Alan Jay Lerner

Speaker 10:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive.

Speaker 10:05

For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen seventy eight and the presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:31

Our Castaway this week has written verses which everybody knows. Most of us have quoted or sung his lyrics to My Fair Lady or Gigi and many other shows and films. Here's Alan J. Lerner.

Presenter0:44

Now first of all Alan, how well could you look after yourself on a desert island? Are you the rugged, open-air type who can cope?

Alan Jay Lerner0:52

Well, I never thought of myself as either indoor or outdoor, but uh I think I'm a survivor.

Presenter0:58

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner0:58

Yeah.

Presenter0:58

Have you ever done it?

Alan Jay Lerner0:58

Uh Camping out. Oh, yes, I did that when I was very young. Successfully? Uh yes. I woke up one morning with a cow standing on my chest, but I mean

Presenter1:03

Yeah.

Presenter1:06

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner1:07

Other than that, I don't remember any uh anything untaught happening. Would you try to escape?

Alan Jay Lerner1:13

Well, I can't imagine

Alan Jay Lerner1:15

the circumstances that would m make me decide that it would be worthwhile to take a chance on dying in order to live because I never having been faced with that, it's very hard to imagine it.

Presenter1:29

Let's get down to music. What's the first record you've chosen to take with you out of this miserable allowance of just eight discs?

Alan Jay Lerner1:35

Yeah.

Presenter1:35

Well

Alan Jay Lerner1:36

Well, the first one is the song called Without a Song.

Alan Jay Lerner1:39

That happens to be a a song that I'm

Alan Jay Lerner1:42

immensely fond of it and and it's I think underrated and one of the most beautiful songs. It came out of the twenties where so much of our best music did, popular music. And uh it would certainly be one of the ones I would take with me.

Speaker 41:56

I'll never know.

Speaker 41:59

What makes the grass so tall?

Speaker 42:04

I only know

Speaker 42:07

There ain't no love out.

Speaker 42:11

Without a song

Presenter2:22

Without a song sung by Frank Sinatra. Now, Alan, you're a New Yorker.

Presenter2:27

And it says here, Educated, Columbia Grammar School, New York City, B. Dales, Hampshire, England. How did that happen?

Alan Jay Lerner2:35

Well, my father was an absolute uh fanatic about the English language and uh

Alan Jay Lerner2:41

He really sent us to sch I have two brothers. We were all sent to school in England to learn the language. He didn't think anybody spoke it very well in in New York, and I think he was probably right. From we were all sent to uh B Dales, but I was only there for a few semesters because I was supposed to go on to Harrow after that.

Presenter2:50

From the first

Alan Jay Lerner2:57

But unfortunately, I had to have my teeth straightened. And in those days, in England, they didn't straighten them, they took them out.

Alan Jay Lerner3:04

At least so he said. So after not too long at Bedale's I was shipped back to the States and uh I went to a school called the Choat School, which is like we call a preparatory, you call a public school.

Presenter3:16

Was going to the theatre part of your training in English?

Alan Jay Lerner3:18

Very well. My parents were divorced when I was very young, and I was very close to my father. I lived with my mother.

Alan Jay Lerner3:24

But he was constantly sending for me, and he would take me to the theater. And he took me to musicals all the time, which he happened to have a special fondness for. So I grew up.

Alan Jay Lerner3:34

loving the musical theater and actually when I was twelve years old I was firmly convinced that I would do nothing else with my life but be in the musical theater somewhere or somehow. Were you taught music?

Alan Jay Lerner3:44

Well, I studied music. I started studying the piano when I was five and I my first ambition was to be a composer.

Speaker 43:50

Hmm.

Alan Jay Lerner3:51

And when I was at Harvard, I spent the summers at the Juilliard School learning advanced harmony.

Alan Jay Lerner3:58

And then when I was about 20, I made a record of everything I'd written, decided I had absolutely no talent at all.

Alan Jay Lerner4:06

But I had been writing lyrics for the things that I had written.

Alan Jay Lerner4:09

And I thought I w I'd better become a writer. What did you read at Harvard?

Alan Jay Lerner4:14

I studied French and Italian literature because I thought I'd read English anyhow, so I I didn't bother with that.

Alan Jay Lerner4:20

And I did.

Presenter4:22

Right, now your education is completed. So let's break at this point for your second record. What will that be?

Alan Jay Lerner4:27

Uh

Alan Jay Lerner4:28

Well, you were speaking of my school days and the most nostalgic part of my school days musically was Ray Noble.

