Mary Martin, Broadway Legend (Hardcover)

by Ronald L. Davis (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist
Forever Peter Pan, thanks to her 1955, 1956, and 1960 live-TV performances, Martin was also the first Nellie Forbush in South Pacific, the first Maria in The Sound of Music. David charts her progress from Weatherford, Texas, where her father was a prominent lawyer, to Broadway, where she first made her name singing Cole Porter’s “My Heart Belongs to Daddy,” to Hollywood and beyond. Frankly idolatrous of Martin, David describes interviewing her as “living out a fantasy” but doesn’t let idolatry interfere with scholarship. He reveals Martin as talented but flawed, sometimes putting career before family—she left son Larry Hagman to be raised by her mother—and making bad, or at least odd, career decisions. Offered the role of Laurey in what became Oklahoma!, she chose instead a show that closed out of town. Expectably for a professor emeritus, David has a healthy respect for facts. More surprising, he sensitively and intelligently dissects the many small events, chance meetings, false starts, and lucky and unlucky breaks that turned a gifted but unfocused teenage amateur into a star. --Jack Helbig

Product Description
South Pacific. The Sound of Music. Peter Pan. As the star of these classic Broadway musicals, Mary Martin captivated theater audiences with her impish persona and magnificent voice. Now Ronald L. Davis fills a major gap in theater history, moving beyond Martin's own 1976 memoir to provide a complete picture of her life and career.

Lively and engaging, Davis's biography is the first book-length portrait of the theater icon, spanning her lifetime to reveal facts about her childhood, marriages, and friendships--as well as artistic collaborations that included the likes of Rodgers and Hammerstein, Cole Porter, and Elia Kazan.

Born in Weatherford, Texas, and mother to the future actor Larry Hagman, Martin went to California after the failure of her first marriage. There, she auditioned for every studio without success. "Audition Mary" finally had her big break when she won a talent contest, leading to her breakthrough 1938 performance in Leave It to Me--in which she wowed audiences singing "My Heart Belongs to Daddy." Davis traces Martin's numerous appearances on Broadway, in touring productions, and on television, showing how--through hard work and persistent optimism--she built a career that lasted nearly fifty years and earned her the adoration and respect of fans and colleagues alike.

Because Martin's life was entwined with many luminaries of the stage, this biography offers rich insights into theater history, including accounts of how various productions were developed. No other book tells her story in such detail--it is must reading for fans and an essential resource for theater aficionados everywhere.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 300 pages
• Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press (April 30, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0806139056
• ISBN-13: 978-0806139050
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #644,797 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Very disappointing. Not thorough or accurate., May 7, 2008

By	George Dansker "rossini2" (New Orleans, La United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I was very disappointed in this book. I was hoping for a major biographical treatment of the life of the legendary Mary Martin -- but this doesn't begin to fill the bill.

A first reading indicates lots of errors. To list only a few:

Mary Martin didn't study with Dino Borgioli in New York as the author claims, but in London.
Cinderella with Julie Andrews was 1957 and not 1958.
The Song "When You're Far Away From New York Town" was not taken from the character who originally sings it and given to Mary Martin to sing during "Jennie". The singer Jack DeLeon sings it on the OBC recording and sang it in the show.
The companion show for NBC that preceeded "Music with Mary Martin" was called "Magic with Mary Martin" and not "Three to Make Music" as the author claims.
One of the most important television shows she did, the "General Foods 25th Anniversary Show -- A Salute to Rodgers and Hammerstein" gets no mention in the list of "major television performances"
There was no "Jazz Version of 'Tit Willow'" in the tv special with Noel Coward.
The 1985 "Our Hearts Belong to Mary" special in which Miss Martin made her final New York Broadway stage appearance gets no mention at all. This was a great night of tribute to Mary Martin and there is nothing in the book about it.
It is Dolores Gray, not Delores Gray.

Additionally, some incidents in Mary Martin's life are told out of the chronological order in which they happened, making them appear to have happened at a different point in time.

With so many errors found in a first casual reading of the book, one has to worry about the accuracy of other information.

The author, Ronald Davis, relied very heavily on his oral interviews with close friends of Mary Martin and with the great star herself. Somehow the focus shifts too often to the interviews with these other individuals. Much of the author's research comes from materials at SMU where he was a professor. This is good material, however there is a wealth of other material out there that wasn't tapped for this book.
Basically there is still another fascinating story to be told about this great performer.

Better attribution for a lot of the source material would be welcome. There is so much material borrowed from other sources that the lack of footnotes is frustrating. Sources are discussed in the back of the book but it is difficult to cross-reference them, and the source material section is quite hard to follow. This is amazing considering the book was published by a university press.

The accompanying back matter, the list of her Broadway shows is very sketchy and incomplete. Only major performers are listed. There is only an incomplete list of television appearances, and there is no discography.

If you are waiting for a major and in-depth biography of this wonderful performer -- this book isn't it. There are some nice photographs which are rarely seen and they were enjoyable to look at.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Still Too Many Unanswered Questions, May 25, 2008

By	A. McIntyre "Texasexpat" (Philadelphia, PA United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This is an okay book for someone who knows very little about Mary Martin.

It is not for anyone who knew Martin (as a friend or acquaintance) or even followed her career on Broadway or television. The author relies heavily on interviews with Martin herself and others, especially life-long friend Besse Mae Sue Ella Austin. Austin and her husband are primary sources and their many comments do fill in some of the blanks, especially about Martin's childhood and family.

However, I learned nothing new about the most important people in Martin's life: husband Richard Halliday, best friend Janet Gaynor or her children Larry Hagman & Heller Halliday. Did the author even try to search out people who could have talked opened about Halliday and Gaynor?

I assume the Austins did provide useful information. If so, Davis made the choice not to include it here. That is one of the problems. Davis has written other books and the narrative flows well. But, Davis wrote this book as a huge fan of Mary Martin, from the days of seeing her in "Annie Get Your Gun" in Texas. Martin, one of Broadway's biggest musical stars, deserves a well researched book by an objective author.

2.0 out of 5 stars Sugar-Coated, Dull Fan Salute to Broadway Star, June 29, 2009

By	Mediaman "TVviewer" (USA) - See all my reviews

Mary Martin apparently had a sparkling personality that made her a star--but none of that shines through in this laborious, sugar-coated bio that approaches the subject from a fan's perspective.

Martin's career had a very slow start and it's over 100 pages before the author gets to anything worth reading about. In those early years she made some very odd choices which go unexplained here--she twice gets married on the spur of the moment to someone she barely knows, then she births children that she virtually has nothing to do with, and makes poor career choices over and over (turning down Oklahoma!).

She is portrayed as a ditzy, naive lovable idiot who didn't really know what she was doing--but one would think at some point she would learn from her mistakes or that someone would confront her about abandoning her children (including future star Larry Hagman).

This book ignores all the flaws and builds up Martin as being a star long before she truly was one. It's a skewed view of her career and life, which the author gleaned from interviews with Martin and her best friends. Others who know the star's background say that there are many mistakes in the book, and it is written in a somewhat academic style that makes for often dull reading. The photo selection is also odd, with some major gaps (none of her kids or first husband and some major shows are missing, but there are photos of her with the author and friends that contributed interviews).

Martin's life as presented here was rather uninteresting and if you are looking for her definitive biography, this is apparently not it.