I suspect no one "trotted her out" for this presentation. To a show person, a "gig" is a gig, they offered it to her as a tribute, she felt she could do it, and did it as well as she could. She IS 90, after all.
Frankly, with her obvious aging and physical limitations, I was surprised they left her out on the stage alone and unassisted as much as they did. But isn't this partly what the song, "One," is about in CHORUS LINE---the chorus of dancing gypsies supporting and enhancing the star, dancing complicated routines around her while she stands in the middle without doing much?
I once saw a touring production of ANYTHING GOES with Ginger Rogers and Sid Caesar in the late '70s. Ginger would sing a chorus or two, do a few kicks, then retire for the rest of the number while the chorus boys and girls danced up a storm onstage. Near the end, the dancers stopped, all eyes turned to Ginger as she returned to the stage, she did a final chorus and a few turns, the chorus boys put her up on their shoulders and marched around with her there, and the song came to an end. Not much dancing from Ginger, but Ginger was a star, the reason they all had their jobs---and the reason the audience came to see the show with the legendary performer in it.
Curiously enough, I was talking with a friend on Tuesday and Channing's name came up. We discussed the fact that Channing was getting frail, but still performing when she could. He said he had seen her at a special charity event 3 or 4 years ago here in Hollywood, and was amazed that she did an 80-minute standup routine very, very capably and well, and was about 87 then. I suspect it was the club act she was preparing around that time. My friend, who was generally noncommital about Channing, said he was very impressed with her clarity and the performance of the material, and developed a whole new respect for her.
Inasmuch as Channing first appeared in a show in 1941, and this is now 2011, I think to have a 70-year show business career, pretty much always spent in the limelight, is quite special.
I suspect no one "trotted her out" for this presentation. To a show person, a "gig" is a gig, they offered it to her as a tribute, she felt she could do it, and did it as well as she could. She IS 90, after all..
I'm sorry my word choice was offensive. I also saw her in a gig doing the Kennedy Center Honors tribut to Jerry Herman. The entire production was rife with original stars doing their numbers. Angela Lansbury, in her 80s, was superb.
Channing, on the other hand, in a red pantsuit with lots of ruffles on the jacket, did not serve the material well at all. She seemed to be mouthing a performance played at half speed.
I very much admire Channing's work and the recordings I have of her are the ones I choose to remember.
..... I also saw her in a gig doing the Kennedy Center Honors tribut to Jerry Herman. The entire production was rife with original stars doing their numbers. Angela Lansbury, in her 80s, was superb.
Channing, on the other hand, in a red pantsuit with lots of ruffles on the jacket, did not serve the material well at all. She seemed to be mouthing a performance played at half speed.....
I agree. Lansbury was great, Channing's turn was unfortunate at the Kennedy Center Honors.
I think, as you age, there is probably a turning point in physical and mental abilities for public performance where, one day you are able, the next day you are not. This may come and go for awhile, but eventually the aging handicaps set in and nothing is possible. The age that this arrives is also difficult to gauge. It may happen sometime in one's early seventies (or less), sometimes not until the mid-to-late nineties, if at all. (Luise Rainer's 100-year appearance at the TCM Festival last year was astonishing. She was certainly physically limited, but her mind was still very, very sharp.)
It is also fairly accurate to say that if you are a true show business trouper, as is Channing, the lure of the lights, the dusty stageboards, the musty theatre, and the audience's response is hard to give up.
.....The spectators on the circus midway were enjoying the sights when they came across a worker diligently following behind the elephant parade scooping up the elephant dung as the parade progressed. One of the audience members collared the worker and asked him if he didn't think his was a rather distasteful job and couldn't he find something better to do. The worker replied, "What? And give up Show Business?".........
Anyone but me remember Carol Channing's strange cameo appearance in a 1984 episode of "Magnum, P.I."?
Leave us not hanging, JP. What was it like?
In an otherwise serious episode, Magnum (Tom Selleck) accompanies his buddy Rick's (Larry Manetti) younger sister at a youthful, flashy, TV New Wave-style club. The sister leaves to ostensibly powder her schnozz but when she doesn't come back, Magnum waits outside the women's pissoir in the hopes that the sister will emerge. Instead, you-know-bouffant-who steps out of the ladies room and Magnum and Carol exchange a few brief words that, while I cannot recall exactly, is rather weird. It's such a "Let's have a faded celebrity on our now-hit show", something the series largely managed to avoid, not counting the excellent Frank Sinatra guest starring episode.
