THE DARWIN THEORY
Tom’s musical play The Darwin Theory was produced by the Los Angeles City and State Colleges in June 1949, a joint venture of the Drama and Music departments of the colleges, which then shared the same campus. The work features the so-called Monkey Trial
in Dayton, Tennessee, in 1925. Story and characters, while borrowing from the lives, times, and events leading up to the trial, are fictionalized. The names of William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow are used, and fragments of their
courtroom discourse are worked into the fabric of the play.
Tom has written, “While I ‘wrote’ the music, at least conceived the melodic lines for the score, I didn’t literally write music. I didn’t know one note from the other. When Ken Carmichael, the head of the Drama Department, decided to stage the show, written as a project for the playwriting class he taught, he conferred with the head of the Music Department who provided students to copy my music. I would sing the songs and the students would transcribe and harmonize them. One of these was Jarred Goldsmith, who later, as Jerry Goldsmith, became a film composer, Chinatown being a notable credit. He played one of two pianos during production, and was as well the show’s musical conductor.”
Concerning one of the songs, “Let’s Believe in Adam and Eve,” Tom wrote, “Edwin Lester, musical director of the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera, and his executive assistant Eleanor Pinkham, particularly liked the music for this song and advised me to continue ‘writing’my own music, perhaps not the wisest advice when Jerry Goldsmith among others was willing to be my collaborator. Since I was limited in demonstrating my own music, others, particularly a woman at Music Corporation of America, urged that I take a job offered me with an established but unidentified songwriting team at one of the studios, an offer she had brokered for me as a friend and believer in my talent. I would be an apprentice or ghost lyricist, Frank Loesser cited as an example of a former ghost lyricist
who made good on his own, having made contacts and friends as a ghost writer. Wisely or unwisely, I declined the offer.”
Coming across Irwin Stone’s Clarence Darrow for the Defense at the Los Angeles Public Library prompted Tom to write the play as a class project. “I’m told that my play and its production was in turn the impetus that motivated Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee to write their play Inherit the Wind about the Scopes Trial. Presumably one or both saw a performance of The Darwin Theory. Perhaps at the time they were already involved with their project . . .
“While I never met Mr. Lawrence or Mr. Lee, I did meet as a result of The Darwin Theory Peter Matz, then a student at UCLA who saw a performance and asked to use one of the songs, “Them Men,” in a musical revue he was staging at UCLA. He and I became friends and infrequent collaborators. He became an important arranger of Broadway musicals and worked closely with Barbra
Streisand on her early albums.
“I also made the acquaintance of Wyatt Cooper through the production. Wyatt, also a student at UCLA and an aspiring writer, caught the show. We became friends but never collaborated on the book of the musical we talked of doing. We both moved to New York. After Wyatt married Gloria Vanderbilt, I saw him infrequently. His son, television reporter Anderson Cooper, looks very much like him except for the latter’s prematurely but attractively gray hair.”
Although the production of The Darwin Theory was very well received, not everyone agreed. “A friend of my landlady’s in Los Angeles saw a performance of the show and told me afterward, ‘I’m sure you’ll go someplace . . .’ As I smiled my thanks, thinking it a
compliment, as perhaps it was, she added in an evangelical tone, ‘I only hope it’s the right place.’ I didn’t know there was such a thing as specific Fundamentalism (caps or no caps) at the time, nor that it was not specific to Christianity. I thought the term generic and nonspecific and only applicable to backwoods Holy Rollers of the past. Little did I know.”
A selection of lyrics from the show follows.
THE AGE OF ROCKS OR THE ROCK OF AGES
Sisters, sisters and brothers,
Listen what I’ve got to tell you –
Listen what I’ve got to say.
The Lord above wants to know today . . .
The age of rocks or the Rock of Ages,
What is it going to be?
Mothers, are we going to let the schools
Make all our children fools
By teaching them their grandma-mas
Were ani-mules?
You!
It’s up to you!
The age of rocks or the Rock of Ages,
Bible or biology?
