Irma La Douce

On September 29, 1960, David Merrick presented Peter Brook’s production of Irma la Douce at the Plymouth Theatre in New York City. A long-run success in Paris and London, Irma la Douce marked the Broadway debuts of Elizabeth Seal and Keith Michell, and brought the haunting melodies of Marguerite Monnot (composer of The Poor People of Paris) to America.

Miss Seal, hailed in London as the “brightest girl star of musical comedy to appear since the war,” began her career in the chorus. When The Pajama Game was produced in London, she was offered the part originated by Carol Haney, and scored an overnight success with her singing, dancing and acting. Thereafter she appeared in Camino Real, starred in Damn Yankees and appeared frequently on television. Irma la Douce represents Miss Seal’s first American appearance.

Keith Michell was an art teacher in Australia when he auditioned for Sir Laurence Olivier and the Old Vic Company. He joined the Old Vic School in 1948, and was seen in many Shakespearean roles both at the Old Vic and at Stratford, England. He made his musical debut in And So to Bed, and has appeared in various movies and television programs.

Clive Revill, from New Zealand, was also a member of the Old Vic School and appeared in numerous productions of Shakespeare, most recently in Peter Brook’s production of The Tempest. Broadway has seen him once before, as Sam Weller in Mr. Pickwick.

A Poule, A Mec and le Grisbi by Leo Lerman

Current international musical comedy is three-faced. It has the profile of turn-of-the-century Vienna, Berlin of the 1920’s, New York of the last three decades. There is not a musical prospering today on this side of the Iron Curtain and probably on the other, in Britain or in either of the Americas which is not indebted, for its basic form, to the sweet and simple operettas of Franz Lehar’s Vienna or the down-to-the-bitter-earth ballad operas of Kurt Weill’s and Berthold Brecht’s Berlin or the zippy, jazzy, hard-boiled sentimentality of the Gershwin’s, Rodgers and Hart’s and Cole Porter’s New York. Irma la Douce, the musical in hand, belongs to the Kurt Weill-Burt Brecht category. It is intensely Parisian French in its musical idiom, its moral atmosphere, its plot and its argot—so recondite is this argot that the Paris programs include a glossary which enables the French to understand what their countrymen are singing and talking about. Irma is, nevertheless, definitely a ballad opera (or musical) depending, as does The Threepenny Opera, for its cumulative impact on a heady mixture of sordid, socially revealing detail and child-like, Turn of the Screw innocence.

Irma la Douce (music by Marguerite Monnot who wrote many of Piaf’s songs and was best known for The Poor People of Paris; book and lyrics by Alexandre Breffort, an ex-taxi driver, novelist and cartoonist who had not yet had a theatrical success) opened at the miniscule Théâtre Gramont in Paris on November 12, 1956 and, at the present writing, four years later, it is still playing in Paris. It opened, its book and lyrics superbly adapted by Julian More, David Heneker and Monty Norman, at the Lyric Theatre in London, in mid-1958 and it continues to delight London. Now, why has this musical been such a tremendous success? “Everyone is mad keen to go see a story about a tart,” explained Elizabeth Seal, star of both the London and New York productions, to a New York Herald Tribune columnist, “but when they get there they’re always surprised. The tart with the heart of gold has been done a thousand times, but not like this.” Miss Seal’s “but not like this” indicates not only the unexpectedness of Irma, the poule in question, but of Irma la Douce, the show which surrounds her, for this musical is like an ear of the best corn which suddenly, right in your hands, becomes a glass of the most potent pernod.

We are, when the curtain rises, in the backstreets off Pigalle (Valse Milieu), as louche a neighborhood as any dockside provided by Weill and Brecht for their Threepenny Opera’s Jenny and Mack the Knife. And here is a gang (Sons of France) and Irma la Douce, herself. She is, of course, the Poule who falls madly in love with Nestor le Fripe (The Bridge of Caulaincourt), a law student without a sou. They take to keeping house together (Our Language of Love), and since Nestor must continue his unremunerative studies, Irma willingly continues her remunerative career (She’s Got the Lot). Thus far Alexandre Breffort’s book is entirely within the corny convention of tart-meets-attractive-but-penniless-male-so-goes-to-work-to-support-same. But now Breffort takes the convention and smashes it diabolically. Nestor is green-eyed over Irma’s customers: he wants to be the only buyer. So he becomes just that by disguising himself in a beard and bowler. Nestor is now Irma’s protector, Monsieur Oscar. And Irma is enchanted with this (Dis-donc, dis-donc). The gang sings of money’s evils (Le Grisbi is le Root of le Evil in Man). But Nestor soon tires of his double life: being both Client and Mec is exhausting (The Wreck of a Mec). Moreover Nestor becomes even more jealous of Monsieur Oscar than ever he was of Irma’s earlier clients. There’s but one way to triumph over Monsieur Oscar: he must die. The gang cautions Nestor: murder’s a nasty business (That’s a Crime) even when it’s a crime passionel. But Nestor is wildly jealous. The deed is done. Nestor is arrested.

