Word: kauffmanns
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...show) as his campaign song; and conducted a hilarious war of words with the theater crit ics that recently came to a headline-grabbing climax when he canceled an entire preview performance and bought back or exchanged about 1,100 tickets -just to keep New York Times Reviewer Stanley Kauffmann from seeing the show...
Savage Joke. Last week Merrick's Marauders struck again at Taubman's successor, Stanley Kauffmann. On a recent trip to London, Merrick found 100 copies of The Philanderer, a 1952 novel by Critic Kauffmann that falls pat to Merrick's purpose-the book was the occasion of an unsuccessful prosecution for obscenity in England. (" 'Darling,' she whispered. How lazy, a woman's first words after lovemaking; how husky and bare"). Cackling wickedly, Merrick bought up the lot and shipped it home. Then he mailed 89 copies to editors and columnists all over the U.S. -and ten copies to key editors...
David Merrick, curiously, did not complain. He even said that Kauffmann could attend all the Merrick rehearsals and previews he wished. That was fine, so long as Merrick did not have a play ready. Last week, however, he had. A few days before the opening of Philadelphia, Here I Come! (see THEATER), Merrick sent two preview passes to Kauffmann. Attached was an ominous note: "Dear Mr. Kauffmann: At your peril. Sincerely, David Merrick...
Sure enough, when Kauffmann arrived at the theater with 1,100 other ticket holders, he found a dark marquee and a sign that read TONIGHT'S PERFORMANCE CANCELED. Was this an ambush, calculated to embarrass the Times's critic? No, Merrick's press-agent explained: a generator was out of order. That seemed funny: although the marquee was blacked out, the lobby lights were blazing...
Next day it was all fixed. Kauffmann played first-nightsville along with his colleagues. The premiere came off and so did Kauffmann's hour review (a murky pan). And when Merrick was pressed about the electrical troubles of the night before, he said, straight-faced: "A rat got in the generator." Positively, Mr. Merrick? Absolutely...