Fathers, are we going to cure what ails,
Burn schoolbooks by the bails
That tell us that our grandpa-pas
Had wagging tails?
You!
It’s up to you!
Why send our children
To school on Sunday
To learn their Bible in verse,
If these sweet children
At school on Monday
Must learn the exact reverse?
The age of rocks or the Rock of Ages,
Are we to be up a tree?
Parents, we must send an invitation
To folks throughout the nation
To help us help the Sunday school save education
With this plea –
It’s not the age or rocks,
Brothers, no siree.
They’re not a-gonna make a monkey out of me!
They’re not a-gonna make a monkey out of me!
WE GOT TO PASS A BILL
(This song wasn't in the student production)
Now I don’t mind biology
Gee, I can see geology,
But when schools call the Bible story
“An aesthetic,
Pure, poetic allegory,”
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
I’m progressive ev’ry way.
I think that schools are here to stay.
But when they say man was created
When two hairy, salivary
Forms was mated,
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
Ethnological research
Threatens ev’ry single church.
We’ll pass a bill
Which will refute
The whole Smithsonian Institute!
Bet your boot,
Bet your boot.
Profs and teachers, they must git.
They ought to be kicked where they sit.
We ought to dip ‘em and baptize ‘em,
Hold ‘em under
And then wonder
Should we rise ‘em?
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
Eve was tempted by a serpent,
A low down snake in the grass.
And so God said to the serpent,
“For what you’ve done to this lass,
You must crawl down on your belly
Till the end of time."
Now the schools want to know
How did it go
Before that time?
I read Genesis and, hey,
No monkey business there, no way.
A Christian shudders each time he sees
Kids a-gorgin’
On this “Or’gin
Of the Species.”
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
I don’t mind zoology.
Or even anthropology.
But these here schoolbooks, they’re all, you know,
Full of libel.
Ain’t the Bible
All we need? So,
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
I got a bill that says it’s so -
All them monkeys got to go.
A bill, when signed,
Designed
To send
A good swift kickin’ to Darwin’s end.
Darwin’s end! Darwin’s end!
Fundamentalists are we.
These here books fundamentally
Mock our religion - “God made Adam.
Then quite glibly,
From a rib He
Gave us Madame.
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
Burn their books,
Release their hooks.
Give them lots of dirty looks
And keep schoolteachers still!
LET’S BELIEVE IN ADAM AND EVE
(Eleanor)
Life would be so simple
If people all were good
And would believe
What they’ve been told
They should,
Let’s believe in Adam and Eve
and love.
Let’s not believe as other people might,
That love is but a fancy
Evolving with the moonlight.
I’ve grown so weary
Hearing Darwin’s theory.
It’s not for me,
No, not for me.
My heart belongs
With the magic of
The haunting Song of Songs.
Female and male,
The Genesis tale for me.
Woman loved man,
The world then began to be.
I want to believe
That our hearts are beatin’
‘Cause an apple once was eaten
And two people fell in love,
So let’s believe in Adam and Eve
And love, and love, and love.
(George)
I’ll believe in Adam and Eve
And love.
(Eleanor speaks)
You’re making fun of me.
(George)
Would I do that?
I’ll not believe as other people may,
That we got here in some other way.
I’ll believe in Adam and Eve
and love.
I’ll not believe the Bible tells a fib,
That Eve was just an afterthought
Fashioned from Adam’s rib.
(Eleanor)
Now you aremaking fun of me . .
.
Oh, George, I’m leery
Of your Darwin theory.
Don’t want to know,
Wish it would go.
My heart belongs
With the magic of
The haunting Song of Songs.
(Together)
Female and male -
The Genesis tale
for me.
Woman loved man,
The world then began
to be.
I want to believe
That our hearts are beatin’
‘Cause an apple once was eaten
And two people fell in love.
So, let’s believe in Adam and Eve
And love,
And love,
And love.
EVILUTION
We’re waiting at the station here
For William Jennings Bryan to appear.
