I was in the same room with Carol Channing three times. One was when she was doing a "farewell tour" (and maybe not the last one) of her legendary role in Hello, Dolly! Keep in mind when I say that that I have a new policy of using the word "legend" sparingly because I think it's been devalued almost to the point of worthlessness by being applied to everything and everyone these days. It just happens to be the only applicable term in this case. And while I have never been all that fond of the show itself, what she did in it was legendary — in the real sense of that word.
Second Time: I was in Houston (or maybe Dallas but I think it was Houston) as a guest at a comic book convention there. This was in the mid-eighties, I believe. The convention operators arranged to have one of their guests go to a local TV station one morning to appear on Good Morning, Houston — or whatever the name of the show and the city were — and plug the con. Every guest more important than me (i.e., all of them) begged off and I let myself get talked into being the one.
It meant getting up way early, making myself as presentable as possible at that hour, being driven to the TV station and waiting an awfully long time to get on the air. I was mad at myself for agreeing until I found out that one of the other guests on the program that morn was Ms. Carol Channing. She was in town in some sort of concert-type show and she was appearing on the TV program for promotional reasons. I found that among the many, many things Carol Channing did better than me was to be awake, alert and very scintillating at 7:30 AM.
We had a wonderful half-hour in the green room waiting to go on. I told her I'd seen her in the above-referenced tour when it played Los Angeles. She was delighted but said, "You know, eventually you'll be telling people that you saw me on Broadway in the original production. Everyone who attended those touring shows eventually does. I think that's why they went to them…so they could tell people "I saw Carol Channing in Hello, Dolly! and either they say it was in New York or they don't mention it was in Schenectady!"
Great lady. Great talker. I was so delighted to spend that time with her and find out for myself that she was just like that for real. I didn't want to spoil the moment by asking her about being in the movie, Skidoo!
I was the last guest that morning on AM Houston or Good Morning, Dallas or whatever the hell it was. They gave me about 45 seconds to plug the con because Carol had been such a great guest, they'd gone way over talking to her. If I'd been the producer, I'd have dumped the clown from the comic book convention and all the other guests and just let her fill the whole danged show.
Third time I was in the same room as Carol Channing: In early 2009, the Magic Castle in Hollywood experimented with hosting cabaret shows in one of its performing spaces. The Board later decided to just stick with magic and they stopped the experiment but before they did, they had some wonderful shows there. Stan Freberg did a couple of nights there as did many singers of show tunes…including Carol. I went with my friend Shelly Goldstein, who herself sold out that showroom for a few evenings.
Carol was dynamic and funny and charming and very energetic. Of course, she was a much younger woman then. She was 88. She did an awful lot of magic of her own kind without pulling a rabbit out of a hat, sawing anyone in half or hauling out the linking rings. She just sat and talked and sang.
It was one of the best evenings I ever spent listening to someone just be legendary. See? There's that word again.