Very Warm for May
Encyclopedia
Very Warm for May is a musical
composed by Jerome Kern
, with a libretto by Oscar Hammerstein II
. It was the team's final score for Broadway
, following their hits Show Boat
, Sweet Adeline
, and Music in the Air
. It marked a return to Broadway for Kern, who had spent several years in Hollywood writing music for movies, including Swing Time
for Fred Astaire
and Ginger Rogers
.
Vincente Minnelli
directed Very Warm for May, which opened at the Alvin Theatre on November 17, 1939. It contained such favorite songs as "All the Things You Are
", "All in Fun", and "In the Heart of the Dark." Gerald Bordman, author of the definitive Kern biography Jerome Kern: His Life and Music, hailed the score as one of Kern's finest.
Very Warm for May ran on Broadway for two months, with June Allyson
, Eve Arden
, and Vera-Ellen
among the performers. It closed after 59 performances. It received mixed reviews, with the New York World-Telegram
calling the show "Gay and delightful" and finding the songs to be "the most charming that Kern and Hammerstein have ever written", while Brooks Atkinson, of the New York Times, yawned, "Very Warm for May is not so hot for November", and Robert Benchley
of The New Yorker
praised the show as "Lovely to the ear and complimentary to the intelligence...unlike most musicals, (it) actually gets better and funnier as it goes on."
Part of the lukewarm response may have been due to a book that was changed at the last minute. Very Warm for May opened out of town with a plot that had Long Island
society girl May Graham fleeing threatening gangsters and hiding out with an avant-garde summer stock troupe in Connecticut. Eve Arden
portrayed a dizzy society matron. This first version of the show received rave reviews and played to sold-out houses. Producer Max Gordon
had been away when the show opened out of town and when he saw it, he hated the gangster subplot and had it removed. However, New Yorkers didn't seem to be as crazy about the summer stock story, having just seen Babes in Arms
the year before.
It was a very competitive season on Broadway. One month after Very Warm for May opened, Cole Porter
's Du Barry Was a Lady, DeSylva and Henderson's George White's Scandals
and Rodgers
and Hart
's Too Many Girls
all opened. Very Warm for May is a quintessential "lost musical from the 1930s" because of its enduring score by two Broadway legends and its surprisingly quick disappearance from the theatre scene.
In 1984, recordings of the original cast performances from 1939 were discovered and which were assembled to form a long playing (LP) album and thus became the oldest Original Broadway Cast Recording
. With notes by Gerald Bordman, the album received a Nomination for a Grammy Award in 1985 as Best Cast Show Album. It was subsequently released as a compact disc and later became available on iTunes
. The recordings, however, are actually from a promotional radio show and not an attempt to faithfully record the full score. Several songs from the show are missing, and "All the Things You Are" appears four times on the collection.
Very Warm for May was transferred (loosely) to the silver screen for the MGM movie Broadway Rhythm
(1944
) with only "All the Things You Are" retained from the musical and the plot rewritten yet again. The actor George Murphy plays snippets of songs from the original score while seated at a piano awaiting the arrival of leading lady Ginny Simms.
Stephen Sondheim
has cited Very Warm for May as an inspiration for his interest in the musical theater. Sondheim saw the original production at the age of nine.
Hammerstein refused to allow productions of Very Warm for May after Kern's death. In 1985, however, the Hammerstein and Kern estates finally authorized a performance by a small New York Company, followed in 1994 by a Carneige Hall concert (with full orchestrations). San Francisco's 42nd Street Moon
theatre performed it as a staged concert a year later in 1995. In May of 2010, 42nd Street Moon produced a fully staged version at the Eureka Theatre, subsequently making it the West Coast Premiere.
Act II
Musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...
composed by Jerome Kern
Jerome Kern
Jerome David Kern was an American composer of musical theatre and popular music. One of the most important American theatre composers of the early 20th century, he wrote more than 700 songs, used in over 100 stage works, including such classics as "Ol' Man River", "Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man", "A...
, with a libretto by Oscar Hammerstein II
Oscar Hammerstein II
Oscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein II was an American librettist, theatrical producer, and theatre director of musicals for almost forty years. Hammerstein won eight Tony Awards and was twice awarded an Academy Award for "Best Original Song". Many of his songs are standard repertoire for...
. It was the team's final score for Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
, following their hits Show Boat
Show Boat
Show Boat is a musical in two acts with music by Jerome Kern and book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II. It was originally produced in New York in 1927 and in London in 1928, and was based on the 1926 novel of the same name by Edna Ferber. The plot chronicles the lives of those living and working...
, Sweet Adeline
Sweet Adeline (musical)
Sweet Adeline is a musical with music by Jerome Kern, book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II and original Orchestration by Robert Russell Bennett. It premiered on Broadway in 1929...
, and Music in the Air
Music in the Air
Music in the Air is a musical written by Oscar Hammerstein II and Jerome Kern . It introduced songs such as "The Song Is You", "In Egern on the Tegern See" and "I've Told Ev'ry Little Star"...
