Classic Film : Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Except for a handful on the pages of specific films or performers over the years, starting threads is something I just don't do, and have never done here on the CFB. But the passing of Debbie Reynolds, a woman of uncommon resilience and determination and an indefatigable performer of endless versatility, so soon after the untimely death of her beloved daughter Carrie hurts just too damned much not to attempt some amelioration through an appreciative remembrance of a force (appropriate word) to be reckoned with.

Exactly one week and one day before the phenomenon that was Star Wars burst upon audiences, Debbie Reynolds opened in a Gower Champion-directed revival of Annie Get Your Gun at San Francisco's Orpheum Theater. My squeeze at the time, a dancer-singer-actor named Marc, was in the company, and I had flown from L.A. to see it, and him. And that night backstage, I encountered Reynolds (only a quick "hello") for what turned out to be the first of many times.

The next was the following Sunday, when the show was dark. Debbie had insisted that, while in San Francisco, we all had to see the drag show at the city's legendary Finocchio's. During it, an apologetic Debbie leaned over and groaned acerbically to Marc and me, "This used to be SO much better...these guys are dogs." She wasn't being mean. She was being honest, and merely hated anything less than tip-top showmanship. Above all, her concern seemed to be for our enjoyment rather than hers. I remember her saying once, "Every audience deserves the very best any performer can give."

The following Friday, I met Carrie Fisher backstage at the Orpheum: "This is Debbie's daughter, Carrie." That's all I knew about her until that Sunday, when Debbie said, "I wanna go see Carrie's movie." Yes, that movie. "But," she added, "I don't want to stand in line for hours."

"Why don't you just call the theater and talk to the manager," Marc suggested, "I'm sure he'll be happy to accommodate you in some way."

"No, I don't want anybody making a fuss," Debbie said, "and I'll go there as early as I have to. I don't mind waiting as long as everybody else, I just want to avoid doing it out on the sidewalk."

Marc said, "Well, we were planning to see it too," so it was arranged that he and I would go stand in line, which we did, and that she would arrive 15 or 20 minutes before showtime. When we saw her pull into the parking lot in her '71 Chevy sedan, Marc went to meet her, and moments later returned: "C'mon."

The manager was delighted to have her, and allowed us all into the lobby until the previous show let out. He then insisted on escorting Debbie (and us) to the best seats in the now-empty house before letting the line in (over Debbie's protests of, "No, no, just open the doors and we'll find seats along with everybody else," but he wouldn't hear of it). Weird thing is, Marc and I were so dazzled by the film that I honestly don't recall what Reynolds had to say about it amidst our excited buzzing. Funny, the things you remember...and the things you don't (in the words of another great screenplay).

In July, Annie Get Your Gun had moved to Los Angeles' Dorothy Chandler Pavilion before a hoped-for Broadway run. During rehearsals for fine-tuning, I had gone down to have lunch with Marc one day. In the house, 20-something dancers and singers were sprawled on the stage, huffing and puffing after the morning's work. On her way out, the fresh-as-a-daisy and twice-their-age human dynamo Debbie said, "I can't understand how these kids are so tired."

There were other encounters in the following weeks at dinners and parties, but my last one occurred eight years later, when I was working at a company that was producing a "Best Of Broadway" show for PBS's Great Performances. Midway through taping, technical difficulties halted the proceedings. While luminaries such as Angela Lansbury, Chita Rivera, Ethel Merman, Robert Morse, Jerry Orbach and others retreated to their dressing rooms to wait out the delay, Reynolds took the stage by herself, and kept the audience entertained for 45 minutes with impromptu stories, jokes, impressions, Q&A and everything else she could think of, and it was better than anything that ended up in the finished show. She was a ham in the best sense of the word, by which I mean this: an audience was there to see a show, and she was damned if she was going to let them sit there staring at an empty stage for three quarters of an hour.

She was the ultimate embodiment of the word, "trouper," and was simply born to entertain. And how she did. As a review of that Annie Get Your Gun production said at the time, "It leaves one to wonder what the true limits of Reynolds' talent are."

I remember the disbelief I felt when a coworker came into my office one morning two years later and said sadly, "Fred died," and I knew exactly who he meant. There had always been Astaire, and it was inconceivable that, suddenly, there wouldn't always be Astaire. The concept of death and that of Fred Astaire somehow didn't fit together.

Same with Debbie Reynolds: it's just beyond imagination that this bundle of endless energy and talent will no longer be with us.

But of course, she, like Fred, always will.

Debbie Reynolds seemed one of the immortals while she lived, and now she's truly among them.





Poe! You are...avenged!

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thank you.


"He was a poet, a scholar and a mighty warrior."

