COMMENCING MONDAY MARCH 22 1982 R atK m ines & R athgar M usical S o ciety
presents
OKLAHOMA! Music by Richard Rodgers
Book and Lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II
When the curtain falls, call In to The Coffee Shop. C o m p le te the n igh t in style. Come along to the Coffee Shop in the S h e lb o u m e . C hoose from a superb selection of starters, fish dishes, om elettes, salads, grills and sweets. Extensive W ine List. Full bar facilities available. OPEN Monday to Saturday 10.30 a.m .-11.30p.m . (L a t t orders
VI .1:) p . m . )
(TheCoffeeShm ...the place to go after the shou
SHELBOURNE HOTEL. St. Stephen's Green, D ublin 2. Tel: 766471.
G AIETY THEATRE
X
SOUTH KING STREET, DUBLIN 2 T e le g ra m s: G aiety Theatre
Telepnone: 7 7 M M
Directors: E a m o n n A ndrew s. Lorcan Bourke. D erm od Cafferky. J o e Kearns R e side nt M a n a g e r: J o e Kearns
COMMENCING MONDAY MARCH 22 1982 R a th m in e s & R a th g a r M u sical S o c ie ty p re s e n ts
Rodgers Hammerstein s
OKLAHOMA! (By arrangement with Chappell & Co. Ltd.) Chorus Master: Heather Hewson Choreography: Billie Barry Set Design: Gaiety Theatre Workshop Costumes: S. B. Watts & Co., Manchester
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MUSICAL DIRECTOR: GEAROID GRANT
E ntire Production b y : P a tric k M c In ty re
OKLAHOMA! John Barber, the distinguished critic of the Daily Telegraph in a tribute to Rodgers and Hammerstein, which he wrote for the programme of the recent London production of Oklahoma! said: ‘Boyish, small, relaxed, all smiles, Richard Rodgers hugged me during the London rehearsal for Oklahoma! and said: ‘Don’t be fooled, it’s not my music made this show a hit — it’s Oscar’s words’. But when I met Oscar Hammerstein I) — tall, blue-eyed, sensitive, touchy — he drew me aside. ‘Dick’s creamy tunes’, he confided are what everyone loves. I said: ‘It took you to make us all sing about the surrey with the fringe on top.’ A sweet smile softened his mottled face: ‘Ah, but who put the clop-clop of the horses into it?’ Credit them equally. The oddly mixed couple wrote this celebration of the American outdoors under a Connecticut oak tree with a 90-foot spread. It was their very first collaboration. Rodgers, 39, had just broken with his brilliant but erratic lyricist, Lorenz Hart after 26 successful years together. He was doubtful about his new partner, who had had no big hit since Show Boat 16 years before. But their work together went wonderfully. They shared an idea which was to revolutionise the stage musical. No romantic princes for them, no lines of female legs, no stuck-on pop numbers. Their simple truthful story was about which cowboy would take a girl to a box social. The curtain rose on a homey farm, with Aunt Eller sitting down churning butter, with an off-stage feller singin’ ‘fit to bust, in waltz time — The breeze is so busy it don’t miss a tree And an ol’weepin’ wilier is laughin' at m e . . . Hammerstein spent three weeks on that lyric of Oh, What A Beautiful Morning. When Rodgers saw it he said: ‘I was a little sick with joy, it was so lovely and so right’ and he wrote the music in ten minutes (When the lyric’s right, writing the tune’s easier then tying a shoelace’). But it took ages to persuade anyone to put up the money for this prairie idyll without stars. A famous playwright, S. N. Behrman, had to have his arm twisted to invest £60,000 (it returned him £2,250,000). Expert showman, husband of Elizabeth Taylor saw a try-out and cabled No Girls, No Gags, No Chance. But when it opened on Broadway in 1943, the audience were entranced. At the interval, Hammerstein said: ‘The glow was like a light from a thousand lanterns’. Oklahoma! — the title song, a last minute addition, the show was originally called Away We Go! — proceeded to run longer, and be
