I Love My Wife
OPENING: April 17, 1977
CLOSING: May 20, 1979
Seen: July 1978
LOCATION: Ethel Barrymore Theatre
When I was in college, my favorite non-theater class was a history class titled History Through the Lens of Pop Culture. It explored the idea that if you studied pop culture in any era of history you would be able to gauge a society by what was presented as entertainment and how it was received.
While Broadway is not known for being “Hip”, the idea of studying its progression does still apply. Some shows, such as Man of La Mancha and Annie, have proven to have universal and era-defying themes. Others, such as Golden Rainbow and I Had A Ball, proved to be products of their time that have not survived the decades since their inception.
Our next show, I Love My Wife, falls into the second category. Written and produced in the 70’s, it explores the swinger culture that was becoming more and more prevalent – I won’t call it popular – at the time.
The story is of Alvin and Wally, friends since boyhood. Wally convinces Alvin to get with the times and open up his marriage. When Alvin presents the idea of a threesome to his wife Cleo, she decides that she doesn’t want a threesome – she wants a foursome with Wally and his wife Monica. Chaos ensues. Confusion endures. Laughs are had. Everyone ends the show on a high note.
This show was a bit of an anomaly, even in the era of experimental theater. It had every element of a classical musical with a modern day plot. However, it was one of the first productions where the band was on stage. Chicago and Cabaret famously were among THE first – but it was the first in which the band interacted with the action on stage, narrating from the background.
The music was by Cy Coleman, made famous for Sweet Charity. The cast was stacked – a young James Naughton played Wally, Ilene Graff (Who my dad had seen as Sandy in Grease) played Cleo, and Joanna Gleason made her Broadway debut as Monica. She won a Theater World Award for the role and eventually won a Tony for her portrayal of the Baker’s Wife in Into The Woods in 1987. She had left the production by the time my dad saw it in 1978. Also a replacement that my dad saw? Tom Wopat, later of Dukes of Hazzard fame, as Wally.
Ultimately, I Love My Wife ran for two years. For a musical that was so clearly a relic of it’s time, I think this was a very healthy run. It’s still done from time to time on the regional and amateur stage, though by no means is it a popular choice. But that’s okay – sometimes the unpopular shows are the most fun because they haven’t been done to death and they are more of a challenge for the actors as they don’t have fifty previous interpretations to pull from.
And that, my darling Theatre Kids, is what makes working on so very intoxicating.
CAST: REPLACEMENT
CLEO: Ilene Graff
MONICA: Virginia Sanifur
WALLY: Tom Wopat
STANLEY: Michael Mark
QUENTIN: Joseph Saulter
HARVEY: John Miller
NORMAN: Mark Franklin
ALVIN: Lawrence John Moss
STANDBY FOR MISSES SANDIFUR AND GRAFF: Lisby Larson
STANDBY FOR MISTERS MOSS AND WOPAT: James Brennan
UNDERSTUDIES: Warren Benbow (Quentin), Michael Mark (Harvey), Joel Mofenson (Norman), and Michael Sergio (Stanley).
Barnes, Clive. “Stage: ‘Tuneful ‘I Love My Wife’” New York Times, April 18, 1977. https://www.nytimes.com/1977/04/18/archives/stage-tuneful-i-love-my-wife-its-a-deft-diverting-different-musical.html?searchResultPosition=1
Bordman, Gerald. “American Musical Theatre: A Chronicle.” New York: Oxford University Press, Inc., 1978.
Internet Movie Database. “Joanna Gleason”. www.ibdb.com. Accessed April 2023.
Robinson, Mark A. “Remembering I Love My Wife.” Mark Robinson Writes (Blog), August 18, 2019. http://www.markrobinsonwrites.com/the-music-that-makes-me-dance/2019/8/18/remembering-i-love-my-wife
Rendell, Bob. “Hey There, Good Times, By Cy Coleman.” Talkin Broadway (Blog), Accessed April 2023. https://web.archive.org/web/20120527145326/http://www.talkinbroadway.com/regional/nj/nj47.html