For William Jennings Bryan is a fi-an man,
No lyin’ man,
A man who’ll send chimpanzees
Back to pasture in the pansies
Comes the fall
Of ev’ry hall
And institution
Of evilution
The prosecution has no fear
For William Jennings Bryan will appear.
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man,
A fi-an man!
A man who is inspired,
To the Lord’s ear always wired.
He’s a gent
Who’s heaven-sent
With God’s solution
To evilution!
When he appears on the platform,
Gentlemen, throw up a hat for’m.
Ladies, on with your singing
Till all our eardrums are ringing.
We’re waiting at the station here
For William Jennings Bryan to appear.
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man –
Don’t try the man –
A man who is a lighthouse.
How we need him in The White House
To repair
With daily prayer
The constitution
And evilution!
We’re waiting at the station here
For William Jennings Bryan to appear.
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man,
None better than,
A credit to our nation,
He’ll demand emancipation
From the corps
That’s calling for
Consolidation
With evilution.
We’re waiting here to give a cheer
When William Jennings Bryan will appear
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man,
Know why? The man
Is full of high ideals.
Bows his head at night; he feels
He’s been brung
To bring the young
Their restitution
From evilution.
When he’s Commander in Chief, yes,
Praise the Lord, teachers will teach less.
He’ll be our President one day.
Each day then holy as Sunday!
We’re waiting at the station here
For William Jennings Bryan to appear.
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man,
Our kind o’ man,
A man who will demand sense
And insist the Ten Commandments
Be brought back
To ev’ry black-
board in the nation.
(Spoken)
The Ten Commandments!
(Sung)
Not evilution!
THE FEAR OF THE LORD
Do you desire
Hellfire?
Do you prefer
The fork to the lyre?
’ll tell you all on the level
You will go to the devil
And you’ll burn.
The fear of the Lord.
Unless you learn
The little guys
Must be baptized
For Satan takes both
The big and the light-sized.
You better walk in the center
Or there won’t be no winter
Where you go.
Unless you know
The fear of the Lord.
You better prepare for His coming.
You better repent and pray.
Be always aware He is coming.
He will nudge you
And He’ll judge you
Comes that final Judgment Day.
Come on, get near it!
The spirit!
Come feel it! And . . .
Come smell it, and come hear it.
Come hear it cry, “Hallelujah!”
Praise the Lord, that’ll do ya.
All you need is just to heed
The fear of the Lord.
Reprise and tag:
You better hear it,
The spirit.
You’ll never climb up
Those stairs until you fear it.
You better kneel and be humble.
When those skies start to rumble,
Brother, show
Him you know
The fear of the Lord.
The fear of the fire,
And the murk and the mire,
And the fork
And the devil
And the good ole fashioned level
fear,
The fear of the Lord.
IN LOVE WITH A MONKEY
This was cut in the revised version although it was a crowd pleaser and, according to Jerry Goldsmith, perhaps the most “perfect” song in the show in that it adhered to standards and format of what a song should be. The song was sung by Connie about her boyfriend who was wearing a monkey suit to mock the proceedings, with a reprise (see below) by Sir Tucker about his dog. In
revising the book and adding “You’re Old Man’s a Monkey,” “Monkey Business Blues,” and “The Monkey Trial,” there were just too many monkey songs for this one to remain, catchy as it is. Besides, it was relevant only thematically.
He hasn’t got a monkey’s eyes,
Or a monkey’s nose,
Or a monkey’s tail
But I’d love him still
If he were a monkey
If he were a monkey
I would be
A kind of three dollar bill.
Oh, my goodness, goodness me,
But isn’t life hunky?
You should be
Happy like me,
In love with a monkey.
Oh, I know it must seem strange,
I don’t deny it’s queer,
But monkeys always send me
And this one is a dearie –
Bleary eyes and shaggy hair
But I’ll be his flunky’
Long as he don’t monkey
‘Round with someone new.
You may think I’m crazy
And your folks may all agree,
But if you knew this monkey
Like I do-oo-oo,
You would be in love with a monkey too.
REPRISE: IN LOVE WITH A POODLE)
See how his little tummy sags?
