Fosse (98 page)

Read Fosse Online

Authors: Sam Wasson

BOOK: Fosse
12.59Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub

[>]
   “Fosse has served up a smorgasbord”: Andrew Sarris, “The Pimp and the Simp,”
Village Voice,
November 15, 1983.

[>]
   “Fosse must believe that he can make”: Pauline Kael, “The Perfectionist,”
New Yorker,
November 28, 1983.

[>]
   “He took to the woods”: Alan Heim, interview with the author, July 22, 2010.

[>]
   “He really thought he was going to win”: Wolfgang Glattes, interview with the author, November 27, 2010.

[>]
   “I didn’t work for years after that”: Mariel Hemingway, interview with the author, May 30, 2011.

[>]
   “I found it very strange”: Teresa Carpenter, interview with the author, July 23, 2010.

[>]
   “You really understood this”: Ann Reinking, interview with the author, November 15, 2010.

 

THREE YEARS

 

[>]
   he exchanged for a plain brown home: Jay Sears, interview with the author, February 16, 2012.

[>]
   He paneled the garage with mirrors: Phoebe Ungerer, interview with the author, December 13, 2012.

[>]
   “It’s painful for me to go”: R. E. Krieger, “People in the News,”
Hartford Courant,
January 4, 1984.

[>]
   Contentious and expansive, Budd was: Phoebe Ungerer, interview with the author, December 13, 2012.

[>]
   “For some reason when you get older”: Tom Hinckley and Kevin Gault, “Bob Fosse,”
Cable
Guide,
November 1984.

[>]
   He found a mangled stray cat: Pete Hamill, “Fosse,”
Piecework
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1996).

[>]
   He called Doctorow in the middle of the night: E. L. Doctorow, interview with the author, May 5, 2012.

[>]
   “It’s generally tough”: Hinckley and Gault, “Bob Fosse.”

[>]
   “I saw it”: Bruce Jay Friedman, interview with the author, August 20, 2012.

[>]
   Cohn never made his clients sign
and following:
Susan Anderson, interview with the author, January 14, 2013.

[>]
   “Sam would lecture”: Sigourney Weaver, interview with the author, August 19, 2012.

[>]
   “He couldn’t believe”: Susan Anderson, interview with the author, January 14, 2013.

[>]
   Chayefsky was among: Tom Bierbaum, “ATAS Inducts Seven into Hall of Fame,”
Daily Variety,
January 23, 1984.

[>]
   “This is a very fickle business”: Shaun Considine,
Mad as Hell: The Life and Work of Paddy Chayefsky
(New York: Random House, 1995), 399.

[>]
   he threw the Doctorows a dinner party
and following:
E. L. Doctorow, interview with the author, May 5, 2012.

[>]
   “He actually interrogated my parents”: Deborah Geffner, interview with the author, October 1, 2010.

[>]
   “He was the ultimate host”: Laurent Giroux, interview with the author, December 13, 2010.

[>]
   He put out cigarettes, and when: Ibid.

[>]
   “Come on, we’re going to do”: Ibid.

[>]
   Bob and Phoebe met at one of Doctorow’s garden parties
and following:
Phoebe Ungerer, interview with the author, December 13, 2012.

 

TWO YEARS

 

[>]
   establish a theatrical scholarship: “Fosse Leaves Money for Scholarship, Friends Dinner,” Associated Press, October 3, 1987.

[>]
   Budgeted at five million and paid for: Carol Ilson,
Harold Prince: A Director’s Journey
(New York: Limelight, 2000), 328.

[>]
   One of the Shuberts, Bernie Jacobs, eased Prince: Ibid., 332.

[>]
   “It became for me the most painful”: Ibid.

[>]
   “Bob didn’t throw out the choreography”: Valarie Pettiford, interview with the author, February 2, 2011.

[>]
   “Mike, do you think we have”: Mike Berkowitz, interview with the author, March 1, 2011.

[>]
   “The interlude gives rueful life”: Frank Rich, “Stage: ‘Grind,’ from Harold Prince,”
New York Times,
April 17, 1985.

[>]
   
Big Deal,
he said to Vereen: Ben Vereen, interview with the author, January 11, 2011.

[>]
   in three minutes, and over the phone: E. L. Doctorow, interview with the author, May 5, 2012.

[>]
   “the worst migraine you’ve had”
and following:
Samuel G. Freedman, “How an Uneasy Alliance Helps Shape Broadway,”
New York Times,
April 1, 1984.

[>]
   “He knew there was never going”: Gordon Harrell, interview with the author, February 23, 2011.

