Friday Dance Party: The First Teen Idol

Davy Jones

1945-2012

Well, "The First Teen Idol" is not exactly accurate. The phenomenon of the Teen Idol predates Davy quite a bit. 

Ricky Nelson was the first Teen Idol
launched by a TV show. His
Dance Party is here.

By the time The Monkees hit the TV airwaves in 1966, turning all four members of the group into teenagers' heartthrobs, Ricky Nelson had already been there, done that.  So had Bobby Rydell, and even Paul Anka, of all people, was considered a teen idol in his early career.  It's sometimes observed that a young Frank Sinatra was the first real teen idol, though I've also heard that some cultural historians point to silent film star and closet case Rudolf Valentino as the first.  I think those folks are confusing "Teen Idol" with "Matinee Idol," but why quibble?

I will go out on a limb, though, and suggest that Davy Jones was the first superstar Teen Idol ("Superteen Idol"?). 

After his death earlier this week (at the shockingly young age of 66), several media outlets displayed polls which put Jones at the top of a list of All-Time Teen Idols.  Again, I wouldn't quibble with that, as I remember the frenzy which greeted his arrival in the national consciousness in 1966.

Jones was the first of the four guys to be cast as a Monkee, primarily due to his being under contract to the studio producing the show.  But he came by his celebrity honestly, I think, as he had legitimate performance credentials before ever being cast in the TV sitcom which made his career. 

Davy spent some time on Brit soap Coronation Street.

In London in 1960, he was part of the supporting cast of the iconic soap opera Coronation Street (that sucker's still running!) when he snagged the scene-stealing role of the Artful Dodger in the original musical Oliver!. He was a replacement in the cast, but his performance was deemed superior to the originator of the part, and he traveled with the show to Broadway. 

Jones won a Tony nomination as
Oliver's Artful Dodger.

While he was Considering Himself One Of Us (and earning a Tony nomination, which he lost to David Burns from A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum), he was spotted by some bigshots from Screen Gems, and put under contract.

(Coincidentally, while appearing on Broadway, Davy and his castmates from Oliver! performed a medley of songs on The Ed Sullivan Show, you can see that grainy clip here.  The date was February 9, 1964, and was also the first appearance of The Beatles on American television.  Davy watched the crowd go wild for the Fab Four, and thought, "I want some of that.")

Vivienne Martin played Nancy to Davy's Dodger. They were both replacements in the long-running Oliver in London.
Davy went to Broadway, playing opposite Georgia Brown, who became the iconic Nancy.

I've written a bit about the formation of The Monkees previously, in fact, the group has appeared several times on the Dance Party. 

Their first album spent 13 weeks at #1.

Go here for their initial appearance in these pages, which coincided with the alarming announcement that Peter Tork had been diagnosed with mouth cancer (it is partially that announcement which makes it so strange that Davy Jones would be the first of the Pre-Fab Four to die.  If you saw a picture of Jones today...or rather, last week, you would agree that he has aged better than any of his castmates.) 

In their later years, reunion tours dissolved into egotistical bickering.

His heart attack this week remains astonishing.  The Monkees also appeared on the Dance Party here, when another Teen Idol of the period, Bobby Sherman, guested on their show. 

The Monkees never recorded a Christmas Album.
This is a compilation of holiday tunes
sung by members of the group at various times
in their careers.

Finally, here is a sweet little clip of a Christmas song the guys sang a capella, putting to rest the lie that they were only actors playing musicians, and not musically talented themselves.

I remember watching The Monkees during its initial two-year run, and everybody at school had their favorite Monkee. 

Davy always had a vaudevillian vibe about him.

Mine was Peter, but Davy must be considered the breakout star of the series. He displayed a non-threatening sexuality which was wildly attractive to adolescent girls (and a few, ahem, boys), and that British accent didn't hurt a bit. His face was plastered all over the teen magazines of the day, and after the show folded, he remained on teenagers' walls for quite a while. 

