Hold the Roses (42 page)

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I got a call from Allen Sviridoff, our former road manager and stage manager, who was now managing Clooney and booking the four girls, whenever they could get four girls together. Marty Kummer had passed away
and I guess Allen took over. He asked me if I wanted to go on a cruise to
Hong Kong with the girls. It had been a few years since I had left. I told
him I didn't think so-I didn't want to go through all that jazz again. He
promised me that there would be none of that. He'd make sure. The money
was great, so I said okay. I called Bernice and she went with me.

The cruise was divine. It was the Holland American Line. They were
celebrating their twenty-fifth-year anniversary with a cruise around the
world. Our trip was eleven days, to Hong Kong. We flew to Honolulu and
met the ship there. Bernice and I went to the ship. The gang went on the
town in Honolulu. Bernice and I had a very nice cabin, and Bernice went
to make arrangements for the second sitting at dinner for the following
evening. She also asked if we could get some dinner that night and they
said, "Yes." So we went into the dining room and we were led to a back
room dining hall. I guess it was for the help-and I blew my stack. I made
such a fuss about "not being help, I was a guest, how dare they do that,"
and so on. Harry Blackstone, the wonderful magician, was having dinner
there and he just looked at me, never saying a word, which was the best
thing to do. I just kept raving on and on and kept saying, "Take care of this
or we wont go on.

The next morning Bernice and I had breakfast in the cabin and then
we went out. I was looking for a man named Peter Farranto. Ruthie had told me to look him up and get to know him. She and Bobbi Baker had
been on some cruises with him; they got to know him and said he was
wonderful guy and would take care of us. He was top man on the ship. He
took care of almost everything and the rest of the crew loved him.

We went into the lounge and I walked over to this tall, good-looking
guy and said, "I'm looking for Peter Farranto."

He said, "I'm Peter Farranto."

I told him, "Ruthie told me to look you up."

And he said, "Everyone on the ship told me Rose Marie is looking for
me. I was scared stiff-I didn't know what I did."

So we laughed, sat down and had a soda and I told him about the
dining room and how mad I was.

He said, "I thought you stars like to be left alone."

"Not me," I said, "I want to sit in the main dining room." So unbeknownst to the other girls, we all sat at the captain's table. I thanked Peter
and he said the captain was very happy to do it.

We were to do two shows for the two sittings, but eleven days without a stop was starting to wear on everyone. I suggested we do our show
the next night. They wanted to put us on the night before we were supposed to land in Hong Kong. I said, "No, put us on tomorrow night.
We've been at sea for about four days and people are getting itchy for some
kind of excitement."

So we rehearsed the next day. The band was not bad. We had Frankie,
Jerry, and Allen, so we were okay. The next night the show went on and it
was a smash. I did a good show because by now I knew practically all the
people on the ship and called them by name, which they loved. I had done
a lot of the activities on the ship, met a lot of people and kidded with
them, so I made use of it when I did my show. Kay Starr was with her
husband at that time, so we didn't see too much of her. Clooney hung out
in her cabin and only came out for lunch and dinner. Helen was with one
of her daughters, Duffy, so they were on their own. Bernice and I hung out
with Peter and had a great time.

As I told you, Harry Blackstone and his wife were part of the show,
and we had some good times with them. I met a lovely lady sitting all by
herself in the dining room, next to our table. I got to talking to her, found
out her name was Alice Mason and we became friends. She threw a cocktail party for the girls, Frankie, Jerry, and Allen, and our traveling companions. We had a great time with champagne and all the wonderful hors d'oeuvres. She started to hang out with us. She was alone, so we adopted
her.

It was getting close to Valentine's Day, and I said to Peter, "We should
do another show. Not like we did before, but just clowning around." Kay
said she'd sing "Love," and Helen said she'd sing "My Funny Valentine."
Clooney didn't want to do the show, so I asked Harry Blackstone to do
about five minutes. He said, "Sure." We went to rehearsal that day. I did
"Chena Luna" with all the jokes-thank goodness Frankie had the music
with him-so we had our little show ready. When we walked into rehearsal,
they were rehearsing the choir, made up of people on the ship. They had
songbooks. I told Allen to get us three songbooks. When the choir finished
rehearsal, they walked, in line, to their seats, like we used to do in school.
I told Allen, "Don't announce us. We'll get in back of the choir line and
just walk on with the songbooks, as the choir goes back to their seats." The
audience loved it, and we were a hit before we started. We did about an
hour show in all and it went really great, just clowning around. Peter kept
telling me that the people on the ship couldn't get over it-that we did a
show we didn't have to do. We had a great time.

We landed in Hong Kong and Bernice, being a travel agent on the
side, got us rooms at the Regency Hotel. What a beautiful room we had.
We even had our own bellboy-he stood outside our door. I turned on the
TV and there I was, on The Dick Van Dyke Show, talking Chinese or Japanese, I don't know which, but it was fun to watch.

We stayed in Kowloon for about three days. Ruthie had made a list of
things to see, buy, and eat. I met a man who made shirts and blousesovernight! We went to his shop and I ordered shirts for Noop, Steve, Bernice,
and myself. It was unbelievable. The prices were low and the workmanship
was terrific. Ruthie told us about a wonderful Chinese restaurant and told
us what to order. We took a cab and found the place all boarded up, so we
went next door and it was a family-type Chinese restaurant. I ordered everything I was supposed to.

Bernice said, "I feel like having some soup."

I said, "Bernice, I've ordered enough food for an army-now you
want soup?" So we ordered the soup and it came in a huge tureen, enough
for ten people. She had one bowl and said she couldn't eat anymore.

I said, "Bernice, this is Kowloon; you don't take home what's left, like
we do in America!"

