I was extremely sorry to read about the passing of Rebecca Luker at the age of 59 from ALS. She was one of my very favorite Broadway performers. How wonderful was she? She starred in the revivals of The Sound of Music, The Music Man and Show Boat. And starred as 'Winnifred Banks' in Mary Poppins. She had the most glorious, pure, soaring voice, and I was lucky enough to see her once near the start of her career when I drove down to San Diego to see the pre-Broadway tryout of the musical Harmony, a show I've written about here often (such as here), with music by Barry Manilow -- even though I didn't have a clue who she was at the time. Also in that production was Danny Burnstein, who later went on to star in the recent revival of Fiddler on the Roof...and all the more important, later married Luker. The best I can offer here is a piece I wrote back on October 27, 2015 when I was posted videos from that production of The Music Man. Here's the next video from our festival of the 2000 Broadway revival of The Music Man, which I wrote about yesterday. It also comes from that same Boston Pops concert, which I'm guessing did a tribute to the show. This is Rebecca Luker, who starred as Marian Paroo, singing "Goodnight, My Someone.". Yesterday, I told the story about how a good friend of mine who grew up in New York and saw the original production of The Music Man repeated times and swore by Baraba Cook's original performance, said that it wasn't until seeing Ms. Luker that anyone came close. (Readers of these pages will also recall the many articles I wrote about seeing the World Premiere 1997 production of Barry Mannlow's musical Harmony in San Diego, and Luker was in that show. And not shockingly, was a gem.) When they did a TV version of The Music Man in 2003 with Matthew Broderick, they cast Kristen Chenoweth to play Marian. It always bothered me that they didn't have Rebecca Luker re-create her part. It's not that Chenoweth was better known -- again this was back 12 years ago, and she wasn't. She'd done a few things on TV, but all in small supporting roles. She was largely a Broadway star -- but then, so too was Luker, who had three Tony nominations at that point. (More since.) And great as Kristen Chenoweth's singing is, Luker's voice is, I think, the more proper range for Marian. One odd possibility that I've wondered is that Matthew Broderick is pretty short, and Ms. Chenoweth is extremely short. Rebecca Luker might be taller, and therefore not as good a "fit." Or...maybe they just wanted Kristen Chenoweth. I like her. She was absolutely fine. But I think Rebecca Luker is better for the role. And deserved the chance to re-create it on film. In my article yesterday, I also more accurately described her has "the ethereal Rebecca Luker." If you don't know her work, here's why. For that article, I added a Bonus Note, writing -- "After posting this, I came across Rebecca Luker singing this song onstage during a live performance. I thought about swapping out videos, but I figured that since Craig Bierko got his Boston Pops performance with good sound quality, Rebecca Luker deserved her, as well. But if you want to see that onstage video, as well, just click here. But rather than make you bother going to the effort of clicking today, I'll just post it instead -- And it's only proper that we add one more video from that 2000 revival. Here is the scene leading into the song and then Rebecca Luker singing to Craig Bierko, "Til There Was You." Leading into the following dialogue into their reprise of "76 Trombones" and "Goodnight, My Someone." And we'll end with a finale encore. Here is Rebecca Luker and the Von Trapp children from the 1998 Broadway revival of The Sound of Music" singing "Do-Re-Mi." Happily, videos and albums exist.
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AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
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