Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - Michael Feinstein

Episode Date: March 14, 2022

Grammy and Emmy-nominated musician and historian Michael Feinstein serenades Gilbert and Frank with classic tunes from the "Great American Songbook" and talks about performing at Hollywood parties, dining with Frank Sinatra, "accompanying" Judy Garland, befriending Rosemary Clooney and Ira Gershwin and recording his latest album "Gershwin Country." Also, Paul Lynde gets plastered, Liberace morphs into Carol Channing, Irving Berlin begs Groucho not to perform his songs and Vincent Price carries on the memory of Dolores del Rio. PLUS: Bert Lahr! The music of Hugh Martin! The genius of Yip Harburg! Peter Lorre meets...Peter Lorre! Uncle Hymie inspires Inigo Montoya! And Michael favors the boys with "I Love a Piano" and "Lydia the Tattooed Lady"!  (Special thanks to Susan Madore, Mario Cantone and Land Romo)  Shop Solo Stove now and get up to 30% off fire pits all month long, use promo code GILBERT at checkout to get an extra $20 off. Plus a lifetime warranty and FREE 30-day returns. Start hiring RIGHT NOW with a SEVENTY-FIVE DOLLAR SPONSORED JOB CREDIT to upgrade your job post at Indeed.com/GILBERT. Offer valid through March 31st. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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the single malt whiskey that started it all for a balanced flavor and smooth finish. Just sit back and listen to the music. This single malt scotch whiskey is guaranteed to impress dad. This father's day, the Glenliv. Live original. Please enjoy our products responsibly. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast with my co-host, Frank Santopadre.

And our guest this week is a musician, singer, composer, arranger, conductor, an Emmy-nominated entertainer, and a multi-platinum Grammy-nominated recording artist. In his very active and prolific career, this man has recorded nearly three dozen albums, including tributes to Irving Berlin, Frank Sinatra, and MGM Musicals, as well as his ambitious songbook project, recording the songs of legendary composers often accompanied by the composer himself, including Burton Lane, Julie Stein, Jerry Herman,

Hugh Martin, Jay Livingston, and Ray Evans, and our pal and podcast guest, Jimmy Webb. He's also an educator, archivist, cultural historian, and the ambassador of the great American songbook and has been featured in Emmy-nominated TV specials like Michael Feinstein's American Songbook and Michael Feinstein's The Sinatra Legacy. He also hosts the critically acclaimed NPR series Song Travels with Michael Feinstein. And somehow he found time to write two books.

Nice work if you could get it. And the L.A. Times bestseller, The Gershwins and Me. But there's more. There's more. Yeah. And if you order now, he's performed on Broadway at Carnegie Hall, at the White House, the Sydney Opera House, and even Buckingham Palace. in Buckingham Palace and his popular nightclub, Feinstein's at the Regency,

Feinstein's 54, and Feinstein's at the Nico Hotel have presented top musical talents including Rosemary Clooney, Ben Vereen, Chita Rivera, Glenn Campbell, and podcast guests Michelle School Songbook Academy. His brand new album, Gershwin Country, a collaboration with longtime friend Liza Minnelli, is a reinterpretation of

the Gershwin songbook by country music performers and features Dolly Parton, Brad Paisley, Roseanne Cash, Lyle Lovett, and more. Frank and I are excited to welcome to the show an artist of many gifts, passions, and abilities, and a man who claims that Mandy Patankin based his character in The Princess Bride on his Uncle Jaime. It's true. The multi-talented Michael Feinstein.

Well, thank you, guys. I'm sorry, but I'm out of time. I have to go. He's got to go. He's got to go. He's got to go. That wasn't the longest one we've ever done, believe it or not, Michael. Wow. Well, I'm very impressed. I feel like I'm doing archaeology into my own remains. You've done a lot. There's a lot to cover in an intro.

Tell us about Uncle Jaime and Mandy Patinkin. Because we gotta know. Uncle Jaime, Jaime Gates, was the oldest member of the Stagehands Union in New York. He first worked in theater, Lower East Side Yiddish theater with Paul Muni and other actors. And he worked the end of his career at the Morosco Theater, which was eventually torn down

to make way for the Marquis Hotel. And so when he retired, they had to manufacture a 75-year pin because nobody had ever been in the union that long. And in the 70s, I think Mandy's first Broadway show was called The Shadow Box. And I was in high school, traveled from Columbus, Ohio to see the thing. And Mandy was quite amazing. And he became very close to Mandy. And Mandy wanted to do a project or something with Uncle Jaime and made all these tapes recording Uncle Jaime's history. And Uncle Jaime talked like this, you know, I told you I'm going to go here, I'm going to go there. And so Mandy told me, he literally, because I said, when I saw the movie,

I said, that sounds like Uncle Jaime. And he said, yes, I'm Don Jose. I am Uncle Jaime. It's Uncle Jaime. So Uncle Jaime lives in The Princess Bride. Indigo Montoya. Exactly. I'm Indigo Montoya. Yeah. So he's not. He's Uncle Jaime. That's hilarious. Yeah. I mean, ask him. It's true. If we get Mandy on this show, we're going to go right to Uncle Jaime. Absolutely.

If we get Mandy on this show, we're going to go right to Uncle Jaime. And before we got on the air, of course, one of those names that always pops up on this podcast, Paul Lynn. And you said you've had some dealings with Paul Lynn. He was wonderful. Actually, he wasn't. Actually, he was not wonderful i i loved him because in columbus ohio we'd go every summer to see him at the kenley players and he would do a play every year uh like he did plaza sweet mimsy come out of there mimsy you know that all that and uh i like his impression better than yours gil it's really good he's got a dead-on point. Oh, he was great. Well, I grew up watching him.

You know, like, my favorite is on Hollywood Squares when they said, Paul, a man reaches a sexual prime at the age of 18. At what age does a woman

reach her sexual prime? And he said, who cares? Great. But I'd watch him, Kenley players, and eventually when I came to California, I'd be hired to play parties.

And he was there. And he was always drunk. And the more he drank, the more mean he became. And I was playing, you know, something like... Playing the piano, minding my own business. He came over and he said, pick up the tempo. And then he poured a drink in the piano. Oh, my God.

Oh, God. Oh, that's a no-no. Well, it wasn't my piano, but I felt bad for the host, you know. Wow. Wow. And I heard, because I used to do Hollywood Squares, and one of the producers was at the original show, and he said that during lunch, Paul Lynn would get really drunk, and all the other people were getting along great and joking back and forth, telling stories, and Paul Lynn would get more and more mean-spirited and more and more anti-Semitic. Yeah. Well, yeah. I mean, he he he became anti everything, I think. But my my my my manager, Jim, represented Paul and he and his wife would go over for dinner and they knew at a certain time as Paul would drink.

It was like, OK, we got to go and everybody would leave because they knew they had to get out of Dodge before it turned ugly. Wow. As long as we're telling stories about misbehavior, in your wonderful book, and this goes— Oh, you should play Let's Misbehave. Perfect. Perfect. Thank you. I'm here all week. I love it.

We're going to talk about playing private parties and piano bars and all of that good stuff, Michael. But I was struck by the stories, and this goes back to Uncle Jaime, who worked with Jolson. Yes. And I was struck by the stories in the book of Jolson's pettiness. Oh, yeah, yeah. Both being envious of other performers doing well. Yeah, yeah. And there's that story about, is it Patsy Kelly or Ruby Keeler that he was working with on stage and pulled a prank?

It's a good story. Yes, yes. Yeah, my uncle worked a lot with Jolson, and he would read Jolson the Yiddish papers because Jolson couldn't read Yiddish. And so he would read him the Yiddish reviews, the Yiddish this and that. But Jolson was very, very petty. He would routinely come on stage and squash the applause for another entertainer so they couldn't get their due. Wow. He just... Would he turn up the faucet backstage to drown out the sound of someone else's applause?

Yes, so he couldn't hear the applause. He would turn on the faucet so he couldn't hear it. Harry Warren told me a story that he was driving back from Palm Springs with Jolson, who had just introduced two of his songs. Actually, Harry Warren and Al Dubin, so they're in the backseat. Jolson's driver's driving, and Jolson's in the passenger seat. And the driver says, gee, Al, those songs you just sang, about a quarter to nine, and she's

a Latin from Manhattan. Those are great songs. Who wrote them? And Jolson looked at him and said, who wrote them? With the composers in the backseat, he still couldn't give them credit for the songs. with the composers in the back seat, he still couldn't give them credit for the songs. He couldn't stand it. But Patsy Kelly, I'm trying to remember what was it. Oh, it's a story. They were in a show on Broadway.

I think it was Wonder Bar. And she had to play Pavlova. She had to do a death scene. A death scene. And he put real buckshot in a gun? Right, that's what it was. He shot her with buckshot. And she said, I did moves, that real dying swan that night. And she said he thought it was funny.

He was an odd guy. What a great guy. But he was, was he the greatest performer that people say he was? Everybody, everybody I asked about said that. I mean, from George Burns to Sinatra to, I mean, you name it, they all said that. Sinatra actually had an interesting story about being on the bill once with Jolson. It was a benefit and Sinatra was supposed to close the bill because he had gotten, you know, he was at the early height of his career. The first bloom of extraordinary success. And he said, you know, Mr. Jolson, I feel that you should close the show.

And Jolson says to Sinatra, no, no, kid. No, you're going to close it. No worries. Don't worry about it, kid. So Jolson was to go before Sinatra. So Jolson was supposed to do two songs or three songs. And instead, he went out and did 30 minutes. And he did one song after another, after another, all of his standards.