Alan Jay Lerner4:37

Everybody in the choke when I was there couldn't wait for the next Rainoble record to arrive.

Alan Jay Lerner4:42

And as an old cow has said in one of his plays, how potent is that cheap music? Well, it takes me back to those lovely days. So my second one is The Very Thought of You by Ray Noble.

Speaker 44:54

What are you?

Speaker 44:59

And I forget to do

Speaker 45:04

The little organary things that everyone ought

Speaker 45:14

I'm living in a kind of daydream.

Speaker 45:19

I'm happy as a king.

Presenter5:24

Ray Noble with Al Bodie

Presenter5:27

So you left Harvard, you had ambitions for the musical theatre. What did you do? How did you start? What was the next move?

Alan Jay Lerner5:32

Well, I I started by, in a sense, by an actual accident. When I was at Harvard, I was training for the Air Corps, because we all knew.

Alan Jay Lerner5:40

We would be in the war. But I had an accident and I lost one eye, so that grounded me permanently.

Alan Jay Lerner5:47

and ended my war days before they really even began.

Alan Jay Lerner5:51

So I came back to New York.

Alan Jay Lerner5:53

and uh wrote radio programmes and did all sorts of any anything I could write at all, and writing lyrics and plays at night, until I finally met Fritz Lowe, which wasn't too long, it was two years later.

Alan Jay Lerner6:05

and who was a Viennese by birth. And he came to me one day and he said, You write lyrics and I said, Yes, I do and he said, Well, I write music and I don't have anybody to write lyrics, so would you do it? and I said, Yes, and we started and it was just as simple as that. How did you start? What was

Presenter6:19

was the first

Alan Jay Lerner6:19

Well, the first thing we did, we w we went to work in a stock company out in Detroit where they were um

Presenter6:20

Well the first thing we did was

Alan Jay Lerner6:24

They were taking old musicals and adding a few songs and my job was to adapt them and add the lyrics and Fritz was writing the music.

Alan Jay Lerner6:32

But when I say that uh the idea was to r take all musicals, it's an exaggeration'cause we closed after one musical. So that was all we did.

Presenter6:40

So that was all we did.

Presenter6:42

When did you first work on Broadboard? Way to go.

Alan Jay Lerner6:44

Well, the first thing we did on Broadway was a 1943, and it was a very.

Alan Jay Lerner6:49

small little musical that George Ballan Sheen, surprisingly enough, staged and directed.

Speaker 16:53

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner6:55

But uh

Alan Jay Lerner6:57

It was, how shall I say, a failure.

Alan Jay Lerner7:00

A dim

Alan Jay Lerner7:02

I mean, a dreadful failure. Then we did another two years later called The Day Before Spring, which was a little better and we seemed to be learning our craft a little more and finding our way along.

Alan Jay Lerner7:13

And then finally in nineteen forty seven we wrote Brigadoon which was a great success and was the first musical to win it a the Drama Critics Award and all of that. How long had it taken you from scratch to get to your success?

Presenter7:21

How long it

Alan Jay Lerner7:25

Well, from the time we started it was five years. Five years. Not too long really. But I was still very young. I mean, I wrote uh Brigadoon when I was twenty-seven.

Presenter7:33

So and you'd been keeping yourself by still doing odd bits and pieces of radio now.

Alan Jay Lerner7:38

And I'd been doing radio and doing these two plays that didn't earn a living and so on until finally came Rigadoo.

Presenter7:44

And brigadoin and after that paint your wagon, which was another's

Alan Jay Lerner7:46

Yeah, which was another success. Yes, well I did one in between with Court Wild.

Presenter7:49

Well, because Fritz went away for a while.

Presenter7:52

Tell me about Cordwell. He's such a legendary character, an easy man to work with.

Alan Jay Lerner7:56

One of the dearest little men that ever lived. I moved right next door to him, up in Rockland County, up the Hudson River Valley, where he lived.

Alan Jay Lerner8:05

And I have never known anybody quite like him. He was one of the sweetest, funniest, and um a unique special man who passed on too quickly.

Presenter8:15

Let's have your third record. What will that be?

Alan Jay Lerner8:17

Well, my third record, oddly enough, is a is something that was related to Fritz and Court. Fritz was Viennese and Court was German.

Presenter8:17

My third

Alan Jay Lerner8:25

And uh Fritz used to say how infuriating the Viennese were, who thought they were they were the only ones in the world who could write waltzes.

