By Seth Rudetsky
01 Mar 2010

	Florence Henderson
	photo by Joseph Marzullo/WENN

As I mentioned before, Florence Henderson was the host, and the fun part was, she was also my guest at the Chatterbox. Turns out, she was the last of ten children, and her father was 50 (!) when he began having kids. James and I did some calculation, and that means her father was born in the 1860's. Holy Abraham Lincoln!

She was very poor growing up but was able to come to NYC to study for one year at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts because someone from her hometown sponsored her. That's where she learned to get rid of her thick Southern Indiana accent. Before she began her second year of school, she auditioned and got cast in the chorus of Wish You Were Here… alongside Phyllis Newman! Then she auditioned for the national tour of Oklahoma! It was an old-school audition in a Broadway theatre (as opposed to a rehearsal studio). After she sang, the man in the audience said that he wanted his partner to hear her sing later on that day. "Who's your partner?" Florence asked. "Oscar Hammerstein," responded Richard Rodgers. Yowza! After her callback, they offered her the role of Laurie, but she didn't know anything about the show. She asked Richard Rodgers, "What's Laurie like?" And he said, "She's a lot like you." Aw! Florence told us that after a year on the road, she got the opportunity to do a screen test for the part. She then glared and said, "I obviously didn't get the film. It went to that b*tch, Shirley Jones!" She then told us she was joking, and they were actually good friends. Speaking of good friends, she and Richard Rodgers were very close throughout his life, and she sounds fabulous singing his music. I did a re-creation of the deconstruction I did in Broadway Backwards, which features Florence singing "The Sound of Music." She's brilliant! Watch! http://sethrudetsky.com/blog/

After Florence did the tour, she auditioned for her first leading role in a Broadway show and got called back many, many times. Finally, she had her final callback and went home to visit her family in Indiana. When she got there, she suddenly got a telegram from the producer, David Merrick. It said, "Come back to New York…Fanny!" What a great way to find out you got a title role in a show! She played opposite Ezio Pinza and told us about opening night. Mary Martin had done South Pacific opposite Ezio, and she was about to open in Peter Pan. She sent him an opening-night card saying, "I hope your Fanny is as big as my Peter." Wow. They were dirty back in the fifties!

I do a comedy show called Deconstructing the Brady Bunch Variety Hour and mentioned it to Florence. She asked me, "Why are gay people so obsessed with that show." I replied, "Have you ever seen it?" No response. So I continued: "The outfits? The song choices? The plotlines?" She concurred. If you don't know what I'm talking about, here's a clip from my show: http://sethrudetsky.com/blog/2009/03/01/deconstructing-the-brady-bunch-variety-hour/ .

Tonight I'm playing in a big benefit for the children of Haiti at Joe's Pub. There is a fabulous line-up, and it was put together by the great composing team of Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens, and it's music-directed by Randy Redd. Go to Joespub.com for tix. I think Kecia Lewis-Evans is going to re-create her amazing "Mama Will Provide" from Once On This Island. Yes! On Friday I fly to Dallas' Watertower Theatre to do my Deconstructing Broadway show and a master class. You can get tickets and register for the class at http://sethrudetsky.com/blog/see-me-live/. The delicious part is the show and master class are both selling well and James is coming along to visit his grandma. The headache-y part is our flight leaves at 7 AM. From Newark. I essentially have to go to bed now in order to get enough sleep to wake up that early. So, on that note, peace out!

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Seth Rudetsky has played piano in the pits of many Broadway shows including Ragtime, Grease and The Phantom of the Opera. He was the artistic producer/conductor for the first five Actors Fund concerts including Dreamgirls and Hair, which were both recorded. As a performer, he appeared on Broadway in The Ritz and on TV in "All My Children," "Law and Order C.I." and on MTV's "Made" and "Legally Blonde: The Search for the Next Elle Woods." He has written the books "The Q Guide to Broadway" and "Broadway Nights," which was recorded as an audio book on Audible.com. He is currently the afternoon Broadway host on Sirius/XM radio and tours the country doing his comedy show, "Deconstructing Broadway." He can contacted at his website SethRudetsky.com, where he has posted many video deconstructions.