Homodox

Estelle Getty 1923-2008

Estelle is gone.  I'm so sad.  I loved Sophia Petrillo.

"I've said it before, sluts just heal faster."

"Picture it: Sicily, 1920. . . " 

RIP and thanks for the laughs.

Bette Davis 1908-1989

Bette Davis would be turning 100 this week, so the Boston Globe has an article on her.  Yes, I took the accompanying quiz, and yes, I got all the answers right.  What does that say about me?  Well, I've always scored high on the classic gay quotient when it comes to Broadway and old movies.  I score surprisingly low on fashion and body piercings.  Go figure.

In the 1950s Davis and then husband Gary Merrill made their home at Cape Elizabeth, Maine.  Remember that Davis was a New Englander (as was fellow icon Katharine Hepburn).  On Payson's mantle there was a picture of Davis, Merrill and some others partying together.  It was always a small reminder that what I took for nostalgia, had been the present in Payson's life.  Davis was camp to me, a person to him.  She had so many great movie lines, but my favorite from All About Eve: "Zanuck, Zanuck, Zanuck, what are you two? Lovers?"

Paul Scofield 1922-2008

A look at the Internet Movie Database entry for Paul Scofield yields only 33 theatrical and TV releases.  Yet, he's only one of nine actors/actresses to win a Tony for a role and then win an Oscar recreating that role on film (A Man For All Season).  Likewise he was the sixth actor to win, what I call, the triple crown of acting in 1969 for adding an Emmy to his Tony and Oscar.  His Sir Thomas More is brilliant and there are so many quotable lines from the movie.  My favorite is his reply to Cromwell that he's been cautious.  Scofield, pointedly, says, "I like to keep my affairs regular." Sadly, I never saw him on stage, his main artistic venue.  Au revoir. 

Heath Ledger 1979-2008

James Dean too. “Dylan was completely inspired by James Dean, and Heath has a little bit of James Dean in him, even physically, a kind of precocious seriousness,” Mr. Haynes went on. “As adult actors seem more and more infantile and refusing to grow up, middle-aged guys with their baseball caps, Heath is one of those young people who have a real intuition, a maturity beyond their years.”  That from the November 7, 2007 New York Times article about Heath Ledger who was found dead today in his apartment there.  I'm shocked.  I first noticed him in 1999 in the film, 10 Things I Hate About You.  His performance in Brokeback Mountain was heart-wrenching.  Too young, too talented. . .

Tony Roberts and John McMartin

My friend Glenn, a true Broadway fanatic, just returned from a trip to NYC where he saw Xanadu and the play Is He Dead? Both shows star two veteran actors who have exactly 22 Broadway credits to their resume (according to the Internet Broadway Database). John McMartin has been nominated for a Tony five times and Tony Roberts twice, but neither has won. They are equally accomplished in musicals and straight plays and both have been on Broadway since the 1960s. John McMartin created the role of Oscar in the original production of Sweet Charity opposite Gwen Verdon. He was also in the original cast of Follies and most recently in Grey Gardens. He was in the revival of Showboat as Captain Andy, a role begun by Robert Morse who co-starred with Tony Roberts in Sugar, the musical version of Some Like It Hot. Tony also was in the original Broadway production of Barefoot in the Park (playing Paul, replacing Robert Redford) and in the most recent revival of the same show playing Victor Velasco. That's an incredible 44 Broadway shows (not counting endless movie and TV credits). Very few actors can boast they made a living on Broadway, but these two can!

Marilyn Cooper

If you know her from anywhere, it's her role as Fran Drescher's grandmother on the sitcom, The Nanny.  But this Broadway veteran has a musical resume that is stellar.  She was in the original productions of West Side Story (as one of the Sharks' girls, singing America), Gypsy with Ethel Merman, Two by Two with Danny Kaye, I Can Get It For You Wholesale with Barbra Streisand, and 15 other shows including her Tony-Award-winning turn in Woman of the Year.  She's been making me laugh for over 20 years when I listen to "The Grass is Always Greener."  See what I mean:

Lynne Thigpen 1948-2003

I've always had a penchant for talented performers who fly just below the status of "stars."  Sometimes, after I've seen them on stage they do become stars in TV or movies.  These men and women work and you recognize their faces, but you may not know their names.  Except if you are me. The late Lynne Thigpen is my first true star pick. You know her from Where in the World is Carmen San Diego? and countless other movie and television appearances, including her last stint on The District.  You've heard her on the original Broadway cast albums of Godspell, Tintypes, and Working.  In 1997 she won a Tony for her performance in An American Daughter.  I love her rendition of "If I Could Have Been. . " from Working.  She was a true star.