See that tail that wags
Always to and fro,
To affection show.
Toy Dog is my doggie.
Love me, love my doggie.
Man’s best friend,
This is the best friend
I know.
Oh, my goodness, goodness me,
’m light in the noodle.
You should be
Happy like me,
In love with a poodle.
Oh, I know it must seem strange,
I want to make that clear,
But I like little doggies
And this one is a dearie -
Bleary eyes and shaggy hair
And full of dog foodle,
But I’ll never toodle
‘Round with someone new.
You may think I’m crazy
And you folks may all agree,
But if you knew this doggie
Like I do-oo-oo,
You would be in love with a poodle too.
A WISE MAN SAID
MEMPHIS MOODY and HIS TRIO increase the volume of the blues riff they’ve been playing in the background. GEORGE strolls over to CLEMENS on the bench.
GEORGE
You know, Mr. Lee, I’ve reached a conclusion. The world is flat,
after all.
CLEMENS
Any dang fool can see that.
GEORGE
Yeah, just look at it.
(Joining MEMPHIS MOODY, SINGS)
On the naked eye
They say we can’t rely.
What we think we see
May not really be.
Perception, yours and mine,
Can be out of line.
Winter turns to spring,
The blues change ev’rything.
MOODY (SPEAKS)
Blues? You got the blues, boy? Tell me.
GEORGE (SINGS)
A wise man said
The world is round
But I’ve found
It’s not like that.
My love has left me and the world is flat.
A wise man said
The grass is green
But I’ve seen
It isn’t true.
My love has left me and the grass is blue.
Sages
For ages
Have written lots of pages
About love.
They doubt love.
But I know
Life is mighty slow
Without love.
A wise man said
The sun shines bright.
That’s not right,
The sun don’t shine.
There’s only darkness in this world of mine.
In this habitat here,
Sun don’t shine, it’s flat here
And the grass is blue
And it doesn’t take a wise man
To tell me I am too.
Tom’s musical play The Darwin Theory was produced by the Los Angeles City and State Colleges in June 1949, a joint venture of the Drama and Music departments of the colleges, which then shared the same campus. The work features the so-called Monkey Trial
in Dayton, Tennessee, in 1925. Story and characters, while borrowing from the lives, times, and events leading up to the trial, are fictionalized. The names of William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow are used, and fragments of their
courtroom discourse are worked into the fabric of the play.
Tom has written, “While I ‘wrote’ the music, at least conceived the melodic lines for the score, I didn’t literally write music. I didn’t know one note from the other. When Ken Carmichael, the head of the Drama Department, decided to stage the show, written as a project for the playwriting class he taught, he conferred with the head of the Music Department who provided students to copy my music. I would sing the songs and the students would transcribe and harmonize them. One of these was Jarred Goldsmith, who later, as Jerry Goldsmith, became a film composer, Chinatown being a notable credit. He played one of two pianos during production, and was as well the show’s musical conductor.”
Concerning one of the songs, “Let’s Believe in Adam and Eve,” Tom wrote, “Edwin Lester, musical director of the Los Angeles Civic Light Opera, and his executive assistant Eleanor Pinkham, particularly liked the music for this song and advised me to continue ‘writing’my own music, perhaps not the wisest advice when Jerry Goldsmith among others was willing to be my collaborator. Since I was limited in demonstrating my own music, others, particularly a woman at Music Corporation of America, urged that I take a job offered me with an established but unidentified songwriting team at one of the studios, an offer she had brokered for me as a friend and believer in my talent. I would be an apprentice or ghost lyricist, Frank Loesser cited as an example of a former ghost lyricist
who made good on his own, having made contacts and friends as a ghost writer. Wisely or unwisely, I declined the offer.”
Coming across Irwin Stone’s Clarence Darrow for the Defense at the Los Angeles Public Library prompted Tom to write the play as a class project. “I’m told that my play and its production was in turn the impetus that motivated Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee to write their play Inherit the Wind about the Scopes Trial. Presumably one or both saw a performance of The Darwin Theory. Perhaps at the time they were already involved with their project . . .