[>]
   Fosse’s bank statements had lost a certain something: Ibid.

[>]
   “Gwen had a photographic memory”: Ann Reinking, interview with the author, November 15, 2010.

[>]
   Fosse took his seat beside Gwen and: Dana Moore, interview with the author, February 11, 2011.

[>]
   “She was going through everything Charity was”: Jane Lanier, interview with the author, February 10, 2011.

[>]
   “Fosse just sort of sat there”
and following:
Dana Moore, interview with the author, February 11, 2011.

[>]
   Fosse slid next to Mimi Quillin: Mimi Quillin, interview with the author, February 2, 2011.

[>]
   “I know that people think it’s strange”: Gwen Verdon interview,
Dance in America,
WNET archives, September 6, 1989.

[>]
   “Don’t go to them, make them”: Dana Moore, interview with the author, February 11, 2011.

[>]
   it had from the beginning: Carol Alt, interview with the author, April 1, 2011.

[>]
   “It’s awful!”: Mimi Quillin, interview with the author, February 2, 2011.

[>]
   “It was like a fight was going to”: Ibid.

[>]
   Fosse asked Allen to run it again
and following:
Carol Alt, interview with the author, April 1, 2011.

[>]
   “God, I can’t do this”: Mimi Quillin, interview with the author, February 2, 2011.

[>]
   “Well, I’m probably not going to”: Ibid.

[>]
   “It used to get a little ugly”: Janice Arkatov, “Rupert Is at Home in ‘Charity,’”
Los Angeles Times,
July 27, 1985.

[>]
   “Everyone seems a little younger”: Dan Sullivan, “Stage Review: Allen Puts Sweetness Back in ‘Charity,’”
Los Angeles Times,
July 22, 1985.

[>]
   While on
Sweet Charity,
dancer Tanis Michaels: Fred Mann III, interview with the author, February 22, 2011.

[>]
   “We didn’t know what was happening”: Donna McKechnie, interview with the author, October 14, 2010.

[>]
   “By the time I was thirty-nine years old”: James Horvath, interview with the author, January 14, 2011.

[>]
   Afraid for their own safety and feeling guilty: Name withheld, interview with the author, September 10, 2010.

[>]
   “Cast members would drink out of Budweiser”: Dann Dulin, “Bebe Neuwirth Moves Through Life Helping Others,”
A&U
, December 2011.

[>]
   “He would come back the next day”: Jane Lanier, interview with the author, February 10, 2011.

[>]
   Michaels was given three months to live, but: Ibid.

[>]
   “Because Bob said yes to Tanis”: Fred Mann III, interview with the author, February 22, 2011.

[>]
   Six months before he began casting: Gordon Harrell, interview with the author, February 23, 2011.

[>]
   “We used six synthesizers in the pit”: Phil Ramone, interview with the author, October 10, 2010.

[>]
   “Even though the unions were against it”: Ibid.

[>]
   He put speakers in the back: Ibid.

[>]
   “I want the dissolves and softness”: Kevin Kelly, “Fosse, at 58, Finds No Security in Success,”
Boston Sunday Globe,
February 9, 1986.

[>]
   “
Big Deal
turned people against him”: Tony Stevens, interview with the author, February 8, 2011.

[>]
   “At a certain point I feel”: Kevin Kelly, “Bob Fosse’s New ‘Big Deal,’”
New York,
April 7, 1986.

[>]
   as many as eight hundred others sang and danced: Ibid.

[>]
   “If you know a dancer that’s a little off”: Valarie Pettiford, interview with the author, February 2, 2011.

[>]
   The only comparable rehearsal venue still in use was: “The Minskoff Studio Closing Over Rent,”
New York Times,
June 15, 1989.

[>]
   a heart ailment reportedly forced Bennett: Jeremy Gerard, “Michael Bennett, Theater Innovator, Dies at 44,”
New York Times
, July 3, 1987.

[>]
   Beset with sciatica, Fosse rehearsed: Kelly, “Bob Fosse’s New ‘Big Deal.’”

[>]
   “I can hardly move”: Kelly, “Fosse, at 58, Finds No Security in Success.”

[>]
   “He had such a big principal cast”: Diana Laurenson, interview with the author, January 17, 2011.

[>]
   but never before had he titled a notebook: LOC, box 11B.

[>]
   “The ensemble didn’t know what”: Stephanie Pope Caffey, interview with the author, March 1, 2011.

[>]
   his back went out and he was carried: Ibid.

[>]
   “Candy,” he said: Candy Brown, interview with the author, January 7, 2011.