In 1967, The Monkees won the Emmy as
Best Comedy Series, beating leading contenders
 Bewitched and Get Smart.

The reunion tours always fell apart.
Davy and Mickey formed their own tour,
with Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart,
who wrote several Monkees hits.

There have been many contentious reunion tours of The Monkees over the years, but here's a fact I find most fun.  Decades after his pop stardom had waned, Davy returned to his theatrical roots, to Oliver!, in several regional productions. He was now playing the comic villain of the piece, Fagin.

Davy, Mickey, Peter, and Mike.
Their onscreen chemistry was undeniable and infectious.

There are lots of clips out there of The Monkees performing, so I chose this one for this week's Dance Party.  I think its tone is reminiscent of the show which made Davy Jones a household name, and it's one of the few hits from the group where he is singing lead vocal.  As everybody knows, Davy Jones died this week from a heart attack.

Friday Dance Party: Tune Up

This week's Dance Party celebrates the gent who would probably be known as the preeminent song-and-dance man of his generation, if that term still held any meaning, eminent or otherwise.  He came of age, professionally, during the 60s and 70s, and though he is admired for his performance abilities, it is his innovative work as a director/choreographer which really put him on the map.

I love a spiral staircase.

In the early and mid-60s, Tommy Tune was just your average chorus boy, if your average chorus boy hovered around 6'7.  He had already appeared in several forgettable musicals of the period, and was a featured dancer on Dean Martin's variety show among others, when his career path altered. 

Michael Bennett

His friend and mentor Michael Bennett was summoned to save the musical Seesaw, which was in dire trouble out of town.  Bennett took Tommy with him, placed him in a supporting role, and allowed him to choreograph his own number.  "It's Not Where You Start, It's Where You Finish" turned into a showstopper;  Tune won the first of his ten Tony awards, and his career as a choreographer was launched. 

Michael Bennett's career was launched by dancing his own showstopping numbers in Subways Are For Sleeping and
Here's Love. He passed it forward to Tune in Seesaw, allowing him to create his own choreography for his big number. Tommy stopped the show and won the Tony.

Tune is responsible for a string of eclectic musical hits, including Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Nine, A Day in Hollywood/A Night in the Ukraine, Will Rogers Follies, Grand Hotel, and My One and Only (he cast himself as the leading man in the last one, opposite Twiggy; he won a performance Tony plus an award for his choreography). 

With Twiggy in My One and Only.

Our hero was the first person to win Tony awards in four different categories (that feat has since been repeated by Harvey Fierstein and Audra McDonald), and he still holds the distinction of being the only person to win back-to-back Tonys as director and choreographer.

Tune's film career was limited (Hello, Dolly and The Boyfriend), which partially explains the fact that he is not better known nationally. 

Tommy teaches Streisand (in the purple) the joys of "Dancing,"
 in Hello, Dolly

As Albert in Birdie

But I've been aware of this gentle giant for decades, ever since I saw him in the national tour of My One and Only (Twiggy had been replaced by Sandy Duncan in that one).  Years later, Tommy appeared in a major revival of Bye, Bye, Birdie, which toured the country for a while, aiming for New York. I saw that production as well, and he was as charming as ever, but his costar, Ann Reinking, was a real mess.  The tour folded before reaching New York, as did subsequent new musicals Busker Alley and Dr. Doolittle. 

Michael Jeter brought down the house at the Tonys, winning
for Grand Hotel.

His work has been showcased in these pages before:  the showstopper from Grand Hotel, delivered by the dynamic Michael Jeter, appears here, and a slap-happy tambourine number from Will Rogers' Follies showed up here.  Both clips are terrific and worth a look.

Tommy has spent the last decade or so showcasing his tap talents in a concert act, as well as running an art gallery in Manhattan which, coincidentally, sells his own work.  He's lately been workshopping a disco musical, all about the notorious Studio 54, but the piece does not seem to be gaining much traction. It seems unlikely that another musical under his guidance will reach Broadway again, which is a shame to me, I'm such a fan.

