''Beggar's Holiday'' is a

musical Musical is the adjective of music. Musical may also refer to: * Musical theatre, a performance art that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance * Musical film Musical film is a film genre in which songs by the characters are interwo ...

with a book and lyrics by John La Touche and music by

Duke Ellington Edward Kennedy "Duke" Ellington (April 29, 1899 – May 24, 1974) was an American jazz pianist, composer, and leader of his eponymous jazz orchestra from 1923 through the rest of his life. Born and raised in Washington, D.C., Ellington was bas ...

History and background

The project originated with black scenic designer Perry Watkins, who envisioned a jazz-driven adaptation of John Gay's

The Beggar's Opera ''The Beggar's Opera'' is a ballad opera in three acts written in 1728 by John Gay with music arranged by Johann Christoph Pepusch. It is one of the watershed plays in Augustan drama and is the only example of the once thriving genre of satiri ...

. Watkins hired John Latouche, who'd written lyrics for the cantata "Ballad for Americans" and "Cabin in the Sky," and teamed him with Ellington, still best known at the time as a band leader

Ellington and Latouche updated the play's locale to a modern American city and turned Macheath into what Bowers calls "a pin-stripe-suited mobster, a singing, dancing Bugsy Siegel." The book itself mixed jazz and blues rhythms with more traditional musical theater, including comedy numbers written for Zero Mostel, making his Broadway debut as Peachum

The Broadway theatre, Broadway production, directed by Nicholas Ray and

choreographed Choreography is the art or practice of designing sequences of movements of physical bodies (or their depictions) in which motion or form or both are specified. ''Choreography'' may also refer to the design itself. A choreographer is one who cr ...

Valerie Bettis Valerie Elizabeth Bettis (December 1919 – 26 September 1982) was an American modern dancer and choreographer. She found success in musical theatre, ballet, and as a solo dancer. Biography Valerie Bettis was born on either December 19 or Decem ...

, opened on December 26, 1946 at The Broadway Theatre, where it ran for 111 performances. The cast included

Alfred Drake Alfred Drake (October 7, 1914 – July 25, 1992) was an American actor and singer. Biography Born as Alfred Capurro in New York City, the son of parents emigrated from Recco, Genoa, Drake began his Broadway career while still a student at Broo ...

Zero Mostel Samuel Joel "Zero" Mostel (February 28, 1915 – September 8, 1977) was an American actor, comedian, and singer. He is best known for his portrayal of comic characters such as Tevye on stage in ''Fiddler on the Roof'', Pseudolus on stage and on ...

, Bernice Parks, Jet MacDonald, Dorothy Johnson, Mildred Joanne Smith,

Marie Bryant Marie Bryant (November 6, 1919 – May 23, 1978) was an American dancer, singer and choreographer, described as "one of the most vivacious black dancers in the United States". Biography Bryant was born in Meridian, Mississippi, moving with her f ...

, Avon Long, William Dillard, Rollin Smith, Thomas Gomez, and

Herbert Ross Herbert David Ross (May 13, 1927 – October 9, 2001) was an American actor, choreographer, director and producer who worked predominantly in theater and film. He was nominated for two Academy Awards and a Tony Award. He is known for directing ...

. The show included an interracial relationship resulting in nightly

picketing Picketing is a form of protest in which people (called pickets or picketers) congregate outside a place of work or location where an event is taking place. Often, this is done in an attempt to dissuade others from going in (" crossing the pick ...

outside the theater. No Broadway

cast album A cast recording is a recording of a stage musical that is intended to document the songs as they were performed in the show and experienced by the audience. An original cast recording or OCR, as the name implies, features the voices of the sho ...

was recorded, but a

demo tape A demo (shortened from "demonstration") is a song or group of songs typically recorded for limited circulation or for reference use, rather than for general public release. A demo is a way for a musician to approximate their ideas in a fixed for ...

was discovered and released, together with the score from the West End musical ''Bet Your Life'' featuring Julie Wilson and Sally Ann Howes, on an LP on the Blue Pear labe

Lena Horne Lena Mary Calhoun Horne (June 30, 1917 – May 9, 2010) was an American dancer, actress, singer, and civil rights activist. Horne's career spanned more than seventy years, appearing in film, television, and theatre. Horne joined the chorus of th ...

's recording of "Tomorrow Mountain," the show's first-act closer, was a hit.

Plot summary

The musical is set in a corrupt world inhabited by rakish

mobster A gangster is a criminal who is a member of a gang. Most gangs are considered to be part of organized crime. Gangsters are also called mobsters, a term derived from '' mob'' and the suffix '' -ster''. Gangs provide a level of organization and ...

s and their double crossing gangs, raffish

madam Madam (), or madame ( or ), is a polite and formal form of address for women in the English language, often contracted to ma'am (pronounced in American English and this way but also in British English). The term derives from the French ''madam ...

s and their dissolute

whore Prostitution is the business or practice of engaging in sexual activity in exchange for payment. The definition of "sexual activity" varies, and is often defined as an activity requiring physical contact (e.g., sexual intercourse, non-penet ...

panhandlers Begging (also panhandling) is the practice of imploring others to grant a favor, often a gift of money, with little or no expectation of reciprocation. A person doing such is called a beggar or panhandler. Beggars may operate in public plac ...

and

street people Street people are people who live a public life on the streets of a city. Street people are frequently homeless, sometimes mentally ill, and often have a transient lifestyle. The delineation of street people is primarily determined by residenti ...

as they conduct their dirty business, ply their trade, and struggle to survive in

brothels A brothel, bordello, ranch, or whorehouse is a place where people engage in sexual activity with prostitutes. However, for legal or cultural reasons, establishments often describe themselves as massage parlors, bars, strip clubs, body rub ...

