the songs this nation has sung and hummed during the last

century, which will open at the World's Fair Music Hall in

Flushing Meadow in April has the greatest name-line-up of

songwriters ever gathered for one show.

Dealing -- as the George Schaefer-Morton Da Costa musical

does, with recreating each decade via its songs -- but with

completely new conceptions as to how those songs should be

presented on the stage -- the show's songs were written by a

who's who of the music world.

Richard Rogers, Oscar Hammerstein, Alan Jay Lerner,

Frederick Loewe, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Harold Rome,

Harold Arlen, Kurt Weill, Ogden Nash, Jule Styne, Sammy

Cahn, Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden, Adolph Green,

Howard Dietz, Arthur Schwartz, Al Dubin, Harry Warren, Joe

Burke, Hugh Martin, Ralph Blane, Leo Robin are just a few of

the songwriters represented in the show.

Among the old-timers are Stephen Foster, George M. Cohan,

Henry Blossom, Victor Herbert, Franz Lehar, Gus Edwards,

Ballard MacDonald, James Hanley and Roger Wolfe Kahn.

Certainly as promising a musical line-up for one show as has

ever been gathered together.

musical which will be seen in the World's Fair's Music Hall in

Flushing Meadow New York, comes April 22, is that by its

songs so shall you know a nation.

In conceiving the remarkable musical George Schaefer and

Morton Da Costa, musical director Franz Allers and Philip

Long the orchestrator, selected songs that, via melody, lyrics

and ideas, could well be termed "an entertaining history of

Broadway musical hits and other songs the nation sang."

There are no stars, per se, in the musical, since its three shows

a day, seven days a week schedule necessitate two completely

different casts. Factually the songs might be termed stars of

the show.

With an original theme song "To Broadway With Love" by

Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick to keep the show together,

the musical, visually and lyrically, but via production numbers

that have nothing to do with the recreation of the way they

were originally presented, takes its audiences on a trip thru

America's greatest contribution to the theatre --musical

comedy.

Who are the songwriters Schaefer and Da Costa think are most

representative? They start with Stephen Foster and his "Old

Folks at Home", more popularly known as "Swanee River";

move on to George M. Cohan's "The Yankee Doodle Boy"

and "Mary's a Grand Old Name". Henry Blossom, the world's

most forgotten lyricist -- he wrote the words for most of

Victor Herbert's songs -- and Mr. Herbert are represented by

"Every Day Is Ladies' Day With Me"; Franz Lehar -- though

not American -- is included with his "The Merry Widow

Waltz".

Since humor is an integral part of any good musical, and since

"To Broadway With Love" will have no dialogue-songs and

dances-the producer and director of the show have gone to

"He'd Have To Get Under-Get Out and Get Under to Fix Up

His Automobile", a song written in 1913 by Grant Clarke and

Edgar Leslie to the music of Maurice Abrahams. Gus

Edwards' and Edward Maden's "By The Light of The Silvery

Moon"; George M. Cohan's "Over there" "Three Wonderful

Letters From Home" by Joe Goodwin, Ballard MacDonald and

James F. Hanley and "Would you Rather be a Colonel With an

Eagle on Your Shoulder, Or a Private With a Chicken on Your

Knee", by Sidney D. Mitchell and Archie Gottler, are used to

recreate a specific time area.

On the world's largest indoor stage, with three revolving

platforms and twelve electrically controlled pylons, with the

world's tallest and most beautiful showgirls, with some of the

most talented terpsichoreans and finest voices, "To

Broadway With Love" will utilize the Ballard MacDonald-

James F. Hanley hit of 1920 "Rose of Washington Square" as

balance to Armand J. Piron's "I wish I Could Shimmy Like My

Sister Kate".  Jack Yellen and Milton Ager's "Ain't She Sweet",

Irving Caesar and Joseph Meyer-Roger Wolfe Kahn's "Crazy

Rythm" and Bob Carlton's "Ja-Da", expose another phase of

American music. As does "Tip Toe Thru The Tulips With

Me" by Al Dubin and Joe Burke. Cecil Mack and Jimmy

Johnson's "Charleston" and Herb Magidson and Con

Conrad's "The Continental".

