Sweet Charity 60 No. 4 - Big Spender, Rich Man's Frug

Excerpts from an opening night review by Stanley Kauffman in the New York Times, 1966.

"Mr. Fosse’s staging of numbers is often superb. ‘Big Spender,’ in which the hostesses line up at a railing that has arisen just behind the footlights, is a splendid mobile frieze of floozies. ‘Rich Man’s Frug’ and ‘Rhythm of Life,’ the ‘religious’ beatnik  number with a sharp vocal arrangement, are electric uses of jazz. Mr. Fosse also employs nice silent-movie touches—subtitles flashed over head, stopped motion, a little dance satire of film comedy (executed by Miss Verdon).

"Robert Randolph’s lighting and settings are good. I particularly admired the airy outlines (apparently wrought iron) of trees and facades that are lowered from time to time against back-lighting. (Much of this show is done in silhouettes with lighting from back and sides; and Mr. Fosse has conceived much of the dancing and staging with emphasis on elongated profile arrangements.)"

"Big Spender"

(left) Photo by Friedman-Abeles via NYPL

(right) Photo by Ralph Morse, LIFE Magazine

(5th from left) Thelma Oliver, (6th from left) Helen Gallagher, (7th from left) Kathryn Doby,

Unsure of the others: Mary Louise, Alice Evans, Betsy Dickerson, Suzanne Charney, Elaine Cancilla, Carmen Morales, Christine Stewart, Charlene Ryan,

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"Rich Man's Frug"

Photos by Friedman-Abeles via NYPL.

The ensemble includes:

I. W. Klein, Mary Louise , Alice Evans, Betsy Dickerson, Kathryn Doby, Suzanne Charny, Elaine Cancilla, Carmen Morales, Christine Stewart, Charlene Ryan, David Gold, Gene Foote, Harold Pierson, Bud Vest, John Sharpe, Eddie Gasper, Michael Davis (i), Patrick Heim, Lee Roy Reams

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