And people were screaming and yelling pandemonium. And then Jolson did another 10 minutes. He goes on for 40 minutes. And finally, he finishes and walks off stage. And he turns to Sinatra and says, follow that. Jeez. Unbelievable. Man. Unbelievable. offstage and he turns to Sinatra and says, follow that! Oh, jeez! Unbelievable. Man! Unbelievable.

And we jump around here, Michael. Chronology and logical order are not our strong points. So I do want to ask about, since you brought Sinatra up, playing that chasen's party for his wife and meeting Frank, because that's a fun story. Yes, yes. I had not met Frank, and I didn't know that I ever would, for that matter. I was still pretty much playing piano bars and private parties and happy to do so.

And I got a call from Chasen's Restaurant, which your listeners probably know was the famous celebrity watering hole in Beverly Hills. And I was hired to play a private party for Frank and Barbara Sinatra. It was Barbara's birthday party. And after I got the gig, I hung up and started thinking about the reality of what was to come, that I would be in the presence of Mr. Sinatra. And I decided I was going to try and learn every obscure or unusual song he had sung in hopes that maybe he would pay attention to the piano player. So I learned songs from like The Kissing Bandit, which is a movie he said he wished he'd never made. But I learned all these songs. And then the night arrived and I got to Chase. It's very early. And

they ushered me into the party room in the back and upright piano in the corner. And I just started noodling, playing, waiting for people to arrive. Then the guests started arriving. And it was Johnny Carson and Don Rickles and Gregory Peck and Dinah Shore. And my hands were, like, atrophying. I was so scared. You know, I thought it was going to— You had to be a kid.

I was in my 20s, and I thought I was going to—early 20 know, I thought it was going to happen. You had to be a kid. I was in my twenties and I thought I was going to early twenties. I thought it was going to hyperventilate. I was so, so nervous and excited, but I would play these songs and, and he and Barbara arrived, nodded actually to me and sat down and I was playing, I don't know, one obscure thing after another. And every time I'd play another, another one of these songs, he would look at me with the most perplexed expression. And so I didn't, I knew I was having an effect on him, but I wasn't sure what it was, you know. But after about an hour, he got up from his table and came over to me and leaned over the back of the upright piano and looked at me with those piercing blue eyes. And this is what he said.

Jesus, how do you know all those songs? How old are you, 12? That's great. And then he invited me to sit down and join him at the table. And he started telling stories. And then he and Barbara invited me over to their house for dinner. And that's how we became friends. So my plan worked.

Well, great plan. And it had to be an out-of-body experience. we became friends. So my plot, my plan worked. Well, great plan. And it had to be an out of body experience. What was Frank like to be friends with? Well, he was different with me than he was with other people in the sense that I spoke his language because I wanted to know about Mabel Mercer. Like I said, is it true that you went to hear Mabel Mercer?

And I'd ask, talk about arrangers Mercer. Like I said, is it true that you went to hear Mabel Mercer? And I'd talk about arrangers, songs. I didn't ever care to know about Ava Gardner or any of that stuff. So he knew that I was passionate about the music. So it gave me an opportunity to get to know that part of him, which was most interesting. Very smart on your part, but also authentic. Yeah, it was just where my passion was. And he was a fascinating guy because he was very volatile, and he reacted viscerally to things. And you never knew what was going to strike him this way or that. And mind you, I didn't know him all that well, I mean, compared to so many other people. And mind you, I didn't know him all that well, I mean, compared to so many other people. But he was very constant in the way he reacted. I remember one night at the house, they were talking about how Dean, Dean Martin had quit. And Frank said, they're going to have to put me six feet under to get me to stop because that's what mattered most to him at one point Liza Minnelli told me she was flying with Frank when they were touring and he was kind of sighing and she said what's wrong Frank he said I'm lonely and she said you miss

Barbara and he said I miss all my wives isn't that interesting it is is. Wow. Wow, wow, wow. Let's talk about this fascinating journey of yours, Michael. Everything prompts a song. This is a seasoned performer. Sorry. That's okay. We should tell our listeners before we turn the mics on and we were trying to get the audio right, Michael was serenading us with one song after another and it was a lot of fun. You grew up in Columbus, Ohio, which you described as not

particularly a hotbed of musical activity. Why did I ever leave Ohio? Yes, it's true. I grew up in Columbus, and Columbus was the place where a lot of shows... Uncle Jaime, who we mentioned earlier, Uncle Jaime said that Columbus was called the death town because shows never drew there, nobody ever did well there. And when Vladimir Horowitz played Columbus, it was the only city on his concert tour that didn't sell out. The symphony there was always about to go under. It was a sports town, you know, OSU and all that. And yet there was this great music exposure for me, thanks to my parents and such. But no, not a lot of culture in that way. It's different now, of course.

I would imagine. But your story is one of people, it seems, you know, giving you opportunities and moving you along in life. I mean, not only your parents, but your Uncle Henry gives you that wonderful collection of records. Uncle Jaime brought you to New York. You know, what Ira Gershwin did for you is well known. What Liza and Rosemary Clooney did for you is well known. You've been the beneficiary of a lot of generous people. I spoke their language, so I had an in in that they were usually intrigued that there was this teenager or 20-year-old kid who understood their references. Yeah, I'd imagine. And so the that was i didn't realize it at the

time but that was the thing that made it possible for me to have these friendships and relationships because i really understood their world their worlds at one point i was working for ira gershwin which was a six-year period most wonderful period of my life and and at one point um i i said made a comment about something that that ira had uh had written and he was so intrigued and shocked that i knew about this and then he looked at me and he said how many others like you are there because he was so shocked that there was a kid who was 20 years old who understood. I left June Levant out. Oscar Levant's widow was also somebody who did you a solid. I mean, it's fascinating to reconstruct the story of your career.

Maybe for you. the story of your career. Maybe for you. Well, tell us anyway. It's very interesting, too. You think you never met Oscar Levant, but you've gone through your life thinking that you have a feeling as if you have a spiritual connection to him.

That is true. I've always believed in reincarnation because when I was five, I sat down and started playing the piano fully, both hands, and I could play. And that's just my belief. But I always felt a connection with Levant. And right after I moved to California, through a series of coincidences, I met June Levant. I went to a used record store in Hollywood

looking for a particular issue of Oscar Levant's that was his last recording, which at that point was rare, issued in 1961. The guy said, no, we don't have that, but we have this box of records that belong to him. And it turns out that they had this huge cache of air checks and soundtrack rehearsal recordings and stuff that was amazing. My eyes popped out of my head and the guy sold it to me for $200. I had to borrow $150 from my parents to pay for it. And then I was able to find a phone number for Oscar Levant's widow, June Levant, and made a cold call to her. And she invited me over to the house because I knew so much about her husband and she was intrigued. And Oscar was a hero to me, not only

as a musician and considered to be the greatest Gershwin interpreter who kept the Gershwin music alive after George died, but also one of the greatest wits. I mean, he said that he knew Doris Day before she became a virgin. And he said Elizabeth Taylor ought to get a divorce and settle down. He said, there's a fine line between insanity and genius. I have erased that line also and also when somebody was talking to oscar about someone who said oh so-and-so is his own worst enemy and oscar said not while i'm around that's funny that's funny something happened when we were talking off the air uh that you are playing the way you look tonight.

And if you could play that and if you could sing a little of it too, well, I could, but yeah, sure. Okay. All right. Yeah.

Someday when I'm awfully low, when the world is cold, I will feel a glow just thinking of you and the way you look tonight. Well, that song was from the movie Swing Time and won an Academy Award for Jerome Kern. But I discovered that actually the first eight bars of this song was a piece of underscore for a movie that Kern had worked on a year earlier at MGM called Reckless, which starred Jean Harlow, whose voice was dubbed because she couldn't sing. But it was just a little piece of underscore that was written as a shottish, because Kern loved these da-da-da-da-da-da. So it goes, I'm trying to remember exactly how it sounded. It was like... It was just eight bars, and it repeated over and over again as this underscore.

And I was so shocked to hear that piece of music and to realize that that became the way you look tonight. So he clearly loved that theme and turned it into a song with that gorgeous bridge. With each word your tenderness goes Tearing my fear apart And Dorothy Fields, who wrote the lyrics, said that that was her favorite lyric of all the hundreds and hundreds of songs that she wrote. Oh, it's a beautiful one. Is that one of your favorites, Gil?

I'll tell you. That was beautiful, the way you sang it just now. Really beautiful. Thank you. Really beautiful. Yeah. Let me just ask you some stuff about meeting Ira. And, you know, we don't have the time in the time that we have here to tell the entire Feinstein story.

But it is fascinating that you can, in those days, you could look somebody up in the phone book and you find Oscar Levent's phone number and you're able to contact his widow. And this leads to a six-year relationship with the legendary Ira Gershwin. Yes, yes. I had gone to a psychic who told me that I was going to meet Ira Gershwin. I'd never been to a psychic, but I was playing in a restaurant. And one of the waiters said, oh, this lady's really great. She charged you $25 and told me that I would meet and work for Ira Gershwin. I went, yes, sir. But it happened less than a year later.

And June Levant is the person who told Ira about me and his wife, Leonore, and they asked to meet me. And so I went over to the house and I met Leonore and Ira. And I was very, very nervous because Ira was somebody who was a true idol to me. And the minute that Lee Gershwin opened the door and I walked in and saw him sitting in the distance, I started quaking because I was so overwhelmed that I was in the presence of this man who was 80 years old, who had written all these classic songs in the twenties and thirties and was still alive.

And I had the opportunity to see and interact with him. I didn't know what would go from there. I had no idea that I would become part of their family. But Ira was autographing an album called Ira Gershwin Loves to Rhyme, which somebody had compiled of demos of him singing. And I said, gee, Mr. Gershwin, I have that album. He said, you do? You're the first person outside of a relative I've met who actually has this album.

