Another Evening With Harry Stoones
October 21, 1961
Gramercy Arts Theater
New York, NY
Stenod Productions, Inc. presents:
ANOTHER EVENING WITH HARRY STOONES
(a new musical revue)
Sketches, Music, and Lyrics by Jeff Harris
Directed by G. Adam Jordan
Musical Direction and Arrangements by Abba Bogin
Choreography by Joe Milan
Scenery and Lighting by Robert E. Darling
Costumes Designed and Executed by Ruth Wagner
Technical Director, Wade Taylor
CAST
Diana Sands, Sheila Copelan, Ben Keller, Kenny Adams, Dom De Luise, Virgil Curry, Susan Belink, Barbra Streisand
PART I: The Civil War
Carnival In Capri, To Belong, Communication, Ballad to the International Business Machine Building, You Won’t Believe Me, The Wrong Plan, Ballet, Bang!, Don’t Laugh At Me, Museum Piece, Tableau, Indian Nuts*, Uh-Oh, Ragtime, Minnesota, Ballad of the Tree, Value*, Session, My Doggie, Jersey*, Dancin’ Free and Easy, Dr. Rosalyn Green, Invitation to the Basketball, Party of the First Part.
PART II: The Roaring Twenties
Big Barry*, Miss Greenwich Village, Stephanie, Betty Simpson, The Rage, Upstairs at the Downstairs, Hail to Thee!, Serena, Butterfingers, Human Side of the News, Miss Heinshlinger, Strangers on a Train, Water on the Brain, Dream House.
Closed Saturday, October 21, 1961 (1 performance)
* Streisand’s skits
All photos from “Harry Stoones,” this page, by Avery Willard
All About “Harry” ...
The Off-Broadway show had nine previews and one performance, then closed.
With a first act billed as “The Civil War” and a second act titled “The Roaring Twenties” (neither act had anything to do with those time periods), Another Evening with Harry Stoones was a mischievous review performed by eight young talents who sang and acted in the show’s various skits. Even the title made fun of theater conventions — there had never been a first evening with Harry Stoones!
(Above: Streisand sings “Jersey”)
Supposedly, the show opened with the cast running onto the stage and singing “Bye, Goodbye and Thanks”. Barbra was featured in several of the sketches. In “Indian Nuts” she played an Indian in a spoof of Columbus’ discovery of America; The song, “Value” (“I’m in love with Harold Mengert”), which Barbra sang in her nightclub act for years, came from Harry Stoones; Also, the short comedic number which Barbra performed before the Bergdorf Goodman section of her first television special (“I’ve Got the Blues”) was from Stoones.
“Big Barry” was a comedic sketch whose punch line was Barbra walking up to her boyfriend in the locker room and saying, “Barry, I’m pregnant.”; “Jersey” was a three-act song about a woman whose lover has moved to New Jersey. She ended the song by vowing to find him. The ending lyrics were, “I won’t yell, I won’t scream, I won’t squawk, for it’s better to die together in Jersey than be single in New York.” Barbra, with her Brooklyn accent, rhymed “squawk” with “York”.
(Above: Kenny Adams and Streisand in “Stoones.”)
Variety’s review mentioned Streisand as “a slim, offbeat comedienne with a flair for dropping a black-out gag. And she belts across a musical apostrophe to New Jersey with facile intensity.”
Streisand recorded Jeff Harris' “Sweet Zoo” for her television show, My Name is Barbra, and “Marty the Martian”, which appeared on A Happening in Central Park. She continued to use Harris' song from Harry Stoones, “Value,” up until her Las Vegas act in the 1970s.
(Above: “Indian Nuts” with Streisand, Dom De Luise and Sheila Copelan.)
(Below: Streisand, Virgil Curry and Sheila Copelan sing “Minnesota.”)
Here's the New York Times review (October 23, 1961) of the show:
One observation to be made without fear of contradiction about “Another Evening With Harry Stoones” is that there is plenty of it.
Jeff Harris, creator of the revue that opened at the Grammercy Arts Theatre Saturday night, i sone of those hosts who insists on stuffing his guests. Indeed, Mr. Harris seems to have been preparing for this event for all of his twenty-six years.
Writer of the sketches, music and lyrics, he has loaded the first half of the program with twenty-four bits and pieces and thrown in fourteen more in the second. Obviously there is plenty, but whether this is something to be thankful for is another matter. Quantity, even the ancients knew, does not necessarily mean quality.
Not that all of this minor contribution to the Off Broadway season is lackluster. Here and there it is possible to detect flashes of humor and point of view. “Dream House”, for instance, the final skit, has a touch of true farce. The tourist agency's rhythmic hymn to “Minnesota” is fun. But too often the sharp satirical edge is missing along with the authentic comic flare. Frequently during the evening there are lapses of taste as Mr. Harris becomes involved with human functions and homosexuality ...
... No matter, “Another Evening With Harry Stoones”, if not exactly unbearable is nevertheless none too stimulating.
(Above: Streisand, Copelan, Diana Sands, and Susan Belink.)
Just like she did for I Can Get It For You Wholesale, Streisand wrote an eggagerated bio for herself in the Harry Stoones Playbill:
End.
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