Ethel Merman stories

"Loretta how much will it cost me to tell ya to GO FUCK YOURSELF?"

I love the stories of her riding through Times Square and yelling at pedestrians with a bullhorn.

Oh wait...

To Carol Channing, in costume for Gentlemen Prefer Blondes: "Whatsa matter, Carol? You walked like you hadda pee."

“Too much booze and dope don’t cut it with me. Hey, Irving —come get your crazy dyke wife offa me.”

Time stamp 43:47

Helen Lawson's character was widely thought to be Ethel Merman.

"The character Helen Lawson, an aging stage actress, is based closely on actress Ethel Merman."

Not exactly something I would be proud of.

R1 - that quote is attributed to Joseph L Mankiewicz.

When she wrote her memoir she had a blank page on her marriage to Ernest Borgnine.

R6 and about seven other people. Even Loretta‘s daughter couldn’t nail down who it was from.

I feel for those big, lumbering straight women or even the slender ones like Bea Arthur. If they had been lesbians they could have had relationships with very attractive younger women.

Instead Merman got her cheeks clapped by Ernie Borgnine. 😔

Ernie told how Ethel was pissed that people knew him better for McHales's Navy than her as a Broadway star.

My favorite:

Borgnine later told fellow actor Frank Wilson that he spent most of his short marriage arguing with Merman. By the end, he recounted how she came back from a film one day and said, "The director said I looked sensational. He said I had the face of a 20-year-old, and the body and legs of a 30-year-old!". Borgnine replied, "Did he say anything about your old cunt?" "No" replied Merman, "he didn't mention you at all."

"It softens me the fuck up!"

Pretty decent episode of a very mediocre show. I can’t get over how much that one queen is really feeling himself. You grew up rich and you knew Merman, ok 🤷🏻‍♂️

Ethel was very upset when she and Ernest Borgnine got off the plane in Japan. All the fans were waiting for him. They didn't know her at all. He told this story on TCM.

R2 WHAT THE HELL IS A BULLHORN?

"People make mistakes! That's why they put erasers on pencils!"

-- Ethel explaining to the press her divorce from Ernest Borgnine less than two months after they wed

"God knows I love Little Ethel, but she can't sing a note!"

-- (Big) Ethel describing her feelings towards her only daughter

When she appeared The Love Boat, she was in the earliest stages of dementia and had to constantly fed her lines

[quote]Merman got her cheeks clapped by Ernie Borgnine

Pics please.

R17 neither could she.

Asked what she thought of newcomer, Mary Martin, Ethel replied, "she's okay, if you like talent."

I don’t remember where I read this. The Broadway conductor Donald Pippin said that when Merman came to see Lauren Bacall in APPLAUSE she sat front and center, right behind the conductor. When Bacall began to sing, Pippin reportedly heard Merman quietly say “Jesus.”

In rehearsals for GYPSY Ethel asked Steve Sondheim about Tab Hunter, with whom she's recently appeared on a TV special.

"Is Tab a queer, Steve?" asked Ethel.

Steve: "Well, Ethel, is the Pope Catholic?"

Ethel: "Yeah, of course,, but is Tab queer?"

This was often Steve's anecdote to elaborate how dumb Ethel could be.

r23 the same story was told by Ann Miller recounting when she and Ethel attended the opening of another Lauren Bacall musical "Woman of the Year".

Screamed, “Help! A dyke is after me” as she ran from Jacqueline Susann who was stalking her and broke into her home.

R23. Was just about to cite that story, but you beat me to it. How”s this one? She was so frustrated with all the last minute changes leading up to the opening of Gypsy, that she said “ call me Miss Birdseye, boys, this show is frozen “

One day Merman brought her kids along to a rehearsal of "Gypsy".

The stagehands were moving set pieces and having a hard time of it.

At a certain point, Merman yelled out: "Guys, guys, don't say FUCK in front of the K-I-D-S!

On the first day of rehearsals for "Happy Hunting," ten minutes into reading their lines, Fernando Lamas raised his hand to interrupt Ethel, turned to the director, Abe Burrows, and said, "Excuse me, but is this the way it's going to be?"

"Is this the way WHAT'S going to be?" Burrows queried.

"What I mean is, am I going to read my lines to Miss Merman, and Miss Merman reads hers to the audience?" Lamas clarified.

"Mr. Lamas," Miss Merman replied testily, "I want you to know that I have been playing scenes this way for twenty-five years on Broadway."

"That doesn't mean you're right,” Lamas countered. "That just means you're old."

For one of her shows (Happy Hunting?), the writers kept giving her line changes, and she followed them until the night of the final dress rehearsal. A stagehand came up to her with the new lines, and she stared at him and said, "Kid, from now on you can call me 'Birdseye' Merman, because this show is FROZEN!"

"Irving Berlin told me, 'Ethel, never take a singing lesson in your life--it'll ruin your voice!' So I DIDN'T!"

You know what's wrong with the world Sylvester? I'll tell you whats wrong with the world. . .

"Go to New Haven and sing the fucking song!"

Merman was such a scary caricature that I remember, when I was very young, my Dad making me and my siblings cry by telling us that he was divorcing our Mom and marrying Ethel Merman so that she would be our stepmother.