And we were sitting there, and he was very quiet and shy. And Leonore Gershwin and her sister, Emily, who was visiting from New York, were sitting in the corner watching this exchange. And to make conversation, I said, gee, Mr. Gershwin, I have a 78 of gems from La La Lucille. La La Lucille was the first Broadway show with music by George Gershwin, 1919. And Ira said, oh, I bet it has the two most popular songs from the show on record, Teotolumbumbo and Nobody But You. And I said, that's right. And Lee Gershwin turned to her sister and said, isn't that cute?

He's telling Ira, that's right. But we clicked. Yeah, and for six years. Yes. He was a fixture in your life. And she hired you to catalog his records, and you wound up going through all the archives in the house and found wonderful artifacts. It was amazing. It was amazing. I mean, just going through the records was amazing, to find recordings of George Gershwin playing and all these things.

And imagine. That in itself was, as my tribe says, Dayenu. But yeah, then Lee came to me, Lee Gershwin, about, I guess about two weeks after I'd been working with Ira, just doing the phonograph records. And she said, you have given my husband a new lease on life. You have brought him back to life. And I'm going to open every door and closet in this house to you. Just stay busy and keep my husband happy. And that's what I did. And I found George Gershwin's little black book with the phone numbers, names of all of his girlfriends that he carried in his pocket, and a little tune notebook with themes that he had notated that were never realized into compositions letters and ephemera his his tie

clip and uh the the fob for his watch that he used when he played concerts and um things that ira had sequestered privately in his closet like the last document that george signed which uh turned everything over to ira when it was clear that ge George was so ill that they didn't know what was going to happen. And to see the signature and the hand run off the page is one of the most poignant and heartbreaking things I've ever looked at, knowing what happened to George, dying at the age of 38 from a brain tumor only two days after signing that document. Wow. Wow. Did you find, and I have to say in the book, reading the story of the relationship between you and Ira, and you may have been told this before, it reads like a movie.

It really does. I mean, the young impressionable fan comes into this situation with a man who has, in many ways, you describe him as depressed and on some days unable to get out of bed and come downstairs. Yes. And you did breathe new life into him. He got to see that somebody of another generation cared about this stuff deeply. It's true. It changed him. It really reads very beautifully in the book. Oh, thank you. Thank you, Frank. It was, he did much more for me than I did for him. He was so sweet, and he never had children. I think he would have liked to have had children, but Lee didn't want children. And it was a very close relationship.

He confided things in me that that um i treasure things that that he felt open enough to share and and uh he he had um never gotten over the passing of his brother in 1937 i was just gonna ask you that yeah so it was he was a very um um a sad guy he he was he he he held his feelings back most of the time. But one day I found a color picture of George, a color photograph of which there are very few in existence. And he just started talking about George saying, look how youthful he is. Look how young he looks. And I said, it looks like he needs a shave. He said, oh, he had to shave twice a day.

He just started talking stream of consciousness about George. And after that, it made him so depressed looking at that picture. He went to bed for two days. He didn't get out of bed for three days. Oh, I'm sorry. It just still affected him to that point. Because Ira wrote the lyrics. George wrote the music.

And Ira always said, why couldn't it have been me? Why couldn't it have been me? Because he felt that George had so much more to offer the world. Oh, he had survivor guilt. Yeah, totally. Yeah, yeah. Heartbreaking. What a fascinating character. And do this for us, if you could. One of the things that strikes me in the book is when you get deep with him into certain lyrics, and there's that lyric from Someone to Watch Over Me. Oh, yes. The handsome lyric. Yes, I know exactly.

Can you demonstrate for us what that is? To anybody who writes songs or cares about this stuff. It's fascinating. It's so interesting because with Ira, I learned so much about interpreting lyrics. It was life-changing, of course. And he asked me to sing something, and I'd often sing his songs, and he would coach me or correct me if I made a mistake. And one day I was singing the bridge of Someone to Watch Over Me. You know, there's a somebody I'm longing to see. I hope that he turns out to be someone who will watch over me. I sang it with a little more feeling then.

But the bridge is, although he may not be the man some girls think of as handsome. Well, I guess I've been listening to the Streisand recording because I sang, although he may not be the man some girls think of as handsome. And he said, stop, stop. I said, what? He said, you ruined the rhyme. I said, what do you mean? He said, it's man some and handsome. And he said, stop, stop. I said, what? He said, you ruined the rhyme. I said, what do you mean? He said, it's man-some and handsome. And I'd never realized that. Although he may not be the man-some, most think of as handsome. It's that sort of thing. It's like Yip Harburg. People always sing, it seems like happiness is just a thing called Joe. What Newt Harburg wrote was,

It seems like happiness is just a thing called Joe. Happiness is just a thing called Joe. It was written in vernacular for Ethel Waters. So those sorts of things are easy to miss. And so I learned a lot about that. That is fascinating to me. and that all these years later, you know, it was still important to him. Oh, yeah.

But you unearthed, was it The Girl I Love that you found and showed to him? Yes, yes. Can you tell that story, how he reacted? Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, The Girl I Love, The Man I Love was written in 1924 for a show called Lady Be Good. Cut from the show because 1924, it was a frothy musical comedy starring Fred and Adele Astaire, Fred's sister. And Adele sang it beautifully, but they realized it was slowing down the action.

They cut it from the show. Then they put it in a show called Strike Up the Band in 1927, which closed out of town. And in that iteration of it, Morton Downey Sr., who was a very high voice tenor, heartthrob of the time, sang a lyric Ira wrote called The Girl I Love. Some day she'll come along, the girl I love. Her smile will be a song, the girl I love, et cetera. And I found the lyric and I showed it to Ira. I said, this is amazing, a male lyric for this song. And he looked at it and then he tore it up. I said, why did you do that? He said, because the song is so iconic as the man I love,

I don't think it should be sung as the girl I love. I said, oh, okay. And I had to respect it, of course. But then, oddly enough, another two years later, somebody found the original full script for the version of Strike Up the Band that closed out of town. It later was mounted again in 29 and was successful. And it had the lyric for The Girl I Love in it, and I showed it to Ira again. I said, look, The Girl I Love. And for whatever reason, on that day, he was more kindly disposed to it being sung, and he

gave me permission to sing it. So it survives. Wow. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's amazing, colossal podcast after this. You'll flip for $4 pancakes at A&W. Wake up to a stack of three light and fluffy pancakes topped with syrup. Only $4 on now.

Dine-in only until 11 a.m. at A&W's in Ontario. Wow, wow, wow. Another song, because we're big big Marx Brothers fans on this show. Oh, and he mentioned Yip Harburg. Yeah. Oh, yes. Could you sing that? What?

The one from the Marx Brothers show or Yip Harburg? Lydia. Lydia the Tattooed Lady. What a treat. La, la, la. La, la, la. La, la, la. La, la, la. Lydia, la la la, la la la.

Lydia, oh Lydia, say have you met Lydia? Lydia the tattoo lady. She has eyes that meant a torso and a torso even more so. Lydia, oh Lydia, that encyclopedia. Lydia the queen of tattoos. On the back is the Battle of Waterloo. Beside it, the wreck of the Hesperus II. And proudly above waves the red, white, and blue.

You can learn a lot from Lydia. La, la, la. La, la, la. Well, you know, there's a wartime lyric that Groucho sang on a radio broadcast that's not in the version of At the Circus. It goes, let's see if I remember it. Lydia, oh Lydia, that encyclopedia. Lydia, the tattooed lady. When she stands, the world gets littler.

When she sits, she sits on Hitler. Lydia, oh, Lydia. So that, they wrote those lines for him that he sang later. Did you include that verse in your wonderful children's album, Pure Imagination, which I have? Did you, were you gutsy enough to include that? I think I did, because children need to learn about those things. Right. That was, yeah.

So, when she stands. When she stands, the world gets littler. When she sits, she sits on Hitler. Lydia, Lydia. That is unbelievable. Yeah. I credit you also, Michael, for putting that on a children's album. In some ways, it's a rather risque number.

Well, it's totally salacious, but what the hell. Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg. Yes. And while we're on the Mocs Brothers, I guess we're talking right now to Mr. Chico. Oh, he played Chico. Michael played Chico. Was that back in Columbus? That was in Columbus at Players Theater, Players Club.

It's now Players Theater. Yeah, yeah. How did you like playing Chico in Minis, boys? I loved it. I absolutely loved it. It was great fun. And that show had a relatively short running time, so they added an epilogue at the end where I sat down

and played stuff with the cast singing, and we did some vintage Marx brothers songs, which as I'm thinking about it now, the, the, the estate probably wouldn't have liked, but it was, it was fun.

It was also something that was probably the first time I, I acted outside of high school. So it was, you, you are our second guest to have played Chico in that, in that show. Peter Riegert, the actor played Chico. How wonderful. Peter Riegert, the actor, played Chico.

How wonderful. I believe he was in the Broadway production. Was he in the original? Can we hear some of your Chico? You know what? I don't think I can anymore. Isn't that terrible? Because now all I do is Jewish accents

and Peter Lorre and Paul Lynde and Carol Channing. Oh, let's hear the Peter Lorre. I don't know why you're asking me this. What is it that you want from me? You bumped it. You bumped it. You've ruined it for all of us. Excellent.

I'm going to make you guys do Peter Lorre's. This is driving me sane. Gilbert, give him some of yours as long as we're comparing Peter Lorre's. He's saying it. Gilbert, give him some of yours as long as we're comparing Peter Lorre's. No, it's you who ruined it. You, it's your perfect attempt to buy it. Kevin found out how valuable it was. No wonder he had such an easy time getting it.