Nestor, found guilty, is dispatched to Devil’s Island where he longs for Irma (From a Prison Cell). Meanwhile on those backstreets off Pigalle, Irma no longer is at work. She’s given it up. (Irma-la-Douce). When Nestor discovers that he’s to be a papa, he makes up his mind to escape: he must be with Irma when she becomes the mother of his child (There Is Only One Paris for That). Nestor and the gang return, via raft, to Paris (The Freedom of the Seas, Arctic Ballet). All sorts of adventures ensue, but finally Nestor proves that he never did murder Monsieur Oscar (But). And the saga of Irma la Douce comes to a radiant end with Nestor arriving just in time for the birth of Irma’s child (Christmas Child) and a full-throated reunion finale.

But it is not only this fantastic story which has made Irma la Douce the darling of both Paris and London. Marguerite Monnot’s score is as chockablock with delectable café chantant tunes as a really good pot au feu is with delicious morsels of meat. They are the kind of tunes we’ve been hearing Piaf and Montand and all those other French café-music hall types sing for years, but pealing from the throats of Irma, Nestor and the “gang” they become wonderfully fresh.

“Grave doubts were expressed as to whether the peculiar qualities of the show were exportable.” Julian More wrote in explaining how Irma came to London. “The tender love story between a prostitute and her protector, the thieves slang of the lyrics . . . the earthy outspokenness of the dialogue, the basic innocence of the Paris production—all these things seemed almost impossible to achieve in a tongue with such a clodhopping language of love as contemporary English . . . we eventually hit on the right way to present Irma to English audiences: to avoid use of Bronx or Cockney slang equivalents, so beloved of subtitlers and so killing to Gallic atmosphere; to use instead a few French argot terms in their original—Milieu (for underworld), Poule (for tart), Mec (for pimp), Grisbi (for money); and to adapt the lyrics freely, taking Breffort’s thoughtline by creating our own shapes, and in some cases writing completely new lyrics to Monnot’s music.” And that is just what More, Heneker and Norman did and what director Peter Brook has put on the stage with Elizabeth Seal, Keith Michell and Clive Revill as Irma, Nestor and Bob the barman-raconteur.

– Leo Lerman

Track Listing

A

1. Overture Orchestra
2. Valse Milieu Clive Revill; Elizabeth Seal
3. Sons of France George S. Irving; Fred Gwynne; Zack Matalon; Aric Lavie; Osborne Smith; Stuart Damon
4. The Bridge of Caulaincourt Elizabeth Seal; Keith Michell
5. Our Language of Love Elizabeth Seal; Keith Michell
6. She’s Got the Lot George S. Irving
7. Dis-donc, dis-donc Elizabeth Seal; Company
8. Le Grisbi is le Root of le Evil in Man Keith Michell; Clive Revill; Zack Matalon; Aric Lavie; Osborne Smith; Stuart Damon
9. The Wreck of a Mec Keith Michell
10. That’s a Crime Clive Revill; Company
11. From a Prison Cell Keith Michell; Zack Matalon; Aric Lavie; Osborne Smith; Stuart Damon
12. Irma-la-Douce Elizabeth Seal; Company
13. There Is Only One Paris for That Keith Michell; Company
14. The Freedom of the Seas
15. Arctic Ballet
16. But Keith Michell; George S. Irving; Rudy Tronto; George Del Monte; Fred Gwynne
17. Christmas Child Company

Album Information

• Artist: Original Broadway Cast
• Catalog Number: OL 5560 / OS 2029
• Catalog Numbers: OL 5560; OS 2029
• Label: Columbia Masterworks
• Liner Notes: Leo Lerman
• Source: OL-5560
• Production: Original Broadway Cast
• Presented by: David Merrick in association with Donald Albery and H. M. Tennent, Ltd. and by arrangement with Henry Hall
• Directed by: Peter Brook
• Theatre: Plymouth Theatre, New York City
• Opening date: September 29, 1960 Press quotes:

“If an original cast album is made available in your neighborhood, get it . . . The music . . . is irresistibly jolly . . . inventive and genuinely stylish . . . There is imagination, and to spare.” —N.Y. Herald Tribune; “Strikingly imaginative style and originality . . . charming score, filled with attractive songs . . . ‘Irma la Douce’ is a pleasure and Elizabeth Seal is an utter delight.” —N.Y. Post; “Saucy, sentimental music . . . a delicious bouquet . . .” —N.Y. Times; “There won’t be a more captivating new musical on Broadway all this season . . . the songs have the lift of Montmartre . . . Elizabeth Seal is a darling . . . Keith Michell is just right.” —Daily News; “Terrifique . . . a socko success.” —N.Y. Journal-American

• Stereo catalog number: OS 2029
• Mono catalog number: OL 5560
• Inspection stamp: INSPECTED 10-4