Site of a memorable New Years Eve.

I still remember fondly the New Year's Eve when a group of college friends and I were visiting New York.  We decided, rather than suffer the crowd in Times Square (we had done that the year before, and once is really enough of that), we would celebrate the evening in that most theatrical of watering holes, Joe Allen.  Seated at the large circular table next to ours was a boisterous group who could only have been theatre people.  Leading the party was Priscilla Lopez, from the original A Chorus Line, and Tommy Tune.

A Day in Hollywood/A Night in the Ukraine,
Tommy's riotous "double feature." Priscilla Lopez is
masquerading as Harpo Marx.

I'm not the starstruck teen who was thrilled to once sit next to an idol, but I was still excited to shake Tommy Tune's hand a few years ago, when he was in DC receiving an honorary Helen Hayes award.  I still have that hand.  He turns 73 next week, enjoy this tribute.

Different Direction

I haven't done much socializing in New York yet, but coincidentally, the folks I have spent a bit of time with, all come from my school days.  In the past few weeks, I've reconnected with old friends from high school, from college, and from grad school.

Chris hasn't changed much since her days
behind the wheel of her Studebaker.

The most astonishing reunion was with my high school comrade Chrissy, whom I had not seen in over 30 years.  Back at Kennedy High in Granada Hills, CA, she was part of the theater crowd (I only spent one year there, so everybody I knew was in the theater crowd), and we reconnected a while ago through Facebook. 

Chrissy as a sassy French maid,
that's me with the cane, as The Miser.

Back in the day, she was a diminutive lass, with a little girl voice which served her well in the shows we produced (if there was a young girl in the show, we were set with Chris).  She lives in LA, after spending lots of time living all over the world, and she traveled with her husband to Manhattan for a few days.  We had a terrific reunion over lunch, and she reminded me of the old Studebaker she drove while in high school.  The sight of this teeny tiny gal peering over the steering wheel of that boxy sedan was hilarious.  

Spending time with this old friend reminded me of that year I spent at Kennedy High, when I had such a bang-up time in the theater department;  it was that year which put me on the path I still follow. (I wrote a bit about that here.)

Monica as the wife of the Emperor
who was hoodwinked about his clothes.

Recently, I also reconnected with Monica, a gal whom I knew while in graduate school.  She was an undergrad while I was in the MFA program at USC, and we did 3 or 4 shows together back then.  Granted, we did not interact much onstage, as my recollection is, our characters rarely if ever appeared together.  I'm sure my Dogberry never met her Hero in Much Ado, and in our Measure for Measure, my Pompey the Tapster never ran into her Juliet the Pregnant Girlfriend. 

Monica attended my annual party celebrating
the anniversary of Stonewall.

But the kids' shows we did together were great fun, and she was always a welcome presence at the parties I hosted back then.  Monica's another one I lost touch with until Facebook entered all our lives;  she has recently transplanted to New York with her husband, and continues to act. 

Another kids' show, Monica as a disgruntled rat.

We had a great catch-up lunch, and I was reminded how much I liked her 18 years ago.  (Monica is documenting her life in New York on a very well-written, fun blog which is worth checking out.)

In between those encounters, I spent a fun evening with a college chum. 

Greg is on the far right, in CSUN's
Guys and Dolls.

I must have been a senior at Cal State Northridge when Greg was a freshman, but we knew each other back then, as everyone did who was in the theatre department. 

We lost touch for a long while, but in recent years, reconnected.  Greg has been a Manhattan local, off and on, for a couple of decades, and is in the midst of an eclectic career in playwrighting, stage management, and in the classroom.  He was very excited to learn of my good fortune in snagging an apartment at Manhattan Plaza. 

I've always been directionally challenged, no more so
than when looking out my own window.

Other than my sister, he is the only person to actually see the apartment, and he delivered some unexpected news.  I've been telling anyone who asks (and a lot of New York actors ask) that my swell apartment faces north.  After his arrival, it only took Greg a few minutes of confused examination out my window to alert me that I was flat wrong.  Contrary to what I've been telling people since Halloween, my apartment actually faces east.

