Being in a Really Good Moody
Back in 2010, Lionel Bart's musical Oliver! celebrated its 50th anniversary with a new production that was performed at the Royal Drury Lane Theatre, which featured Russ Abbot as Fagin. On what I believe was opening night, the show had a special guest during the curtain call -- Ron Moody, who originated the role of Fagin in that original West End stage production and then largely came out of semi-retirement in 1968 to recreate the role for the Oscar-winning Best Picture, which got him an Oscar nomination as Best Actor and revitalized his career...performing in movies and TV for another 44 years, until 2012! He even did a revival of Oliver! in 1984 (from which I posted a video here.)
The then-86-year-old Moody's curtain call speech at that 50th anniversary production -- really almost more of a performance -- is a total treat, and the definition of appreciating the limelight and chewing up the scenery. It got recorded from the audience (not very well, alas, but a good enough to be a joy) and was split into two videos. I'll post the second one first, since it's the most entertaining -- as it features him singing in full, strong voice, "You've Got to Pick a Pocket or Two" with the urchins joining in with their regular choreography. And then there's a bonus "finale" musical number after. Actually, sort of two.
The sound isn't great, and I wish the person filming this had a better sense of keeping the camera on Moody more, but as I said, as long as you're forewarned, having this on the record is wonderful. All with a large photo of Lionel Bart looming in the back above everyone.
For those interested, the first part of the video is enjoyable, as well, though it's more of his speech, which at times is difficult to understand with the poor sound. However, helping make it fun is not just the applause that greats his appearance, and his tales of the early rehearsals of the show and opening night, but also that as Moody gets into things, he periodically breaks into singing short bits of others songs from the musical, not all of which were Fagin's.
There is a bit of overlap between the two videos, so if you watched the previous one, you can stop around the 8-minute mark.
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