Another April Quiz By Peter Filichia
By now, faithful readers have learned that April is National Quiz Month. That’s why I’ve been spending each Tuesday of the month giving you a quiz that asks you to identify lines and lyrics from various Broadway and off-Broadway musicals.
Before we get to this week’s quiz, let’s give credit to Fred Abramowitz, Steve Bell, Susan Berlin, Brigadude, Jason Flum, Ingrid Gammerman, Charles Kirsch, Alynn Amkraut Krull, Robert Lo Biondo (who did even better than last week), Paul Roberts, Arthur Robinson, Steve Rosenthal, Donald Tesione, Rick Thompson, and especially Noel Katz, for he got them all!
Here are those answers from last week’s quiz, which asked you to identify lines and lyrics from musicals that referenced royalty:
1. “I don’t like crap games with barons and earls.” (“The Lady Is a Tramp” – Babes in Arms)
2. “I’ve interviewed Pablo Picasso and a countess named di Frasso.” (“Zip” – Pal Joey)
3. “‘Yes, Your Majesty!’ ‘No, Your Majesty!’” (“Shall I Tell You What I Think of You?” – The King and I)
4. “If I ever saw a prince, my Harry was him.” (“He Had Refinement” – A Tree Grows in Brooklyn)
5. “I will tell you all the books I’ve read and the way I met the King of France.” (“I Talk to the Trees” – Paint Your Wagon)
6. “The mayor of Shannon would shoot off a cannon and crown ye the queen.” (“My Darlin’ Eileen” – Wonderful Town)
7. “Princes come, princes go.” (“Sands of Time” – Kismet)
8. “That’s enough for me to be living like a king.” (“7 1/2 Cents” – The Pajama Game)
9. “And this queen has her aces in all the right places.” (“A Little Brains, A Little Talent” – Damn Yankees)
10. “‘Thanks a lot, King,’ says I, in a manner well-bred.” (“Just You Wait” – My Fair Lady)
11. “The Duke of Windsor and His Duchess … at last you’re out of my clutches.” (“I’m Going Back” – Bells Are Ringing)
12. “But alas! The prince couldn’t find a lass.” (“Many Moons Ago” – Once upon a Mattress)
13. “The grown folk who wander to and fro have ways known to their own folk we throne folk don’t know.” (“What Do the Simple Folk Do?” – Camelot)
14. “In fact, the more we British get to know of you, the more we wonder why our king let go of you.” (“Over Here” – Jennie)
15. “Somewhere beneath the mountains of Mexico there dwelt a royal fella, King Hamlet.” (“Melisande” – 110 in the Shade)
16. “There are heroes in the world; princes and heroes in the world.” (“There Won’t Be Trumpets” – Anyone Can Whistle)
17. “May God bless and keep the czar far away from us.” (“Tradition” – Fiddler on the Roof)
18. “If I could have been a duke, for you I would have.” (“Stay” – Do I Hear a Waltz?)
19. “I’m the band from Macy’s big parade, a wild Count Basie blast.” (“I’m a Brass Band” – Sweet Charity)
20. “I’m not Queen Victoria. That suit has to go.” (“You’ve Got Possibilities” – It’s a Bird, It’s a Plane, It’s Superman)
21. “He comes! His Royal Tallness! His Highest Highness! His Way, Way Upness!” (“Make Way” – The Apple Tree)
22. “Just avoiding Maharajahs and obsequious old codgers.” (“To Get out of This World Alive” – Darling of the Day)
23. “But did your king ever say a thing or decorate me?” (“No Boom Boom” – Zorba)
24. “Princes. Why not kings?” (“Sons” – The Rothschilds)
25. “I’ve been through Gandhi, Windsor and Wally’s affair.” (“I’m Still Here” – Follies)
26. “Not kings and lords but nations, not thrones and crowns – but men.” (“Save the People” – Godspell)
27. “C’mon, King of the Jews.” (“Herod’s Song” – Jesus Christ Superstar)
28. “Or I shall marry the Prince of Wales.” (“The Miller’s Son” – A Little Night Music)
29. “All your strangers better beware. This is the King of the Jungle here.” (“Mean Ole Lion” – The Wiz)
30. “Merlin the magician prophesied a virgin to a proper dauphin.” (“Visions & Voices” – Goodtime Charley)
31. “He ain’t no sheik. That’s no great physique.” (“Funny Honey” – Chicago)
32. “Every prince has got to have his swan.” (“At the Ballet” – A Chorus Line)
33. “If the tea the Shogun drank will serve to keep the Shogun tranquil.” (“Chrysanthemum Tea” – Pacific Overtures)
34. “Now I don’t even wince when it eats the prince.” (“We’re Gonna Be All Right” – Side by Side by Sondheim)
35. “My set of Theodore Dreiser; my portrait of the Kaiser.” (“The Legacy” – On the Twentieth Century)
36. “Is that a chair fit for a king?” (“God, That’s Good” – Sweeney Todd)
37. “Your queen is dead. Your king is through.” (“Oh, What a Circus” – Evita)
38. “We were cowgirls and pirates and gypsies and queens, but I never knew you.” (“Sisters” – Pump Boys and Dinettes)
39. “I know a duchess who got pregnant at the bar.” (“La Cage aux Folles” – La Cage aux Folles)
40. “He’s a prince who prepares.” (“On the Steps of the Palace” – Into the Woods)
