Send In The Clowns Thread

CZJ

Bernadette Peters.

Dame Cleo gave us the definitive version.

Krusty

WAP by Cardi B.

Florence Henderson and her interpretive dancers:

Dame Judi gives the right amount of damaged for the song.

Van Morrison and Chet Baker

I’m partial to Judy Collins because that’s the first version I knew

CZJ was atrocious at the Tonys. Bernadette, on the other hand, is fantastic. Find her on YouTube. She also looks fantastic as an added bonus.

R8 Never heard that version before, I really like it!!

The song was written for Glynis Johns, who originated the role of Desiree in A Little Night Music. By any reasonable standards, her version should be considered definitive, as all the others are not only covers, but not performed in the context of the show, where the song belongs. Her co-star is Len Cariou. Glynis is still alive, age 90+. Some will also remember her as Mrs. Banks in Mary Poppins (the original).

I’ll always love Sarah Vaughan’s version

But this may come in a close second

Thread closed. Judy Cohen. That is all.

R15 wins

What - is this thread every two fucking weeks? It's like Groundhog Day. It's a hell of a boring song after the second time you've heard it. It doesn't need more than one rendition. But because it is so pretentious and monotonous, my favorite version is by the non singing CHER. She doesn't overdo it, because she can't. But she looked AMAZING back then before I was BORN. The timber of her voice always makes if seem like she feels something when she sings. She doesn't. Doubtful that she even understand the words. It's true. But I saw this version on the last thread about this dumb ass song. When was it - about two weeks ago?

Judith Cohen

Other Works

(July 14 to August 9, 1987) She played Alcmene's servant in the musical, "Olympus on My Mind," at the Burt Reynolds Jupiter Theatre in Jupiter, Florida with Alex Daniels (Jupiter); Jason Graae (Mercury); Jacqueline Schultz (Alcmene); Joyce Dewitt and Frank Kopyc in the cast. Barry Harman wrote the book and lyrics. Grant Sturiale was composer.

Another vote for Glynis Johns.

Nobody can, has, or will EVER top Judi's performance. Sondheim songs can not merely be sung, they must be acted. All of these lounge singer's performances lack the depth that the song needs.

You and everybody else on the planet, R9. Sondheim owes her big-time.

Good or bad?

I loved the Judy Collins version growing up but never understood the lyrics until I saw Bernadette Peters perform it in a revival of A Little Night Music a decade ago.

What is it that all these Judys gravitate to this song?

It is a song, it cannot just be acted it must also be sung. Dame Judi is not meeting the moment.

R22 Her voice is awful but her performance is actually wonderful. She doesn't have the anger that others have when they perform it, but it's replaced with a true deep longing. The regret hangs on every word. Liz was America's last actor with true talent, and when she died so did Hollywood.

Fuck yer damn clowns.

Bow before royalty, bitches.

Freddie Mercury instrumental.

Sondheim teaches

More

THERE’S.

GOT.

TO BE.

CLOWNS.

Yes for Glynis and Cleo.

But you may want to consider this.

For a lark.

OOPS. I'm blind.

Good for you, R29.

Judi Dench knew enough to have Fredrik there. It's a dialogue, and needs to be delivered to someone. Hers is the supreme acted version.

But Bernadette sang it better than anyone, and completely bettered CZJ.

Elizabeth Taylor got it, though one wishes she sang just slightly better.

I love the disco version Grace Jones did on Portfolio album. Even better than her rendition of Tomorrow from Annie - on the same record.

I envision Sondheim fainting on hearing it.

Why was the melancholy circus clown trope so big in the 60s/70s? Everyone seemed to have those creepy sad Hobo Joe paintings in their homes.

The first version I ever heard was Carol Burnett’s.

I didn’t like it because I didn’t understand it and it seemed the least funny sketch she’d ever done.

I was seven. I still remember it clearly.

Dame Judi for the win. It's certainly the best-acted, if not the best sung (although the way she gets her voice to crack on "Sorry, my dear" is quite moving). The performance is improved by the dialog just before the song and in the middle. Context is all!

Ennui, R36.

Perry Como’s version, if you suffer from insomnia:

Dame Angela's version, abridged but still moving.

I think poor CZJ was in a manic high at The Tonys, hence her overwrought performance. Did anyone see her and Angela when they did the show together? How were they?

R38 totally agree.

R37, I miss shows like that. SNL once was able to let melancholy show up a little.

Here’s my newest obsession: Jackie Trent. Her voice is beautifully deep and smoky. The arrangement is a little all over the place, but the bridge is lovely.

CZJ was quite good in person. That Tony performance was nothing like what she did eight times a week. She had glamor and a charming coarseness, but maybe the pain was only a flesh wound.

Bernadette nailed it. She was still at the height of her talent, but showed just how tired Desiree is of her theatrical routine. When the extremely talented Fredrik (Alexander Hanson) left her, it wasn’t clear anyone would be there next year.

