Oh, Lady! Lady!!
A musical
| Book: | Guy Bolton and P. G. Wodehouse |
| Lyrics: | P. G. Wodehouse |
| Music: | Jerome Kern |
First produced 1 February 1918 at the Princess Theatre, New York, moving to the Casino Theatre (total 219 performances).
Revived by Musicals Tonight! Inc., April - May 2006 in New York and by 42nd Street Moon from Nov 23 to Dec 16, 2007 in San Francisco.
Synopsis
Act 1 is set in a country house in Hempstead, Long Island. Spike Hodgins, valet to Willoughby Finch, is in love with pickpocket Fainting Fanny. Finch is due to be married but an old flame, May Barber, turns up and the wedding is cancelled. Hodgins gets Fanny to pretend to be one of Finch's ex-girlfriends to get rid of May. In Act 2, on Finch's roof garden in Greenwich Village, the problems are sorted out with May and another man, Underwood, falling in love. *
Recordings
Broadway Through the Gramophone (1844-1930), Vol 3: 1914-1920 - a double CD on Pearl GMS 0084, with five songs from early 78s: When All the Little Ships Come Sailing Home, Not Yet, Before I Met You, Some Little Girl, You Found Me and I Found You and When All the Little Ships Come Sailing Home - which looks like it might be a medley. (I have not heard it - it also features songs from Have a Heart, Leave it to Jane and Oh, Boy!.)
The Land Where the Good Songs Go - on Harbinger Records, catalogue HCD 1901, containing Bill and 15 songs with lyrics by Wodehouse from other shows.
The story was later used by PG as the basis for his book
The Small Bachelor, but with many changes.
* There is some confusion over characters' names, with Hodgins also called Hudgins and Hudgkin, and May is also called Marjorie. (The latter possibly because the actress for that production was named Madge.) The chorus, on the other hand, are blessed with such names as Della Catessan, Mollie Gatawney and C. Ollie Flower.
While writing this musical, PG lived in a studio apartment on the roof of an office building on 22nd and Madison Avenue, not far from the Princess Theatre.