Comedy legend Carol Burnett—who got her start on The Garry Moore Show—summarized the man who hosted this CBS variety show: “He's not as well known today as he should be, but in the late 1950s Garry Moore was a television icon. A performer and producer, he hosted his own CBS daytime talk and variety show, and a nighttime game show called To Tell the Truth.”
From 1958 to 1964, The Garry Moore Show aired on CBS as a weekly hour-long evening series.
Garry Moore's May 29th show featured guests Barbra Streisand, Robert Goulet and comedy team [Marty] Allen and [Steve] Rossi. Carol Burnett and Durward Kirby were Moore's “regulars” on the show.
Streisand told an interviewer in 1962: “That Garry Moore Show I did. That wasn't because of the reviews [of her Broadway show I Can Get It For You Wholesale]. That was because my agent dragged Garry's producer in to the theater to see me, and he liked me.”
Streisand and Robert Goulet drove out in a golf cart for the opening group number, “Teamwork.”
Barbra sang a smashing version of “When the Sun Comes Out” on a balcony set.
Next on the show, Barbra sang a song that would become part of her concert repertoire for years to come — “Happy Days Are Here Again.” She told Sir! Magazine how it all happened:
“I did the Garry Moore show ... he has a feature called 'That Wonderful Year.' He selects a year and then you do songs and headlines from that year. We were going to do the year 1929 (the year 'Happy Days' was first published). Garry spotted the song and thought it would be good for me. During rehearsal, Ken Welch, the show's music director, played it slow so I could get familiar with the lyrics and sort of feel my way into it. We both noticed a new quality coming out in the melody and we worked it over into a ballad.”
Barbra Streisand wrote in her Just For the Record liner notes: “All of a sudden the lyric took on new meaning —became ironic and dramatic. So Ken [Welch] and his wife, Mitzi, wrote a verse for it [I'm broke, I'm poor, I'm back where I started ...] and created a scene about a woman who has just lost all her money in the crash.”
On the show, Streisand stopped at a bar and ordered a glass of champagne from a waiter (played by Bob Harris). As the song progressed, she exchanged earrings and furs as payment.
Irwin Kostal (music director for The Garry Moore Show) disagreed with Streisand's memory. Kostal told writer Steven Suskin that he and orchestrator Sid Ramin had worked on an album in which they “reversed the traditional tempos of the selected songs.” Kostal said “it was my idea for Barbra to sing the song slowly.”
Show writer Norman Barasch recalled the rehearsal of the show. “I was sitting in the theater waiting for one of our sketches to be rehearsed. I happened to glance across the aisle and saw a young girl slouched down, with her legs dangling over the back of the seat in front of her. As I recall, she was wearing a nondescript pair of scruffy-looking jeans and what seemed to be someone else's sweatshirt ... When it came time for the musical portion of the rehearsal, the girl casually rose from her chair and climbed onto the stage ... Then she started to sing a slow version of the old 1932 Roosevelt era song, 'Happy Days Are Here Again.' Her voice was breathtaking. When she finished, everyone present in the theater—stagehands, musicians, producers, et al.—stood and applauded.” [From Barasch's memoir, The Joy of Laughter: My Life as a Comedy Writer.]
Streisand's last song on The Garry Moore Show was a few bars of “Moanin' Low” wrapped in a fur during a medley of songs from 1929.
[Barbra-Archives note: Streisand recorded a full version of “Moanin' Low” some ten years later for her Lazy Afternoon album with an arrangement by Rupert Holmes.]
