The World's Greatest Minstrel

'JOLSON' STARRING CLIVE BALDWIN
at Paper Mill Playhouse
by Lenore Baldwin

It was January of 1978 and CLIVE was hotter than a firecracker, having recently done THE TONY AWARDS at the WINTER GARDEN THEATRE in New York City, as well as starring in our own production of 'THE MAGIC OF JOLSON'. We had been touring all over the USA and had our own Dinner Theatre in Miami Beach, The Red Dolphin Theatre.

Our good old friends, IRWIN LEVINE and LARRY BROWN, writers of 'TIE A YELLOW RIBBON 'ROUND THE OLE OAK TREE", and whom we had met back in 1972, were collaborating on some new Jolie type songs for Clive and were determined to do some sort of show, bound for Broadway.

As fate would have it we met up with two young guys, at the MEADOWBROOK THEATRE, where FRANK SINATRA debuted, not too far from his home in Hoboken, New Jersey. They were rabid Jolson fans who were knocked out by Clive's voice and Jolsonic manner. They were hired to write a script and did just that.

Six months later, we had a play, music, a Producer, Director and a beautiful theatre in New Jersey. Actually, it was the State Theatre of New Jersey, called THE PAPER MILL PLAYHOUSE, and we were ready to go for the gold.

Rehearsals were set for September and a large cast of singers, dancers and actors was hired after weeks of cast calls held in a studio in New York. We had great times, it was all show biz for Clive and me. Living in New York was fun and exciting and we had all of the pre-show hullaballoo, radio and television shows and lots of newspaper stories about Clive.

IRVING CAESER the great songwriter of 'SWANEE' and 'IS IT TRUE WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT DIXIE?" came to see Clive at a show one night and exclaimed how much like Jolson he was. "Never was anyone closer,", he said with a big smile on his glowing face. He re-lived the glory days of old as he sat in the audience and beamed up at Clive onstage. Clive worked a few jobs with an old CATSKILL MOUNTAINS BUDDY, CHARLIE CALLAS who had played GEORGIE JESSEL in the HBO TV special, "THE LAST GREAT VAUDEVILLE SHOW," which they starred in along with DEBBIE REYNOLDS and DONALD O'CONNOR. It seemed like all of New York was anxiously awaiting the opening of this new bound-for Broadway musical extravaganza, thanks in part to the efforts of our very good friend and fan, MR. NEW YORK RADIO.....JOE FRANKLIN who took every opportunity to have CLIVE appear on his radio and television shows. Joe was Clive's first big New York radio booster.

The songwriters were ecstatic about Clive's singing their new songs, and some of them were terrific. 'GIVE ME A GOOD OLD MAMMY SONG': headed the list and the interesting thing about that song was that Clive had asked Irwin to write him "a good old mammy song" while they were on the golf course one afternoon and Clive even provided part of the lyric. Of course, he never got any credit for it. Levine and Brown were notoriously all cash, no credit. Especially when they were raking in the cash, and they sure did, for many of their world reknowned hits. About this time they wrote a novelty song with Clive in mind, called "WHO'S IN THE STRAWBERRY PATCH WITH SALLY?'. Everyone agreed it would have been a big hit for Clive and they put it in the show. Unfortunately, they gave it to Tony Orlando who was well known at the time for having made a hit of 'TIE A YELLOW RIBBON 'ROUND THE OLE OAK TREE", so that they could double up their chances of making money....and it went nowhere. But, that's part of the problem with show biz, the real talent is sometimes not the one who gets the breaks. But, Clive has had his share of great breaks and opportunities. The Paper Mill seemed to be one of these times. And it would have been, but, the songwriters wrote a pile of new, cutesy songs and voted with the Producer to keep out all of the tried and tested JOLSON all time favorites.

We were kind of naïve at the time and expected that the people involved with writing, producing and directing were as anxious as we were to see a big success of the show and an eventual move to Broadway.

Well, the audiences loved Clive, but foolishness and greed were the order of the day and some of the reviews even wondered why this remarkable performer from England even bothered to come into a show like this. A counterfeit Jolson show others wrote. Where was "MY MAMMY' and 'SONNY BOY', they wondered. And the audiences were disappointed to hear Clive sing "LITTLE SAMMY" and other very forgettable tunes.

But still, because of CLIVE and his wonderful reputation as the "quintessential Jolson singer of all time, the Living Voice of AL JOLSON', as proclaimed by no less an authority than the INTERNATIONAL AL JOLSON SOCIETY In honor of his having worked together with PEARL SIEBEN to produce the very first International Convention in New York City in that wonderful year of 1975.

People came to see the show. They begged from the audience for one good Jolson song and finally the producers, director and songwriters had to acquiesce to my insistent cry that the Jolson songs must go in for they might save the show. And after many fights and altercations, threats that I would resign Clive from the show and lots of tears of frustration, one wonderful night they put in ten Jolson standards and it nearly turned everything around.

To see CLIVE in a darkened theatre, onstage alone, telling the audience, "You ain't heard nothin' yet" brought tears of joy to my sad, tired eyes. Tired and sad from reading review after review praising CLIVE BALDWIN's great talent , and criticizing almost everything about the cliché ridden. non-musical musical they had come to see and enjoy with such high hopes.

But it was too late, one critic wrote of the show, seeing it for the second time, "The curtain goes up at 8:30, but the show does not begin until way after ten o'clock, when, in an apology for the preceding hour and a half, CLIVE BALDWIN comes out on stage alone and sings ten of the wonderful, classic Jolson standards and brings the house down.".

It had a good six week run and then packed up it's old kit bag and moved to Florida, to the world famous ROYAL POINCIANA THEATRE, for a month long engagement. The producer of that theatre wanted the Jolson songs out, but, once again, I prevailed, was adamant that the show would close in a day with the Florida critics tearing it to pieces and the only hope was the Jolson standards. So he reluctantly agreed. The show opened with Clive singing two famous numbers in the opening bit, 'ROBERT E. LEE" and the ever popular tear jerker, "SONNY BOY"

Then it was over.

The Paper Mill Playhouse darkened once again. The Royal Poinciana brought in a re-vamped comedy and we went home.

And one year later, to the day that it had opened the year before, the damn place burned to the ground. To the ground. Perhaps it was a bit of payback for their counterfeit corruption and deceit towards us. It was alleged to us that perhaps it was a case of "Jewish lightning", because the audiences hadn't gotten over the deception of 'JOLSON' and were not returning to the theatre in droves. Jewish lightning is a humorous old cliché' indicating the burning of a place for insurance purposes. Just hearsay?

All in all it was a good experience. Clive made a lot of money, we learned a few lessons, made a lot of really good friends and fans and suffered the loss of Levine and Brown as friends. That was no great loss, after we found out from Irwin that the reason they did not want Jolson songs in the show was so that they could keep all the royalties and profits from a cast album for themselves and not pay anything to Al's last wife, Erle Krasna for the use of the standard Jolson songs. With friends like that who needs enemies?