Holiday Bonus: "We Need a Little XMAS" or "Desperately Seeking Santa"
A Terribly Modern Operetta - and a Memorial for Helen Gallagher
God bless Jerry Herman! In retrospect, it’s hard to believe he only wrote seven shows that played on Broadway. (Mr. Sondheim, f’rinstance, wrote exactly three times that many.) But among other things, Jerry Herman given us everybody’s favorite Broadway Christmas carol.
What I love about “We Need a Little Christmas” from Act 1 of Mame (1966) is the undercurrent of desperation. It’s only a snappy jolly polka on the surface. If you pay attention to the words, or, better still, are lucky enough to see a production of Mame (are you reading this, City Center Encores?) - it’s not “we want a little Christmas” or “a little Christmas would be nice, hey.” Hardly!
At this point in the narrative, the great depression has officially started and Auntie Mame’s jazz age glory years are over. Her savings and investments are wiped out, and thus Mame Dennis and her household - her nephew Patrick, her secretary Agnes Gooch, and Ito, her endlessly-amusing Asian houseboy (clearly a close relative of Mr. Yuniyoshi in Breakfast at Tiffany’s) are, as Louis Armstrong would say, “SOL (S**t out of luck).”
With no money coming in, and Mame incapable of doing anything that could possibly be considered a job, they are staring directly in the face of starvation and eviction. The only thing that can save them, it turns out, is an almost religious belief in the secular power of Christmas to save them. (Spoiler alert: it essentially does).
To me, the inherent desperation really comes through in these lines:
For I've grown a little leaner, grown a little colder
Grown a little sadder, grown a little older
And I need a little angel sitting on my shoulder
Need a little Christmas now
As we know, the movie version of Mame (with an ill-cast Lucille Ball) is a major disappointment, if not an outright disaster. And, alas, although there are a few later clips of Angela Lansbury doing numbers from Mame (including “Open a New Window” on the 1971 Tony awards telecast), apparently she never appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show, which is the source of most of our best Broadway footage from the 1950s and ‘60s.
The opening night cast of Mame somehow never made it onto Sullivan. The sole exception is Frankie Michaels, who played young Patrick, and who appeared on the Sullivan show of February 19, 1967, singing the title song, “Mame.” That clip has never surfaced either in the hands of private collectors (ahem!) or on the official Sullivan youTube channel. (PS: Michaels still holds the record as the youngest performer to ever win a Tony, at age 11.)
However, clearly Ed Sullivan really liked Jane Morgan, who was a frequent guest on his long running Sunday night variety show. I would guess that Sullivan decided to feature two numbers from Mame on his December 15, 1968 broadcast primarily because Morgan was replacing Lansbury for a few months (from December 1968 to May 1969) - and because one of them was a Christmas song.
While I do wish we had Lansbury as Auntie Mame here, or Jane Connell or even Loretta Swit as Agnes Gooch, I have to say I am still delighted to have two numbers with Jane Morgan, and, even more so, Helen Gallagher, improbably cast as the Gooch.
This is a great fun number - I have always found it very moving - with Jane Morgan, Helen Gallagher, Chris Hagan (replacing Frankie Michaels) as Patrick, and Tom Matsusaka as Ito. Morgan may not be Angela Lansbury, but she and Gallagher and the others totally capture the combination of exhilaration and desperation that so powerfully drives this scene and this song.
And furthermore: I have shown this clip many times, both in Broadway-centric presentations and holiday-centric presentations. And every time I have been delighted to inform viewers that both of the principals here were still with us: Jane Morgan celebrated her own centennial this year, and Helen Gallagher made it to 98.
Alas, Ms. Gallagher just left us a few weeks ago, two years short of her own centennial. As we all know, she started on Broadway as a dancer, then gradually became a singer and an actress, a daytime soap opera star, and, for much of her career, she was one of the number one acting instructors in the theater. She also had a huge career on television: I have her on dozens of shows, from a Mel Tormé show in 1951 to many episodes of Sullivan, Max Liebman Presents, The Bell Telephone Hour, and other series. As George Connolly says, Helen Gallagher departed from this earth in order to pay a visit to the Man in the moon. (Spoiler alert #2: The man in the moon is a lady. It’s all true!)
And, as the photo above shows, Gallagher was easily one of the great beauties of Broadway. She easily had enough charm and class and sheer chutzpah to even play Auntie Mame herself - it’s a shame that never happened. (By the way, if anyone wants to talk me into doing a Helen Gallagher clip joint - something I always wanted to do with the great lady herself - I can be reasoned with.)
Let us conclude with a message of a Happy Centennial birthday to Jane Morgan, whose life and music are a source of eternal “Fascination.” Here’s Ms. Morgan in her other number from that same Sullivan episode. Most of us know this song as Marilyn Maye’s usual opener. (And yes, Marilyn played both “Dolly” and “Mame” in regional theater.)
Haul out the holly
Put up the tree before my spirit falls again
Fill up the stocking
I may be rushing things, but deck the halls again now
For we need a little Christmas, right this very minute
Candles in the window, carols at the spinet
Yes, we need a little Christmas, right this very minute
Hasn't snowed a single flurry, but Santa dear we're in a hurryClimb down the chimney
Turn on the brightest string of lights I've ever seen
Slice up the fruit cake
It's time we've hung some tinsel on the evergreen bough
For I've grown a little leaner, grown a little colder
Grown a little sadder, grown a little older
And I need a little angel sitting on my shoulder
Need a little Christmas nowFor we need a little music, need a little laughter
Need a little singing ringing through the rafter
And we need a little snappy, happy ever after
We need a little Christmas now
In the words of the late Herb Friedwald, everybody have a Merry Christmas and a Harry Connicka!
PS: My buddy, Ben West, recently gave us a great post about Christmas songs that originated in Broadway musicals, you can read it here. And yes, Larry Maslon has devoted several episodes of the great podcast series Broadway To Main Street to Christmas songs, including this one from 2022.
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SLOUCHING TOWARDS BIRDLAND is a subStack newsletter by Will Friedwald. The best way to support my work is with a paid subscription, for which I am asking either $5 a month or $50 per year. Thank you for considering. (Thanks as always to Beth Naji & Arlen Schumer for special graphics.) Word up, peace out, go forth and sin no more! (And always remember: “A man is born, but he’s no good no how, without a song.”)
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Interesting post and clips, thanks.
Jane Morgan in Mame was my second Broadway show. I was 15 ! I thought Jane was so glamorous!