My 1st show, from Author Ben Bryant’s Hollywood Memoir “Three Stages”


Here’s an excerpt from Chapter 4 (An Innocent on the Boards) of the first volume of my

Hollywood memoir,

“Three Stages”.

“One day that spring (‘57) I ran into my old high school rival, Bruce Yarnell. He was now a professional singer and he told me about an open audition for the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera production of South Pacific that was being mounted that summer. I had no ambition for professional singing or show business in general but, as a lark, I took a day off work and went to the audition.

“There’s an Actors’ Equity requirement that all shows on a Broadway contract must hold an open audition for both Equity members and non members. The LA Civic productions were, by contract and quality, Broadway shows. The audition I went to was for non-Equity members and there were about 500 guys there. We stood in line and, one at a time, walked into a large room containing a piano, a pianist and a table where two men were seated. … The pianist asked if you were a baritone or tenor, played an appropriate arpeggio and you sang it; “ah, ah, ah” etc. Then one of the guys at the table either said “Thank you.” or told you to take another card and fill it out. I got “Thank you”.

“… I was later to learn that in the business this was known as a “cattle call” and very rarely did anyone get hired.  Anyhow, that was it. My shot at showbiz seemed to be over.

“After the audition I went to ABC to hang out with Cobb [My pal Bob Collins]. Later when I was going to the parking lot I heard a woman’s voice calling my name. I turned around and saw Susan Luckey, a girl I sort of knew from Hollywood High. [A professional dancer]

“These two chance meetings completely changed my life.

“We chatted … [and] the audition story came up. Susan asked if “Mr. Lester” was there. I had no idea who this was but I described the men and she said he wasn’t one of them. Edwin Lester was the founder and executive producer of the Civic Light Opera. She said that she was under contract to him and that he ought to hear me sing. She took my phone number. I went home and forgot all about it.

“A couple of days later I got a call from someone at the Civic who told me … Mr. Lester wanted to hear me for South Pacific. So I showed up. This time there were ten or twelve guys instead of 500. This was the non-Equity callback.

Buy Three Stages

“… I don’t remember what ballad I sang sixteen bars of but the other number I did was Without a Song. This time they didn’t stop me after a few bars and I sang on. Somewhere in the middle I forgot the words but made up lyrics, which rhymed, and kept going. Later Mr. Lester told me that’s what got me the job. I didn’t get rattled and quit but instead made the best of a bad situation.

SoPacComp

“What a job! Instead of working forty hours a week on a line gang for $90.00 I got to sing Bloody Mary is the Girl I Love and There is Nothing Like a Dame eight times a week and get $100.00. I loved showbiz! Not only that, I was “working” with Mary Martin, Georgio Tozzi and Myron McCormick, one of the theater’s all time great comic actors. I was hooked. No more football coach, I was now a professional singer/actor and because of the structure of the South Pacific book, wherein everyone had a character name, it was a principal (as opposed to chorus) contract.

We opened in San Francisco … and played for five weeks at the Curran Theatre. It was my second time in that beautiful city (first time was just two days) and I explored it thoroughly in my many free hours.

“Georgio Tozzi somehow found out that I had been a swimming instructor and confessed that he had never learned to swim. So, at his fancy hotel’s pool, I had the honor of teaching one of Opera’s greatest baritones that fine and healthful sport.

“The next show in the season was Annie Get Your Gun and I hoped to be chosen for the chorus but I didn’t make it. I was very disappointed but in retrospect it was a good thing because I went back to Whittier to finish college.”

My being a “professional actor” had some amusing ramifications in the Whittier College theatre department that you’ll read when you buy Three Stages.

 

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