I'D WRITTEN ABOUT HER HERE.
JUST FOUND THIS TEENY CLIP FROM HER TALK SHOW.
I WROTE HER SON IN NOVEMBER...AND HE WROTE ME BACK!
I ASKED ABOUT THE HBO FILM THAT WAS SUPPOSEDLY IN PRODUCTION
BASED ON HIS GREAT MEMOIR RECALLING HIS YOUTH WITH MOM.
SADLY, THE PROJECT DIED.
AS FOR HER CHAT SHOW, HE WROTE,
"There are copies of some of my mother's tv shows, but not enough to distribute, so they sit next to my book, keeping each other company until the right time comes around."
I WANTED TO WRITE HIM BACK, STRESSING THAT THE PEOPLE
WHO WOULD PAY TO SEE THESE SHOWS (I'D MADE A POINT TO TELL HIM I'D PAY RETAIL) WON'T BE ALIVE ALL THAT MUCH LONGER, BUT I DIDN'T WANT TO WEIRD HIM OUT & THINK AN INTERNET LUNATIC HAD FOUND HIM.
ANYWAY, THIS IS A NICE TASTE.
"A friend" wrote to Marlene Dietrich's daughter Maria Riva via one of her sons and received a prompt, friendly reply from him. Didn't hear from Ms Riva though.
ReplyDeletei love that story!
Deletewonder if letter writer speaks with sultry accent?
Do you know, I don't know that I'd heard of her? Of course, now I'm intrigued...
ReplyDeletethere WILL be a quiz!
DeleteI'd pay too!
ReplyDeleteAnd I don't think I'll even be dead soon
Well, not completely at least
when i wrote about being dead, i was only
Deletethinking of ancient mariners (such as myself)
not chicken like you.
Looks like a great show, I wish there was more.
ReplyDeleteMy friend Andre (God rest his soul), used to go to parties in NYC when he was "just a fagling" (his words), at which Gypsy would regularly attend along with Jim Backus, Wally Cox and others. Anyway, Andre always said that she was "pure class", I only bring it up because Andre never had a nice thing to say about anyone!
did you hear me squeal as i read this? well, i did.
Deleteto bad andre's gone, i wanna meet him.
Did you ever locate Spielglass ?
ReplyDeleteleonard?
DeleteYes, I think so - you mention him in an answer on your older post as a script-writer.
DeleteBTW I think it's great that you contact these people.
Producing DVDs should not cost so much, I think it's the legal side that may be a bit difficult.
A nice booklet, nice case, limited edition - is some kind of anniversary of her coming up ? Well her hundreth birthday is this year (or already was it, have no clue ?), next year would be 45th year of her death.
Often, the issue is clearances - every little bit of music requires finding who owns the rights and getting the green light for use, finding old contracts, etc.; for a show like Gypsy's, locally produced, that gets harder given how poor some record-keeping was. But oh, how tempting the little fragments one can find are!
DeletePerhaps a Friends of Gypsy Rose Lee letter-writing campaign is in order?
ReplyDeleteI suppose a Facebook campaign is the way to go but you KNOW how I feel about F-book.
of course i don't know exactly why he wrote what he did, but i imagine there's no company willing to shell out what it will cost to produce DVDs, pay royalties, etc. and i bet he doesn't have the money or doesn't want to spend it. of course, it confuses me why a little "blip" of the program shows up on youtube.
Delete