PUT ON A HAPPY FACE I

Because I went to see a preview of "Bye Bye Birdie" the other night at the renovated Henry Miller's Theater, I wanted to showcase a YouTube clip of Dick Van Dyke performing "Put On A Happy Face". He performed the number on 'The Ed Sullivan Show' while he was still performing in the original production.

Unfortunately, SOFA Entertainment objected to its use and the clip was taken down.

But not before I was able to grab a few, rather fuzzy, screen grabs from it!
However....

For one week during Chita Rivera's 2007(?) revue "The Dancer's Life", Dick Van Dyke joined her onstage to perform a couple of numbers from "Bye Bye Birdie", including "Put On A Happy Face".

Thanks to RyanGlitter, here's their duet on one of those nights:



Janet Leigh was enjoyable in the movie, but this was another example of a role's creator being robbed of the chance to immortalize it on film. Chita Rivera should have played Rose in the original movie!

BCnU!