Asked what she thought of newcomer, Mary Martin, Ethel replied, "she's okay, if you like lipstick cootch"

fixed for R22

DON'T LET THE PARADE PASS YOU BY

I was her understudy and used to wait in the wings wishing she’d drop dead!

I can't think of her without picturing her hilarious scenes in It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World. She was the scene stealer.

"On an evening in the mid-1970s, the actor Carroll O’Connor and his wife took Ethel Merman to hear Bobby Short at Café Carlyle. Merman, who could be strident in her disapproval of other singers, gargled champagne during the set. It was a gesture of hostility too much even for Archie Bunker, and although she and the O’Connors were to remain friends, Merman never had the guest shot on All in the Family that she pined for."

R8 I just read a variation said by Robert Mitchum.

While making Rachel and the Stranger Mitchum reputedly held his tongue about his pious co-star until shooting was completed. As he exited the set on the final day of production, Mitchum smiled, dropped a $20 bill into the jar, and said, "This should just about cover everything I've been wanting to say to Loretta."

My father loved the big bands and all the classic pop singers, but he HATED Merman. Whenever she'd pop up on TV he'd say, "She doesn't sing, she bellows!"

Also on his shit list: Mel Tormé and Vic Damone.

She didn't need to be miked.

It’s a shame we don’t have a single video online of her performing Rose’s Turn.

R41, Merman is neither big band nor classic pop.

When they were appearing together in Red Hot and Blue on Broadway in the ‘30s, Merm and her costar, Bob Hope, would fuck in doorways on side streets in Times Square on the way home after the show.

I walked into it. Years ago in Tower Records I was flipping through the DVDs of old Hollywood ggmusicals when one of the staff casually asked if I was looking for anything special. I looked up and said, “Call Me Madam”

Her reply? “0f course. And now that we have that cleared up, I think it’s in this bin over here.”

The gg came out of nowhere

In the 1930s she was loud but she didn't have that hiccup in her voice she later adopted, Where did that come from?

R45 Oh give it up, it ain't gonna happen.

[quote] In the 1930s she was loud but she didn't have that hiccup in her voice she later adopted, Where did that come from?

R48 Those hiccups were probably Ethel doing a “grace note” in which a musician starts on the note above the main note and quickly goes to the main note. It may have evolved because Ethel wanted to go beyond just belting the melody, and grace notes are ornamentations of music.

As you’ve noticed, her grace notes were not particularly graceful (hiccup!). Ethel did not have a trained voice that could do anything fancy. She had strong vocal cords, volume, and lung capacity.

She tried out for our group!

Gayest Boy Scout troop ever. Ethel Merman starring in their fund raiser.

Ethel was seen at Central Park with a weeping grandchild.

Merman said, “So you don’t want to go to the zoo, what the FUCK do you want to do??”

Ethel on the Ford show correcting Mary's pronunciation of "cud" in the song Mississippi Mud.

Mary was pronouncing it "cood" apparently? Ethel disapproved.

Mary sang it correctly in rehearsal......then went ahead and sang "cood" during the telecast.

‘Like Gangbusters!’

Ethel got invited to the premiere of At Long Last Love, the musical that was a tribute to Cole Porter.

After the movie, leaving the theater, she was overheard saying (rather loudly) "Thank God Cole didn't live to see this!"

A scripted line in an Eddie Cantor movie but it sounds like something she would really say.

Guy: (reading the newspaper) Hey remember that guy who pretended to be your husband in Atlantic City.

Ethel: Yea.

Guy: He's dead.

Ethel: I coulda told you that in Atlantic City.

My mom’s mom always remind me of Ethel Merman. Seriously.

We were all terrified of her.

R56, Kitty Carlisle was over heard saying the same thing.

She lived giving men rimjobs. They called her Rimmy.

After seeing Marilyn in her costumes for "There's No Business Like Showbusiness," Ethel had Bill Travilla design for her that white bodice gown for the showstopping finale. It was supposed to give the illusion that the Merm was just as amply endowed as Marilyn.

My favorite apocryphal backstage anecdote.

At the appointed time, a stage manager knocks quietly and sticks his head inside Ethel's dressing room and informs her - "Miss Merman, you're on."

She belts back via her reflection in the mirror - "I am? How'm I doin'?"

She was up to play a part in the original movie version of West Side Story but I forget which one.

R61 - Mitzi Gaynor reported that she and Ethel would make fun of Marilyn on the set of that movie.

R62. That happened on an episode of That Girl, not IRL.

Ethel Merman and Mary Martin performed for a charity event. To cut costs, the organization told Ethel they could just take a cab to the theatre. Merman said “Do you think we’re a couple of chorus girls???? Get us the limo!” Merman also demanded a hairdresser and other star accoutrements. The limo alone costed $2,000.00.

When rehearsing GYPSY with some children, Ethel said to the stagehands: "Don't say FUCK in front of the K-I-D-S."

R66 here - Merman demanded new dresses, as well.

I'm willing to bet that most of these anecdotes are apocryphal.

Oh hell no - not a one of them is in the Bible.

R69:

R66 & R68 here. My sources are from Bob Thomas's biography of Ethel Merman.

I love this anecdote. "I know there's a war on -- I read Variety!" Classic

Don't believe everything you read, r71.

R73, Bob Thomas was a very well respected writer.