SPOTLIGHT ON THE 2011 TONY AWARDS: DAY 9 & 10 - GYPSY/Rose with Lansbury, Daly & LuPone

As a super-special Spring extension of BroadwayWorld's SOUND OFF column, every day until the Tony Awards on June 12 we will be presenting a spectacular new entry in the SPOTLIGHT ON THE 2011 TONY AWARDS series featuring a particularly entertaining, interesting, relevant and exciting Tony Awards-related clip from the last sixty-three years of the ceremonies (and subsequent seasons on Broadway) with a rundown and commentary on the sights, sounds and showmanship on display in each carefully chosen selection - all, of course, coming in anticipation of Broadway's biggest night, which will be broadcast on CBS this year, as always. Once again this year, BroadwayWorld is the official home of the 2011 Tony Awards and we will also be featuring exclusive interviews, articles, photos, video content, interactive features and more in the coming days and weeks leading up to the event so be sure to check back daily for your theatre fix!

Today we have a triple-feature and a double-dose day, with all three of the Tony-winning leading ladies who have won the Best Actress Tony Award for their take on Rose in GYPSY - as great a role in the musical theatre as Lear in KING LEAR is in the classical canon; no question. Believe it or not, Ethel Merman - the once-thought-incomparable original Rose in GYPSY - did not take the prize for Best Actress, nor did Bernadette Peters in the Sam Mendes-directed revival from early this century, but the three divas that did certainly made an unmistakable mark on the titanic role. Cutting to the chase, the ladies of the day: Angela Lansbury, Tyne Daly and Patti LuPone. Who could ask for anything more? Not even Rose herself - and that's saying something.

This Time For Three

So, let's take a look at three different takes on the role of Rose and compare Lansbury, Daly and LuPone side-by-side-by-side with recollections on their idiosyncratic character choices, and - of course - clips featuring all three ladies taking on two of the most famous and most enthralling Jule Styne/Stephen Sondheim songs from the classic score for GYPSY: the establishing song, "Some People"; and, the closer, "Rose's Turn". Each lady is so unique and special - but, which do you prefer? Can we even compare them at all? Perhaps it's best to just take it all - and them all - in, particularly when you have a banquet buffet as rich as this one is. Eggrolls included.

Lansbury

While Angela Lansbury brings a bloodthirsty ruthlessness to her role that brings to mind her Academy Award-nominated performance in John Frankenheimer's THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE as the ultimate mother-from-Hell - amply evidenced in her riveting, searing and unforgettable "Rose's Turn"; indeed, the best the song has ever been done - she also injects a daffy, kooky, wacky quality reminiscent of her music hall roots in numbers like "Together, Wherever We Go". While a complete performance record of Angela Lansbury in the West End revival production - which was directed by the late Arthur Laurents; the first time he had directed the show, for which he wrote the peerless book - does not exist, a few clips from the Broadway transfer of the hit West End revival survive.

Perhaps no one until Patti LuPone captured so many different sides of Rose and brought them all together into one comprehensive, complex cornucopia of neuroses and ambition. Listen to Lansbury's furious rebuttal to her father in "Some People"; witness her vaudeville shtick and lighthearted goofiness in "Together Wherever We Go"; and, then - the piece de resistance; one of the great moments in all of musical theatre history - a slap of the stage to close "Rose's Turn". The applause may die down - but, she's still bowing. Do you have chills yet? This is as good as it gets. Enjoy it.

