May 1 there were 28 shows on Broadway. June 1 there were 16. Such a
slump is normal enough at season's end, but this year Broadway thought
that the New York World's Fair would keep her dolled up in her
midwinter ermines. Instead, with New Yorkers scurrying to Flushing and
out-of-towners in no rush to get to New York, the Fair has Broadway
limping about in rags. Last month within a few days more casts
petitioned Actors' Equity Association to be allowed to take cuts than
at any other time in Equity's history; and most of the shows, even on
reduced expenses, had to fold. Smart money predicted that only eight of
Broadway's 16 shows can. survive the summer. The Fair has hit most night spots as hard as the shows. Many night clubs
smell of fresh paint, gleam with new chromium, prance with new legs,
but the nocturnstiles are not clicking—while at the Fair such places
as the French Pavilion, where the check for eight people may come to
$90,. are jammed. Some of the entertainments which Manhattan's 135
night-club owners have put on for hoped-for Fair visitors: Floor Shows. Closed is Smart Showman Billy Rose's famed Casa Manana, but
sparkling with the brightest floor show in town is his Diamond
Horseshoe. In a room decked out with expertly hideous. Mauve Decade
decor, on a tiny stage above a tremendous bar, the Diamond Horseshoe flings a gay revue of yesteryear, all fluffy ruffles and
“cheesecake.” Scenes of pre-War Rector's, of Delmonico's on New Year's
Eve with Diamond Jim Brady and Lillian Russell, a medley of old
Ziegfeld Follies tune hits, tincture sex with nostalgia. Waddling
souvenir of the past is onetime Glamor Girl Fritzi Scheff gurgling Kiss
Me Again. As much a part of the Broadway scene as a ham actor out of work, the
flashy International Casino, melting pot of buyers, cooks up a long,
elaborate girls-&-gagsters vaudeville. With never a lozenge to cool his
throat, Wisecracker Milton Berle serves as
tireless, tedious Master of Ceremonies for such acts as Georgie Tapps's
neat dancing, Harry Richman's loud singing, and Caribbean Rapture, a
writhing dance to voodoo drums that is the best and warmest of
Manhattan's tropical chorus spectacles. Once the boast of Harlem, now just a strong link in the Broadway chain,
the Cotton Club doops a lot of colored hotcha and horseplay. Though
much of the old animal verve of Harlem has given way to routine
Broadway showmanship, the show has winning headliners in Tapster Bill
Robinson and Crooner Cab Galloway; a pleasant surprise in
Hymn Swinger Sister Tharpe; plenty of jungle sex. Across the George Washington Bridge in New Jersey, sitting high and
cinematic on the Palisades, is Ben Marden's ornate million-dollar
Riviera. Its show, gaudy and gay but clean as one of Beau Brummell's
neckcloths, has routine ballet and crooning, a panting jitterbug fest,
Comic Joe Lewis, who—after rusticating most of the evening—goes to
town at the end, and Mary Raye and Naldi, whose beautiful dancing
steals the show.