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thanks for the write-up!

~~~~~
Jim Hutton (1934-79) & Ellery Queen =

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Doghouse, my esteemed friend, your post is further proof, if any be needed, that you are the finest contributor to these boards. Lovely stories, fabulous memories, and proof that Debbie was everything we liked to imagine she'd be: a trouper, an indefatigable bundle of talent, and most of all, a nice, down-to-Earth, unpretentious person. It's hard to believe she's no longer with us, but comforting to know she'll never be gone from us.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories



Nicely put!

When I read posts like his, I remind myself that a lot of people on these boards live in the USA (some in places like L.A. and New York), so their chances of meeting a celebrity are pretty good. (Where I live, the chances of meeting a big Hollywood name are next to nothing.) I enjoy reading these kinds of anecdotes.

(Aside: about 10 years ago, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie were in my city for the filming of The Assassination of Jesse James. Apparently they were spotted in one of the food courts of our big mall. That might have been the last time that any Hollywood actor was in my neck of the woods.)

Back to the topic: yup, the OP wrote up a very nice tribute!



~~~~~
Jim Hutton (1934-79) & Ellery Queen =

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories


It's hard to believe she's no longer with us, but comforting to know she'll never be gone from us.
There's no way anyone could say it any better, hob. Thanks.


Poe! You are...avenged!

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

What a beautiful tribute to the incomparable Debbie Reynolds. Thank you for sharing your memories with us on this very sad day.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thank you for that post.

Debbie was in one of the very first films I saw in Hollywood, "How the West Was Won."

I will remember her for trying to preserve Hollywood memories for us all. I really wish that her museum had become a reality.

But one thing that many may not remember was that when she had her TV show, she refused to let it be sponsored by tobacco companies, which caused it to be cancelled. She was a person or principle and amazing talent.

🎭All the world is a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Those are wonderful memories, Doghouse. Thanks very much for sharing them.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thanks for sharing those memories with everyone. I really enjoyed reading what you wrote.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thank you.

I am far more shocked and moved by Debbie's passing than I was about Carrie's. I was never a Star Wars fan, so Carrie was just a name I was familiar with. Debbie is someone I knew and appreciated all my life -- one of the last from MGM's Golden Age.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Doghouse. Good post. Perhaps you should write more often.

She certainly didn't look or act like she was 84. She still had that 1950s spirit the last time I saw her on TV.

What a firebrand! She learned show business from the best teachers in the world.
Too bad she had such bad taste in men.

She was a great collector of vintage Hollywood memorabilia. What happens to all that? I wonder.

.







Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories


What a firebrand!
Great word, jimcat, and thanks for your kind ones.

To the best of my recollection, it was all eventually sold off at three separate auctions, the last of which was a couple or so years ago. All except an original Maltese Falcon (the other sold for millions), which she described as the "one man that did not get away."



Poe! You are...avenged!

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

She always seemed so full of life, so it took the passing of her daughter to weaken her. You obviously knew her so it must be hard for you. Her family having to deal with both of their deaths, can not imagine. Thanks for sharing.

Keep the change, ya filthy animal! 🏠

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Lovely memories of a great entertainer.

thanks, Doghouse, for this thread!

I vividly remember seeing her in UNSINKABLE MOLLY BROWN at Radio City Music Hall.
The "Titanic" scenes were so unusual and unexpected in this movie, they were stunning. I loved her character in it.

"We will bury you"-NIKITA KHRUSHCHEV

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Great post Doghouse. Debbie was a great trouper and a great interview. I'd recommend a podcast she did with Alec Baldwin (really) on WNYC in 2013. The transcript and podcast is available here:

http://www.wnyc.org/story/281718-debbie-reynolds/#transcript

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thank you for the link. I had to listen to it in dribs and drabs so it took until now to get through it.

I was struck by her passing remark about arriving at MGM with "no talent and no experience." Of course the second was true; she had a lot to learn, and learn it she did, and from the best. But that process merely unlocked the door to an astonishing store of talent that was already there. It's perhaps equally astonishing that she herself hadn't suspected it.

Performing is something that can be learned, but not talent. As Rose sings in Gypsy, "Ya either got it, or ya ain't. And, boys, I got it!"

Come to think of it, during her active theater years in the '70s, Reynolds would have made a great Mama Rose.


Poe! You are...avenged!

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thank you for sharing your memories of Debbie. She has always come across to me as an honest, fun and strong woman. A very sad loss. R.I.P Debbie.

When I heard the news yesterday my first thought was that it was due to the shock/stress of losing Carrie. It turns out those suspicions were true(due to comments from Debbie's son).

All sympathies to Debbie and Carrie's family and friends. I can't begin to imagine the pain and shock that family are going through.

I watched Singin in the Rain last night in Debbie's memory. She really does deliver a touching and memorable performance.




Go to bed Frank or this is going to get ugly .

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

What a wonderful tribute. Thank you.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thank you so much for sharing! A beautiful tribute, indeed.

It might sound silly, but Debbie Reynolds was one of those people you can't image dying. She was always full of energy and even in her 80s looked much younger her real age.

I so hope she's in peace now.

I succeeded by saying what everyone else is thinking. Joan Rivers

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

It's posts like this that are going to make me miss the hell out of this board.

Thanks for sharing, Doghouse-6.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories


It's posts like this that are going to make me miss the hell out of this board.

