Lauren Bacall sings "The Saga of Lenny" to Bernstein for his 70th birthday

[NoName3]

Posted: 8/17/14 at 2:31pm

Lauren Bacall sings "The Saga of Lenny" at a 70th birthday celebration for Leonard Bernstein at the Tanglewood summer music festival, 1988. The music is "The Saga of Jenny" from Kurt Weill's Lady in the Dark and the new, and very clever, lyrics are by their mutual friend, Stephen Sondheim.

The page I'm linking to embeds the video from youtube and I'm linking to it because the article gives more background on the performance and their friendship than the youtube page does.

Bacall serenades Bernstein Updated On: 8/17/14 at 02:31 PM

[Will42]

Posted: 8/17/14 at 3:31pm

Thank you for sharing!
I remember watching that video a couple of years ago.
Ms. Bacall was not the greatest singer, but she had screen and stage presence like no one else. It's a tremendous loss for the industry and film lovers all over the world.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/17/14 at 10:39pm

I want to hear those Dexamyl stories...

[NoName3]

Posted: 8/28/14 at 12:25am

Shamelessly bumping my own old thread since BBW has featured the video under "Latest Headlines."

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 8/28/14 at 4:10pm

Did the thought cross anyone else's mind that his mother Jennie's not caring if he matrimonially settled on a schlemazel or a shiksa might be a lightly veiled, extremely clever, delightfully Sondheimian allusion to Bernstein's bisexuality? (Could Sondheim have possibly contemplated adapting Saga of Jennie to Saga of Lennie without including Bernstein's sexual versatility?) And, yes, for the literalists out there, I'm well aware that, broadly speaking, not all schlimazels are men, not all women are shiksas, and that actual gay marriage wasn't an option for Lennie at 28.





Updated On: 8/28/14 at 04:10 PM