Johnny Appleseed for the Arts: An Interview with Kitty Carlisle Hart

To theatre-goers the world over, the name Moss Hart is synonymous with the Golden Age of Broadway. Renowned as the co-author of such classics as Once in a Lifetime, You Can't Take It With You, and The Man Who Came to Dinner, and the director of Camelot and My Fair Lady, Moss Hart helped make Broadway what it is today. And today, his widow, Kitty Carlisle Hart, is helping the theatre in a different way, using her name and business savvy to raise funds for the arts. To recognize the work of this legendary duo, The Metropolitan Opera Guild will hold a star-studded gala event on Sunday, November 21. Hart to Hart will celebrate the theatrical contributions of both Moss and Kitty, with such stars as Jane Alexander, Polly Bergen, former Governor Mario Cuomo, Michael Feinstein, Rosemary Harris, Celeste Holm, Nathan Lane, and Audra McDonald scheduled to appear at Lincoln Center's Avery Fisher Hall. Dame Julie Andrews and Beverly Sills will co-host the event.

Cheerful, charming, and funny, Kitty Carlisle Hart is a genuine grande dame in both style and manner. "It's more than me," she says modestly of the gala being thrown in her honor. "In a sense, it's mostly for my husband, because he was very important in the arts." Moss Hart's work as a playwright, director, and producer is legendary, and it can be easily said that he brought about some of the best theatre of the twentieth century. But the show cannot go on without the business, and Ms. Hart's fundraising skills have proven just as valuable as her husband's literary credits. As a philanthropist, she has raised millions of dollars to support the arts, making new theatre possible in challenging times.

As an actress, Ms. Hart is probably best remembered as the romantic ingenue in the raucous Marx Brothers classic film A Night At The Opera. Ms. Hart recalls the experience of working with the famous comedians as "very disappointing," not because of shenanigans on the set, but because of the lack of them. "I expected them to play tricks on me and all that, and they were very, very nice!" she laughs. "Groucho would come up to me every once in a while and say, 'Is this funny?" And he'd read a line badly, and I'd say, 'No, Groucho, it's not funny.' Then he'd read it funny, and I'd laugh." Ms. Hart has nothing but praise for her legendary co-stars. "They were charming. Couldn't have been nicer," she says fondly, and declares the film "the best movie they made."

Not that the experience was entirely smooth sailing. When she prepared to film a key musical scene in which her character sang, Ms. Hart realized that the pre-recorded voice to which she would be lip-synching was not her own from the recording session, but another woman's. The classically trained opera singer was to be dubbed. "I wouldn't do it," she says. Instead, she walked off the set in protest. "It was the bravest thing I ever did," she recalls. "I went to my dressing room and I called my agent, and after he discovered what had happened, he said to me, 'I went you to be dressed, ready for work every morning, and don't move from your dressing room until I come and get you!' So I stayed there for three days!" At last, the movie's producer, the equally legendary Irving Thalberg, called Ms. Hart to his office to settle the dispute. "I came to his office, and I cried in his wastepaper basket, and I cried on the top of his desk, and I cried on the top of his head!" It worked, and the lovely soprano voice singing in the movie is Ms.
Hart's and no one else's. "When I hear the Miserere in that movie, that high C is mine!" she says with the pride of a true artist.

 

A Night At The Opera was not only a great professional experience for Ms. Hart, it helped her personal life immeasurably as well: the movie lead directly to her meeting Moss. "He came on the set of A Night at the Opera to get a leading lady for his new musical Jubilee," Ms. Hart recalls. "He came with [George S. Kaufman], and they invited me to come up to their suite that evening and sing for them." She went upstairs and performed for the legendary impresarios, "and didn't get the job!" She laughs at the memory, and adds, "It took me nine years to land the man!"

Quite understandably, Ms. Hart believes her work with the New York State Council on the Arts as her greatest accomplishment. "I was there for twenty years, and I got the budget up. Way up!" During her years as Chairwoman, the budget for the council went from approximately $30,000,000 to $80,000,000. "It was a great honor," she says. "I worked very hard... I was like Johnny Appleseed!" Kitty Carlisle Hart laughs, justly proud of her long list accomplishments and contributions to the arts. "Everywhere we went, our organization sprang up. That made me very happy."

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