Alan Jay Lerner8:33

And yet the greatest waltz opera ever written was by a German, Rosen Cavalier, and it is one of my absolute in this as it is with everybody in the world, one of the pure delights of all time. So

Alan Jay Lerner8:46

If we could hear some of that.

Presenter9:47

The closing passage of the second act of Richard Strauss's Der Rosencavalier, George Shelte conducting the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, and we heard just a snatch of Manfred Jungwirt as Baron Oche. Now you'd had these two successes with Frederick Lowe.

Presenter10:05

There was a proposition floating about.

Presenter10:07

To make a musical out of Shaw's Pygmalion.

Alan Jay Lerner10:11

Yes, started by Gabriel Pascals.

Alan Jay Lerner10:14

improbable man who had

Alan Jay Lerner10:17

somehow cajoled or

Alan Jay Lerner10:19

persuaded Shaw to give him the rights to make the motion picture of Pygmalion and season Cleopatra.

Alan Jay Lerner10:25

And it was his idea to do it as a musical. And he came to Fritz and me. Rogers and Hammerstein had worked on it and turned it in. Yes, well he didn't tell us that. He said, You are the only ones who can do this. But he never told us that Rogers and Hammerstein had tried me off at it first and turned it down after a year.

Speaker 110:38

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner10:42

But we we actually we didn't know that. So we worked on it for six months and then abandoned it and said it can't be done.

Presenter10:48

Why, from the point of view of getting the storyline right.

Alan Jay Lerner10:50

Well, no, it really was because

Alan Jay Lerner10:52

It was at a period in the musical theater where there were certain demands placed on musicals automatically. I mean, where did the singing chorus come from? We were still in the era where there was a great deal of ballet in the musical theater. And there had to be a secondary love story, etc.

Alan Jay Lerner11:10

And somehow w we just couldn't

Alan Jay Lerner11:13

Make that

Alan Jay Lerner11:15

Drawing room comedy, which is primarily what it was, expanded into the full dimension of the musical.

Alan Jay Lerner11:20

When we picked it up again, things had changed. The week had changed. The times had changed.

Alan Jay Lerner11:27

And uh

Alan Jay Lerner11:28

Those requirements didn't seem to be so essential any longer.

Alan Jay Lerner11:32

So we decided we could just do

Alan Jay Lerner11:35

Pygmalion, as Pygmalion, and not have any particular singing chorus, we would use a chorus where it would seem logical that it should appear.

Alan Jay Lerner11:43

And there didn't have to be a secondary love story. We didn't have to have a leading baritone. We could speech sing it so that it would be much more in the style of what Shaw had written.

Alan Jay Lerner11:55

meaning Rex Harrison of course. And uh and so

Presenter11:59

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner11:59

Suddenly it became a

Presenter12:00

viable, possible musical play. It took a tremendous amount of setting up. You you and and mister Lowe more or less set it up yourselves.

Alan Jay Lerner12:07

Yes, we did. We we we went ahead and and wrote it without even having the rights to it.

Presenter12:12

So

Alan Jay Lerner12:13

So but that happens. A few statistics. How long did it run on Bogley?

Alan Jay Lerner12:18

Well, it ran a little over six years and then it it also toured the country for about the same amount of time and it played over here for about the same amount of time.

Presenter12:27

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner12:28

And at one time there were about fourteen companies of it play

Presenter12:30

playing around the world.

Alan Jay Lerner12:31

Yeah.

Presenter12:32

Then there was the film of course, and the stage production is still being played around the place. It's being revived in this country.

Alan Jay Lerner12:37

Yes, the London Arts Council is reviving it again and it's going out on the road and uh on the provinces next month. So you did all right out of my fair lady.

Presenter12:46

Uh

Alan Jay Lerner12:47

Yes, I have nothing to complain about.

Presenter12:47

I have nothing to complain about.

Alan Jay Lerner12:49

Right call. Number four, please. Well

Alan Jay Lerner12:52

I worship Coldwater.

Alan Jay Lerner12:54

And one of the private joys I had in Fair Lady was that um

Alan Jay Lerner12:59

It was Christmas time and I called Cole and I said, what would you like for Christmas? Because he had everything in the world. He said, I want two tickets every Wednesday night.

Alan Jay Lerner13:07

So I sent him two tickets every Wednesday night for a year.

Alan Jay Lerner13:11

And that's the reason I think of one of his songs, which was one of my favorites, just one of those things.

Speaker 413:23

It was just one of those things.

Speaker 413:30

Just one of those crazy flings.

Speaker 413:36

One of those bells that now and then rings Just wanna

Presenter13:44

Hello Uh

Speaker 413:45

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Presenter13:47

Coalport is just one of those things.

