CDs: Early Havoc

Monty Woolley bet his friend Cole Porter that Porter, the master of the sophisticated love lyric, couldn't write a song built around a title as plain as "I Love You." Perhaps because the melody Porter supplied for his simple lyric was superior, "I Love You" became the breakout number from Porter's 1944 Broadway hit Mexican Hayride.

It was a period of stage hits for Porter. Just prior to Mexican Hayride, the composer-lyricist provided the scores for Leave It to Me! introducing Mary Martin, DuBarry Was a Lady with Bert Lahr and Ethel Merman, Panama Hattie Merman, Let's Face It Danny Kaye, and Something for the Boys Merman. But there was a feeling among the critical fraternity that Porter was no longer supplying his best work, an assertion that didn't disappear until Kiss Me, Kate came along in '48.

Mexican Hayride was a wartime frolic built around star clown Bobby Clark, whose trademarks were painted-on eyeglasses and a big cigar. The book was by Herbert and Dorothy Fields, who had collaborated with Porter on Let's Face It and Something for the Boys. Because Mike Todd was the producer, no expense was spared to make Mexican Hayride an eyepopper, with a cast of ninety, lavish settings, a bevy of lovely chorines, and 600 costumes. Such an expenditure allowed Todd to charge the unusually high top ticket price of $5.50.

Clark played Joe Bascom, a.k.a. Humphrey Fish, a racketeer and fugitive from justice hiding out in Mexico. By accident, Joe is hailed as America's goodwill ambassador, and is obliged to submit to a week of tributes. Meanwhile, pursued by the law, he's forced to don various disguises, all of which allowed Clark to score heavy laughs.

The show's leading lady was June Havoc, who was, of course, Gypsy's Baby/Dainty June. At this point, while she had scored a hit as Gladys in Pal Joey 1940 and had gone on to appear in films, she was still often referred to as Gypsy Rose Lee's sister. Lee had also worked for Porter, replacing future Gypsy star Ethel Merman in DuBarry Was a Lady. In Mexican Hayride, Havoc played Montana, a female bullfighter from America. The romantic lead was taken by baritone Wilbur Evans in his Broadway debut; Evans would follow Mexican Hayride with Up in Central Park, the London South Pacific, and By the Beautiful Sea.

During its tryout, Porter expressed his unhappiness with the show. But thanks to Todd's elaborate production and Clark's drawing power, Mexican Hayride played a healthy 481 performances at the Winter Garden. The show's souvenir program even boasted a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt, who declared that "anyone who wants a pleasant evening will enjoy this show." Minus Porter's songs, Mexican Hayride became a 1948 film, starring Abbott and Costello.

Clark stayed until the end of the run. When Havoc withdrew to replace Ethel Merman during rehearsals of Sadie Thompson, Havoc's Mexican Hayride songs were divided between Imogen Carpenter, who took over Havoc's role of Montana, and Luba Malina, who had been playing a supporting role from the beginning. Porter was so displeased by Havoc's departure that he decreed that the actress would never again be considered for his shows. Havoc's later musical-theatre work would include the final Miss Hannigan in the original Broadway production of Annie and a national tour as Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd.

In addition to numerous ballets and local-color sequences, Mexican Hayride had only nine songs. Decca's cast recording preserves eight of them, originally on four 78 discs, later on a ten-inch LP, and still later on one side of a Columbia Special Products twelve-inch LP paired with Decca's cast album of Texas, Li'l Darlin'. Now Decca Broadway has given Mexican Hayride its CD premiere.

Because Clark wasn't a singer, he was featured in only two of the show's musical numbers, "Girls" and the eleven o'clock showstopper, "Count Your Blessings," a trio for Clark, Havoc, and George Givot. But Clark didn't record the album, whose only soloists are Havoc, Evans, and Corinna Mura, a Latin soprano with an extraneous role but two exotic numbers, including Porter's favorite from the score, "Sing to Me, Guitar."

For the recording, Evans sings Clark's "Girls," and Havoc does "Count Your Blessings" as a solo with male quartet. Because Havoc recorded neither Pal Joey nor Sadie Thompson, this is her only Broadway cast album. In addition to the country-ish "Blessings," she has a good list song called "There Must Be Someone for Me" and a tongue-in-cheek number about romance, "Abracadabra."

Havoc's cutesy style won't be to all tastes, but she's certainly distinctive. The operatic Evans does quite well by "I Love You," the score's only popular number. Although Evans got to record one of Clark's numbers, he didn't get to preserve his first number in the show, "The Good-Will Movement," but then that would have required an additional 78.

While it's undistinguished Porter, the Mexican Hayride cast album makes for a moderately pleasant twenty-three minutes or so. To fill out the new CD, Decca Broadway has followed the eight Mexican Hayride tracks with a fine bonus, a 1940 album featuring Mary Martin in six Porter songs, including her starmaking Leave It to Me! number, "My Heart Belongs to Daddy." She offers silken, elegant renditions of "I Get a Kick Out of You" and "What Is This Thing Called Love?," and insinuating accounts of "Katie Went to Haiti" and "Let's Do It."

I regret to report that the initial pressing of the new CD contains an error of the sort we have had on Decca Broadway's recent reissues of The Merry Widow and Song of Norway. Of the six Martin/Porter tracks, one, "Why Shouldn't I?," has been accidentally omitted. In its place track #12, we get, of all things, Martin in the "Vision Song" from her Decca album of Lute Song.

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