to believe these reviewers are not writing about a show completely different from the one Kerr and Atkinson saw. Chapman of the News, Coleman of the Mirror, Alston of the World-Telegram and Sun -- they all love it. Watts in the Post is not quite as enthusiastic but is still very admiring. McClain in the Journal-American likes the principals, but says he thinks "the Captain's ship lists slightly to starboard." His review is about half-and-half.

Ferrer stands on the steps of the Captain's cottage with the cast gathered around him. This is his farewell address.

"The story is sad on two, pretty good on five," he says. "I have only one thing to say -- eight happy audiences a week will make real jerks out of those two jerks. You now have a harder job -- you have to work harder all the time. Let me point out that we broke the house record twice in Philadelphia, and those people down there aren't idiots. We've got a million and a half advance in the till. We sold a lot of tickets this morning and they're still selling. We've got 30 standees out there today, so we just can't accept the opinions of Atkinson and Kerr as typical of the reception this show is getting. It's up to you. I'll be in every few weeks, to spank you or give you a feel. So -- work. God bless."

Everybody cheers as he puts on his cap and walks off.