Then the food came, and came, and of course it was too much and we had to leave it there. I thought, "I'll probably want some of this about
midnight," but we didn't take home any cartons.

Next day we had high tea at the Peninsula Hotel-a classic thing to
do in Kowloon. I shopped like crazy and had a good time on Nathan
Road, located in the middle of the city, the shopping center of the world!
We flew back to California, with a stopover in Tokyo. It was a long trip,
and as much as I enjoyed it, I was glad to get home.

Allen called again about some dates he lined up for the girls, only
Clooney was out of it. So it was Helen, Kay Starr, Margaret and myself.
There were more switches than a railroad yard! But it still worked. I decided we needed a new finale. I remembered a song from Scrooge called
"Thank You Very Much." I called Frankie and told him to get a copy of the
song, come over to the house and we would lay it out.

He said, "Don't you think you'd better check it out with Helen?"

I said, "Why?"

He said, "She'll feel better if you ask her."

I said, "Okay."

So I called her and she said, "I don't think we need a new finale. `4
Girls 4' is still good."

I said, "We're playing the Fairmont in Dallas again, and Phoenix again,
the Fairmont in Chicago. We can't go in with the same stale stuff."

She said, "It means laying out more money, the arrangement..."

I said, "Forget it, Helen. I'll do it in my act."

She said, "Well, wait a minute. Why don't we hear it and see what we
can do with it."

I said, "I know what to do with it, and I can tell you, the audience will
sing along with us, we'll shake hands with the audience, and it will be a
smash!"

She said, "Oh, all right."

I was really upset about this. How dare she get final say? I knew
Margaret would go for it, and so would Kay. Helen was always the odd one
who had to make a fuss over everything.

So I called Frankie and said, "The queen has okayed it." He came
over to the house the next day with a copy of the song and we laid out the
whole arrangement-and it was great. We needed a few extra lyrics to fit it
into our act, so I asked Helen to write some. She was very good, I mean
really good, at that.

So we went to Phoenix. We couldn't break in the new finale because we were playing Sun City and the audience is a block away from the stage.
We rehearsed it and said we'd break it in in Dallas. We then went to
Westbury, Long Island, and did a couple of days. Great biz, and the shows
were great. I decided to do "I Love a Piano." Michael Feinstein had a good
arrangement of it and I asked him to help me do it my way. Frankie made
the arrangement, and it was great. I did it at Westbury and it wound up
being one of my best numbers, because I sat on top of the piano and moved
all over the piano-it was funny as hell. We then went to Dallas. I called
my friend Steve Castlebury and we spent some time together. I met him
when I was doing Bye Bye Birdie, and we became good friends. We did the
new finale. Helen wrote some great lyrics. The arrangement was great and,
just like I figured, the audience sang it with us and gave us a standing
ovation. It went over with a bang. Kay and Margaret loved it. Helen was
kind of cool on it. I didn't care. I knew it was right and knew it was going
to be a smash. Our next stop was St. Louis, where we played that beautiful
theater that they had just redone. It was one of the old vaudeville/movie
theaters, and it was breathtaking. We were on the bill with Woody Herman
and his orchestra. It was a nice date.

We then went to Chicago's Fairmont Hotel, and we did great business and the show was terrific...and my throat was going. I really got scared.
I didn't want to go through another operation on my throat. So after the
two weeks, I quit again. I could hardly talk. I told the gang "Thank You
Very Much" was my gift to them. I paid my fourth and they could have it.

I came home and went to the doctor about my throat. He's the best
throat man, Dr. Von Leder. He looked at my throat and said, "You have
nodes, but we can get rid of them. No smoking, no drinking, and rest the
throat as much as possible, and see me in two weeks."

I hardly spoke a word. I didn't have to worry about drinking, but I
did quit smoking. It was so damn hard to quit, but I did it, cold turkey!

When I went to see him, he said, "One of the little nodes is gone." (I
had had four little ones.) I couldn't believe it. My voice was getting clearer
and clearer. It was unbelievable. I didn't dare do any work. I just stayed
home and didn't talk, and in three months, the nodes were gone. I was
thrilled, but I had to think about going to work, so I did some more guest
parts. I got a call for a series. It was called Scorch, and I worked with a
puppet. God, I've done everything, and now with a puppet. It only lasted
about six shows and that was that.

I did Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella. I played the fairy god mother. Steve Allen and Jayne Meadows played the king and queen. We
played the Pantages Theater in Hollywood. It was wonderful and I loved
doing that show, especially since I never got to do that Rodgers and Hart
show in New York!

Then Billy Van Zandt called me. He's a wonderful writer and does a
lot of writing for comedy series. He and his partner had written a play
called Drop Dead-a comedy, of course-and Barney Martin told him to
call me. Barney and I worked together as Frank's mother and father on
Murphy Brown (did three of those!), and Barney thought I would like to do
it. Barney also played Jerry Seinfeld's father on Seinfeld.

Doing the play would mean no money, of course, and we did it in a
little theater-it seated about forty-five. I read the script, loved it, and
said, "Yes." We had a good cast. Adrienne Barbeau, Barney Martin, and
some new kids who were great. We had a lot of fun. I played five weeks and
had to cancel the last week, because I did a pilot with Debbie Reynolds
called Esme. Her daughter, Carrie Fisher, had written it. Damn good show.
I don't know why it didn't sell. I love Debbie. She's a real trouper and fun
to work with-and Carrie is a great writer. It's a shame that they didn't
pick it up. I was also doing a movie and they wouldn't let me out of my
contract to do the Debbie Reynolds pilot, so CBS, who was doing the
pilot, paid sixty thousand dollars to get me out of the movie contract! Talk
about star power.... Wow!