You bloated fathead. You idiot. I can die now. I've got dueling Peter Lorre. Well, that's superior to mine. But, you know, Peter Lorre and Liberace and Carol Channing are all very close. Peter, you do this, and if you want to do

Liberace, you just go, hello, everybody. It's so wonderful. Yeah, very good. Thank you very much. You want to hear some boogie-woogie? Thank you. Yeah, very good. Thank you very much. You want to hear some? Very good. Oh, that's a good Liberace. Some boogie woogie. Thank you. I'm very, very, very glad to be here, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you.

And then Carol. Carol, she's just checking. Hello. I'm Carol Channing. Hello. Dolly, hello. It's very nice to be with you, Lee. Thank you, Carol.

I love touring with you. What are you doing? You're driving me crazy. So, you know. This is great. Liberace back then was considered the ladies' man. Liberace back then. It was the ladies' man.

Yeah. Liberace was, yeah, that whole thing. Yeah. Yeah, a confirmed bachelor. Exactly. That's what they used to say. I believe was the term they used to use. Speaking of Groucho, everybody came

to the house at Ira's house. I mean, Angie Dickinson would come through, and the legendary Swifty Lazar, who you didn't care for very much. No. Doesn't sound like a nice person. No. Tell us a little about him. Well, Irving Lazar was a guy

who had the most powerful clients in Hollywood and therefore he was the most powerful guy. And he was a very short, bald-headed guy who had a germ phobia and absolutely sized you up immediately. And if you weren't used to him, you were invisible.

And he'd come to the house and I'd answer the door and he would always to the house and I'd answer the door and he would always walk past me and not say anything and make a beeline for Ira to butter him up so he could make some deal with the Gershwin catalog. And one day I answered the door and he walked past me and Lee Gershwin happened to be standing there.

And she said, Irving, Michael is very important in this household and you must treat him with the same respect with which you would treat us. And he was practically on his knees saying, oh my God, I'm so sorry, Lee, Irving, Michael is very important in this household, and you must treat him with the same respect with which you would treat us. And he was practically on his knees saying, oh, my God, I'm so sorry, Lee. Of course, of course, of course. Because Lee was very quixotic, and that in itself could have pushed him out of employment with them, truly. So the next time he came over, I answered the door, and he said, nice to see you.

And then he walked in and walked past me. There was Lee. She said, Irving, did you say hello to Michael? And he said, yes, I just said, nice to see you. Did I just say nice to see you? And I said, yeah, yes, yes, you did Irving. Thank you. So that was Irving. I must say it's shocking behavior for an agent. Well, you know, the big, the thing, the true story the true story alan j learner was convinced that lazar was not reading any of his scripts and he sent irving a script which he glued the pages together and said irving please read this and let me know what you think and irving sent it back with a note it's the greatest thing i've ever read and it was glued shut he couldn't that's terrific yeah what was uh was grouchooucho ever? Did you meet Groucho?

Did he come through Ira's house at any point? I missed Groucho the day that he came to the house. He came with Marvin Hamlisch. And Groucho and Ira shared a love for Gilbert and Sullivan. Groucho loved his Gilbert and Sullivan. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And Ira became giddy when Groucho would come over. He became giddy with

Groucho, and he was giddy when he spoke to Irving Berlin on the phone. But he had known Groucho for years. But Ira was always so shy and retiring and quiet that it was sometimes hard to read him. But with Groucho, even when he talked about it, he was gregarious. And I found these stereo photographs. Ira had a stereo camera, 3D, you know. And I found this beautiful image that he or Leonor had taken of Groucho playing pool at the house in the 50s. And I've often wondered if I can get my hands on that picture because it's so resonant. Did you ever meet Bill Marks, Harpo's son?

Oh, yeah. Bill is the most wonderful guy. Yeah, we had him here. What a great fellow. I remember Groucho used to come on shows and he would sing. On a tree by the river sat little Tom Tit singing willow, tit willow, tit willow. And I asked him, oh Dickie Bird, why do you sit singing willow, tit willow, tit willow? Tidwillow, is it weakness of intellect, birdie, I cried, or a rather tough flame in your little inside? With a shake of his poor little head, he replied, oh, widow, Tidwillow, Tid willow, tick willow, tick willow. Lovely.

Thank you. Wow, a piece of groucho I haven't heard you do on the show before, Gilbert. Yeah, he also used to sing that Irving Berlin song called Stay Down Where You Belong that Berlin asked him not to sing. Oh, my God. Yes. Yes. Should I or you? No, no. I think you should. Okay. Maybe he'll give you some accompaniment. Sat the devil talking to his son who wanted to go up above, up above.

He said, it's getting too hot for me down here. And so I want to go up highest and have some fun. And the devil said, you stay down here where you belong the folks who live above you they don't know right from wrong to please their kings they've all gone off to war and not a one of them knows what they're fighting for. They're breaking the hearts of mothers, making butchers out of brothers. You can stay here. Where you belong. Right?

Yeah. Oh, you stay down here. Down here where you belong. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Well, Berlin used down here where you belong. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Well,

uh, wow. Berlin used to beg him not to sing it and that's why he sang it. Seriously. Berlin was like, and the other song of his he sang was,

was Cohen owes me $97 by Berlin and Berlin said, you can't sing that because it's, it's, it's, uh,

it's a very stereotypical Jew. How does that one go? Cohen owes me $97. Cohen's got to be the one. Basically, the song says that this old man Rosenthal is sick in bed. He's about to die.

But then Cohen owes him $97, so he's not going to die until he gets the $97 from Cohen. So he's feeling better. But now it's... Only a Jew could get away with writing it. Yes. Which brings us to another thing. Frank and I were talking. We talked

about this a few times. How come there are so many Jewish songwriters? Well, especially the Tin Pan Alley crowd. I mean, they're all Jewish fellas from Brooklyn or the Lower East Side. Yes. Well, I think it was the tonic or the elixir of New York City,

of all these kids of immigrants. And there were other ethnicities that were involved. But one of the things that I've discovered is that the music publishing business was something that Jews could get into that was not prejudiced, so they could get into that business. And then these publishers would go to the synagogues and find kids who sang in the synagogue choirs to become songpluggers, to go to the other vaudeville houses and sing songs for them. So these young boys who were recruited to do the songpl song plugging, a lot of them became songwriters. And so, it was just part of that community that evolved in that way. It's fascinating, because a lot of these people, as you point out in your book and in various interviews I've seen you give, these were not educated men. Gershwin was described as a street urchin? Yes, yes. George, I mean, not Ira? Gershwin was described as a street urchin? Yes.

George, I mean, not Ira? Yes, that would be true. He was a kid who was bound to come to no good. I mean, nobody had any... And it didn't even show an interest in music, by the way. No, he didn't until one day the Gershwin family got a piano because Ira, who was the oldest of four kids, was supposed to take lessons, as the oldest boy was in those days. And when the piano arrived, George sat down and started playing. And Ira was there, and he couldn't believe it. George said, I didn't know you could play the piano. George had been picking a piano at a friend's house. He'd been noodling on it. And so it just was there. It was just there. And he

couldn't get the music out fast enough. As quickly as he could conceive something, it came through. Unbelievable. It was unbelievable because that's what Maury Riskind in his book, Shot an Elephant in My Pajamas, he talks about how it was just divine to see how this music flowed through George. It has to be. Did you ever see the Amazing Stories episode where Lainey Kazan plays a psychic who turns into George Gershwin and is channeling these songs?

No, but we'll watch it now. Well, it's fantastic because she plays the psychic who says, she turns into George Gershwin and she says, kid, I couldn't write the songs down fast enough. Because this guy in the plot is supposed to be writing a score for a Broadway show. He's played by Bob Balaban and he's gone dry. So he goes to a psychic who channels George Gershwin and he steals all of these Gershwin songs that George has channeled. So they had all these soundalike Gershwin songs like, let's see.

Balboa thought it was terrific when he discovered the pacific columbus sailed the ocean blue both clark and lewis brought something to us and i discovered you all these you know instead of they all laughed at christopher columbus they were paul uh paul bartell and john meyer wrote all these sound-alike Gershwin songs. That's great. And it was hysterical. Well, we've got to watch that episode now. Yeah, it's great.

By the way, on the subject of They All Laughed, it's one of the sweet things in the book. And again, back to your relationship with Ira. Was it your birthday or you were sick and he called you or he would sing you different passages from They All Laugh? Shortly after I started working for Ira, about two months after, I came down with mono. Infectious mono. That's in the days of... I'm sorry I mangled the story. No, no, it's all right.

Those were the days when mono was considered a serious disease. But I was housebound for, I guess, a couple of weeks. And Ira would call me every day and sing a line of They All Laughed. Every day he'd call and he'd sing the next line and the next line. And I was very touched by that. That's so great. Can we hear some of that? Some of yours.

Of They All Laughed? Yeah. Oh, okay. Okay. Some of you. Have they all left? Yeah. Oh, okay.

Okay. The odds were 100 to 1 against me. The world thought the heights were too high to climb. But people from Missouri never incensed me. Oh, I wasn't a bit concerned. For from history I had learned how many, many times the world had turned. They all laughed at Christopher Columbus when he said the world was round. They all laughed when Edison recorded sound.

When Edison recorded sound They all laughed at Wilbur and his brother When they said that man could fly They told Marconi, wireless was phony It's the same old cry They laughed at me, wanting you Said I was reaching for the moon But oh, you came through Now they'll have to change their tune

They all said we'd never stay together Darling, let's take a bow Ho, ho, ho, who's got the last laugh? Hee, hee, hee, let's have the best laugh Ha, ha, ha, who's got the last laugh? Hee, hee, hee. Let's have the best laugh. Ha, ha, ha. Who's got the last laugh now? Wow. Wow.