[>]
   “It’s an absolute nightmare”: Bob Fosse, May 18, 1986, interview with Kevin Boyd Grubb, LOC, audiocassette.

[>]
   Maneuvering over sixty microphones: Ibid.

[>]
   Herb Gardner kindly encouraged Fosse to: Herb Gardner/Bob Fosse correspondence, LOC, box 8B.

[>]
   Neil Simon came to Boston to write: Gordon Harrell, interview with the author, February 23, 2011.

[>]
   “If it’s a screw-up”: Kelly, “Fosse, at 58, Finds No Security in Success.”

[>]
   “I’ve made a tremendous amount of changes”: Larry Katz, “Fosse’s Big Gamble,”
Boston Herald,
February 28, 1986.

[>]
   “Could you possibly choreograph”: Gerald Schoenfeld/Bob Fosse correspondence, March 19, 1986, LOC, box 8B.

[>]
   Fosse was too outraged to parse them: Phoebe Ungerer, interview with the author, December 13, 2012.

[>]
   “I don’t think they like it”: Diana Laurenson, interview with the author, January 17, 2011.

[>]
   “People are telling me it’s too dark”: Don Rebic, interview with the author, February 28, 2012.

[>]
   “What do you think we should do”: Wayne Cilento, interview with the author, January 27, 2011.

[>]
   Fosse had been unwell for months: Phoebe Ungerer, interview with the author, December 13, 2012.

[>]
   “Fosse makes a sudden gesture”: Kelly, “Fosse, at 58, Finds No Security in Success.”

[>]
   “He was in a hyperactive frenzy”
and following:
Dan Wilensky, interview with the author, October 2, 2010.

[>]
   “What if it isn’t any good?”: Chet Walker, interview with the author, December 22, 2010.

 

ONE YEAR

 

[>]
   “The party after was not a pleasant experience”: Alan Heim, interview with the author, July 22, 2010.

[>]
   “If for only 10 minutes or so”: Frank Rich, “Theater: ‘Big Deal,’ from Bob Fosse,”
New York Times,
April 11, 1986.

[>]
   “ultimate Fosse, a minestrone of everything”: Kathryn Doby, interview with the author, November 27, 2010.

[>]
   “I heard about a couple of reviews”: Kevin Grubb, “Fosse and His Followers,”
Dance Magazine,
August 1986.

[>]
   “He
loved
that show”: Ann Reinking, interview with the author, November 15, 2010.

[>]
   “
Big Deal
was ahead of its time”: Kathryn Doby, interview with the author, November 27, 2010.

[>]
   “What he did was compose a folk opera”: E. L. Doctorow, Bob Fosse Memorial, Palace Theater, October 30, 1987, New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Theatre on Film and Tape Archive.

[>]
   to find the notice had been posted: Wayne Cilento, interview with the author, January 27, 2011.

[>]
   Gwen came with Nicole and handfuls
and following:
Grubb, “Fosse and His Followers.”

[>]
   “You know how show folks are”: Kevin Boyd Grubb,
Razzle Dazzle: The Life and Work of Bob Fosse
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989), 263.

[>]
   found themselves at the front of the house, lingering: Valarie Pettiford, interview with the author, February 2, 2011.

[>]
   “I wanted to make you all stars”: Loretta Devine, interview with the author, November 19, 2010.

[>]
   Sam Cohn arranged for the writer Michael Herr
and following:
Michael Herr, interview with the author, April 13, 2011.

[>]
   Herr began his outline with
and following:
Michael Herr,
Winchell
(New York: Knopf, 1989).

[>]
   “I changed my mind”
and following:
Michael Herr, interview with the author, April 13, 2011.

[>]
   Phoebe could see Fosse extricating: Phoebe Ungerer, interview with the author, December 13, 2012.

[>]
   He could spend afternoons sketching: Ibid.

[>]
   Martin Richards approached him: Martin Gottfried,
All His Jazz
(Cambridge, MA: Da Capo, 1998; first published by Bantam in 1990), 447. Citations refer to the Da Capo edition.

[>]
   Sam had been pushing it: Phoebe Ungerer, interview with the author, December 13, 2012.

[>]
   he considered filming
Dreamgirls:
Ann Reinking, interview with the author, November 15, 2010.

Other books

Surviving Us by Erin Noelle
A Silent Fury by Lynette Eason
Invisible Girl by Kate Maryon
Lust, Money & Murder by Mike Wells
The Perfect Mess by K. Sterling
Boston Avant-Garde: Impetuous by Kaitlin Maitland
The Whole Man by John Brunner
High-Rise by J. G. Ballard