41. “Knock ev’ry duke and count and baron right off his feet!” (“I Want to Go to Hollywood” – Grand Hotel)
42. “You would be queen to me – not wife.” (“Unworthy of Your Love” – Assassins)
43. “‘Cuz there happens to be a prince right in front of your nose – and he happens to be the man I chose.” (“Rookie in the Ring” – My Favorite Year)
44. “Warn the Duke!” (“Ragtime” – Ragtime)
45. “And in the end, the Queen would send the men off to hell.” (“An Old-Fashioned Love Story” – The Wild Party)
46. “He wants to dine with a duchess and a duke.” (“I Wanna Be a Producer” – The Producers)
47. “A prince is a pauper, babe, without a chick to call his own.” (“It Takes Two” – Hairspray)
48. “Fairy tale romance, princess and hero.” (“Closer Than Ever” – Bombay Dreams)
49. “The hands that hold the scepters, every head that holds a crown.” (“Posh” – Chitty Chitty Bang Bang)
50. “I’m a young Norwegian princess or a milkmaid.” (“In My Own Little Corner” – Rodgers + Hammerstein’s Cinderella)
Now onto your new one: You can choose your friends, but you can’t choose your relatives. And yet, many lyricists and librettists have chosen to include relatives in their lines and songs. Here are fifty relatives from both Broadway and off-Broadway musicals. From what songs and shows do they spring? To make it easier on you, I’ve arranged them in chronological order from the show’s first major opening date. So if you recognize a quotation from 1971 and one from 1973 two quotations down, you’ll have a good idea that the one in the middle is probably (but not necessarily) from 1972.
You may send me your answers at [email protected]. And even if you don’t, you’ll see on next Tuesday the answers when you take our fourth and final April quiz.
1. “She’s going to visit her grandmother in Trenton, New Jersey”
2. “Like a straying baby lamb with no mammy and no pappy.”
3. “Don’t you know your momma has a heart of gold?”
4. “She lost one dad and mother, a sister and a brother.”
5. “Many a likely lad does what he can to woo her from her faithful dad.”
6. “My uncle down in Texas can’t even write his name.”
7. “But, sister, here’s the menace.”
8. “Of course, I’m awf’lly glad that mother had to marry father.”
9. “She’s my baby. I’m her pap.”
10. “The one you call your daddy ain’t your paw.”
11. “Poppa’s not president since maybe tonight.”
12. “You can meet your Uncle Max and everyone you know.”
13. “Brother, you can’t go to jail for what you’re thinking.”
14. “My father came from Rovno Gubernya.”
15. “Country butter, eggs by the dozens, gettin’ grabbed by all the cousins.”
16. “My grandpa’s always plastered.”
17. “If you want to have attractive children.”
18. “I haven’t got a godmother. I’ve got a mother.”
19. “Come on, poppa, whaddaya say?”
20. “You may fool your brothers and all of those others, but, sister …”
21. “And such a son-in-law like no one ever saw.”
22. “Safe from disaster; no one haster take care of ma and pa.”
23. “Nanny smelled of Clorox, and boarding school was hell.”
24. “And please, my sweet patater: keep this from the mater.”
25. “My mother’s Uncle Herbert from the institute.”
26. “And for the mayor’s favorite niece.”
27. “A real live nephew of my Uncle Sam.”
28. “I got million-dollar charms, cousin.”
29. “They fired. Oh, ma, did we run.”
30. “And, brother, there’s a lot of ways of swinging a bat.”
31. “My niece from Ohio.”
32. “‘Take me to Granny tonight.’”
33. “Ordinary mothers lead ordinary lives.”
34. “The garden mama used to tend may now be overgrown.”
35. “As I once remarked to father whom I disappointed rather.”
36. “All thanks to sis, now married and fat.”
37. “Four eyes are better than two, brother.”
38. “Do only what you’d do with mother in the room.”
39. “Girls have come and gone, papa.”
40. “I’m just quoting mama.”
41. “At the end of the path was granny once again.”
42. “With three Rockettes and the mayor’s niece.”
43. “That’s thirty times a week, fifty weeks a year, ’cuz I always visit mama at Christmastime.”
44. “Why is the smart son always the gay son?”
45. “And though her daddy is in sulphur and her mommy is insane, still there’s no doubt she’s coming out.”
46. “That’s just what my parents told me when I was a kid.”
47. “My ma tells me ‘No,’ but my feet tell me ‘Go!’”
48. “Have to kiss your aunts and watch your zayde dance.”
49. “Makes you insecure, makes you so unsure, is so immature, loves his mother more.”
50. “I think we’ll have some fun here: your mom and you and me.”
Peter Filichia also writes a column each Monday at www.broadwayselect.com and each Friday at www.mtishows.com. His book The Great Parade: Broadway’s Astonishing, Never-To-Be Forgotten 1963-1964 Season is now available at www.amazon.com.