“While I never met Mr. Lawrence or Mr. Lee, I did meet as a result of The Darwin Theory Peter Matz, then a student at UCLA who saw a performance and asked to use one of the songs, “Them Men,” in a musical revue he was staging at UCLA. He and I became friends and infrequent collaborators. He became an important arranger of Broadway musicals and worked closely with Barbra
Streisand on her early albums.
“I also made the acquaintance of Wyatt Cooper through the production. Wyatt, also a student at UCLA and an aspiring writer, caught the show. We became friends but never collaborated on the book of the musical we talked of doing. We both moved to New York. After Wyatt married Gloria Vanderbilt, I saw him infrequently. His son, television reporter Anderson Cooper, looks very much like him except for the latter’s prematurely but attractively gray hair.”
Although the production of The Darwin Theory was very well received, not everyone agreed. “A friend of my landlady’s in Los Angeles saw a performance of the show and told me afterward, ‘I’m sure you’ll go someplace . . .’ As I smiled my thanks, thinking it a
compliment, as perhaps it was, she added in an evangelical tone, ‘I only hope it’s the right place.’ I didn’t know there was such a thing as specific Fundamentalism (caps or no caps) at the time, nor that it was not specific to Christianity. I thought the term generic and nonspecific and only applicable to backwoods Holy Rollers of the past. Little did I know.”
A selection of lyrics from the show follows.
THE AGE OF ROCKS OR THE ROCK OF AGES
Sisters, sisters and brothers,
Listen what I’ve got to tell you –
Listen what I’ve got to say.
The Lord above wants to know today . . .
The age of rocks or the Rock of Ages,
What is it going to be?
Mothers, are we going to let the schools
Make all our children fools
By teaching them their grandma-mas
Were ani-mules?
You!
It’s up to you!
The age of rocks or the Rock of Ages,
Bible or biology?
Fathers, are we going to cure what ails,
Burn schoolbooks by the bails
That tell us that our grandpa-pas
Had wagging tails?
You!
It’s up to you!
Why send our children
To school on Sunday
To learn their Bible in verse,
If these sweet children
At school on Monday
Must learn the exact reverse?
The age of rocks or the Rock of Ages,
Are we to be up a tree?
Parents, we must send an invitation
To folks throughout the nation
To help us help the Sunday school save education
With this plea –
It’s not the age or rocks,
Brothers, no siree.
They’re not a-gonna make a monkey out of me!
They’re not a-gonna make a monkey out of me!
WE GOT TO PASS A BILL
(This song wasn't in the student production)
Now I don’t mind biology
Gee, I can see geology,
But when schools call the Bible story
“An aesthetic,
Pure, poetic allegory,”
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
I’m progressive ev’ry way.
I think that schools are here to stay.
But when they say man was created
When two hairy, salivary
Forms was mated,
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
Ethnological research
Threatens ev’ry single church.
We’ll pass a bill
Which will refute
The whole Smithsonian Institute!
Bet your boot,
Bet your boot.
Profs and teachers, they must git.
They ought to be kicked where they sit.
We ought to dip ‘em and baptize ‘em,
Hold ‘em under
And then wonder
Should we rise ‘em?
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
Eve was tempted by a serpent,
A low down snake in the grass.
And so God said to the serpent,
“For what you’ve done to this lass,
You must crawl down on your belly
Till the end of time."
Now the schools want to know
How did it go
Before that time?
I read Genesis and, hey,
No monkey business there, no way.
A Christian shudders each time he sees
Kids a-gorgin’
On this “Or’gin
Of the Species.”
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
I don’t mind zoology.
Or even anthropology.
But these here schoolbooks, they’re all, you know,
Full of libel.
Ain’t the Bible
All we need? So,
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
I got a bill that says it’s so -
All them monkeys got to go.
A bill, when signed,
Designed
To send
A good swift kickin’ to Darwin’s end.
Darwin’s end! Darwin’s end!
