Paley Center Celebrates Mary Rodgers with ONCE UPON A MATTRESS and FEATHERTOP Screenings Today

Paley Presents will host "A Celebration of Mary Rodgers" today, July 19, 2014, beginning at 2 pm in New York City.

As part of the New York Musical Theatre Festival, the Paley Center pays tribute to Broadway composer Mary Rodgers, who wrote the music for musicals including Once Upon a Mattress (1959), and Hot Spot (1963), and contributed songs to the Broadway show Working (1978) and The Madwoman of Central Park West (1979) and the 1970s record album and TV special Free to Be... You and Me. The celebration will include screenings of the 1964 telecast of Once Upon a Mattress and the "lost" 1961 television musical Feathertop.

FREE for Paley Center Members. Included with general admission (Visit New York). No advance ticketing; purchase at the door. Become a Member! Join online or contact Membership at 212.621.6780.

Details below!

2:00 pm

Screening: Once Upon a Mattress (1964)

The first television production of the 1959 Broadway musical by composer Mary Rodgers and lyricist Marshall Barer. Starring Carol Burnett and featuring Joseph Bova, Jane White, Jack Gilford, Bill Hayes, Shani Wallis, and Elliott Gould; directed by Joe Layton and Dave Geisel. (CBS; 90 minutes)

3:45 pm

Panel

Conversation about the musicals of Mary Rodgers, comoderated by Ted Chapin and Bill Rudman. Panelists to include Martin Charnin.

Screening: Feathertop (1961)

The musical fantasy Feathertop, which was commissioned for television and broadcast in October 1961, has music by Mary Rodgers and lyrics by Martin Charnin and is based on the Nathaniel Hawthorne tale of a witch who transforms a scarecrow into a man. Starring Jane Powell, Hugh O'Brian, Cathleen Nesbitt, and Hans Conried; directed by Dean Whitmore. (ABC; 60 minutes)

For more information about the event, click here.