, shanty towns, and

prisons A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correct ...

. The plot focuses on the exploits of MacHeath, a suave New York mobster, his three women, and their various trials and tribulations with the law.

Characters

* MacHeath, a ruthless mobster * Jenny, MacHeath's lover * Polly Peachum, MacHeath's wife * Hamilton Peachum, Polly's father * Mrs. Peachum, Polly's mother * Lucy Lockit, daughter of the Chief of Police * Careless Love * The Cocoa Girl * Chief of Police Lockit * The Horn

Musical numbers

Original 1946 production

;Act I *"In Between" — Lucy Lockit *"When You Go Down By Miss Jenny's" — Citizens and Girls *"I've Got Me" — MacHeath *"Take Love Easy" — Jenny *"I Wanna Be Bad" — Careless Love *"Rooster Man" — Jenny *"When I Walk With You" — Polly Peachum and MacHeath *"I've Got Me" (Reprise) — First Girl *"The Scrimmage of Life" — Mrs. Peachum, Hamilton Peachum and Lucy Lockit *"Ore From a Gold Mine" — Mrs. Peachum and Hamilton Peachum *"When I Walk With You" (Reprise) — MacHeath and Polly Peachum *"Tooth and Claw" — Mac's Gange *"Maybe I Should Change My Ways" — MacHeath *"The Wrong Side of the Railroad Tracks" — The Cocoa Girl, Careless Love and The Horn *"Tomorrow Mountain" — MacHeath ;Act II *"Brown Penny" § — Lucy Lockit *"Tooth and Claw" (Reprise) — Hamilton Peachum and Reporters *"Lullaby for Junior" — Jenny *"Quarrel for Three" — Polly Peachum, Lucy Lockit and MacHeath *"Fol-de-rol-rol" — MacHeath *"Women, Women, Women" (Reprise) — The Cocoa Girl and Careless Love *"When I Walk With You" (Reprise) — MacHeath *"The Hunted" — MacHeath ;''Notes'' *§: Lyrics based on poem by William Butler Yeats

Productions

Original 1946 production

''Beggar's Holiday'' premiered on Broadway at the Broadway Theatre on December 26, 1946 and closed on March 29, 1947 after 111 performances. Directed by Nicholas Ray, the show starred

as MacHeath, Bernice Parks as Jenny, Jet MacDonald as Polly Peachum,

as Hamilton Peachum, Dorothy Johnson as Mrs. Peachum, Mildred Joanne Smith as Lucy Lockit, Avon Long as Careless Love,

as the Cocoa Girl, Rollin Smith as Chief of Police Lockit, and William Dillard as the Horn. The show featured orchestrations by Billy Strayhorn, choreography by Valerie Bettis, production design by Oliver Smith, lighting design by Peggy Clark, and costume design by Walter Florell

2004 Marin Theatre Company Production

In 2004,

Dale Wasserman Dale Wasserman (November 2, 1914 – December 21, 2008) was an American playwright, perhaps best known for his book for Man of La Mancha. Early life Dale Wasserman was born in Rhinelander, Wisconsin, the child of Russian immigrants Samuel ...

, one of the musical's producers and the author of ''

Man of La Mancha ''Man of La Mancha'' is a 1965 musical with a book by Dale Wasserman, music by Mitch Leigh, and lyrics by Joe Darion. It is adapted from Wasserman's non-musical 1959 teleplay '' I, Don Quixote'', which was in turn inspired by Miguel de Cerva ...

'', teamed with the

Marin Theatre Company The Marin Theatre Company (MTC) is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization and professional LORT D regional theater located in Mill Valley, California. Jasson Minadakis is the company's Artistic Director and Meredith Suttles its Managing Director / CEO. ...

Mill Valley, California Mill Valley is a city in Marin County, California, Marin County, California, United States, located about north of San Francisco via the Golden Gate Bridge and from Napa Valley. The population was 14,231 at the 2020 United States Census, 2020 ...

to create a revamped, updated, and radically rewritten version that toned down much of the original's social criticism and political humor. The substantially rearranged

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a m ...

score included hints of

funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the mi ...

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form which originated in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads from the ...

and

rock and roll Rock and roll (often written as rock & roll, rock 'n' roll, or rock 'n roll) is a genre of popular music that evolved in the United States during the late 1940s and early 1950s. It originated from African-American music such as jazz, rhythm ...

. Overall, its mood was far lighter and more optimistic than that of the 1946 version. Although Wasserman had hopes of a Broadway staging, to date his plans have not materialized.

2012 Cast Recording

In 2012, French baritone David Serero performed and produced a full revival production of Beggar's Holiday by Ellington and Wasserman i
November 2012 in Paris
with an international cast including Emmy Award winner John Altman, Charlie Glad, Gilles San Juan and directed by James Marvel. David Serero has also performed, arranged and produced the only Cast Album Recording of Beggar's Holiday.

References

External links

Internet Broadway Database listing
{{Duke Ellington 1946 musicals Broadway musicals Compositions by Duke Ellington Musicals based on operas