Presenter13:50

Now one thinks of a lyric as something that

Presenter13:53

One writes in an afternoon and polishes after dinner, but you've slaved for weeks over one number

Alan Jay Lerner13:56

But uh

Alan Jay Lerner13:59

Well, I've known very few lyric writers in the theater who are not the uh

Alan Jay Lerner14:04

sweat and groan kind of there cried Ira Gersh from these.

Alan Jay Lerner14:08

The only one I know who really could write a lyric quickly was Larry Hod. Cole Porter used to die of writing over lyrics.

Alan Jay Lerner14:16

I usually average about uh oh maybe five days to eight days, working twelve to sixteen hours a day. But sometimes it runs much longer.

Alan Jay Lerner14:26

One song of it in particular I

Alan Jay Lerner14:29

I worked for two weeks on and uh got nothing. Then I said, well I can't do this for the rest of my life. So I worked three hours every morning on it.

Alan Jay Lerner14:38

And I did, but it was eight months later before I finished it. So it seems

Presenter14:42

Seems absurd, I know, but

Presenter14:44

Occasionally I suppose you'll get a quick one that slots into place at once. I I believe the rain in Spain

Alan Jay Lerner14:49

Well the rain in Spain was just uh I

Alan Jay Lerner14:52

I could have been more astounded than I was when it happened because uh Fritz and I were talking as we walked up the street one day, how shall we end the l that whole section of Eliza's lessons? And I said, Well, why don't we just

Alan Jay Lerner15:04

Put all the lessons together and do something called The Rain in Spain. And Fritz said, Oh, fine, let's do it as a tango. And we walked upstairs to where we were working, and he did it. We did it in about ten minutes. So, but that was the only time something like that ever happened that I remember. How did you

Presenter15:18

You and he work. You've got a title, you've got an idea, you've got the situation for the number. What happened then?

Alan Jay Lerner15:24

Well, we would discuss it thoroughly before I even had the title, and then once I had the title, that sort of...

Alan Jay Lerner15:31

Said what the the mood and the idea was, then Fritz would go to the piano and start to play. He had been a concert pianist, so he was the improvising kind of composer. I would sit in the room always, he liked me to sit there when he was just composing, because he'd almost go into a trance as he would play, and all of a sudden I'd say, Wait, stop, that's fine.

Alan Jay Lerner15:50

And he would say, what's that? And I said, well, blah, blah, blah, whatever it was. And he said, oh, you like that? And I said, yes. Sometimes he would too, and sometimes he wouldn't. And then he would keep going. But that's the way we worked together.

Presenter16:01

Now, before my fair lady, who had been to Hollywood and written a screenplay for An American in Paris, for which you got an Oscar.

Presenter16:08

So after, my fair lady, you you went back to Hollywood.

Presenter16:12

Uh and you worked on a musical film version of Colette's Gigi. Yes.

Presenter16:18

You weren't terribly happy with the results.

Alan Jay Lerner16:20

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner16:21

Well, I was with that one.

Alan Jay Lerner16:23

I've not been terribly happy with the results of all the adaptations of musical plays, even though I've done them that have been made into films. But Gigi, because we wrote it absolutely for a film, seemed to me the most fully realized work, because it was not an adaptation of something. We wrote it purely for the screen.

Presenter16:43

Uh

Presenter16:44

Yeah. There's a story that when you saw it that you wanted to buy the negative yourself.

Alan Jay Lerner16:47

Oh, well yes, well that was after we when the when you're quite right. When it was finished and they had what you know, those usually Hollywood sneak previews and all that. Well Fritz and I were in despair when we saw it. We thought it was dreadful.

Alan Jay Lerner17:00

but fixable.

Alan Jay Lerner17:02

But the studio at the time had no money. They it was at the time when they were all going broke and then they didn't have any more money to put into it.

Alan Jay Lerner17:09

So we pleaded with them and then finally we said, could we buy 10% of it?

Alan Jay Lerner17:13

And they said, no, they didn't do that.

Alan Jay Lerner17:16

So finally, the picture co cost three million dollars, or two million seven, so it needed three hundred thousand to fix. So I said to Fritz, what do you say? Let's gamble. So we walked in and we said we would like to buy the picture, the print, for three million dollars. Now needless to say, we did not have three million dollars, nor did we know where we were going to get three million dollars.

Speaker 117:31

No.