Still in the terrific thirties and the show picks up "Dancing In

The Dark", by Howard Dietz and Arthur Schwartz "Lullaby of

Broadway" by Al Dubin and Harry Warren and "Get Happy"

by Arlen and Ted Koehler.

Moving into the forties with Cole Porter's "Another Opening,

Another Show", and Irving Berlin's "There's No Business Like

Show Business", "To Broadway With Love" changes its pace

with the Ogden Nash-Kurt Weill "Speak Low". "Diamonds

Are A Girl's Best Friend" by Leo Robin and Jule Styne,

"Buckle Down, Winsocki" by Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane

and the great Rodgers and Hammerstein hit "Bali Ha'i".

Betty Comden, Adolph Green and Leonard Bernstein are

represented by "New York, New York", Harold J. Rome by

"F.D.R. Jones", Cole Porter by "C'Est Magnifique", Alan Jay

Lerner and Frederick Loewe by "Get Me To the Church on

Time" and "Camelot".

Other Rodgers and Hammerstein songs are "Carousel Waltz",

"Hello Young Lovers" and Richard Rodgers' solo effort "The

Sweetest Sounds". Irving Berlin also has "It's A Lovely Day

Today". Harold Rome's second song in the show is "Wish

You Were Here". Arnold Horwitt and Albert Hague's big hit

"Young and Foolish", "The Land of Milk and Honey" by Jerry

Herman and "Hey Look Me Over" by Carolyn Leigh and Cy

Coleman are also included in "To Broadway With Love".

There are a few songs that have been left out of this rundown,

but these songs should give you some idea of the scope, the

range and the quality that will make "To Broadway With Love"

the outstanding theatrical event at the New York World's Fair.

different decade as the rhythm and lyrics change." Morton

DaCosta, who directed the stage and screen versions of

"Auntie Mame" and "The Music Man" was doing the final

work preparatory before placing two completely different

companies into rehearsal for "To Broadway With Love,"

which will be the big legitimate musical at the New York

World's Fair.

Almost all of the problems, and there have been many in the

ten months since he and George Schaefer conceived the

spectacular salute to American musical comedy, which will be

housed in the Flushing Meadow Music Hall a $4,000,000

Theatre being built for just this show, were momentarily

solved.

"Talk about the problems. Where do you start, the

jurisdictional disputes of the unions, the last minute changing

of certain songs because rights were not clearly defined,

they're over with. Let's talk about concept."

DaCosta and Schaefer had decided to present a history of

American musical comedy --" musical comedy because this is

the field in the theatre, in which, without the faintest shadow

of a doubt, we excel" -- which would take a tour from the early

minstrel shows and "The Black Crook" to the present. "Each

decade will be presented thru the songs of that particular

period, but we are not repeating the production numbers from

the original show, this would be a waste of the technical

improvements, the advance in musical comedy technique. We

are trying to tell the story of that particular moment in time via

its music.

"It is one of the most exciting things I've ever worked on; and

one of the most frustrating. It is also the biggest challenge. Can

you imagine directing two companies -- they alternate daily

what with three shows a day, seven days a week -- in the exact

same patterns. You must remember, " Da Costa continued,"

that there is no dialogue in this entertainment. Music, lyrics,

songs and dances, a panorama of nostalgia -- dating back to

the early shows and the operettas, combining the excitement of

the circus and the satisfaction of modern musicals. And we'll

feature glamorous girls as girls should be.

"One of the things missing from Broadway in the last two

decades" admitted Mr. DaCosta," is the glamour the highly

publicized showgirls in the days of Ziegfeld, Carroll and

White, brought to the Great White Way scenes. The tall,

beautiful girls disappeared from the theatre as the dancing

requirements were made tougher and only the stars could fake

singing. With actors in singing roles you needed voices to

back them up.

"So the lovelies who could do nothing but walk, slink, entice

on stage disappeared into the few nightclubs large enough to

have a couple of showgirls. But nightclubs don't have the

glamour of the theatre despite Vegas and a couple of other

places.