Fundamentalists are we.
These here books fundamentally
Mock our religion - “God made Adam.
Then quite glibly,
From a rib He
Gave us Madame.
We got to pass a bill
To keep schoolteachers still.
Burn their books,
Release their hooks.
Give them lots of dirty looks
And keep schoolteachers still!
LET’S BELIEVE IN ADAM AND EVE
(Eleanor)
Life would be so simple
If people all were good
And would believe
What they’ve been told
They should,
Let’s believe in Adam and Eve
and love.
Let’s not believe as other people might,
That love is but a fancy
Evolving with the moonlight.
I’ve grown so weary
Hearing Darwin’s theory.
It’s not for me,
No, not for me.
My heart belongs
With the magic of
The haunting Song of Songs.
Female and male,
The Genesis tale for me.
Woman loved man,
The world then began to be.
I want to believe
That our hearts are beatin’
‘Cause an apple once was eaten
And two people fell in love,
So let’s believe in Adam and Eve
And love, and love, and love.
(George)
I’ll believe in Adam and Eve
And love.
(Eleanor speaks)
You’re making fun of me.
(George)
Would I do that?
I’ll not believe as other people may,
That we got here in some other way.
I’ll believe in Adam and Eve
and love.
I’ll not believe the Bible tells a fib,
That Eve was just an afterthought
Fashioned from Adam’s rib.
(Eleanor)
Now you aremaking fun of me . .
.
Oh, George, I’m leery
Of your Darwin theory.
Don’t want to know,
Wish it would go.
My heart belongs
With the magic of
The haunting Song of Songs.
(Together)
Female and male -
The Genesis tale
for me.
Woman loved man,
The world then began
to be.
I want to believe
That our hearts are beatin’
‘Cause an apple once was eaten
And two people fell in love.
So, let’s believe in Adam and Eve
And love,
And love,
And love.
EVILUTION
We’re waiting at the station here
For William Jennings Bryan to appear.
For William Jennings Bryan is a fi-an man,
No lyin’ man,
A man who’ll send chimpanzees
Back to pasture in the pansies
Comes the fall
Of ev’ry hall
And institution
Of evilution
The prosecution has no fear
For William Jennings Bryan will appear.
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man,
A fi-an man!
A man who is inspired,
To the Lord’s ear always wired.
He’s a gent
Who’s heaven-sent
With God’s solution
To evilution!
When he appears on the platform,
Gentlemen, throw up a hat for’m.
Ladies, on with your singing
Till all our eardrums are ringing.
We’re waiting at the station here
For William Jennings Bryan to appear.
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man –
Don’t try the man –
A man who is a lighthouse.
How we need him in The White House
To repair
With daily prayer
The constitution
And evilution!
We’re waiting at the station here
For William Jennings Bryan to appear.
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man,
None better than,
A credit to our nation,
He’ll demand emancipation
From the corps
That’s calling for
Consolidation
With evilution.
We’re waiting here to give a cheer
When William Jennings Bryan will appear
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man,
Know why? The man
Is full of high ideals.
Bows his head at night; he feels
He’s been brung
To bring the young
Their restitution
From evilution.
When he’s Commander in Chief, yes,
Praise the Lord, teachers will teach less.
He’ll be our President one day.
Each day then holy as Sunday!
We’re waiting at the station here
For William Jennings Bryan to appear.
For William Jennings Bryan
Is a fi-an man,
Our kind o’ man,
A man who will demand sense
And insist the Ten Commandments
Be brought back
To ev’ry black-
board in the nation.
(Spoken)
The Ten Commandments!
(Sung)
Not evilution!
THE FEAR OF THE LORD
Do you desire
Hellfire?
Do you prefer
The fork to the lyre?
’ll tell you all on the level
You will go to the devil
And you’ll burn.
The fear of the Lord.
Unless you learn
The little guys
Must be baptized
For Satan takes both
The big and the light-sized.
You better walk in the center
Or there won’t be no winter
Where you go.
Unless you know
The fear of the Lord.
You better prepare for His coming.
