Joan Rivers, God bless her, was here because of Ray Bolger.
Bolger, the Scarecrow from “The Wizard of Oz,” once starred in an old Frank Loesser musical called “Where’s Charley?”
Joan’s school group saw a matinee one day in 1948 and was invited backstage. Bolger, as Joan told me on “Theater Talk,” liked to meet the kids from NYC’s public schools.
“Ray Bolger, God bless him, would take the children backstage and give them a tour of the theater. I stepped on that stage and I knew I was in the Temple,” she said.
That’s how it began for one of the great comedians of all time. She went to the heights of comedy — Carson, her own show, movies (“Rabbit Test,” anyone?), books and, brilliantly, “Fashion Police.”
But, in her heart, Rivers was a Broadway baby.
She made a few attempts at a stage career, replacing Linda Lavin in Neil Simon’s “Broadway Bound” in 1988. And she starred as Sally Marr, Lenny Bruce’s mother, in a play called “Sally Marr . . . and Her Escorts” — a bizarre play about rape and left-wing politics, but she had fun.
“I know it’s flop, but it’s a BROADWAY flop,” she told me after it closed.
When we met again a few years ago, Joan told me, “I read you all the time. And I’ve become a critic myself.”
Where, I asked?
“The Beverly Hills Courier,” she said. “I review all the shows for them — for free!”
So, for the “Theater Talk” critics’ round table at the end of the season, I asked Joan Rivers from the Beverly Hills Courier to join Ben Brantley from the New York Times and Peter Marks from the Washington Post.
Before she arrived, we asked if she’d like anything to drink: coffee, tea, soda.
“White wine,” she replied. We were taping at noon.
Joan later told me that she never did a TV show without a sip of wine. It loosened her up, no matter what time of day.
I went out and bought her a very good Sancerre.
She sipped her glass in the green room, and brought it with her on the set.
It was a jolly show. I asked Joan why she had become a critic. She said, “I go to the theater all the time, and the Beverly Hills Courier asked me to write reviews. I am the voice of the people.”
Marks replied: “The voice of the people? And you write for the Beverly Hills Courier?”
Joan said: “Yes. My people.”
Brantley and Marks declined a glass of wine before the show. But I stashed Joan’s bottle under the table, and at the end of the show I said, “In the great tradition of theater critics, who were all drinkers, let’s have a toast.”
Peter and Ben did not object.
I poured out the wine, and asked them why they fell in love with theater. Joan talked about Bolger. “You’ve become an important critic,” I said, “and we’ll read the Beverly Hills Courier for your reviews. I hope they’re paying you what you’re worth.”
“That’s the trouble,” she said. “They are.”