. It marked a return to Broadway for Kern, who had spent several years in Hollywood writing music for movies, including Swing Time
Swing Time
Swing Time is a 1936 RKO musical comedy film set mainly in New York City and stars Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Helen Broderick, Victor Moore, Eric Blore and Georges Metaxa, with music by Jerome Kern and lyrics by Dorothy Fields...
for Fred Astaire
Fred Astaire
Fred Astaire was an American film and Broadway stage dancer, choreographer, singer and actor. His stage and subsequent film career spanned a total of 76 years, during which he made 31 musical films. He was named the fifth Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute...
and Ginger Rogers
Ginger Rogers
Ginger Rogers was an American actress, dancer, and singer who appeared in film, and on stage, radio, and television throughout much of the 20th century....
.
Vincente Minnelli
Vincente Minnelli
Vincente Minnelli was an American stage director and film director, famous for directing such classic movie musicals as Meet Me in St. Louis, The Band Wagon, and An American in Paris. In addition to having directed some of the most famous and well-remembered musicals of his time, Minnelli made...
directed Very Warm for May, which opened at the Alvin Theatre on November 17, 1939. It contained such favorite songs as "All the Things You Are
All the Things You Are
"All the Things You Are" is a song composed by Jerome Kern, with lyrics written by Oscar Hammerstein II.It was written for the musical Very Warm for May , where it was introduced by Hiram Sherman, Frances Mercer, Hollace Shaw, and Ralph Stuart...
", "All in Fun", and "In the Heart of the Dark." Gerald Bordman, author of the definitive Kern biography Jerome Kern: His Life and Music, hailed the score as one of Kern's finest.
Very Warm for May ran on Broadway for two months, with June Allyson
June Allyson
June Allyson was an American film and television actress, popular in the 1940s and 1950s. She was a major MGM contract star. Allyson won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress for her performance in Too Young to Kiss . From 1959–1961, she hosted and occasionally starred in her own CBS anthology...
, Eve Arden
Eve Arden
Eve Arden was an American actress. Her almost 60-year career crossed most media frontiers with supporting and leading roles, but she may be best-remembered for playing the sardonic but engaging title character, a high school teacher, on Our Miss Brooks, and as the Rydell High School principal in...
, and Vera-Ellen
Vera-Ellen
Vera-Ellen was an American actress and dancer, principally celebrated for her filmed dance partnerships with Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Danny Kaye and Donald O'Connor.-Early life:...
among the performers. It closed after 59 performances. It received mixed reviews, with the New York World-Telegram
New York World-Telegram
The New York World-Telegram, later known as the New York World-Telegram and Sun, was a New York City newspaper from 1931 to 1966.-History:...
calling the show "Gay and delightful" and finding the songs to be "the most charming that Kern and Hammerstein have ever written", while Brooks Atkinson, of the New York Times, yawned, "Very Warm for May is not so hot for November", and Robert Benchley
Robert Benchley
Robert Charles Benchley was an American humorist best known for his work as a newspaper columnist and film actor...
of The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
praised the show as "Lovely to the ear and complimentary to the intelligence...unlike most musicals, (it) actually gets better and funnier as it goes on."
Part of the lukewarm response may have been due to a book that was changed at the last minute. Very Warm for May opened out of town with a plot that had Long Island
Long Island
Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...
society girl May Graham fleeing threatening gangsters and hiding out with an avant-garde summer stock troupe in Connecticut. Eve Arden
Eve Arden
Eve Arden was an American actress. Her almost 60-year career crossed most media frontiers with supporting and leading roles, but she may be best-remembered for playing the sardonic but engaging title character, a high school teacher, on Our Miss Brooks, and as the Rydell High School principal in...
portrayed a dizzy society matron. This first version of the show received rave reviews and played to sold-out houses. Producer Max Gordon
Max Gordon (producer)
Max Gordon was an American theatre and film producer. His credits included My Sister Eileen, which he produced both on stage and on film.-Biography:...
had been away when the show opened out of town and when he saw it, he hated the gangster subplot and had it removed. However, New Yorkers didn't seem to be as crazy about the summer stock story, having just seen Babes in Arms
Babes in Arms
Babes in Arms is a 1937 musical with music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Lorenz Hart and book by Rodgers and Hart. It concerns a teen-age boy who puts on a show with his friends to avoid being sent to a work farm.- Production history:...
the year before.
It was a very competitive season on Broadway. One month after Very Warm for May opened, Cole Porter
Cole Porter
Cole Albert Porter was an American composer and songwriter. Born to a wealthy family in Indiana, he defied the wishes of his domineering grandfather and took up music as a profession. Classically trained, he was drawn towards musical theatre...
's Du Barry Was a Lady, DeSylva and Henderson's George White's Scandals
George White's Scandals
George White's Scandals were a long-running string of Broadway revues produced by George White that ran from 1919–1939, modelled after the Ziegfeld Follies. The "Scandals" launched the careers of many entertainers, including W.C. Fields, the Three Stooges, Ray Bolger, Helen Morgan, Ethel Merman, ...
and Rodgers
Richard Rodgers
Richard Charles Rodgers was an American composer of music for more than 900 songs and for 43 Broadway musicals. He also composed music for films and television. He is best known for his songwriting partnerships with the lyricists Lorenz Hart and Oscar Hammerstein II...
and Hart
Lorenz Hart
Lorenz "Larry" Milton Hart was the lyricist half of the famed Broadway songwriting team Rodgers and Hart...