I've always been lousy with directions, and this proves the point.  I wonder if my error in direction has bigger meaning.  I've landed in New York (albeit part time) through a series of flukes and luck.  While here, I'm floundering around a bit, like I've been tossed into the deep end of the pool unexpectedly. 

It's not like I'm drowning; at my age, I know how to swim.  But I'm still bewildered by the significance of landing here at this stage of my life, rather than when I was a young pup; I'm not sure what it all means.  I'll be needing my New York friends like Greg to point me in the right direction, since I'm likely to be facing the wrong one.

Auditionary Antics

I am finally spending substantive time at the New York Branch. The past month or so, it's been a week in NY, a week in DC, and so forth, as both cities are in the midst of lots of Auditionary Activity.

DC theatres plan ahead. Many are holding
auditions for shows beginning rehearsal
more than a year from now.

In DC, local theaters are auditioning for their upcoming season, waaaaaaaay too early, as everyone agrees. There is an audition on next week's schedule, I kid you not, for a show which does not begin rehearsal for 14 months! In New York, meanwhile, this is the time of Summer Stock auditions.

I am doing my best to make good use of my time in New York, by attending as many EPAs as possible. The EPA, for those of you mercifully out of the business, is the Equity Principle Audition. Such auditions are required of most theaters by the union, but they usually don't yield much. Oh, I suppose if a particular theatre is looking for an Asian dwarf who speaks Portuguese, and you happen to BE an Asian dwarf who speaks Portuguese, you might get lucky at one of these things. Still, I've been hitting these EPAs as often as possible, otherwise, what am I doing in New York? These things are called Cattle Calls for good reason, as they are always massively attended, even when the odds of snagging a job are so slim. 

NY Shakes performs at the Delacorte,
an amphitheatre in Central Park.

Last week, for example, I attended the call for the New York Shakespeare Festival, which is part of The Public Theatre, and used to be called simply "Joe Papp," after the guy who invented the place. They are famous for producing free Shakespeare in Central Park every summer, and their audition was hugely attended, even though they always cast their shows with named stars.

I nearly passed out from bovine breath
in this waiting area.

This particular audition sticks in my mind, as I was trapped in line for about half an hour between two guys who knew each other, and spent the entire time catching up. They both had bad breath. So here I was, stuck in line, as these guys excitedly talked over me, holding me hostage, as I attempted to dodge a hail of halitosis.

That same day, I attended an EPA at a well-regarded, but small, Off-Broadway house, for a Shaw piece which had a dynamite role for me. This one, of course, was also wildly over-attended, with the line of hopeful actors snaking down two flights of stairs and spilling into the lobby of the theatre.

Irish Repertory Theatre

These auditions can get pretty chaotic, and do not lend themselves to an actor's best work, but whatta ya gonna do?  This one, at least, was being viewed by the director of the play, and the artistic director of the theatre.  Usually, these EPAs are attended by a lowly administrative intern.

There is a rather new program happening in New York these days, called the Agent Access Audition. AEA invites agents to attend an evening audition, where they see about 50 people during a three hour session. 

Yet another waiting area at Equity.

I have no idea if this kind of thing ever garners any response, but I attended one last week, as an alternate.  Yes, even these things are over-attended in New York, and all the audition slots were full, so I spent about two and a half hours in the waiting room, hoping that actors who had lined up at the crack of dawn to snag an audition appointment would, 14 hours later, be too pooped to return to the Equity building to attend.  Sixteen such actors did just that, so I was eventually ushered in to meet the two agents who were graciously dignifying us with their presence.

I call this my Senior Discount Headshot.

One remained silent throughout, but the younger one offered some brusque (but good) advice for me. (And she liked the bearded headshot, which remains, for me, only temporary).

Sadly, she lost interest in me when she discovered that I do not have a "reel," which is a 2 minute compilation of all my film appearances.