"At the Music Hall in the Texas Pavilions we're bringing back

the showgirls in their luxurious loveliness. We're glamorizing

them onstage and publicizing them off-stage. Between that, a

large chorus of fantastically great dancers, a large group of

magnificent singing voices and principals who can sing and

dance, plus the music that made this nation the number one

musical comedy producers we have a boquet to songwriters in

'To Broadway With Love' that we think will be one of the most

entertaining shows, not only at the Fair, but in New York."

Ziegfeld, Earl Carroll and George White, the showgirl per se

were synonymous with the glittering Bright White Way.

Before the days of Hollywood stars and starlets, the mink clad-

off-stage, unclad-on-stage beauties were responsible for

injecting excitement into the theatrical area.

Since the lights of Broadway have been dimmed, showgirls,

like the old fashioned musical comedies that set out to entertain

the public, have gone on their way to some unknown Valhalla,

while musical comedy books have become almost as serious

as Tennessee Williams' plays.

The news today is good news. Showgirls are going to come

into their own again at New York's World's Fair in a show

called "To Broadway With Love", which will be housed in the

$4,000,000 Music Hall in the Texas Pavilions in Flushing

Meadow.

George Schaefer and Morton Da Costa, who are presenting the

spectacular salute to the songs the nation has sung and

hummed for the last century, are bringing back the glamour that

gleams from these six foot, beautifully proportioned Amazons,

via 16 of the most pulchritudinous dazzlers a six months

search could unearth.

There are no stars in the two companies that will present "To

Broadway With Love", three times a day, seven days a week,

comes April 22nd.

Who are these glamorzons that Schaefer and Da Costa expect

to dazzle the 70 million visitors to the Fair with? How do they

differ from the old time showgirl? Our reporter with a

penchant for statistics investigated the question thoroughly and

has come up with some pertinent information.

First -- the old time showgirls did not have much more than a

grammer school education, it that. They started work at

fourteen or fifteen, with no visible talent but their looks.

Today's showgirl is from a different world.

The girls who will grace "To Broadway With Love" can slink

across a stage with the best of the old timers: they can match

them feature by feature and win hands down; and today's crop

of beauties are talented as well as pretty.

Of the sixteen girls in the Music Hall musical six stopped their

formal education after graduating from high school; but of the

six, four continued musical and dramatic studies. Five of the

girls have college degrees, four of the girls have had a

minimum of two years of college and one went three years

before leaving and is continuing at night school to earn her

degree. One majored in psychology; most majored in drama

and music.

The overall average height is 5 ft. 9 1/2 -- though on stage the

girls will all probably be close to six feet -- the tallest girl is a

six footer, the shortest if five foot 8. The thinnest weighs 123

pounds; the heaviest refuses to give her weight. Average

weight is 130, for the 15 who will tell. Largest bust is 39, the

smallest 35 1/2, the average 36. Waist average is 24 with 23

the smallest and 29 the largest. Hips average 36, with 27 the

smallest and 39 the largest.

The girls come from musical comedy, the Copacabana, the

Latin Quarter, the Denver ballet, the Follies Bergere, London's

Crazy Gag, the Chez Paree, Vegas' Tropicana, one from

modeling, one from a Water Follies and one beauty was

discovered in a burlesque show.

Their families range from one mother who is a Doctor, to

another mother who was a showgirl at the Acquacade at the

last New York's World's Fair. One girl's uncle was the late

Victor McLaglen, another girl's first cousin is the city editor of

a New York newspaper. One girl's father is a photographer,

one girl's grandfather walked to Texas with an oxen team; a girl

who is a direct descendant of General Nathaniel Green, one girl

was Miss Page One in 1963, another was runner up for Miss

New York City in 1964.

For the record, if you are a historian at heart, note these names

-- they will be showgirls in "To Broadway With Love" at the

World's Fair comes April; but tomorrow? beauties whose

names will probably be famous internationally. In alphabetical

order, Alleen Aune, Diane Brown, Pamela Burrell, Terry

Crawford, Michele Evens, Carol Holt, Lyn Janice, Anna

Johnson, Melissa Mc Call, Jo Mc Kee, Denise McLaglen,

Trinka Morgan, Judy Pierce, Cathy Triffon, Carolle van Seter

and Mary Lee Winton. They will add beauty and glamour to

the World's Fair and will dazzle the audience with a wardrobe

designed by Freddie Wittop that is actually costing $490,890.