BETTY COMDEN: THE PARTY'S OVER. I wish I could choose from more YouTube video to pay tribute to Brooklyn-raised writer-entertainer Betty Comden, who died last Thursday after a show business career highlighted by a long and fruitful and apparently very merry collaboration with Adolph Green.

Over the weekend, WNYC's Jonathan Schwartz recalled phoning Comden's answering machine just to hear her sing "New York, New York," which she co-wrote with Green and Leonard Bernstein for On the Town,

Here Comden and Green introduce a concert version of "New York, New York." I think their presentation offers a hint of the enthusiasm and joy they brought to their work in Greenwich Village, Hollywood, and Broadway. I can just picture them pitching a tune....



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Here's how the song was presented (with "wonderful" replacing "helluva") in the movie version of On the Town, starring Gene Kelly, Jules Munshin, and Frank Sinatra. See how many of the sites you can recognize!



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On the Town also includes a fun companion to "New York, New York"--"Come Up to My Place." That's Betty Garrett with Sinatra.



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Now, if I could snap my fingers and make a video of my choice appear next, it would be a clip from It's Always Fair Weather (1955), which Comden and Green also wrote. A kind of unofficial sequel to On the Town, It's Always Fair Weather revolves around a trio of war buddies who reunite only to find that their friendships have soured. Unusually dour and sardonic for a movie musical of its time, It's Always Fair Weather includes wonderful television parodies featuring the delightful Dolores Gray.

I'd also include some funny Comden and Green moments from Singin' in the Rain (a takeoff on the transition from silent film to talkies) and The Band Wagon (a takeoff on the theater), both frequently included on "best movie" lists. And perhaps I'd close with one of their melancholy songs--like the musicalized sighing of "Some Other Time" (also from On the Town):

Just when the fun is starting
Comes the time for parting
But let’s be glad for what we had
And what’s to come

Oh, well
We’ll catch up some other time

Well, maybe that'll become available some other time. In the meantime, here's a video inspired by a Comden and Green collaboration with Jule Styne.



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Thanks to The Singing Librarian Talks (or Writes...) for the lyrics.