You better repent and pray.
Be always aware He is coming.
He will nudge you
And He’ll judge you
Comes that final Judgment Day.
Come on, get near it!
The spirit!
Come feel it! And . . .
Come smell it, and come hear it.
Come hear it cry, “Hallelujah!”
Praise the Lord, that’ll do ya.
All you need is just to heed
The fear of the Lord.
Reprise and tag:
You better hear it,
The spirit.
You’ll never climb up
Those stairs until you fear it.
You better kneel and be humble.
When those skies start to rumble,
Brother, show
Him you know
The fear of the Lord.
The fear of the fire,
And the murk and the mire,
And the fork
And the devil
And the good ole fashioned level
fear,
The fear of the Lord.
IN LOVE WITH A MONKEY
This was cut in the revised version although it was a crowd pleaser and, according to Jerry Goldsmith, perhaps the most “perfect” song in the show in that it adhered to standards and format of what a song should be. The song was sung by Connie about her boyfriend who was wearing a monkey suit to mock the proceedings, with a reprise (see below) by Sir Tucker about his dog. In
revising the book and adding “You’re Old Man’s a Monkey,” “Monkey Business Blues,” and “The Monkey Trial,” there were just too many monkey songs for this one to remain, catchy as it is. Besides, it was relevant only thematically.
He hasn’t got a monkey’s eyes,
Or a monkey’s nose,
Or a monkey’s tail
But I’d love him still
If he were a monkey
If he were a monkey
I would be
A kind of three dollar bill.
Oh, my goodness, goodness me,
But isn’t life hunky?
You should be
Happy like me,
In love with a monkey.
Oh, I know it must seem strange,
I don’t deny it’s queer,
But monkeys always send me
And this one is a dearie –
Bleary eyes and shaggy hair
But I’ll be his flunky’
Long as he don’t monkey
‘Round with someone new.
You may think I’m crazy
And your folks may all agree,
But if you knew this monkey
Like I do-oo-oo,
You would be in love with a monkey too.
REPRISE: IN LOVE WITH A POODLE)
See how his little tummy sags?
See that tail that wags
Always to and fro,
To affection show.
Toy Dog is my doggie.
Love me, love my doggie.
Man’s best friend,
This is the best friend
I know.
Oh, my goodness, goodness me,
’m light in the noodle.
You should be
Happy like me,
In love with a poodle.
Oh, I know it must seem strange,
I want to make that clear,
But I like little doggies
And this one is a dearie -
Bleary eyes and shaggy hair
And full of dog foodle,
But I’ll never toodle
‘Round with someone new.
You may think I’m crazy
And you folks may all agree,
But if you knew this doggie
Like I do-oo-oo,
You would be in love with a poodle too.
A WISE MAN SAID
MEMPHIS MOODY and HIS TRIO increase the volume of the blues riff they’ve been playing in the background. GEORGE strolls over to CLEMENS on the bench.
GEORGE
You know, Mr. Lee, I’ve reached a conclusion. The world is flat,
after all.
CLEMENS
Any dang fool can see that.
GEORGE
Yeah, just look at it.
(Joining MEMPHIS MOODY, SINGS)
On the naked eye
They say we can’t rely.
What we think we see
May not really be.
Perception, yours and mine,
Can be out of line.
Winter turns to spring,
The blues change ev’rything.
MOODY (SPEAKS)
Blues? You got the blues, boy? Tell me.
GEORGE (SINGS)
A wise man said
The world is round
But I’ve found
It’s not like that.
My love has left me and the world is flat.
A wise man said
The grass is green
But I’ve seen
It isn’t true.
My love has left me and the grass is blue.
Sages
For ages
Have written lots of pages
About love.
They doubt love.
But I know
Life is mighty slow
Without love.
A wise man said
The sun shines bright.
That’s not right,
The sun don’t shine.
There’s only darkness in this world of mine.
In this habitat here,
Sun don’t shine, it’s flat here
And the grass is blue
And it doesn’t take a wise man
To tell me I am too.