Zero Mostel recreates “Comedy Tonight” at the 1971 Tony awards
In the Tiber there sits a boat, / Gently dipping its bow,
Trim and tidy and built to float. / Pretty little picture? Now:
Put a boy on the starboard side, / Leaning out of the rail.
Next to him put a blushing bride, / Slim and slender and starry-eyed,
Down below put a tiny bed. /
The sun gets pale, / The sea gets red,
And off they sail / On the first high tide:
The boat and the bed and the boy and the bride.
It’s a pretty little picture, oh my!
Pretty little picture, how true!
Pretty little picture, which I,
Pseudol-iddle-us, give to you!
Feel the roll of the playful waves,
See the sails as they swell,
Hear the whips on the galley-slaves.
[PSEUDOLUS, HERO & PHILIA]
Pretty little picture?
[PSEUDOLUS]
Well:
Let it carry your cares away, / Out of sight, out of mind,
Past the buoy and through the bay, / Soon there’s nothing but sea and spray.
Night descends and the moon’s aglow–
Your arms entwined,
You steal below,
And far behind,
At the edge of day,
The bong of the bell of the buoy in the bay,
And the boy and the bride and the boat are away.
[HERO & PHILIA]
It’s a pretty little picture to share
As our little boat sails to sea.
[PSEUDOLUS]
Take your little trip free as air–
Have a little freedom on me!
[HERO & PHILIA]
No worries, no bothers,
No captains, no fathers…
[PSEUDOLUS]
In the ocean an island waits, / Smooth and sandy and pink,
Filled with lemons and nuts and dates.
[PSEUDOLUS, HERO & PHILIA]
Pretty little picture?
[PSEUDOLUS]
Think:
In a cottage of cypress trees, / Seashells dotting the door,
Boy and bride live a life of ease–
[PSEUDOLUS, HERO & PHILIA]
Doing nothing but what they please.
[PSEUDOLUS]
And every night when the stars appear,
There’s nothing more / To see and hear,
Just the shore / Where the lovers lie–
[HERO & PHILIA]
The sand and the sea and the stars and the sky–
[PSEUDOLUS]
And the sound of a soft little satisfied sigh.
[PSEUDOLUS, HERO & PHILIA]
All your/our petty little problems will cease,
And your/our little blessings will flow,
And your/our little family increase–
Pretty little picture?
[PSEUDOLUS]
No, no!
[PSEUDOLUS, HERO & PHILIA]
Pretty little masterpiece!
Pretty little picture…
Stephen Sondheim proved he was a genius with the first musical he wrote on his own, both lyrics and score. (Burt Shevelove and Larry Gilbert wrote the book.) When Utica College put on A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, I just had to audition for it. I mean, who wouldn’t want to play Pseudolus?
What catches your attention first in the show is the non-stop action. All of the characters, but especially Pseudolus, run here and there trying to find something (mare’s sweat) or hide something (like a virgin). Then the songs hit: snappy words, memorable music. Tricky music, very tricky for a Broadway musical: modulations and syncopation shifts, nothing too much out of vocal range but a workout through sheer volume and then the speed with which one number follows the other. Pseudolus has seven featured numbers in the first act, an eighth new one (or is it two?) in Act Two plus I forget how many reprises and reworkings of songs from Act One. And though the lyrics tend to be clever and funny, the melodies aren’t throwaways. We remember the opener, “Comedy Tonight,” and “Everybody Ought to Have a Maid,” which I sang with one guy my height (6′ 3″), another average in height and a fourth (he played Senex) who stood 5′ 3″ on his tippytoes. And “Pretty Little Picture,” regardless of the cleverness of its words, is lovely. Sondheim almost throws songs away. They’re almost lost in the midst of so much going on. It’s what he did in Todd too, isn’t it? The most beautiful melodies run parallel with the most incongruous happenings, comical in Forum, gruesome in Todd.
***
In the photos below, I am being introduced to Gymnasia, the tallest and most Amazonic of the prostitutes Glycus has for sale or rent. You can see how taken I am by her. Emily, who played Gymnasia, was as tall as me in her stocking feet. Add heels and a shock of red hair and she towered over me, especially as I played bent over for most of the show to minimize how tall I was compared to other players –after all, I was supposed to be a slave, not a master! I dared not loom.
Zero again, “Pretty Little Picture”
“Everybody Ought to Have a Maid,” at Sondheim’s 80th birthday celebration in London
MUSIC & ME 