If you were reaching for an evening of nostalgia, you probably would not choose a square, naked room of pea green cinderblocks, illumined as brightly as a Little League field splashed in golden high noon sunshine.
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Stephen Fry at piano with Winston Gieseke
Yet when the Culver City Historical Society gathered last evening in the Multi-Purpose Room of the Vets Auditorium, today was a hundred miles away.
Yesterday instantly became today, and everything that was good about what we remember jumped into our laps like your favorite child welcoming you home.
Staid old William McKinley was President again, the 20th century was new, and chautaquas were a favored form of relaxation and recreation.
Mellifluously, the ubiquitous, gleamingly professional pianist Stephen Fry along with the young actor/singer Winston Gieseke, the father of a magnificent voice, turned memories back to the era when the late Dick Clark was born.
They could, and perhaps should, take this act on the road, except that it was announced Mr. Gieseke soon will be moving to Berlin.
Without a prop in sight, the two terrific talents revived familiar singalongs and pop tunes from 1929’s Broadway Melody, and films of the next 15 years.
Many of the songs, truthfully, sounded alike, possibly because they were written by Nacio Brown and Arthur Freed. The Messrs. Freed, Brown and the others created songs that only are played today on radios on the moon – “Should I?,” “All I Do Is Dream of You,” “I’ve Got a Feeling You’re Fooling,” “You Made Me Love You.”
Just as entertaining was watching the totally engaged audience keep time.
Rows and rows of them.
If you were deaf, you would have been fulfilled by following their fluid, flowing movements.
If you were blind, you would have unwittingly emulated them, tapping your soles, satisfying your soul, irresistibly swaying your head to and fro, swinging your whole body so effortlessly and mindlessly that you can pass on this week’s aerobics and gym workouts.
If your tongue was your only working part, you still would have hummed the entire program because you really did recall the melodies, and without realizing it, you resurrected the words.
As oldtimers used to say when the air was still or stale and a body didn’t know whether to sweat or perspire, “It’s getting a little close in here.”
This inspired another ubiquitous personality, School Board member Nancy Goldberg, and others to fan themselves for relief.
Ah, for the days of yore when fans passed for air conditioning, and nearly every family owned a collection.
Nice breeze, isn’t it?
