Alan Jay Lerner: A Lyricist's Letters (11 page)

        
This aside, I am now into
Green Mansions
, and you will be receiving the opening sequence within the next ten days. I see Tyrone Power
³³
more and more as I work on it. He has the well-born look and air of a gentleman that Brando
³⁴
lacks, plus the lyricism that Robert Taylor
³⁵
lacks. Of course (and I am assuming the man I am about to suggest is still young enough), I suppose the most really ideal casting of all would be Laurence Olivier.
³⁶
I have had him in my mind, too, for a long time,
and the only reason I haven’t mentioned him is that I thought he was impossible to get. But he, obviously, is in the great tradition of classic actors. Whereas, José Ferrer,
³⁷
also in that tradition, has great equipment, but the soul of a pistachio nut. Olivier, at least as an actor, has a soul as big as his talent. The nearest thing to him in the quality we need for
Green Mansions
—for me, anyhow—is Power.

        
I’m also terribly excited about that “future project” I mentioned on the phone. I think it’s a better and fresher venture even than
Marco Polo
,
³⁸
and absolutely marvelous for Gene [Kelly]. Also, an absolutely ideal part for Cyd [Charisse], or Leslie [Caron], for that matter. (One of these days, we’ve got to do another picture for Gene and Leslie.) So prepare yourself, when I come out I’m going to try and sell the pants off you.

        
If you want any more changes in
Huck
, let me know.

Love,

Alan

    
P.S. Forgive the paper—I left my stationery in the office.

As well as the explanation of his changes to the screenplay, this letter is useful for explaining some of Lerner’s ideas about casting, with frank comments about a handful of the leading actors of the time.

    
In the next two letters, which are undated but are relevant to this period, Lerner writes to Minnelli and Freed about
Huckleberry Finn
, on which he was working in earnest:

    
To Vincente Minnelli

    
[Undated]

    
Dear Vince –

    
I think this is right, but if it isn’t, at least you have something to correct.

        
I’ve had a bitch of a time with the river lyric.
³⁹
I thought I was finished yesterday but then this morning it looked rotten to me, so I’m working on it again.

        
However, be of good cheer. Rehearsals start tomorrow morning
⁴⁰
and if all goes well at the first reading, and I have every reason to think it will, I’m going up to the country for a few days and finally finish up all the lyric work on the picture. I’ll call you over the weekend to talk about Gene’s number.

        
I hope I haven’t been too much of a problem. I’ll try to make up for the delay with quality.

        
I miss you. We must do a picture together sometime.

Love,

Huck

    
To Arthur Freed

    
[Undated]

    
Dear Chief,

    
Yes, I’m really enclosing a lyric. And there isn’t one line missing!
⁴¹
I hope the shock won’t be too great.

        
“I’m from Missouri” is in the works and I’ll have it in a few days at the latest. “I’ll Wait for You by the River” has two lines missing. Gene’s number I’ll get to next week-end.

        
I now weigh twenty-two pounds and have the color of the pages of a first edition of Dante’s Inferno. Other than that I’m fine.

        
Glad everything is going well. Keep me posted.

Love, love, love,

Alan

Alan Jay Lerner

Fourth Assistant

To The Second Secretary

Of the First Ass-Kisser

Of The Head of Music Department

Though it is perhaps difficult to appreciate every detail contained in these letters, it is nevertheless fascinating to see how Freed continued to push his team to produce new material, even in the face of the imminent collapse of the movie musical as a commercial genre. Freed’s active involvement in the
content of the development of the material is also striking: perhaps this is one of the key reasons that so many of his movies have endured, compared to those of some of his contemporaries. This correspondence is all we have left of what could have been two major films of the decade, given the personnel involved.

    
As much as Hollywood provided plenty to distract him, Lerner’s heart was always drawn toward the stage. Excited though he clearly was about
Finn
and
Green Mansions
, he showed renewed interest in a Broadway project that had been brewing for almost a year,
Li’l Abner
. By early February 1954, the personnel for the show started to take shape. Herman Levin was to produce, with Michael Kidd as choreographer, and Lane had firmly taken Schwartz’s place as composer.
⁴²
But the lynchpin of the project was to be the director, Robert Lewis (1909–97), who had directed the original Broadway production of
Brigadoon
and went on to direct Lerner’s later work
On a Clear Day You Can See Forever
. This letter offers him the job as director of
Abner
and outlines the timescale of the project:

    
To Robert Lewis

    
February 3, 1954

    
Dear, dear Bobbie:

    
Sorry I missed seeing you before you left, but life ganged up on me that week, and by the time I disentangled myself, you were already sipping 11:00 o’clock bouillon in your deck chair. Anyhow, I hope you “voyaged bon.”

        
Not too much has happened since you left. I haven’t even had another daughter. The only slightly good news I can relate is that there is a great possibility that Billy Rose is about to have a crashing flop. His production of
The Immoralist
⁴³
opened in New York Monday night, and he publically asked the critics not to come for a week, while they doctored things up a bit. From all I can glean, the critics will come next Monday night and publically ask the audience not to come from then on. Oh, happy day!
⁴⁴

        
Everything has finally been straightened out on
Li’l Abner
. Burton Lane is doing the music, and Herman Levin will produce. (On the
production end, I will be kind of a silent partner.) Herman is a very close friend of Al Capp’s and came into the picture at a crucial moment. He turned out to be indispensable in helping us hurdle several problems with Capp and making the entire project possible. Not only that, he is an old friend of Burton’s. He is in complete sympathy with the project, and I feel he is ideal on all counts.