perform ed more widely, than any other musical show seen before. Both the two partners became millionaires and went on to create South Pacific, The Sound of M usic and many more. W hat is it that makes Oklahoma! such a landmark in the history of the m usical theatre? First, the singability and memorability of R and H’s songs. Next, the respect and integrity of the story-telling. Although so lighthearted, it deals with genuine emotions. It does not funk a death. But its real achievement is the way the music, the story and the ballet fuse into a whole. The songs tell you more about the characters, they are not just chart-toppers. So does the dancing. The ballet of Laurey’s dream s expresses her secret fears and hopes, and here Agnes de M ille’s choreography is not only wonderfully angular and lusty: it betrays a Freudian knowledge of repressed desires. She also uses ballet to reveal the obsession of dirty-minded Jud, the villain with vulgar sexual images — a startling novelty in 1943. And it does all this with jolly lashings of comedy and contains two of the funniest songs I know. As to what makes Hammerstein so special, it is not the cleverness but the appropriateness of his lyrics. Other writers are wittier, and use more cunning rhym es and rhythms. A Hammerstein lyric sounds like an out flow of spontaneous emotion from the man or girl who sings it. It seems to pour out from the heart, not from a skilful craftsman’s desk. It belongs absolutely to the singer. No musical character anywhere is more real to us than Ado Annie, and it is because she tells ua all about herself in I C ain’t Say N o !— the girl who always says: ‘come on, let’s go’ just when she ought to say ‘Nix!’ Irving Berlin said: T he difference between Oscar and the rest of us is that he is a poet’. And a poet is a man who tells all. The achievement of Rodgers in Oklahoma! is the more remarkable if you recall that for years he worked exclusively with a citified and even sleazy sophisticate, for Hart was far more complex than Hammerstein. But suddenly, overnight, out of heaven, Rodgers achieved a new style in Oklahoma! and its successors, a tender style which added musical wings to the warmth and dignity of a man who was ‘stuck like a dope with a thing called hope’ . Like his own career, every Rodgers tune takes a turning you don’t expect. Once heard, the lilt and the languor of a waltz like Out Of M y Dreams lingers in the mind for ever. ‘W hat’s wrong with sweetness and light?’ Rodgers once asked. ‘They’ve been around a long w hile’. Never did sweetness shine so bright as in Many A New Day, and if you are musical you will know that its because of the beguiling triplets that begin every other bar. which recalls the dancing of the star under which Shakespeare’s Beatrice was born. And here’s an amazing fact about the show. How many tunes do you think there are in this treasure casket of melody? As few as 12, the sm allest num ber of any musical. And how often do they come round? 33 tim es. Out of his teeming invention, Rodgers selected his very best, then gave it to us in abundance.
OKLAHOMA! t Time: Just after the turn of the century.
SONAE
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C urly ........................................................ PHILIP BYRNE A................................. MARY PURCELL Laurey ......... \ . ..... / ..... >. A unt E lle r ............... ' ....^H E A T H E R HEWSON A do Annie C a r n e s ^ ^ ^ ^ . . . ^ ^ < ^ ^ ^ ^ F ^ A N C E S CAMPBELL W ill Parker ,3. ./...v? X „ J .^..JjA R Y MOUNTAINE Ali Hakim <hM .^M . . ...\ .. ^ f e . C U ^ P E T E R WHEAR1TY Jud Fry McGAURAN Andrew (Pop) C a rn e s •.............................. EDDIE GUILMARTIN Ike S k id m o re ...................................................... PASCHAL WALSH Cord Elam (S h e riff)..................... . y & . . ................. HENRY KENNEDY G ertie C u m m in g s ......... . j .................................. MELANIE RYAN Slim .......... A . . < ..................W - ............................ SEAMUS GREENE
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‘" i /Laurey’s Friends
^ M IC H E L E O ’BYRNE, ZINDA FITZGERALD, CATHY VARD, CATHY O ’MALLEY, KATHY CORBOY, URSULA CONLAN
Dream Ballet L a u re y .......................................................................EILEEN O ’CARROLL C u r ly ......................................................................................JOHN BRADY P ig ta ils ......................................................................... ISABELLE MARTIN Jud Fry ................................................................... ARTHUR McGAURAN Dance Hall G irls .......................................................................TINA WALL OLIVIA BRENNAN RAPHAELLE CULLEN
Place: Indian Territory (State of Oklahoma).
Act I Scene I The Front of Aunt Eller’s Farm House. Scene II The Smoke House. Scene III A Grove on Aunt Eller’s Farm. Interval
Act II Scene I The Skidmore Ranch. Scene II Skidmore’s Barn. Scene III The Back of Aunt Eller’s Farm House.