Speaker 117:33

I got

Speaker 417:33

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner17:35

But they were so stunned at the idea that uh

Alan Jay Lerner17:40

The president of the company said, Well, if you feel that strongly about it

Alan Jay Lerner17:44

Why, all right, we'll put up the three hundred thousand dollars.

Speaker 117:45

The three hundred thousand.

Alan Jay Lerner17:48

And at least they say we almost died of relief, you know.

Speaker 117:48

And you

Presenter17:49

Please say we are.

Speaker 117:49

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner17:51

So that's how we were able to then go back and make the necessary changes that really were necessary.

Alan Jay Lerner17:58

Record number five. Where do we go now? One of my favorite

Alan Jay Lerner18:02

I suppose everybody's favorite composers, especially since Leonard Bernstein has done so much to revive interest in him as Mala.

Alan Jay Lerner18:10

And um the fifth symphony of Marlowe's that Lenny recorded.

Alan Jay Lerner18:16

and the last movement, if possible.

Alan Jay Lerner18:18

will satisfy me on any island.

Presenter19:22

The beginning of the last movement of Mahler's Fifth Symphony in C Sharp Minor, Leonard Bernstein conducting the New York Philharmonic.

Presenter19:29

For your next stage musical.

Presenter19:31

Something of a of a change of pace, a a a rather more solemn musical Camelot.

Alan Jay Lerner19:37

Yes. We hoped we could do it as light entertainment, but of course as it turned out it it it it wasn't a ponderous musical, but nevertheless it's a tragic story in a way that ends inspirationally, I hoped, and certainly in

Alan Jay Lerner19:51

the once and future king which we based it on,

Alan Jay Lerner19:54

Tim White's brilliant book, he felt that way, and we did too.

Alan Jay Lerner19:59

And um

Alan Jay Lerner20:01

Yeah.

Alan Jay Lerner20:02

Opened and it had a strange career because it was well received.

Alan Jay Lerner20:07

But no hats were thrown in the air. But then three months later

Alan Jay Lerner20:10

There was a a program honor in Fritz and Me by Ed Sullivan.

Alan Jay Lerner20:14

And Richard Burton, who was in it, and Julie Andrews did bits and pieces from Camelot on the program. And the next day the people were lining up at the box office and it became a hit and continued to run for four years.

Alan Jay Lerner20:27

And it was during that period, of course, that the President tragically was assassinated.

Alan Jay Lerner20:32

And Mrs. Kennedy, in an interview, said that the President's favorite song had been The Last Moment in the Album of Camelot. Don't let it be forgot that once there was a spot for one brief shining moment that was known as Camelot.

Alan Jay Lerner20:48

And that since then has become associated with the Kennedy years.

Presenter20:52

Yeah. You have worked at the White House quite a lot on the entertainment side.

Alan Jay Lerner20:55

Well, I've I've worked in the Democratic Party and uh I did do the last birthday party of the President. I staged it and so on and put it together. We did it in New York City because uh he was up there raising funds, as which is part of a Presidential obligation.

Alan Jay Lerner21:10

And uh

Alan Jay Lerner21:12

We had a it was a marvelous show, including Louis Armstrong, who's you know, I was able to get everybody I like I wanted to see because it was the President Kennedy.

Presenter21:21

We've chosen one of Sergmo's records, so this seems a good place to play it.

Alan Jay Lerner21:25

Oh yes, please. And what is it? It's uh Mac the Knife, naturally, which is one of the most joyous things he ever did. And Court Wild again. And Court Wild.

Speaker 421:35

All the shark houses.

Speaker 421:38

Brunette, dear

Speaker 421:41

And he shows them a pearly wine.

Speaker 421:46

Just a jackknife.

Speaker 421:49

As McHeat did.

Speaker 421:52

And he keeps it.

Speaker 421:54

Out of sight.

Speaker 421:57

When the shark bites

Speaker 422:00

With his teeth near scarlet billows

Presenter22:06

Louis Armstrong.

Presenter22:07

Now after many years you and Frederic Lowe decided that enough was enough, or rather he did. Now since then you've written a number of shows with other composers.

Alan Jay Lerner22:17

Yes. Actually the reason that our collaboration ended was because

Alan Jay Lerner22:22

Tragically, it was because Fritz had a serious heart attack and simply had to retire. So I had to go out and try and find other collaborators, and of course, I'll never find anybody.

