The run closed December 14, 1957
- Opened
- May 3, 1956
- Closed
- December 14, 1957
- Performances
- 676
- Previews
- —
- Theatre
- Imperial Theatre
Of the 705 productions we hold that opened in the 1950s and record a performance count, this is the 27th longest. That is a rank within what we hold, not within everything that was staged.
Other stagings of The Most Happy Fella 2 more that season
| 1979 | Majestic Theatre Revival · Jack O'Brien | 53 perf. |
| 1992 | Booth Theatre Revival · Gerald Gutierrez | 229 perf. |
Who was in it73 named
Lanier Davis
Henry Director
Ralph Farnworth
Beverly Gaines
Alan Gilbert
Russell Goodwin
Marlyn Greer
Norris Greer
John Henson
Richard Hermany
Keith Kaldenberg
Athan Karras
Walter Kelvin
Jerry Kurland
Roy Lazarus
Martha Mathes
Carolyn Maye
Meri Miller
Genevieve Owens
Arthur Partington
Louis Polacek
Hunter Ross
Patti Schmidt
John Sharpe
Lillian Shelby
Toba Sherwood
Marjorie Smith
Christopher Snell
Evans Thornton
Lois van Pelt
Louis Bolyard
Nancy Davis
Marcella Dodge
Ralph Farnsworth
Joyce L. Foss
Tony Gardell
Garold Gardner
Billy Harris
Stuart Hodes
Jack Irwin
Jack Mccann
Wendy Nickerson
Hal Norman
Janice Painchaud
Tony Rossi
James Schlader
Thelma Scott
Ann Sparkman
Richard Weede
Dean Dittman
Rina Falcone
Betty Oakes
Milton Jiricka
Bill Reynolds
Bob Roman
22 of these 73 names have a person record behind them and link to one. The other 51 are set from the identifier in the cast list, which is a slug of the name — so hyphens and full stops are lost and a few come out wrong. We hold nothing else about them. Nobody here is matched to a character: the cast list records who was in the company and not what they played.
Creative team
- Director
- Joseph Anthony
- Choreographer
- Dania Krupska
- Producer
- Kermit Bloomgarden and Lynn Loesser
- Orchestrations
- Don Walker
A producer is one string on this record, however many people or companies it names. Directors and choreographers are held both as text and as identifiers; where an identifier exists the name links to a page.
Tony Awards 0 from 1 nomination
| Best Musical | Nominated |
Around this production
- Frank Loesser’s The Most Happy Fella (1956) Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 4
- Her solid and commanding stage presence and her no-nonsense way with a song should have catapulted her into stardom, but except for The Most Happy Fella all her appearances were in short-running musicals (Oh Captain! , Whoop-Up , and Donnybrook! ). Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 284
- Frank Loesser’s The Most Happy Fella (1956), Leonard Bernstein’s Candide (1956), and Blitzstein’s Juno (1959). Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 320
- Three other musicals touched upon the basic plot of Fanny (a young woman is deserted by her lover and marries an older man), two of which were also set in France: Michel Legrand’s 1964 film musical The Umbrellas of Cherbourg and Stephen Schwartz’s 1976 The Baker’s Wife, which closed during its pre-Broadway tryout (like… Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 426
- The original cast album was released on a three-LP set by Columbia (# OL-5120-22) and later issued by Sony Broadway on CD (# 52K-48010), and it remains the definitive recording of the score. Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 538
Passages naming this production, found by keyword across 178 books. Where it turns up in the literature, not curated notes about it.
What this page does not know
- No photograph of this staging. 48 of 13,459 productions hold one.
- No character names. We can say who was in the company and not who they played.
- No recording is held for The Most Happy Fella at all.
- Reviews, box office, running order, understudies and designers: none of it is held for any production.