So that song helped cure you of mono. It did. It did. It's so sweet. I mean, that's why I say, Michael, the story, the friendship between these two people, it plays like a movie. He has that wonderful line that he's so impressed

with what you know about him. And this is a line for the ages. He says, you have an advantage over me. Oh, yeah. Do you want to finish the line? Well, we had an argument about the chronology of when something happened in his life. Yeah and um he was adamant about it and i finally found proof with a book or something and i showed he said see that and he said well you were right he said but

you have an advantage over me and i said what is that he said i've only lived my life you've thoroughly researched it yeah that's great. Oh, wow. That's great. And what's the Mel Torme story, too, if I may ask you to tell that? Because that's an example of the man's kindness. Yes, it is. Mel Torme was one of the great singers, and I adore his work. He was a prickly human being. We have heard that before on the show. Yeah, it's no secret that Judy Garland called him Mel Torment. And Mel was appearing at the Hollywood Bowl. And Mel sometimes would get very, very hip.

You know, like I remember once on The Tonight Show, he did a fast jazzy version of Send in the Clowns. Isn't it rich? Aren't we a pair? Me here at last on the ground. You in midair. You know, Send in the Clowns. Oh, because Sondheim must have loved it. I can only imagine.

And he recorded it with Buddy Rich. But it's just like, really? And so he was doing this. He was doing Gershwin songs, and he was doing a Porgy and Bess medley. It ended with, Bess, you is my woman now. You is, you is, you is, and you must laugh and sing and dance for two instead of one. You know, all that. And I think he must have recorded it.

And I saw him afterwards and he said, oh man, I hope Michael, man, I hope Ira loves the way I sing his songs. I hope he likes the way I do them songs. I hope he likes the way I do them. And I was very gentle. And I said, well, he loves your voice. I said, sometimes he just wishes you wouldn't take some of the liberties. And he said, oh no. He said, I would be crushed. I would be crushed, man, if I didn't think Ira didn't like the way I sang his songs. That would be, oh my God, I'd be crushed. So I was telling Ira about it, and Ira said, just tell him I love him. Tell him I adore him. I said, but you don't like the way he takes his liberties. He says, no, I don't. But so what? Just write him a letter and tell him I love him. So, I did.

That's beautiful. That really speaks to the man's generosity of spirit, his humanity, which, of course, never knowing Ira Gershwin as you did, and you do point out in the book that he has to be a sentimentalist to write the things he writes, even though you said he could not express some of those things in life. Oh, absolutely not. What he put down on the page, and that's just fascinating. Oh, absolutely not. What he put down on the page. And that's just fascinating. Yes. Well, I guess that was his means of expression, even though he always claimed that he never put any of himself in a song, except someone to watch over me. He admitted to me that the line, you may not be the man some girls think of as handsome.

because he wrote that song when he married Leonor Gershwin, and he felt he was so lucky to win this beautiful woman, because he, compared to his brother George, was chubby and wore glasses and didn't think he was attractive to the opposite sex. But he did channel his self into the music and lyrics, even though he didn't see it that way. It's sad, in a way, that that came out of him on the page. I mean, you look at a line like from Love Is Here to Stay. I mean, in time, the Rockies may crumble.

Gibraltar may tumble. They're only made of clay. I mean, that's poetry, to be obvious. Yes. Well, that, of course, is the last song. Well, not of course. Some people may not know. But it's the last song that the Gershwin brothers wrote together.

George died before they finished the song, and it was Oscar Levant who notated the rest of it. The composer Vernon Duke claimed that he wrote the verse to the song, but actually Ira wrote the words and the music to the verse of the song because George had died. And I said, but Ira, Vernon Duke said he wrote it. Ira said, you can tell that I wrote it. The music is so undistinguished. And anyway, Ira did write it. And so the words to the verse to me are the most poignant because they were his love letter, his message to his lost brother.

I mean, as you say, George's talent was divine, but is it possible in some way that Ira Gershwin could actually be underrated? I think all lyricists are underrated, except perhaps Johnny Mercer, you know, or, I don't know, Lorenz Hart, Cole Porter, he wrote both. Hammerstein, people talk about him. Yes. It's funny, hearing that lyric, man some, girls think of as handsome.

It's like before I thought, you know, it's a witty, catchy lyric. And now all of a sudden it takes on such a new meaning, the way you explained it. It's poignant. It's poignant. It's poignant. You know? Although he may not be the man some girls think of as handsome. It's all how you interpret it. That's the thing that I learned.

You know? And that's why the songs survive. Because they have great bones you can interpret them in. Of course. Millions of different ways. Which we'll talk about when we talk about the new country album, but that's a perfect segue. But I did want to ask, tell us a little bit about their process.

And there's this wonderful line, I think it's your line, that it was an extraordinary coincidence that the same family produced two geniuses who were able to work so well together. Yes. And how did they, how exactly did they collaborate? You said in an interview that I saw with Terry Gross where you were talking about sometimes Ira had to make sense of the melody, of what he was given to work with. Yes, yes, exactly. Yes. Usually Ira preferred a tune first because then he didn't have to worry about the composer messing up the scan of a lyric. And Frank Lesser wrote a very funny song about singing on the wrong syllable. I don't know if I can play it. On the island from which we come, the point of interest besides the coconut and the

sarong is that we put the accent upon the wrong syllable and we sing a tropical song. Put the accent on the wrong syllable. And that's what I was worried about, that the accent would be on the wrong syllable. But a great example of Ira's process is when George played him the tune of this. Well, Ira had to figure out what kind of lyric would fit with that. So he started experimenting with dummy lyrics. Roly-poly, eating solely. Ravioli, better watch your diet or bust. Now, the purpose of that lyric was to get an idea of how any words would sound with a tune, right? And he felt that using a lyric that rhymed, roly-poly, eating solely, he said, that sounds too sing-songy. It rhymes.

So then he started experimenting with blank verse, which is anathema to a songwriter, not rhyming, but he went, just go forward, don't look backward, and you'll soon be ahead of the game. He thought, that's weird, but this tune sounds like the lyrics shouldn't rhyme. And so he came up with, eventually, I got rhythm, I got music, I got my man who could ask for anything more. Doesn't rhyme, except for the bridge. Old man trouble, I don't mind him, you won't find him round my door. And then Ethel Merman sang it, you're hanging around my front door, back door.

You know, that whole thing. But I got rhythm. It was Irving Berlin who said you'd better never write a bad song for Ethel Merman because if you do you'll hear it was it was it I didn't like Ethel Merman didn't like Ethel Merman didn't like it okay I won't ask you why well I mean and when she sang I got rhythm in the second chorus she's saying So I took her recording and I spliced it together so she holds the note for about 60 seconds.

I played it for him. I said, I have a new recording of Ethel Merman. And he fell down. And you mentioned something that I was going to get to. That I was going to get to. And it's funny that you, I remember hearing the writer of Tifa 2 on like Murph. Irving Caesar, who wrote the lyric. Wrote the song in two minutes as quickly as Vincent Newman could play the tune on the piano. I wrote the lyric.

It's a dummy lyric. It's just a dummy lyric. It meant absolutely nothing. And Vincent said, it's good. Keep it. I said, no, it stinks, Vincent. It stinks, Vincent. He said, no, Irving, keep it, keep it. It's wonderful dummy lyric It's just a dummy lyric It meant absolutely nothing And Vincent said It's good, keep it I said, no, it stinks, Vincent It stinks, Vincent He said, no, Irving Keep it, keep it

It's wonderful All right, so I took the lyric And I sat down And I wrote the script It's a dummy I said, Vincent, I'll fix it later Picture you upon my knee T for two and two

T for me for you U for me It stinks No, it's great, Irving It's great, Vincent I'll fix it later And it became the lyric We will raise a family

A boy for you A girl for me Wrote the song in two minutes Great Fantastic When he was on the show came to lyric. We will raise the family. A boy for you, a girl for me. Wrote the song in two minutes. When he was on the show, I remember that was the first time I heard that term, dummy lyrics. And according to the story, T for Two were the dummy lyrics. Exactly, yes. He was just, picture you upon

my knee, T for two, two for T, me for you, and you for me alone. It was just dummy. And Vincent said, it's good, it's good, it's good. And he said, no, no, I'll write it later. And that lyric stayed. The whole lyric. Yeah, someone said to him, just no, that's it, that's it, stick with that. And that lyric stayed. The whole lyric. Yeah, someone said to him, just know. That's it. That's it. Stick with that. And they did. Irving Caesar sounds like a wonderful character, too. So many of these guys.

Question from your friends and ours, John Tita and Seth Saltzman at ASCAP, our friends at ASCAP, who, by the way, say they're friends with Julia Riva, Harry Warren's granddaughter, who they say you must be friends with as well. Yes, I've known Julia ever since I knew Harry back in the day.

Oh, we'll talk about Harry in a minute. They had a question for you, though, Michael. Did Ira talk about projects that he and George had planned for the late 30s, projects that were developed but never saw the light of day once tragedy struck? Was there anything on the boards? Yes. George wanted to write a second opera after Porgy and Bess. He was discussing a novel called The Lights of Lamy with Lynn Riggs,

who also wrote Green Grow the Lilacs that became Oklahoma. That was in the works. He also was planning on writing a symphony. He had conceived in entirety a string quartet, which he played on the piano for Harold Arlen. And after George died, Harold called Ira and said, did he write down the string quartet? And he hadn't. And it was George's intention to basically 50-50 continue to work in musical theater and film, writing scores, and then making enough money to work on his classical or more serious concert music. So the two would have gone side by side. Ira did not speak of specific projects that they were working on but certainly their their film contracts would have

been even further extended because they came to hollywood to write one movie and up writing four scores in the nine months he was there before he passed away george edis it's one of the great tragedies uh in the history of the culture to lose that man uh in in his late 30s, given what he produced and what may have come. Let's talk a little bit about you and something you and Gilbert had in common. You both were guest programmers on TCM with our late, beloved friend, Robert Osborne. He was terrific. We had him here, and we adored the guy. Yeah.

