The lights of Broadway will dim for one minute this evening (Wednesday January 16) to mark the passing of Carol Channing, an outsized persona and outsized talent for whom the nomenclature “Broadway legend” could have been invented.
She died Tuesday (15 January) at the age of 97 at her home in Rancho Mirage, California. Her death came almost 55 years to the day after the 16 January 1964 opening of her history-making performance as Dolly Gallagher Levi in Hello, Dolly! The role won her a Tony Award that year as Best Actress in a Musical, and counting revivals, she went on to play it more than 5,000 times. In 1995, she was Dolly in a touring revival when she received a Tony Award for lifetime achievement.
Sizeable attention first came to Channing in the musical revue, Lend an Ear, which opened on Broadway in 1948. It was choreographed by Gower Champion, who later directed her in Hello, Dolly!
She achieved Broadway stardom in 1949 with the opening of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, where she embodied the gold-digging darling of the Roaring Twenties, Lorelei Lee. Before she created the musical Dolly Levi, she appeared as a replacement in Wonderful Town and was also in the shows The Vamp and Show Girl. After her seven-year stint in the original mounting of Dolly, Channing starred in the play Four on a Garden and in Lorelei, a revised take on Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.
In between Dolly’s revivals and tours, there were tours of Jerry’s Girls, a revue of the songs of Dolly’s composer Jerry Herman, and the appropriately named play, Legends, co-starring with Mary Martin. Her film work included Thoroughly Modern Millie, for which she received a supporting-role Oscar nomination and Golden Globe Award; The First Traveling Saleslady, and Skidoo. There were multitudes of television and nightclub appearances.
On a personal note, as a young theatre-goer seeing her when she toured in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes was almost an out-of-body experience. She outdid expectations that had already been heightened by reams of publicity, including a wide-eyed portrait that fairly burst off the prestigious cover of Time magazine. Here was this adorable overgrown kewpie doll looking like a creature from another world and dominating the stage with a voice that could go from a come-hither drawl to a bottom-of-the-barrel baritone. She brought a new definition to Broadway leading lady, one that has never been matched.
Her passing brought forth tributes from a wide berth of showbusiness colleagues and admirers, including her successors in the role of Dolly Levi in the show’s most recent revival, which closed on Broadway this past August: Bette Midler and Bernadette Peters. Midler in a statement recalled how after she was asked to play the role, she visited Channing.
“It was one of the great afternoons of my life… I will forever be grateful to her for lighting my way to one of the most magical experiences of my performing life…,” said Midler. “As far as I’m concerned, she will live forever.”
“She was showbusiness and love personified,” tweeted Peters, while Betty Buckley, playing Dolly in the revival’s national touring company, noted: “We are dedicating our opening tonight in San Diego to her in the theatre where the first national tour of Hello, Dolly! starring Ms. Channing opened. Thank you, Carol, for the legacy of joy!”
Barbra Streisand, who played Dolly in the movie version, said: “Carol was a true life-force… a kind and effervescent woman who never allowed the parade to pass her by!”
Ron Cohen
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