Do Re Mi is a musical with music by Jule Styne, lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green, and a book by Garson Kanin, who also directed the original 1960 Broadway production. The plot centers on a minor-league con man who decides to go (somewhat) straight by moving into the legitimate business of juke boxes and music promotion. The musical was headlined by the comedy couple of Phil Silvers and Nancy Walker, both of whom were Tony nominated. Popular songs introduced included "Cry Like the Wind" and "Make Someone Happy".
Synopsis
Hubie Cram is "a loser endlessly scheming to win big." His long-suffering and patient wife Kay urges him to "Take a Job," while he plots. He finds three pals, Fatso O'Rear, Brains Berman and Skin Demopoulos, and they scheme to enter the juke-box business ("It's Legitimate"). Soon they have 300 juke-boxes, which they plan on selling to John Henry Wheeler, a record producer. Hubie discovers a naive singer, Tilda Mullen, and they plan their future ("Ambition"). At a fancy nightclub Hubie explains, and demonstrates, gangster's behavior that he learned from watching the Late Late Show. Kay compares her abandoned comfortable existence with the insecurity of life with Hubie ("Adventure"). Tilda and Wheeler fall in love ("Make Someone Happy"). In the end Hubie realizes that he has nothing except a wonderful marriage.
Design elements
The musical was notable for its elaborate scenic design by Boris Aronson, who conceived the set as an enormous pop-art jukebox, and used extremely novel forms such as collage in his design. The curtain of juke boxes "evoked a cathedral's stained-glass effect."[1] In a scene in a night club, the tables had drawn figures instead of actors, and the actors would talk with these drawings.[2] (A similar design and staging conceit was seen when Silvers guest-starred in a 1967 TV adaptation of Damn Yankees!) And in the "Fireworks" number, black light is used to reveal shooting stars and Roman candles as Tilda and John's love affair explodes in song.
Songs
Act I
"Waiting, Waiting" – Kay Cram.
"All You Need Is a Quarter" – The Swingers.
"Take a Job" – Hubie and Kay Cram.
"It's Legitimate" – Hubie, Fatso O'Rear, Brains Berman, Skin Demopoulos and the Loaders.
"I Know About Love" – John Henry Wheeler.
"The Auditions" – Marsha, Lou and Gretchen.
"Cry Like the Wind" – Tilda Mullen.
"Ambition" – Hubie and Tilda Mullen.
"Success" – The Tilda Mullen Fans, Tilda Mullen, Hubie, Fatso O'Rear, Brains Berman and Skin Demopoulos.
"Fireworks" – Tilda Mullen and John Henry Wheeler.
"What's New at the Zoo" – Tilda Mullen and Animal Girls.
In the original Broadway production, the understudy for Hubert Cram was Bernie West. Brad Oscar appeared in the ensemble of the 1999 Encores! production.
Porchlight Music Theatre, Chicago, Illinois, presented Do Re Mi as a part of their "Porchlight Revisits" season in which they stage forgotten musicals three times per year. The production was in May 2018. It was directed and choreographed by Christopher Pazdernik and music directed by David Fiorello.[6]
The J2 Spotlight Musical Theatre Company, an Off-Broadway theatre company dedicated to producing revivals of worthy musicals, will produce Do, Re, Mi as part of their 2024 season in April 2024.
Recordings
The Original Broadway cast recording was released in January 1961 on RCA Victor. The 1999 Encores! cast recording was released on September 21, 1999 by DRG.[7]
The New York Times called the musical "fast, loud and occasionally funny." It noted that "a team of expensive talent has turned out some lively songs, set them in motion in feverishly paced production numbers and has managed to overcome, at least part of the time, the cheapness of a machine-made book." It commented that Phil Silvers was cast against type, here playing "the fall guy, the poor sap who ends as the victim.... Betty Comden and Adolph Green have written sprightly lyrics, and Jule Styne has contributed some attractive as well as some ear-shattering tunes. The loveliest is "Cry Like the Wind" which has the keening quality of a folk song of lamentation."[8]
According to Stanley Green, the musical had "an average score that is worth the price just to hear Miss Walker describe her life of 'Adventure'".[9]Ethan Mordden wrote that the song "Adventure" is "one of the grandest comedy songs ever.... Here we learn that she, at least, already knows that it's a wonderful marriage, because it's never boring ... then came a Mad Scene - a bolero complete with trumpets pealing out like the band in the Plaza del Toro on corrida day and woodwinds tripping up the scale with the flash of a hundred capes."[10]
In reviewing the 1999 "Encores!" production for The New York Times, Ben Brantley wrote that, despite its famous creators, "the show still has the incomplete feeling of a work that never quite meets its own aspirations... A tale of buffoonish gangsters trying to muscle in on the music industry." He further suggested that the show was like a "shotgun marriage" of Bye Bye Birdie and Guys and Dolls with parts of the television sit-com The Honeymooners.[4]
"Make Someone Happy"
The song "Make Someone Happy" has been recorded by numerous artists, including:
Perry Como on his subsequent 1962 RCA Camden album Make Someone Happy (US #80, 1960)[11]