👏


and this one http://www.imdb.com/board/bd0000010/nest/258387729?p=1

one of the positive experiences.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

While I still have the chance I wanted to tell you that your experience reminded me of the Perry Mason television movie that guest starred Debbie Reynolds, as a stage actress, with murder in the theater..

There comes a moment when Debbie Reynolds is reunited with Raymond Burr, and the camera lingers on them. In that moment you know these are two life long friends, that goes way beyond 'acting'. These are real friends. It was such a beautiful moment. If you haven't already seen it I do hope you get to, and I'm sure this moment will be a treasure to you, as you knew her so well, and worked in the theater with her. Kindred spirits, forever.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thanks for that. One of the cable channels periodically runs a bunch of the '80s - '90s Masons in mini-marathons, so I'll be on the lookout for it.


Poe! You are...avenged!

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

great post, thanks for sharing the story.
I wish you would have written more.

Just one quibble - why are you completely non-interesting performers like Jerry Orbach, Robert Morse and Angela Lansbury - luminaries ?????

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thanks for the kind words, Oleg.

Just one quibble - why are you completely non-interesting performers like Jerry Orbach, Robert Morse and Angela Lansbury - luminaries ?????
As the issuer of many a quibble myself, I never begrudge one.

It was a "Best Of Broadway" revue and, with over 30 shows - Mame, Sweeney Todd, The Matchmaker, How To Succeed, Threepenny Opera, Carnival, Promises, Promises and Chicago among others - and 10 Tony awards between them, they're certainly considered luminaries of Broadway theater. Lansbury, of course, is equally well-known for both film and TV work as well, and Orbach became a regular TV fixture himself during the last decades of his life.

Goodness knows there are any number of performers I consider uninteresting, but who nevertheless deserve their due for achieving prominence in their fields. And between you and me, I adore Lansbury.


Poe! You are...avenged!

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thanks for sharing those memories Doghouse. Very evocative writing, and an encouraging reminder to strive to be more of a trouper myself.

My wife's going to love reading this when I show her later - we turn to Singing in the Rain for some pep from time to time and Reynolds delivers that without fail -that stuff never gets old. Listened to a podcast not long ago in which she was cracking edgy jokes and had the audience in the palm of her hand. Not many can radiate that kind of energy at all let alone maintain it like that.

Cheers,

Manton


If to stand pat means to resist evil then, yes, neighbour, we wish to stand pat.

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Well said, Manton. You've really summed up her stage presence - "had the audience in the palm of her hand" - to which I can't think of a thing to add.



Poe! You are...avenged!

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Doghouse-6 writes:


Reynolds took the stage by herself, and kept the audience entertained


I had exactly the same experience with her, also for PBS, although it was a different show. (Chita and Morse were there, but no Orbach, Lansbury or Ethel.) We started out with a terrible script, and when she arrived she said, "What are we going to do about this?" and she and the producers sat down on the floor at the hotel and went through the typed pages with a pencil and she did what she could. She was our host, and when we had sound problem delays, she went out there and took questions and delighted everyone. Also, she was originally scheduled to sing "Strike Up the Band" at the end of the show, but she thought her singing would be anticlimactic following Melba Moore. so she worked out a comic Singin'-in-the-Rain type lip-syncing routine with Moore that was funny (if hokey) and used their talents to best advantage.

But the most important thing she did that night--and I think of it as a guide for myself to this day--was her response to a run-in she had with another star in the show (and I've told this story here before, so it may sound familiar). After the show, apropos of absolutely nothing, Miss X said to Debbie, "Remember that movie we did together when I was just starting out and you asked me to go over your lines with you? You gave me your script and I saw the notes you had written in the margin, and that's when I realized what a shallow actress you are." Rather than being provoked into unpleasant words, Debbie said, "I'm not an actress, dear, you're the actress, look at you, you're so pretty and so deep. No, I'm a clown! I can get by as an actress in the right role, but look who I started out in pictures with... Jimmy Durante... Donald O'Connor... That's who I am, I'm a vaudevillian, and I'm fortunate to have learned from the best."

Ever since then, I have watched her do the same thing in interviews. In response to the "gotcha!" questions, she'd be blunt but gracious, and she'd tell the truth, not necessarily the whole ugly truth, but the truth that allowed room for grace, and when I'd get into a tricky situation, I'd sometimes try to think of how Debbie would handle it, and it has helped!

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

I've borrowed ... ok .. stolen... parts of your last paragraph for my profile page... I hope that you don't mind.

I don't know if we have "met" before but wish that we had done so earlier .. you read like a "keeper" !




Dragging myself back on topic ... and thereby avoiding the "look" from Dog !

I wonder if Carrie learned her "script doctoring" skills from Mom ?

Re: Debbie Reynolds: Personal Memories

Thanks so much, DT, for that contribution. Wonderful. That self-assurance she had, the ability to handle anything with aplomb, was a noteworthy characteristic, onstage and off.

And if her energy could have been harnessed, she could have powered every home in California.

I'm so glad and grateful for your having shared your experiences.



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