        
I mention all this because I know you and he had difficulties in the past, and I am hoping that those difficulties won’t stand in the way of our working together again—at long last. From Herman’s point of view, all I can tell you is that he is as enthusiastic about the possibility of your doing the play as I am, and you know how much my heart is set on it.

        
We now have a definite schedule. We are planning rehearsals for somewhere between the 15th of September and October 1st. Under ordinary circumstances we would wait on a choreographer until the director were signed, so that he would be a part of that choice. However, you and I have spoken about the choreographic problem together, and I know that we are in agreement about the rightness of Michael Kidd. Consequently, Herman and I are going to the Coast sometime this month, at which time Herman can talk to him about it.

        
I have been working terribly hard on the book, and I am more excited about the project than ever. I have an outline, but I would prefer not sending it to you, but waiting until you return, when we will have a few songs and a few scenes either written or laid out in detail. The basic reason we feel confident in scheduling rehearsals now is because of the general enthusiasm about the outline and because we all feel that the road is clear for the writing.

        
If you are still as interested in doing the show as you were before you left (and I hope to God you are), the time has now come to make everything official. And so, old boy, please write me and tell me: a) That you can’t wait to do
Li’l Abner
and that if you don’t do it you will die, and b) Whom we should talk to about drawing up a contract.

        
I finally saw
Teahouse
⁴⁵
and was completely enchanted. I am sure it will be as big a hit in London as it is here. I hope all is going well.

        
I’ll be looking forward to hearing from you. If you have no time to write, a cable will do.

Devotedly,

Alan

By June,
Abner
was one of three musicals that Lewis was “wondering about” for his next project, according to the
New York Times
,
⁴⁶
and a November rehearsal date was now mentioned, but in the end Lerner did not see the project to completion.

    
This was hardly surprising, considering how much work he had on at the time. With
Brigadoon
being filmed and
Finn
still on the backburner, he resumed work on
Green Mansions
and started to develop the outline into a script. In the following letter, Lerner nervously submits the first 25 pages to Freed and Minnelli for their opinion. His passion for the movie is palpable, but it is also clear that he is still unsure as to how to overcome the unevenness of the source material.

    
To Arthur Freed

    
February 9, 1954

    
Dear Arthur:

    
Here are the first twenty-five pages of
Green Mansions
. I am also sending a copy to Lillie,
⁴⁷
with instructions to read it and then pass it along to Vincente, so that there will be two copies in the studio.

        
It goes without saying that at this point in the writing, the script is my lover. I don’t know whether she’s bad or good—I only know I love it. Consequently, after you and Vincente have read it and we speak on the phone, I hope you will discuss it in violent terms. I hope it’s either wonderful or it stinks. If it’s mediocre, I’ll be lost. If it stinks, it’ll be obvious why.

        
I am hoping you will be able to tell even from these few pages that I am trying to make the narrative as pure and simple as possible, and make every scene pertinent to the story and, here in the beginning, to the humanizing of Abel. I am resisting desperately the temptation to write “charm” and “local color.” I feel very keenly that it must never look like a fantasy, but at the same time the story must be tight from beginning to end. I am also trying to write it economically, not only to preserve the mood and narrative flow, but also so that there will be adequate room for the visual.

        
I was delighted to talk to you three Highlanders
⁴⁸
Monday. If I seemed a little vague, it’s because while you are punting on the Doon, I am cruising up the Orinoco. I’ll call you Sunday. Can’t wait for your reaction.

Love,

Alan

    
The spring of 1954 saw Lerner continuing to work on his Hollywood projects, as well as collaborating with Lane on
Abner
. Then on July 18, his father Joseph J. Lerner died of cancer in New York’s Memorial Hospital at the age of 67, after more than 50 grueling operations.
⁴⁹
Naturally, this came as a huge blow to Lerner: he idolized his father, who had introduced him to musical theater as a boy and to whom he owed his all-round cultural education. Years later, he wrote with affection of his father’s final weeks: “One day when I was pushing his bed into the elevator to take him into the operating room, he wrote to me: ‘I suppose you’re wondering why I want to live.’ It was precisely what I was thinking and I nodded. He wrote another note and just before the nurses took him away, he tore it from the pad and stuffed it into my hand.…It read: ‘Because I want to see what happens to you.’”
⁵⁰
This story is one of the most affectionate in Lerner’s autobiography, and underlines the pain he clearly still felt many years later.

    
Lerner tried to battle on with his portfolio of work, now turning back to
Green Mansions
. As Vincente Minnelli geared up to create a screen test for Pier Angeli
⁵¹
to play Rima the Bird Girl, Lerner wrote hurriedly to Freed to inform him that he intended to be on hand to observe Angeli’s suitability for the role (he hoped she would speak in a bird-like voice):

    
To Arthur Freed

    
August 9, 1954

    
Dear Arthur:

    
No word from Clift
⁵²
as yet. I am also awaiting the call from Metro about the appointment with the professor at Cornell.
⁵³
I think it’s very important that I see both of them before I come out.

        
I spoke to Vincente a couple of days ago, and we both thought it would be a good idea if I were on the Coast while he’s making the test of Pier Angeli. I had planned to come around the 18th, but because of some meetings that have just come up concerning my father’s estate, for which my brother is flying here next Monday, I think it will now be next weekend, or around the 21st. I hope this is satisfactory. If it isn’t, please let me know.

        
I’ll call you as soon as I know something about Clift.