Alan Jay Lerner22:32

with whom I was as compatible or as sympathetic or whatever as if w I was with Fritz, but I have worked with others, Burton Lane, for example, and

Presenter22:40

On a clear day you can see

Alan Jay Lerner22:40

Clear days. I did a musical with Andre Preben before he came over here to be Dr. Leonard Sefer. Coco with Carlin Hepburn. And you did one with Leonard Bernstein. And I did one with Leonard Bernstein, which

Speaker 122:48

Yeah, yeah.

Presenter22:50

That was an actor.

Presenter22:51

Mm.

Alan Jay Lerner22:56

Can only be compared to the Titanic.

Alan Jay Lerner22:58

I know what you mean.

Presenter23:00

Yes.

Alan Jay Lerner23:01

Uh

Presenter23:01

A real large juicy disaster.

Presenter23:06

And in reminiscent mood you've you've written a book, The Street Where I Live.

Presenter23:10

About the great days of Lerner and Lowe.

Alan Jay Lerner23:13

Well, yes. Really I wrote it about the end of that era because uh it was the end of an era that came at the end of the Kennedy years because from then on everything changed, the anti-establishment

Alan Jay Lerner23:26

Rebellion began and everything was swept aside with it. The kind of musical theater that we had been used to disappeared. Well, it didn't disappear, but it it went to s it was brushed aside and the record business changed. Everything changed.

Alan Jay Lerner23:39

So I just wanted to write about those last giants. As the Bible says, you know, they were giants on the earth once and people like Moss Haut was a giant.

Alan Jay Lerner23:50

And although we have another kind of theater now, I don't think we will ever have giants like that.

Presenter23:54

So instead of doing a straight autobiography, this is the story of

Alan Jay Lerner23:55

Dead of

Presenter23:59

Of those people and those just those three productions. That's right. My Fair Lady, Gigi, and Camelot.

Alan Jay Lerner24:02

My

Alan Jay Lerner24:05

With Arthur Freed and Marie Chevalier and all those kind of people that are gone now, you see.

Presenter24:10

And there are some very funny stories in it. I must say that it's a delightful book.

Presenter24:15

Thank you.

Alan Jay Lerner24:15

Do we

Alan Jay Lerner24:18

Of course there's no greater piece of music ever written than Beethoven's Ninth. So if if I had among all the great pieces that I would like to hear again and again, Were I on Your Island,

Alan Jay Lerner24:31

I suppose would be the last move of Beethoven's Dinner.

Presenter25:35

The closing passage of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, Sir George Sheltey conducting the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

Presenter25:41

Which brings us to record number eight and your last one on the island.

Alan Jay Lerner25:46

Well, whatever I think of popular music

Alan Jay Lerner25:49

which I do all the time.

Alan Jay Lerner25:51

I always think of the joy that a real popular music brings, but uh

Alan Jay Lerner25:57

Even with the best of the kind of music we hear today, there isn't the joy that you will find in, let us say, Fat Swallows Ain't Misbehaving.

Alan Jay Lerner26:05

And so that would be my last choice.

Alan Jay Lerner26:09

Rule one

Speaker 426:09

To talk with all by myself.

Speaker 426:14

No one to walk with, but I'm happy on the shelf. A misbehaving.

Speaker 426:21

Flaming my love for you, for you, for you.

Speaker 426:27

Volume

Speaker 426:29

I know for sure.

Speaker 426:31

Don't wanna though

Speaker 426:34

I'm through with flirting, it's you that I'm thinking

Presenter26:39

The great Thatswalla.

Presenter26:41

Alan, if you could take just one disc out of that age you played us, which would it be?

Alan Jay Lerner26:46

Well, I suppose because of all the memories attached to it, I would take Louis Armstrong, because nobody ever made me happier for as long a period as he did.

Alan Jay Lerner26:57

Yeah.

Presenter26:57

and you're allowed to take one inanimate luxury to the island.

Alan Jay Lerner27:02

Well, could I have a piano with my wife's picture glued to it? Yes, of course.

Presenter27:06

Alright.

Presenter27:08

Right. And one book apart from the Bible and Shakespeare, which are already there, and we put the bar up on big encyclopedias.

Alan Jay Lerner27:16

I think the one that I would most want is uh Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. A very unappreciated book because people think it's sort of Tom Sawyer, and it's not at all. It's a very adult book.

Alan Jay Lerner27:27

extraordinary piece of writing and I read it every year. So if I had to I'd read it every day.

Presenter27:34

Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, and thank you Alan J. Lerner for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Alan Jay Lerner27:40

Uh

Presenter27:40

Thank you for allowing me to be here.

Presenter27:43

Goodbye, everyone.

Speaker 127:53

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs archive. For more podcasts, please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio four.