My quickie scene in Pecker belongs
on my "reel", as it was included in
the film's trailer.

I've known for years that I need to put together such a thing, but have always put it off, perhaps that is the Next Big Thing on my To-Do List.

This is only a sampling of the audition experiences I've been having the last month or so.  My most promising NY audition was for a showcase production of Hamlet.  Showcase productions are those in which union actors are allowed to participate for free (under certain guidelines).

This one went swimmingly, and the callback was even better. I slayed them, they were putty in my hands. I was rewarded with a request from the producers that they be allowed to keep me in their files for future projects.

In New York, it's even hard to get a job for free.  I would have taken the gig, gladly, even as I roll my eyes at the whole concept of the showcase production.  I've heard that some of these things have such substantial budgets, they even hire casting directors.  They certainly hire designers, who don't work for free, and crew members, ditto, and spend money on rental space as well.  It's only the actor who is expected to donate his time and expertise, and is expected to be grateful for the opportunity.  I can't think of another professional who conducts his career in such a fashion.

Ah well, it's the New York way, I suppose.  I am lucky that I am able to remain part of the DC talent pool while this Manhattan Project unfolds.  As I said, it's audition time in DC as well, and I may have some promising news on that front in a few weeks.  Meanwhile, I remind myself, it's a fine life.

Friday Dance Party: I Danced With Somebody

Rudy

You won't find an obit for Whitney Huston in these pages, you can certainly go elsewhere for that.  But her death this week caused some strong memories to surface for me, of a time in the 80s when her music received top play in the dance clubs, a time when I was still trying to figure out my life as a gay man. 

Those halcyon days of youth.

I spent more time than I should admit, carousing in those clubs, with Whitney and her contemporaries blaring in the background.  I lived in the San Fernando Valley section of Los Angeles at the time, and there were several gay bars with dance floors in the area.  I usually spent my time there, but on occasion, I would drive "over the hill," as we called it (I imagine they still do), into Hollywood.  Or more accurately, West Hollywood, which hosted the really big nightclub scene.

Studio One was the big dance club at the time.

For the life of me, I don't recall in which of those clubs I met Rudy, but without a doubt, Whitney Huston was playing overhead.  Rudy was (ahem) several years younger than I, and was only recently transplanted to the U.S.  He had a pretty good grasp of English, considering he was from someplace in South America, but he was in dire need of someone to take care of him.  I took him home the night we met, and not in the way you think, you deviants. 

According to Facebook,
this is Rudy today.

His friends had left him behind, and I drove him back to the apartment he shared with another Latin friend. 

He was sleeping on the couch of the apartment, while his buddy and another roommate took the two bedrooms. 

Rudy's bedroom: the couch.
 I have no idea what is perched on my head.
I was just too precious to live.

This other roomie, the only American in the group, was a certifiable nutcase, and, I came to realize, had a huge infatuation with Rudy. 

Rudy became a bear.
I became a hermit.

Believe me, there were some pretty dramatic moments during the brief time Rudy and I had our fling.  One particularly scary night right out of Stephen King, this roommate got drunk and brandished a kitchen knife.  All this drama was unsettling to me, to say the least, but Rudy and I would never have lasted anyway.  The differences in our backgrounds were just too great, and I was still struggling with being completely open about my sexuality, so we didn't really stand a chance.

It's been many years since I thought about that torrid time of my life;  the various tributes to Whitney Huston which have been running all week brought it all back to me. 

Those tributes usually included snippets of her big hits, two of which provided the soundtrack to my fling with Rudy.  "I Want To Dance With Somebody" was probably her biggest dance hit, but it's the other song which takes me back to my clubbing days, and to my days with Rudy; it provides this week's Dance Party. 

Sharing white zin in Santa Barbara.
Yeah, I was that guy.

I am absolutely sure this was the song playing when we met, and is also the song to which we first danced.  When I hear it now, I realize how prescient the lyrics were;  I am taken back to Rudy, and to those young, sexually charged days of the 80s.