Well, Hello!, Again
I like the stage musical Hello, Dolly! a great deal. I saw it in Chicago with Carol Channing when she toured with the show, and also saw it on Broadway when Pearl Bailey starred with Cab Calloway in the all-Black production.
(I even saw Louis Armstrong at the Ravinia Music Festival the Summer that his massive hit recording of the 'Hello, Dolly!' title song exploded in 1964, the same year the show opened on Broadway. How huge was his hit? The audience was so enthusiastic for his performance that he sang -- I'm not exaggerating -- six encores! In fairness, he didn't sing it all the way through each time. But did for two of the encores, and then sang the chorus for the other four.)
And I enjoy the 1969 movie adaptation, it's very well done, but as talented as Barbra Streisand is and did a good job in the film, but was just miscast, much too young for the role of an older woman wanting a second chance to "rejoin the human race" years after the death of her longtime husband. Streisand was 26 years old at the time. When Carol Channing and Pearl Bailey did the show on Broadway, they were in their 40s. Ginger Rogers was 54 and Ethel Merman 62 when they joined the original Broadway production. In the recent Broadway revival, Bette Midler was 71 -- and when Bernadette Peters took over, she was 69. So, good as she was, 26 is too young for the role. Still, the movie is fun. But there is one thing (for my taste) that soars above all its positives in the movie, and makes it all worth making whatever its flaws and strengths. And it's that the filmmakers had the brilliant, proper and decent idea to hire Louis Armstrong to join in singing the title song production number of 'Hello, Dolly!'. And Barbra Streisand gets credit for agreeing to share her big scene with him. And what I love, as well, is that they figured out a great way to get him in the number that not only doesn't seem forced -- but comes across as natural. As "of course". The 'Hello, Dolly!' scene takes place in the Harmonia Gardens restaurant where Dolly is returning for the first time in years since the passing of her husband and where there's a dance contest. The dancing is not written that way specially for the movie, it's in the play, and the contest is part of the plot. Because one of the characters who marriage-broker Dolly is advising -- Cornelius Hackel, a clerk who works for Horace Vandergelder (who Dolly wants to marry and has also brought him to the restaurant), is hoping to win money in the dance contest so it can help him get a start in life and with his own hoped-for marriage. So, a band is necessary to the story. It's not necessary to focus much on the band, but it has to be there. And so, the filmmakers realized -- a band needs a bandleader. And who did they decide to put in that otherwise nothing-of-a-role? Well, yes, by now you've figured it out: Louis Armstrong. So, with his back to the audience, when he turns around, sees her arrive back at the Harmonia Gardens after years away and says surprised and happily, "Well, hello, Dolly!" -- it's just a magical popular culture and film moment. And seeing Louis Armstrong get his moment to sing the song he helped make renowned (and also helped the popularity of the Broadway show, that went on to run for 2,844 performances, almost seven years) it's just transcendent. When Barbara Streisand joins in, the movie glows. Once upon a time, the full scene was available on YouTube. It hasn't been for a while. And still isn't. But I found three videos that sort of patch it all together. And it's important to post the full number, because the build-up to Louis Armstrong (which must have been so joyously unexpected to audiences on the film's initial release) helps the whole grand point of the moment. So, here we go. This is the opening of the scene, as Dolly arrives at the Harmonia Gardens in a carriage. It ends right after Dolly sings the bridge of the song --
This continuation has a bit of an overlap, when Dolly again sings the bridge, starting with "I went away from the lights of Fourteenth Street...). And it ends just when you see the back of the bandleader. And he turns around, and... --
And finally, here it is. When Louis Amstrong has turned around, and he gets his moment and the duet, up through his lovely close-up at the end of his performance to the conclusion of the number.
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