's Too Many Girls
Too Many Girls (musical)
Too Many Girls is a Broadway musical comedy and a 1940 film version of the show, starring Lucille Ball.-Broadway version:Too Many Girls opened October 18, 1939, with music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Lorenz Hart and book by George Marion Jr. It was produced by George Abbott...
all opened. Very Warm for May is a quintessential "lost musical from the 1930s" because of its enduring score by two Broadway legends and its surprisingly quick disappearance from the theatre scene.
In 1984, recordings of the original cast performances from 1939 were discovered and which were assembled to form a long playing (LP) album and thus became the oldest Original Broadway Cast Recording
Cast recording
A cast recording is a recording of a musical that is intended to document the songs as they were performed in the show and experienced by the audience. An original cast recording, as the name implies, features the voices of the show's original cast...
. With notes by Gerald Bordman, the album received a Nomination for a Grammy Award in 1985 as Best Cast Show Album. It was subsequently released as a compact disc and later became available on iTunes
ITunes
iTunes is a media player computer program, used for playing, downloading, and organizing digital music and video files on desktop computers. It can also manage contents on iPod, iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad....
. The recordings, however, are actually from a promotional radio show and not an attempt to faithfully record the full score. Several songs from the show are missing, and "All the Things You Are" appears four times on the collection.
Very Warm for May was transferred (loosely) to the silver screen for the MGM movie Broadway Rhythm
Broadway Rhythm
Broadway Rhythm is an MGM Technicolor musical film. It was produced by Jack Cummings and directed by Roy Del Ruth. The film was originally announced as Broadway Melody of 1944 to follow MGM's Broadway Melody films of 1929, 1936, 1938, and 1940. The movie was originally slated to star Eleanor...
(1944
1944 in film
The year 1944 in film involved some significant events, including the wholesome, award-winning Going My Way plus popular murder mysteries such as Double Indemnity, Gaslight and Laura.-Events:*July 20 - Since You Went Away is released....
) with only "All the Things You Are" retained from the musical and the plot rewritten yet again. The actor George Murphy plays snippets of songs from the original score while seated at a piano awaiting the arrival of leading lady Ginny Simms.
Stephen Sondheim
Stephen Sondheim
Stephen Joshua Sondheim is an American composer and lyricist for stage and film. He is the winner of an Academy Award, multiple Tony Awards including the Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre, multiple Grammy Awards, a Pulitzer Prize and the Laurence Olivier Award...
has cited Very Warm for May as an inspiration for his interest in the musical theater. Sondheim saw the original production at the age of nine.
Hammerstein refused to allow productions of Very Warm for May after Kern's death. In 1985, however, the Hammerstein and Kern estates finally authorized a performance by a small New York Company, followed in 1994 by a Carneige Hall concert (with full orchestrations). San Francisco's 42nd Street Moon
42nd Street Moon
42nd Street Moon is a professional theatre company in San Francisco, California. The company specializes in the preservation and presentation of early and lesser-known works by Rodgers & Hammerstein, Rodgers & Hart, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Kurt Weill, George and Ira Gershwin, Jerome Kern,...
theatre performed it as a staged concert a year later in 1995. In May of 2010, 42nd Street Moon produced a fully staged version at the Eureka Theatre, subsequently making it the West Coast Premiere.
Songs
Act I- In Other Words, Seventeen - May Graham and William Graham
- Stop Dance
- Characterization
- Babbling Brook Scene
- All the Things You AreAll the Things You Are"All the Things You Are" is a song composed by Jerome Kern, with lyrics written by Oscar Hammerstein II.It was written for the musical Very Warm for May , where it was introduced by Hiram Sherman, Frances Mercer, Hollace Shaw, and Ralph Stuart...
- Ogdon Quiler, Liz Spofford, Carroll and Charles - Winnie's Audition Scene
- May Tells All
- Heaven in My Arms - Johnny Graham, Liz Spofford and Carroll
- In Other Words, Seventeen (Reprise) - Winnie Spofford
Act II
- That Lucky Fellow - Raymond Sibley
- L'Histoire de Madame de la Tour - Carroll, Miss Wasserman, Jane and Andre
- That Lucky Lady - May Graham
- The Strange Case of Adam Standish, or Psycho-Analysis Strikes Back
- In the Heart of the Dark - Carroll and Carroll
- Ballet Peculiaire
- In the Heart of the Dark (Reprise) - Liz Spofford
- The Deer and the Park Avenue Lady - Andre and Miss Hyde
- All in Fun - Liz Spofford and Johnny Graham
- High Up in Harlem
- All the Things You Are (Reprise) - Kenny
- All in Fun (Reprise) - Kenny and Johnny Graham