What did you pick? I have no idea. I saw you pick? I have no idea. I saw you introducing all about Eve and I thought that's interesting. It's not a musical. No, no. It's just, I think, one of the most perfectly crafted films. It's just... It is a beautiful film.

And I think Road to Morocco was one of your picks. I believe you. I believe you. Yeah. Yeah, well, of course, I'm a huge Crosby fan and loved Bob Hope. Did you work with Bob Hope? You were in a Bob Hope special in the early 90s? Yes, he did a special for my hometown in Columbus, Ohio, and I was a guest there. And boy, were my parents caveling, you know? I bet. And he was a sweet there. And boy, were my parents caveling, you know. I bet. And he was a sweet guy.

He was wonderful. I appeared with him, I think it was his last appearance in public. It was at the McCallum Theater in Palm Springs. It was a benefit for the theater or some kind of special evening. And I was there with Rosemary Clooney and Bob and his wife, Dolores. And he was not very responsive at that point. And I was very concerned that they would allow him to go out on stage.

And then they announced his name and he went from being sort of bent over. He became fully upright and he walked out right to center stage with a spotlight there. He says, I want to tell you, it's great to be here tonight. He started doing routines.

It's like, it's like he completely woke up. It's like something plugged in. And he was even ad-libbing and talking and he was fantastic. And then he walked off stage and it's like he went back

to sleep again. I've never seen anything like it. Gilbert does every show that way. Yes. does every show that way yes although minus the wake up part we will return to gilbert godfrey's amazing colossal podcast but first a word from our sponsor. Now, you also, last time we had Uncle Junior from

The Sopranos. I sent the clip. I don't know if Susan shared it with you. I sent Dominic Chianese playing Brother, Can You Spare a Dime on this show. No, no, no. On acoustic guitar. Can we hear some of that, please? More Yip Harburg.

Yeah, well. I'll send you the clip. It's quite beautiful. Oh, I'd love to hear it. And understated. Can we hear a little of that from you? I'm asking, I'm putting you on the spot. You're asking me?

Yes. Oh, okay. All right, well, back to my piano bar days. Can you have a few bars? He's taking requests. Sure. Well, from illustrious talents as yourself, of course. Let's see.

Yeah. Once I built a railroad, made it run, made it race against time. Once I built a railroad, now it's dead. Brother, can you spare a dime? Once I built a tower Now it's done Honey Can you spare a dime I didn't want to go into the whole khaki boots part.

Beautiful. Let's give proper credit to Jay Gourney and Yip Harburg. And they swapped wives, you know. I didn't know that. Yeah, they swapped wives. You got all the information, Michael. Wow. Let's talk about the new album, because we're talking about Gershwin music and how adaptable

it is and how durable it is. And you've got a new project, which is Gershwin Country. Yes. Which is a bold, innovative idea. Yes. Which is a bold, innovative idea. It's something that happened as a result of my friendship with Maya Angelou, with whom I was close favorite music, and a lot of it was country music. It started really educating me about country music in the sense that the last great storytellers of lyrics, interpreters of lyrics, is, I feel, and she felt, in the country genre. And we went so far as

to discuss Maya executive producing a country album for me. Because she was that deep into it. And she said yes. But then she passed away. And it wasn't until a few years ago, I was lying in bed, and I had this morning errant thought that was sort of drifting around about taking the Gershwin songs and doing them with a Nashville band. And then I started thinking about voices and singers and thought, well, this could be duets. And that's exactly what it became. I must say, it's quite extraordinary because if you don't know these songs and you hear this

recording with this group of Nashville musicians and the other voices, such as Dolly Parton and this group of Nashville musicians and the other voices such as Dolly Parton and Roseanne Cash. I heard the Alison Krauss one, it's wonderful. The Alison Krauss, yeah, thank you. The songs are organic, they sound like they were written in that style and it's one of the most joyous experiences I've ever had working on an album because we were in the studio working with the band, improvising, let's change key here, let's try this, let's try that. And they were just so facile.

And so it was different from anything else I'd ever done because it was truly on the spot and spontaneous. Wow. And a great experience, great experience. And the album, as the kids say, drops March 11th? Yes, yes, March 11th. It is a tribute, in a way, to that Gershwin music that you can interpret in so many different ways. Oh, yeah.

Yeah. Isn't it? I may be wrong, but I think, even though Dolly certainly knew Gershwin, she didn't seem to be that familiar with Love Is Here To Stay, which we sing together. And I know some of the other artists were not familiar with these songs. And that was part of the fun of it because they just interpreted on face value. Doing They Can't Take That Away From Me with Amy Grant. I don't think she knew that song. Or the Time Jumpers and Vince Gill doing Fascinating Rhythm. They just sort of peripherally knew the song.

And we were trying to figure out how to make it sound authentically country. And we just started fooling around. And there it was. Or with Lyle Lovett doing Clap Your Hands. That was so much fun. I flew to Houston to do that one. I bet. Is it an extra kick to turn these seasoned musicians onto songs that they don't know? It must be.

It's joyous. That's the educator in you and the musicologist in you. Yeah, it was fun. And I would play them vintage recordings in the studio, like listen to this or listen to this riff or listen to how they did this and did that. And so it was great. And I learned so much from them, Lord knows, about improvising and technical stuff, too, because they're all great artists. Okay. And the other project. Go ahead, Gil.

No, I know I'm making you work on this one. So once again, I want to hear I Love a Piano. Oh, that's one of his signature songs. We're back to Irving Berlin. Yes, we are. 1915, I think. Yeah. Oh, got to get that tuned.

I love a piano. I love a piano. I love a piano. I love to hear somebody play on a piano, a grand piano. It simply carries me away I know a fine way To treat this time away

I love to run my fingers Over the keys The ivory And with the pillow I love to memo When Liberace comes my way I'm so excited When I'm invited

Thank you ladies and gentlemen To hear that long hair genius play Thanks Lee Well you can keep your fiddle And your bow Give me a P-I-A-N-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O Oh yeah Fantastic. I didn't give it the full throttle treatment

because I didn't want to bust people's eardrums. This is like being at 54 Below. This is a Michael Feinstein show. I feel like I set him up, you knock him down. You bet. What a treat. Okay, now I'm going to make you work, Gilbert. Oh, geez.

If I have this right, Michael, one of Ira's last works, last great works, was The Man That Got Away in A Star Is Born. Gilbert's going to favor you now with a little of his James Mason from A Star Is Born. Gilbert's going to favor you now with a little of his James Mason from A Star Is Born. Congratulations, dear.

I seem to have made it just in time, didn't I? I had a whole speech prepared in my head, but it seems to have gone out of it. I don't need to be so formal. I know most of you gentlemen.

Well, the point is I need a job. Yes, that's it. That's my whole speech. I need a job. I'm not confined to drama. I could do comedy as well. That's fantastic. Oh my God, you have it spot on.

I met him once. Did you ever meet him? No, I wish I could have. Oh, do tell. Oh, I have a photo with him. It was at the restoration of A Star is Born when they restored all the lost footage of the thing and I helped peripherally supply

something that ira gershwin had ira was still alive at the time and james and althea mason were there and he was the most delightful man and and there was that voice coming out of him you know that's nice to hear oh it was something he was charming and um it was a great thrill oh and i just remembered this is one of those things that would kill me if I didn't, and just for my own good, I just remembered that lyric that I fucked up on the Groucho thing. Stay down where you belong. You'll find more hell up there than you will down here below. Fantastic. than you will down here below. Fantastic.

That would bother me the whole time. What was the other one he would sing on the Dinah Shore show? Was it Peasy Weezy? Oh, I don't know the words to that, but I know the song. And Father's Day, too. Today, dear father. Today, dear father, is Father's Day, and. Today, dear Father. Today, dear Father, is Father's Day. And we're giving you a tie. It isn't much we know.

It's just our way of showing you. We think you're a regular guy. You say we really didn't have to bother. But dear Father, it was really no fuss. No fuss. For according to our mother mother you're our father and that's good enough for us i used to sing that to my dad every father's day and the size that we got Didn't cost an awful lot And we'll get you The same tie next year

Michael, will you take Gilbert on tour? Absolutely This could be a thing I'll be Groucho and you'll be Chico Sure, sure I'll be Alan Jones Yes! Alone, alone on a night that was

meant for love we had your friend Jack Jones here a couple of weeks ago by the way let's do a segue here too because we're talking about A Star is Born just a minute ago and another project of yours is well it's the Judy Garland 100th year the centenary

of Judy Garland you did some year, the centenary of Judy Garland. You did some shows at your own club in December, and there's a tour coming to celebrate Judy's life and career? Yes, yes. Multimedia? Exactly. The club was a tryout. I did act one one week and act two the next week. And since that time, I did the show with a big band in Naples, Florida. And it was fantastic. I was more scared doing a Judy Garland tribute than a Frank Sinatra tribute. Really?

