Too Many Girls (1939)

Music by Richard Rodgers
Lyrics by Lorenz Hart
Book by George Marion, Jr.

Directed by Greg MacKellan
Musical Director: Brandon Adams
Choreographer: Jayne Zaban

Playbill Notes

The spring of 1939 found Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart riding the crest of an enormous Broadway success. Following an unsatisfying stint in Hollywood, they had returned to New York in 1935 to write Jumbo, which would be the first in a string of hit shows including I Married an Angel, Babes in Arms, and The Boys from Syracuse. Looking around for their next property, they were intrigued by the idea of giving a modern, late 1930's kick to the "college football musical," which had its most famous models in 1917's Leave it to Jane and 1927's Good News. Together with book writer George Marion, Jr. and director George Abbott, the team proceeded to take the cherished by hoary old idea and stand it on its head with Too Many Girls.

Buoyed by the infectious high spirits of the undertaking, Rodgers and Hart turned out of their strongest scores, including "I Didn't Know What Time It Was," "Love Never Went to College," "I Like to Recognize the Tunes," "Give it Back to the Indians," and "She Could Shake the Maracas." Marion's book sizzled with a flippant but sophisticated tone, and Abbott assembled a first-rate cast including Syracuse leading lady Mary Westcott, comic Eddie Bracken, dancer Hal Le Roy, and-fresh from his sensational debut at the chic Manhattan club La Conga-23 year-old Desi Arnaz.

Following a brief and untroubled tryout, the company sailed triumphantly into New York's Imperial Theatre on October 18th, 1939. The critics gave a solid thumbs-up, and the showed played through the season (with bit player Van Johnson assuming the lead when the show moved to the Broadway Theatre). Too Many Girls was so successful that RKO immediately snapped up the film rights. In June, most of the chorus (including Jonhson) and Bracken, Le Roy, and Arnaz headed west to film the movie, then to Chicago in August to open the national tour.

Rodgers and Hart wrote one new song for the film, "You're Nearer," which then went into the stage version in Chicago. The film did quite well, but at the time no one realized that a momentous show business event had occurred during the making. Replacing Mary Westcott in the lead for the movie was young RKO contract actress Lucille Ball (singing voice courtesy of Trudy Erwin); she and Arnaz hit it off immediately. A year later the pair was married, and thus began the legendary (if stormy) Hollywood marriage/partnership, out of which the classic sitcom I Love Lucy was begot.

If Too Many Girls is not exactly a musical for the ages, it still boasts the superior Rodgers and Hart score and a sublimely sill book. A major reconstruction of the show's orchestrations is planned for next year, and we are delighted to be able to give our audiences a sneak peek (or is it a sneak look back?) at a 1939 "Broadway Deluxe" model show.

Plot Summary

Mr. Casey's daughter Connie wants to go to the Pottawatomie college and he sends without her knowledge four football players as her bodyguards. The college is in financial trouble, so her bodyguards use their salary for the college. The football players join the college team, and so the team becomes one of the best. One of the football players, Clint, falls in love with Connie, but when she discovers, that he is her bodyguard she decides to go back to the East, her bodyguards follow her, so the football team is very weak for the game next day. (Lorenz Hart.org)