Chorus of Girls, Farmers and Cowboys M isses Dodo O’Hagan, Eva Staveley, Ann Crossan, Nuala Kealy, Joan Brittan, Michelle Foynes, Paula Hannan. Messrs. Patrick Garton, Ray Ryan, Michael Ryan, Seamus Greene, Frank Jacob, Vincent Becker, Tim Dunne, Seamus Murphy, Noel Dillon, Larry Shelley, William Bennett, Robin FitzGerald, Jack Kelly, John O ’Rourke, Peter Winckworth.
Dancers Misses Eileen O ’Carroll, Isabelle Martin, Raphaelle Cullen, Leo O ’Kennedy, Mary Godfrey, Tina Wall, Olivia Brennan, Lorraine Byrne, Anne Macken, Priscilla Hamilton. Messrs. Desmond Allen, Donal Shiels, Andy Herrity, John Brady, Shay Gibson, Bernard Farrell.
For Rathmines & Rathgar Musical Society Honorary General Secretary : PATRICK CAMPBELL Honorary Treasurer : MICHAEL FORDE Honorary Booking Secretary : FRED TAYLOR Honorary W ardrobe M aster : ARTHUR SALMON Honorary W ardrobe Mistress : CYNTHIA TAYLOR Honorary Business Secretary : SEAN HOGAN Stage Director : BETTY LONG Assisted by : DAPHNE MILLAR NORA O ’ROURKE CLODAGH FOLEY Public Relations
GLADYS MacNEVIN
Block Booking Enquiries: Mr. Fred Taylor, “ Dartry” , Ardtona Avenue, Dublin 14. Telephone: 981249
For Gaiety Theatre Stage Manager : PADDY JONES Assistant Stage Manager : GEORGE McFALL Chief Electrician : SEAN BURKE Lighting Equipment by Bourke Strand Electric No Smoking in the Auditorium please
Dublin Grand Opera Society
S p rin g Season '82 Nightly at 7.30 p.m.
La Favorita (Donizetti) April 12th, 14th, 16th, 20th & 22nd «» « »« »« » «»« » « »« »
Tosca (Puccini) April 13th, 15th, 21st & 24th «»«»«» «»«»«»«»«»
Nabucco (Verdi) April 19th, 23rd, 26th, 28th & 30th «»«»«»«»«»«»«»«»
L’Elisird’Amore (Donizetti) April 27th & 29th and May 1st «»«»«»«»«»«»«»«» Saturday 17th April at 8 p.m.
O p eratic C oncert Piero Cappuccilli (Baritone) with the Radio Eireann Symphony Orchestra NOW
BOOKING
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ELO PRESS LTD 4 9 R eu b en A ven u e D ublin 8
T e le p h o n e : 7 5 1 2 5 7
The public may leave at the end of the performance by all Exit doors. Persons shall not be permitted to stand or sit in any of the gangways intersecting the seating, or sit in any of the other gangways. (Copy of by-laws) The taking of photographs in the auditorium is strictly forbidden.
ALL'S W ELL THAT ENDS WELL AT THE GAIETY And what better w ay to end the pantomime than with a free Coke (worth 33p). FREE w ith every burger you buy at Burger King just around the corner in Grafton Street (Opposite W oolworths).
BURGER
KING
N.B. Present th is coupon w he n ordering. O ffe r c lo s e s M a rch 31st.1982 C o ca -C o ia a n d C f ll'e a r e re g is te re d Irr id e m a rk s w h ic h ir i e n l i ly m e s a m e p ro d u c t o l T h e C o c a -C o la C ru np an v
PALM GROVE
W
D elicious Ice Cream
N o w on Sale in this Theatre
We’d like to propose a toast. A toast to a n enjoyable visit to the Gaiety. T he G aiety bars are o p en a half an h o u r before each perform ance, so you can start on a pleasant n o te with a pre-show drink, or order your drinks for the interval. T h en as the curtain I drops o n the first act I
they'll b e waiting at th e table specially reserved for you. After the show o u r bars rem ain open, so you can enjoy further relaxation in congenial company. A nd perhaps p ro p ose another to a s t—a toast to your next visit.
Gaiety Printed by the Elo Press Ltd., Dublin 8.