During Betty Buckley’s absolutely terrific Café Carlyle cabaret return—in which she questions the proper definition of cabaret and whether she fits it; she does—she talks about her friendship with Elaine Stritch. She gabs about how much she learned from the inimitable performer and recalls that when Stritch was in residence at the Carlyle and Buckley was performing there, the former would stand at the bar and loudly critique the latter.
Buckley says she was grateful for that mentor-mentee element of their relationship. To prove it, she does an hour-plus turn that demonstrates in song and spiel how much she’s taken on from Stritch, who also repeatedly took the Café Carlyle stage with command. In the process, Buckley proves how prepared she is now to pass on to anyone interested the astounding heights to which cabaret artistry can rise. To prove it further, she’s written lyrics for the amusing “Elaine Stritch Is My Guardian Angel” (melody by music director Christian Jacob).
Not that over the years Buckley hasn’t proved herself time and again on intimate-room stages. She has, but as of this appearance there’s a difference—and a substantial one at that. In previous days, Buckley had her clarion voice to show off, those traffic-stopping vocal chords that easily allowed her, for instance, to end numbers with sustained, seemingly impossible final notes.
Buckley no longer has that voice to send soaring over cabaret tables. She compensates—make that, she more than compensates—by modulating her take on the songs she includes. Yes, she maintains the upper register notes she’s always had, but when she goes for, and reaches, them, she doesn’t stay there for long. As for those last high Cs, or whatever astonishing highs she used to achieve, more often than not now (perhaps to leave her vibrato alone), she ends softly and impressively.
And remember this about Betty Buckley: She has always been—like Stritch, like Barbara Cook, whose voice also eventually cooled—a first-class actor. She’s proved that in movies, on television and, of course, on stage. Anyone who saw her opening 15 or 20 minutes as Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard will passionately attest to that.
Another Buckley fact to keep in mind is that, although she’s devoted to the Broadway musical, she’s always wanted to broaden her interests when in the up-close-and-personal boîtes. That’s why when she opens with the Oscar Hammerstein II-Richard Rodgers “Surrey With the Fringe on Top,” it’s jazzed up by her top-flight musicians (Jacob at the piano, Oz Noy on guitar, Tony Marino on bass, and Ben Perowsky on drums).
She also doesn’t stick to the obvious Great American Songbook songsmiths. She’s looking for the newer additions. In that search, she was told about Joe Iconis. She looked him up on YouTube, liked what she heard, and contacted him. He sent her some ditties she felt weren’t for her. So he penned a newie, “Old Flame, which just happens to be a hilarious showpiece about a vengeful, gun totin’ rejected lover. In other words, Iconis writing for an icon, with the result that “Old Flame” is now one of his best-ever songs and simultaneously one of hers.
Another more recent Broadway boulevardier is Jason Robert Brown, around whom Buckley builds a four-part medley about today’s distressed world. The songs are also among Brown’s most accomplished. (She sure can pick ‘em.) She concludes with the poignant “Hope,” which Buckley acts with heart-breaking concern. By the way, a fourth song here is the Hammerstein-Rodgers “You’ve Got to be Carefully Taught.”
In a bow to her recent Hello, Dolly! tour, Buckley does give out with Jerry Herman’s title hit and closes—before her Carolyn Leigh-Johnny Richards “Young at Heart” encore—with “Before the Parade Passes By.” She also gets around to The Baker’s Wife, with its Stephen Schwartz score. Not, though, “Meadow Lark,” which used to be one of her signature songs, but the more gently philosophical “Chanson.”
Talking with great comfort and much humor, Buckley laughs that when she initially and reluctantly ventured into cabaret, alarmed friends informed her she needed to speak to the ringsiders. Now she does, seemingly off-the-cuff and self-deprecatingly. Indeed, she doesn’t make a false move at being convincingly herself. As with all the best cabaret entertainers, she’s great good company.
N.B.: Buckley does not sing the T. S. Eliot-Andrew Lloyd Webber “Memory,” perhaps for obvious reasons. All the same, she leaves patrons with strong new memories, and that’s saying something.
Betty Buckley opened March 10, 2020, at Café Carlyle and runs through March 21. Tickets and information: cafecarlylenewyork.com