Daly

Known to most of America for her titular turn on the seven seasons of CAGNEY & LACEY - a hit nighttime drama series in the 1980s and early 1990s - it was with her turn in the 1989 revival of GYPSY, also directed by the show's author, Arthur Laurents, that she made a name for herself in musical theatre - and took home a Tony Award for her considerable efforts. Never a singer on the level of the other great dames highlighted in this column today, she did deliver the goods and put across her material - especially her songs; but, more so than many other Roses, the comedic material, especially (her "Goldstone" may be my favorite) - with a vivacity, intensity and earthy sexiness that had never quite been imbued to the role previously. Her Rose is all its own - as are the very best of the best Roses, as we can see here. Always. Ms. Daly will be taking the Broadway stage again in the near future - after an over-twenty-year absence from singing on Broadway (though she recently took on Maria Callas in MASTER CLASS regionally, but the character does not sing in that, alas) - by taking on the lead role in the new Marvin Hamlisch-score-supplanted production of BALLROOM, directed by Jerry Mitchell, now titled QUEEN OF THE STADUST BALL. Bottom line: if you can do Rose - and do it well; let alone this well - you can certainly do anything. And that is certainly true of Ms. Daly - she's got it. What's not to like?

Check out an uncharacteristically blonde (?) Tyne Daly - looking the most glamorous I remember her ever looking, in a sleek evening gown befitting the gala event - tackling GYPSY's "Some People" at the Kennedy Center Honors tribute to Jule Styne shortly after the run of GYPSY on Broadway. She commands your attention and holds it in the palm of her hand - that's a Rose.

https://www.youtube.com/embed?feature=player_detailpage&v=r1zeN3HuAgY

As a special bonus, here is a performance capture of Ms. Daly onstage and ripping through the grand GYPSY finale, "Rose's Turn" in her more naturalistic, gritty take.

LuPone

Patti LuPone is Broadway royalty - plain and simple. Yet, there is nothing plain or simple about Ms. LuPone - or her talent. Beyond the simple fact that she is a force of nature, that is. None of the current divas on Broadway can quite command the heat, excitement and electricity of a new Patti LuPone performance in a musical - especially when she takes on the role of a lifetime, as she did three years ago in GYPSY, first at City Center Encores! and, then, on Broadway. LuPone brings something truly anomalous to Rose, in this, the 2009 Broadway revival of GYPSY - which also took home Tony Awards for Best Featured Actress for Laura Benanti, as Gypsy, and Best Featured Actor for Boyd Gaines, as Herbie - and it is almost indescribable to illustrate for those who did not see her live what exactly made this performance truly one of the classic Broadway moments in the 21st century. First of all, it is the perfect marriage of performer and role, and, somehow, by the middle of the run, Ms. LuPone had made an earth-shattering portrayal of one of the finest-written characters in the theatre something even more dynamic - and even richer and more rewarding. And funnier. And sexier. And even more pathetic and desperate. Yes, despite all the protestations to the contrary - spoken, sung, shouted, screamed and otherwise - Rose is really a frightened little girl on the inside and, perhaps not since Merman, had anyone fully laid bare that quivering child beneath the exterior of the mother of all mother monsters. Then, she takes it away as quickly as she revealed it - or, does she? Where does the artifice end and her real face begin to show - warts, wrinkles, flaws and all? Would Rose ever show us that - or even show herself that? These questions - and hundreds more - reveal themselves when a great actress like LuPone (or Lansbury or Daly) take on one of the classic roles.

If there were to be only a handful of Tony Award clips that survived the Rapture, this would hopefully be one of them. This is Broadway in the 21st century at its very, very best - and musical theatre acting at its finest. Be awed - and wowed. "Everything's Coming Up Roses", indeed - and how!

Now, check out Patti LuPone in the Broadway revival of GYPSY doing the Jule Styne/Stephen Sondheim finale-to-beat-all-finales, "Rose's Turn", by the diva-to-best-all-divas in the lead-role-to-top-all-lead-roles, Rose. "Swell" and "great" don't even begin to cover it - new words may even need to be invented to describe this.

One last special bonus: Patti LuPone, "Some People" live on Broadway. Sing it, Rose!

That's all for this weekend. Be sure to stay tuned to BroadwayWorld for all things Tony Awards and subscribe to this column to be the very first to check out the clips, commentary and take part in the conversation in our deluxe toast to the one and only Antoinette Perry every day until June 12 - and, especially, on that day! Until then…