Why? Well, because with Sinatra, I knew I could weave the story with different anecdotes and having met him and bring in some unusual songs that illustrated it. different anecdotes and having met him and bring in some unusual songs that illustrated it. But Judy is so iconic and in a different way. Of course, Sinatra is equally iconic. But for me, to try to figure out how I had anything to say about Judy Garland, where's the connection other than my adoration and love, even though I know her family very well and have met many people who knew her and worked with her in stories. So it was trying to find my personal voice that would relate to each individual. And I think that I found that through the stories that I've chosen to tell and getting home movies from the family

and photographs and such. And it works gangbusters. And I do a lot of different routines of songs, so I'm not copying her, even though I do a couple of her routines because people would like to hear them. And I make it very clear that I'm not trying to imitate or copy her in any way because that's just silly. And an odd thing happened a few years ago where, and this is kind of like a Michael Feinstein experience, that I was visiting the house that Judy Garland had built for her mother in 1939. And I was looking through the house, going through the house, and something drew me to a part of the house. There was a wall there, and it turned out that it was a fake wall. And behind the wall were a series, a whole stack of old recording discs.

And I knew that she'd had a home recording machine. And I took the recordings home and they were recordings, home recordings of Judy Garland singing. And one of the recordings was Judy singing, I'll Be Seeing You, acapella without accompaniment. And she had never, ever performed or sung that song anywhere, ever.

It's not documented. She never sang it. There it was. So in the show, I accompanied her singing that song anywhere, ever. It's not documented. She never sang it. There it was. So in the show, I accompanied her singing this song. Oh, that's lovely. So it's a very special moment. What a great thing to put in the show. You know, and because it's important to you.

You want younger generations to know not just the tawdry stuff, not just the way that people talk about Judy Garland and remember Judy Garland and the tragic parts. It's important to you to re-educate. Well, yes, because it's so easy to just look at the tragedy, but it is because of the enormity of her talent that we remember her. Of course. But, live in a time where people focus on the tragedy. I hope I'm not speaking out of school, but when Garland's daughter, Lorna Luft, went to see the movie with Renee Zellweger, I said, well, what did you think?

She said, Michael, it was about as realistic as cats. Wow. About as realistic as Rhapsody in Blue. Yeah, yeah, there's another one. Right, right. Yeah, so when my friend Jay Livingston died, he was interred at Westwood Mortuary near Marilyn Monroe. And there were two young girls who were putting flowers on Marilyn Monroe's stone. And I said, you're fans of Marilyn? She said, oh, we love her. And I said, well, what Marilyn Monroe movies do you like?

And one of the girls said, oh, we've never seen any of her movies. And it's like, okay, then it's just the legend or the persona. Yeah, the legend. Or the sadness of the death or whatever. It's all of that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't believe I missed the show here in New York in December. I hope you bring it back to New York.

I'm intending to. As part of the tour, because we will make a pilgrimage. Are you going to be – Gilbert's in Boca, by the way. Don't you – you have – I noticed on your website you're going to be down in Florida. Yes, I've got another date at the Kravis Center in Palm Beach, and then I'll be in Clearwater again. They love me in Florida. What can I tell you? Gilbert and Dara Daytrip.

Oh, you're very welcome. Believe me. Speaking of Judy, and I'm going to make another segue here, and I'm going to show this to you, Michael, which may not mean as much to you as it means to me because Hugh Martin was a friend of Judy, and I'm going to make another segue here, and I'm going to show this to you, Michael, which may not mean as much to you as it means to me, because Hugh Martin was a friend of yours, and you must have many artifacts. Ah, John Fricke. I wrote you a letter, Hugh. I wrote him a letter telling him how much I loved Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, and he sent me back this signed sheet music. Can you see this?

I'm sorry the show is not video. Can you see that he wrote the sorry the show is not video. Can you see that he wrote the little notes along the top? That's fantastic. One of my prized possessions. He's one of the few. You knew the man. Well, he's one of the few writers of a standard Christmas song who wasn't Jewish.

That's right. Well, Gilbert gets a kick out of that. that's right well gilbert gets a kick out of that yeah it seems like like 99 percent of the greatest christmas songs were written by jews yeah yeah it's true i mean you can go down the line the christmas song by mel torme he and bob wells were jewish let it snow uh jewish uh all those johnny mark songs from the. Johnny Marks. I'll Be Home for Christmas. Kim Gannon was Jewish. I mean, you could go, We Need a Little Christmas.

Jerry Herman was Jewish. White Christmas. White Christmas, of course, serving Berlin. I mean, how hard would it have been to write, I'm dreaming of a white Hanukkah. You know, I mean, how hard would that have been? You know, but he didn't do it. With every Christmas card I write.

Eddie Yiddish card. I don't know. I think one of my favorite parts of your vast and impressive output is the albums that you got to do with your heroes, with Jerry Herman and Burton Lane. I mean, can you, and Hugh Martin and Ray Livingston and Gilbert and I were getting a kick out of, Jay Livingston, excuse me. Gilbert and I were getting a kick out of the fact that on the Jay Livingston album, you even included the Mr. Ed theme. Yes.

To be a completist. Yes. Of course. And Jay Livingston sang the original theme for the TV series. That's Jay Livingston's voice because the producers were too cheap to hire a singer. I didn't know that. So that's fun. What is it?

A horse is a horse, of course, of course. And no one can talk to a horse, of course. Unless, of course, the famous horse is a famous Mr. Ed. Go right to the source and ask the horse. He'll give you the answer that you endorse. He's always there on a steady course, the famous Mr. Ed. You got to get these records. I am Mr. Ed. Is there a, and it must have been wonderful for you, the ultimate fan of these people and admirer of these people, to sing their songs, you know, being accompanied by Hugh Martin on the piano or Burton Lane.

What a dream come true. It was a dream come true. a dream come true. Actually, Hugh Martin and Burton Lane were the two best pianists of all the songwriters because they sometimes were great songwriters, but didn't play piano well. Irving Berlin was a terrible piano player. So was Jerome Kern. So was Harry Warren. Harry Warren used to joke about it and say, Kern plays with one finger, Berlin with two, and me with three. You know, I mean, they were all rudimentary, but it was in the head and they were able to realize it. But Burton Lane played orchestrally, and Hugh Martin was an incredible accompanist. He was a great vocal arranger. He was staggering. And it's still a thrill to me because I love that song to death. It's a great song. And it's a thing that Hugh actually wrote music and lyrics without Ralph Blaine.

Oh, he credited Ralph Blaine because of the partnership? Yes, yes, because they had an agreement. But Hugh wrote it entirely on his own. And, of course, he changed the lyric when Sinatra recorded it, because Sinatra said it was too sad. So he changed it from, the original was, But till then we'll have to muddle through somehow To hang a shining star upon the highest bough So he changed the lyrics to make it less sad.

Didn't Judy react that way when he submitted the original lyric about living in the past? Well, the original lyric, which was not used, was, Have yourself a merry little Christmas. This may be your last. Next year we will all be living in the past. And she said, that's too damn depressing. I can't sing that, especially to a child. And Hugh refused to change the lyric.

And then Tom Drake, who played the boy next door in Meet Me in St. Louis, went to him and said, you know, you're being an ass. And Hugh said, what are you talking about? And he said,

well, just change that lyric. You'd have Judy Garland singing a Christmas song, for God's sake. Yeah. And Hugh thought the better of it. And as happens, the lyrics that he rewrote

were better. And that's what went into the film. Yeah. the original lyrics make me want to jump in front of a train yeah but they're beautiful yeah yeah i mean they are beautiful well crafted but two on the nose perhaps yeah you know what another thing when you were talking about how uh a lot of these composers can't play and stuff like that. I always noticed it about like Bert, Bert Lancaster, Bert Bacharach singing.

Right. It's like totally off key. He's one of the greatest composers, but his singing is completely off key. Well, it's stylized. Let's put it that way. What should, what should we say about your singing, Gilbert? Is it stylized? Well, it's stylized. Let's put it that way. What should we say about your singing, Gilbert?

Is it stylized? Well, he learned singing from me. There you go. Well, my singing teacher was Bert Lahr. I would king of the four. You know, I mean, he was the best, you know. If only he had been around to do do the Andrew Lloyd Webber musicals, it would have been perfect.

Don't cry for me, Argentina. You know, all that. She was the greatest star of... You missed your calling as a mimic, Michael. And I've heard you talk about how you learned to be a performer and you learned patter in those piano bars and you learned it well, my friend. Thank you. You played for Billy Wilder at one point. I found all kinds of little gems researching you.

Yeah, Sammy Cotts House. Everybody was there and Billy Wilder was always there with his wife, Audrey, who was not very nice to me. And she was a singer, so maybe she didn't like my music. Oh, I'm sorry. his wife, Audrey, who was not very nice to me. And she was a singer, so maybe she didn't like my music. Oh, that's right. But they were all, I mean, Billy Wilder, my God. You know, I mean, and the last lyrics that Ira wrote was for the film Kiss Me Stupid, which Billy created.

And I would play songs from Kiss Me Stupid just to irritate him and say, no, Mr. Feinstein, please, Mr. Feinstein, stop, please, no, don't play those, no, stop. I beg you, I beg you. That's what he would do. Please, Mr. Feinstein. So you met William Wyler and Billy Wilder. No, I met Mrs. Wyler.

Oh, Mrs. Wyler, okay. But you also did meet, and this is just wonderful information, you met Dolores Del Rio. Yes, yes, I did. I did. Because I was at a party, June Levant took me to a party at the studio of Tony Duquette, the great designer. And Dolores Del Rio was there. And like I did with Sinatra, I thought, how can I get her attention? So I started to play the song Ramona, in which she starred in 1928. So I was playing.

