Vivienne Segal

Early years

Segal was born on April 19, 1897, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She was the elder daughter of Jewish parents Bernhard Segal, a physician, and Paula (née Hahn) Segal, who encouraged Vivienne and her sisters Vera and Louise to seek careers in show business. Her obituary in The Guardian reported that her father "underwrote a local opera company in order to give her the chance to sing." She studied singing with Estelle Liebling, the voice teacher of Beverly Sills.

Career

Segal's career began when she was 15 years old and began performing with the Philadelphia Operatic Society. Her Broadway debut came in The Blue Paradise (1915), a production that was underwritten by her father. She was also a performer on the CBS Radio program Accordiana in 1934.

Segal may be best remembered for creating the role of Vera Simpson in Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart's Pal Joey and introducing the song "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered". Pal Joey opened at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre December 25, 1940, with a cast that included Gene Kelly and June Havoc. She also starred as Morgan LeFay in the Rodgers and Hart revival of A Connecticut Yankee in 1942. One of Lorenz Hart's last songs, "To Keep My Love Alive", was written specifically for her in this show.

Since the 1940 Pal Joey production went unrecorded, a studio cast was assembled in 1950 to record the musical. In 2003, this recording was reissued on CD by Columbia Broadway Masterworks in a release featuring the full show's numbers plus two bonus tracks**:** Harold Lang singing "I Could Write a Book" (from the CBS TV show Shower of Stars) and Segal singing "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered" on the CBS Radio show Stage Struck, interviewed by Mike Wallace recalling Hart's promise to write her a show. In 1952, she played in Pal Joey again, when it was revived on Broadway.

Vivienne Segal retired from acting in 1966 following a guest appearance on Perry Mason as Pauline Thorsen in "The Case of the Tsarina's Tiara."

Awards

In 1952, Segal received a Donaldson Award in the Best Performance-Actress (Musical Division) category for her performance in the revival of Pal Joey.

Personal life and death

Segal and actor Robert Ames eloped in 1923 but divorced three years later. In 1950, she married television executive Hubbell Robinson, Jr.

According to composer Stephen Sondheim, Segal was a “canasta crony” of Sondheim’s mother, Etta Janet Fox (“Foxy”) Sondheim.

Segal died in Beverly Hills, California of heart failure on December 29, 1992, aged 95. She was interred in the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles.

Musical theater

• 1915 The Blue Paradise
• 1917 My Lady's Glove
• 1917 Miss 1917
• 1918 Oh, Lady! Lady!!
• 1919 The Little Whopper
• 1921 A Dangerous Maid (as a replacement)
• 1922 The Yankee Princess
• 1923 Adrienne
• 1924 Ziegfeld Follies
• 1925 Ziegfeld Follies
• 1925 Florida Girl
• 1926 Castles in the Air
• 1926 The Desert Song
• 1928 The Three Musketeers
• 1931 The Chocolate Soldier
• 1938 I Married an Angel
• 1940 Pal Joey
• 1943 A Connecticut Yankee Broadway revival
• 1947 Music in My Heart
• 1950 Great to Be Alive!
• 1952 Pal Joey Broadway revival

Films

Selected Television Appearances

• Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1960) (Season 5 Episode 38: "Hooked") as Gladys
• Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1962) (Season 7 Episode 24: "Apex") as Clara Shorup

References

Sources

• Sies, Luther F. Encyclopedia of American Radio: 1920-1960. Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 2000.

References

1. "Vivienne Segal". Jewish Women's Archive.
2. Dean Fowler, Alandra. (1994). "Estelle Liebling: An exploration of her pedagogical principles as an extension and elaboration of the Marchesi method, including a survey of her music and editing for coloratura soprano and other voices". [[University of Arizona]].
3. (2 January 1940). "Star Quits 'Goody' Types". The Los Angeles Times.
4. "Vivienne Segal". The Broadway League.
5. "Vivienne Segal".
6. Sies, Luther F. (2014). ''Encyclopedia of American Radio, 1920-1960, 2nd Edition, Volume 1''. McFarland & Company, Inc. {{ISBN. 978-0-7864-5149-4. P. 11.
7. "''Playbill''".
8. Suskin, Steven (1990). ''Opening Night on Broadway: A Critical Quotebook of the Golden Era of the Musical Theatre''. New York: Schrimmer Books, pp. 154–157. {{ISBN. 0-02-872625-1.
9. (2 January 1993). "Unbothered and bewitching". The Guardian.
10. "Pal Joey - Studio Cast - 1950 - Lyrics by Lorenz Hart".
11. (June 21, 1952). "The Winners of the 9th Annual Donaldson Awards 1951-1".
12. Grimes, William. (30 December 1992). "Vivienne Segal, 95, a Stage Star In Roles Sweet to Cynical, Is Dead". The New York Times.
13. Sondheim, Stephen. (2011). "Look, I Made a Hat: Collected Lyrics (1981–2011) with Attendant Comments, Amplifications, Dogmas, Harangues, Digressions, Anecdotes and Miscellany". Alfred A. Knopf.
14. William Grimes. (December 30, 1992). "Vivienne Segal, 95, a Stage Star In Roles Sweet to Cynical, Is Dead". [[New York Times]].