The Other Side of Midnight

I walked up to him and said, “I can pay you back now, Mr. Sardi.”

He smiled. “You’ve already paid me back. I saw the show tonight.”

CHAPTER 15

Dorothy Kilgallen was a bright, creative woman with a nice sense of humor. She was a joy to collaborate with.

Having first found fame as a crime reporter, Dorothy went on to become a powerful Broadway and Hollywood columnist. She later returned to her top-notch investigative reporting and was crucial in helping to secure a new trial for Dr. Sam Shepard, whose murder case was the basis for the popular TV series The Fugitive.

While Dorothy and Ben worked on Dream with Music, Guy Bolton and I finished the libretto of Jackpot. Vinton Freedley decided to send the show on tour before its Broadway opening, and it turned out to be a long and profitable run. Along with Allan Jones and Nanette Fabray, the show now starred Jerry Lester and Betty Garrett.

On January 13, 1944, at the Alvin Theatre, Jackpot opened on Broadway. Most of the critics loved it.

The Herald Tribune: “Jackpot dances along at a smart pace, an elegant production.”

The Mirror: “Jackpot has pleasing-to-the-ear songs and a bang up cast. Nanette Fabray is a delight. Jerry Lester and Benny Baker are top-flight laugh provokers.”

The New York Post: “Another hit from the Freedley factory.”

Ben and I had another triumph. We went to Sardi’s to celebrate. It was a month before my twenty-seventh birthday.

We all knew that our biggest hit was coming up.

It was obvious to everyone from the beginning that Dream with Music was destined to be a gigantic success. Unlike Vinton Freedley, Richard Kollmar was sparing no expense to create one of the most elaborate productions Broadway would ever see. Stewart Chaney designed the intricate sets, Miles White created the beautiful period costumes. George Balanchine was the choreographer. The production contained a flying carpet on which Ronald Graham, our leading man, would make his entrance. A treadmill circled the entire stage, and the sets included a Baghdad palace, a bazaar, and a colorful game preserve with dancing animals.

Ben and I stayed on the same working schedule. I wrote with Dorothy Kilgallen during the day, in her beautiful penthouse apartment, and Ben and I worked at night in my hotel room, when he could get away from Fort Dix.

One evening when Ben and I were writing, I dropped a pen and as I bent down to pick it up, my disc slipped out, and I fell to the floor in agony, unable to move. Ben called for an ambulance and I spent the next three days in a hospital. Bad timing. We had a lot of work to do.

When I got out of the hospital, we started again, and finished the libretto.

Dorothy, Ben, and I sat in the theater watching the rehearsals, which were breathtaking. On the stage was a dazzling array of colorful costumes, beautiful backgrounds, and the exquisite dancing of Vera Zorina.

The romantic scenes between Vera Zorina and Ronald Graham, our leading man, played well. Richard Kollmar watched the dress rehearsal and said, “We’re ready.”

Natalie and Marty had come to New York for opening night. We all sat near the front of the theater, in the house seats. The theater had filled quickly. Through some mysterious alchemy, theatergoers always know when they are about to see the opening of a hit show. There is an excited, knowing buzz in the audience. Ben and I looked across at each other and smiled. Three hits in a row.

The orchestra began the overture, filling the theater with the bright, melodic music of Clay Warnick and Edward Eager. The show had begun.

Stewart Chaney had arranged for an enormous silk pink bow to be sewn on the outside of the house curtain.

The overture was over and the house curtain began to rise. We could feel the anticipation of the audience. The curtain was halfway up, when the beautiful pink bow caught on a beam, loudly ripped off, and slammed into the orchestra pit. The audience gasped. What none of us knew at that moment was that that was going to be the best thing to happen that evening.

Dream with Music consisted of two acts and thirteen scenes, and the first scene opened with a dozen beautifully costumed African-American showgirls, nude from the waist up, gaily walking on the huge treadmill. But moments after the scene began, the treadmill started to speed up, and the girls began tumbling to the stage floor, one by one. The audience looked on, unbelievingly.

That was just the beginning. Things were about to get worse.

Vera Zorina, one of the most acclaimed ballerinas in the world, who had danced at the rehearsal perfectly, began her ballet, and halfway through it, in the middle of a jeté, she slipped and fell, sprawled out on the stage floor. The audience was watching in horror. Ben and I were sinking in our seats. But the fates had not finished with us.

Two scenes later, Vera Zorina and Ronald Graham, in gorgeous period costumes, came out and walked to center stage, to play their love scene, in soft moonlight, with beautiful forest scenery behind them. They began speaking the tender words that Dorothy and Ben and I had written. The scene was going well and the audience was listening intently.

Suddenly, every light in the theater blacked out. The audience and the actors were plunged into total darkness. Zorina and Graham stood on the stage, not sure what to do. They began haltingly trying to continue with the dialogue, and then stopped in confusion, wondering whether to go ahead, or wait for the lights to come back on.

At that moment, out from the wings came the stage manager in rolled-up shirtsleeves, carrying a flashlight. He ran to the center of the stage and held the flashlight over the heads of the two lovers. It was so incongruous to see the contrast of the two beautifully costumed stars with the man in shirtsleeves holding a flashlight over their heads that the audience began to giggle. The actors bravely started to go on with the love scene. And suddenly every light in the theater blazed on.