Ramona, I hear the mission bells above. And she had her back to me. It was talking to someone. And she whirled around and gave this very low, deep, aristocratic bow. And then went, fall up again, and turn back. And we had this moment. Again, you know, it was speaking the language. I met Dolores Del Rio, Anne Southern was there, all of these. Oh, Anne Southern. Yes, who replaced, who did the road tour of the I Sing in 1932. She had this beautiful high soprano voice and was quite a

fine singer. Do you know the Dolores Del Rio song from the short-lived Carl Reiner musical? I don't know it by heart, but it was Ginny Mancini's favorite song, and I sang it at her last birthday celebration. It's a masterwork. I mean, we had Richard Kine sing it on this podcast. She's doing Dolores Del Rio. So true. Written by, I believe, the comedy writer Stan Daniels. Yes, he was incredible. A funny guy.

Frank was telling me a Vincent Price story. Oh, that's related to Dolores Del Rio. Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, I was close to Vincent and he was so funny. He'd say that every time he came off stage, he would say, fold him again. But he sometimes, if somebody asked for an autograph, he would sign Dolores Del Rio. And I said, why did you sign Dolores Del Rio? And he said, because the last time I saw her, she said, don't let them forget me.

So he signed Dolores Del Rio. And he said, because the last time I saw her, she said, don't let them forget me. So he signed Dolores Del Rio. I love that. See, he got to know Vincent Price. You got to know everybody, Michael. Say a couple of words about Rosemary Clooney, who was, I guess, a mentor to you in some ways and a second mom. What a Clooney. What a talent. She was my favorite female singer. She was a person whose voice always went deeply into my heart for reasons that one can't explain. You know, we all have different visceral reactions to different types of art and the way that she vocalized always was very personal for me,

which is what one hopes as a singer to be able to accomplish. And Rosemary was Ira Gershwin's next door neighbor. And so Lee Gershwin would send me over to the Clooney house to sometimes be her amanuensis to tell them that they weren't feeding their cats properly because Rosemary's cats were coming to the gershwin house to eat and i was trying to explain to mrs gershwin that because she was putting out bay shrimp that every cat in the neighborhood was coming to eat at their house and it was true she would buy bay shrimp at nathan house and put out shrimp which is addicting for cats uh and so of course rosemary's cats were coming next door to eat the shrimp. But anyway, I got to meet Rosemary.

And we became very, very close friends. And she generously appeared on my first album and my first major TV appearance. I asked her to come with me on the Merv Griffin show. And we ended up, through the the years doing about 200 concerts together, including the Hollywood bowl and other places. And I miss her every day. What a legend, you know,

and it's, but goes, goes back to what I was saying before, you know, you, you have been, you have benefited from the kindness of, well,

maybe not strangers, but the kindness of stranglers. Very good. That, you know, Mrs. Levant did you a solid. And you say that you owe your career in many ways to Ira.

Yes. You know, Liza was good to you. Rosemary Clooney was good to you. It's a beautiful thing that these people that you admired so much returned the kindness. That these people that you admired so much returned the kindness. It is something that I never have taken for granted. And I always will try and give back to others in the same way. Because without all of them, I would not be here. And Liza Minnelli, who hosted a huge party for me in California in 1985 when I was playing at the Mondrian Hotel, where she invited all these people that I never would have gotten to spend time with.

But she did that for me and hosted my first night at the Algonquin in New York. So again, it's something that made it possible for me to do what I love. That's great. Tell us, too, quickly, and we know you got other appointments and you got to get out of here, but tell us about the foundation and why it's important. And I imagine the goal, one of the goals, is to build a museum for the American Songbook. Yes, indeed. And all these wonderful artifacts that other people have collected, but some that you have unearthed. Yes, I started collecting things that were important to me when I was quite young.

And I didn't know what I was going to do with these things. But especially after I moved to California, I would find things at estate sales and garage sales that were unique. Sometimes music manuscripts or rehearsal recordings or private recordings or ephemera or contracts relating to music in the Great American Songbook. And so by default, I amassed this huge collection of memorabilia and music and records. And I still have a great deal of it, but I started the Great American Songbook Foundation as a repository to preserve this material because there amazingly is not a museum for the great american songbook we have a country music hall of fame we have the rock and roll hall of fame we have all these other places the blues museum but we don't have a place for the great

american songbook and so i created the first of all, for the artifacts and then to educate young people. And we have a lot of amazing programs in an annual high school songbook academy where 40 kids come from all over the United States to have a week-long intensive to learn about the songbook. And we have great singers and celebrity mentors and coaches and guides because this music, when they discover it, it becomes another language for them. And they're passionate about it. And we've planted these seeds with now thousands of kids who are going out and spreading this music. So that's part of it.

And then we have a program called Perfect Harmony for people with dementia and Alzheimer's that's taken off because that is a very underserved community. And now we're building a museum, and we've been lucky enough to get seed money to do it, and we're in the planning stages because the collection at this point has amazing artifacts relating to every major singer of the 20th century and many of the composers whose families have donated all kinds of things from Richard Whiting's piano. It was played not only by Richard Whiting, the right hooray for Hollywood and two marvelous words,

but it was played by Stravinsky and Rachmaninoff and Gershwin memorabilia. And I have Andy Williams music library of 150 boxes of orchestration. And all that stuff you found in Secaucus. Secaucus. I mean, there's all of this stuff. It's, and so it now is preserved and cataloged and is available.

We have Meredith Wilson's archive. Wow. From the Music Man and beyond. And we helped supply some of the unpublished songs that were written for Music Man and not used that they were considering for the revival. So those sorts of things are thrilling to be able to be involved with. You're doing the Lord's work. I know you've been told that, but it's really true. You're doing important work. That's very kind.

And you're honoring the memory and the work of these people. You're giving it a second life and a third life, and it's very admirable. Thank you very much, Frank. And thank you, Gilbert. I think you're absolutely wonderful. Let's plug the upcoming Garland. Hello, Gilbert. Well, hello, Gilbert.

I'm sorry, Frank. Were you saying something? I was going to plug the Garland show again, which is the tour that's coming up. Plug away. Go to your website. Can people go to your website and find out where you're going to be doing this? That's where I go when I want to find out where I am. Michaelfeinstein.com and also the new Gershwin Country album, which drops in March. So much we could talk. I hope you'll come back and play with us another time. We didn't get into Harry Warren, who was one of mine,

Paisan Gilbert, an Italian guy. Oh, then fuck him. He was the most wonderful person. It sounds like you would have loved him, Gilbert, from what I've learned about him. Yes, you would have. Frank was telling me he's one of those people that just didn't promote himself.

Yeah, he hired a publicist, and the first time he read something in a column, he fired him. Unbelievable. But what a body of work. Until we have Michael next time, I urge our listeners to look up Harry Warren, not his real name. Salvatore Guaragna. Salvatore. But what a body of work. And we could go on and on and on with Michael. But maybe he'll take us out with one more song. Let me thank a couple

people. You knew Paul Stewart before we go? Oh, Paul Stewart used to come to the house, the character actor. Yes, he first film role was the butler in Citizen Kane. Yes. Oh, Mr. Kane. He was very quiet. This is the only. Yeah.

He sounded like he was doing a Bela Lugosi imitation in Citizen Kane. This is the only podcast in America, Michael, I can assure you, that's talking about Paul Stewart. Oh, I love Paul. He was great. Let me thank Mario, our mutual friend, Mario Cantone, who was nice enough to write me and said, Michael Feinstein, you've got to have Michael Feinstein on the show. And here you are. And what a gift it's been.

And thank you for listening to the show. That is my great, great pleasure. It's my world. And I love you guys. You're so sweet to say that. And we'll thank Susan Medore. Hey, the 28th is my birthday. So you know what?

I need you to play right now. Really? Yes. Oh, no. That's a nightmare for a piano bar musician. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear Gilbert.

Happy birthday to you. Thank you, Liberace. You're very welcome. It's my great pleasure. What are you doing after the podcast, Gilbert? I never thought Liberace would be coming on to me. I'll be seeing you.

Go away, Leah. This is my guest spot. Sorry, Michael. Okay, thank you. Michael, you gotta do a one-man show. Go away, Leah. This is my guest spot. Sorry, Michael. Okay, thank you. Michael, you've got to do a one-man show. I mean, not just the music, but stories, anecdotes about these people. I mean, you've got stories about Rosemary and Martha Ray and Elaine Stritch and all kinds of things we didn't get into. Yes, it's true.

Today. But good luck with the album. We will promote it. Go to Michael's website, michaelfeinstein.com. Go to Apple Music and find Michael's wonderful output and wonderful albums that he did with all of these great artists. And we can't praise you enough or thank you enough for your contributions. Thank you. It's a tremendous pleasure to be with both of you.

Thank you for your kindness and your generosity. We had a great time and we laughed. And Gilbert, any excuse for Gilbert to sing as Groucho? Next album. We want to thank Brendan Lynch and Lan Romo who were there recording Michael today and all the people who made this episode possible. One of my instant favorite episodes. How about you, Gil? Oh, terrific. Thank you for serenading us. And, Michael, we'll see you out there.

Indeed. God bless and be well. Thank you, pal. We've been talking to the multi-talented Michael Feinstein. The demon discographer. Thank you. It only took me 75 times, but I got it right. That's all that matters. Michael, when you meet Gilbert in public, will you refer to him as Gilbert Gottfried

or Godfrey just to make me happy? I have a story for next time about somebody's memorial where they got the name of the decedent wrong. Oh, Jesus. It's true, and I'll tell you. Please come back and play with us again. My great pleasure. This was a lot of fun. A thrill for us. For me, too, very much so. Thank you all.

Thank you. Take care. She may be far She may be nearby I'm promising hereby To my heart she'll carry the key And this world would be like heaven if she'd Follow my lead Oh, how I need Someone to watch over me

Someone to watch over me I'm Thank you.