Stretch versus Lansbury was also fascinating. Angels had her routine down flawlessly. Stritch didn’t have her lines or lyrics, but was the kind of actress who would not move until an organic moment was there. Hence, “Liaisons” lasted six minutes.

The real failures were the dreary set, the tiny orchestra, and a Charlotte who astonishingly managed to find a way to make that character both unfunny and unsympathetic. If Natasha Richardson has not died, we might have seen a new production worthy of the material.

CZJ and Michael Douglas were as shocked as the rest of us to win the Tony.

But she was charming as hell in her speech.

R37 Marilu Henner per chance?

How DARE you bitches not mention ME in this thread?

I don't think CZJ was shocked to win, if you watch knowing what we know now she is clearing unbalanced that night.

R48 The child viewers no doubt had nightmares about Liberace and that skeletal clown for years to come.

I love the singer at R29, so sweet

Barbara Cook, at 82 years of age, singing "Send In the Clowns" in SONDHEIM ON SONDHEIM on Broadway.

Any more reviews on Angie and CZJ when they were on stage?

She's adorable.

R9 It's funny, I was a young adult when Judy's version came out and I kind of ignored it. Listening now, I find it gorgeous.. It's nice to hear the song beautifully sung, rather than theatrically "interpreted" as all these older actresses do it. Same reason I like the young singer at R29.

R66 it's Judi

R56, I think R55 means Judy Collins.

I do mean Judy Collins. I tried listening to Dame Judi and.....well, that's what I mean about "interpretations."

I remember being fascinated by the Judy Collins version as a 13 year old.

It wasn't played on my local radio stations, but I heard it on the Casey Kasem American Top 40 show, because it spent a few weeks in the lower reaches of the Billboard top 40 in 1975. (A couple of years later, it made the top 40 again, and charted significantly higher than it had initially. Not sure why it was re-released, or what led to the resurgence.)

It was so different from everything else that was out at the time, and the lyrics were fairly enigmatic. I had no idea it was from a musical, or that Sondheim wrote it, or even who Sondheim was, for that matter. I just thought it was a very unique piece of music, and that it was beautifully sung by Judy.

There is a somewhat rare Angela version on the disc A STEPHEN SONDHEIM EVENING, which is a live recording of a small-ish off-broadway compilation show from the late 70s, I think. Angela sings SITC at the end with Sondheim accompanying her. She sounds great and it's neat that Sondheim plays for her.

For those who know the album, Liz Callaway sounds incredible in a "Miller's Son" rendition and there is a terrific "Someone in a Tree" as well. And some cut songs from FORUM that are cool.

It was a one-performance concert at the Whitney museum in 1983.

Angie sounds great in that version. She would have made a good Desiree

It was also an unusual choice for Judy Collins herself at the time, since she was then still pretty solidly a folkie. That’s part of what made her version interesting for me.

Johnny Hartman’s live recording is one of my favorites with its graceful swooping vocals and stuttering violin.

Melancholy and solitary.

It needs a shookie shookie beat...

Judy Collins, on her album "Strangers Again," revisits SITC and does it as a duet with - are you ready - Don "American Pie" McLean.

I love the version that Judy Collins rerecorded in 1977—more dramatic and less languid than the 1975 version at R9.

I vote for Judy Collins. also, her version of Both Sides Now makes me cry, it really gets me every time.

[R17] Many thanks for posting that. I have never heard it before, had no idea it even existed. Loved it. Now my favourite version of an over done, tedious, pretentious theatre song. Always sung with intense personal feeling and knowing that makes me puke sometimes. Think your critique of it absolutely nailed it. Agreed with everything you said about the song and Cher’s ‘interpretation’. We’ve all had 40 years of Cher being Cher and love her for it. This made me re evaluate a bit. Made me see why she altered our perceptions of beauty because she was simply stunningly beautiful. Stick Cher amongst the serious folk and you’d think she’d fall on her arse but she never does. Like her acting. In Tea with Mussolini with all those heavy weights, she comes out fine. In a sea of pretentiousness I enjoyed this one.

R29 weirdly, that young lady’s version is my favorite.

For most of my life, I misheard the line as “they’re all tippy clowns.” Like those big clown balloons that you punch and try to tip over.

[quote]CZJ was quite good in person. That Tony performance was nothing like what she did eight times a week. She had glamor and a charming coarseness, but maybe the pain was only a flesh wound.

She was great in the show and deserved her Tony. You can tell her voice was raspy on The Tonys and didn't feel well and she acted the hell out of it but it was far from a disaster. If she had canceled, she would have been attacked too. But of course Sondhemites will never accept anyone but Johns anyway. they will never be pleased

Randy Rainbow knows all of your names!

Well, I watched that whole god damned show and there wasn't one fucking clown!

Is Cher at r17 actually good? I assume it's a joke that people think it's great.

One of the worst songs ever

Shirley Bassey is 85, that's four times my age! Imagine that?