Say Sally Struthers, and everybody knows who she is.
Or who she played: Gloria Bunker Stivic on the historic Norman Lear sitcom. “All in the Family” and next-door neighbor Babette Dell on “The Gilmore Girls.”
Those performances, 55 and 25 years in the past, represent a mere fraction of Struthers’ work during almost 60 nonstop years as an actress.
Audiences across the U.S. know Sally Struthers is a theatrical dynamo. Each year, she shows up — again — in Maine, Kansas, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, or wherever in a new show.
Next week, she shows up at New Brunswick’s George Street Playhouse in prolific playwright Joe DiPietro’s comic send-up of noir detective movies, “An Old-Fashioned Family Murder.”
You can bet at age 78 she’s ready for the play after that and the play after that. Or maybe a string of “Old-Fashioned Family Murder” productions from her home base in L.A. to wherever her work takes her.
“It’s no secret how I keep going,” Struthers says during a telephone interview.
“There are two things I live by, two sayings that explain my attitude about slowing down or retiring.
“The first is ‘You rest, you rust.’
“How many times have you seen people fade after retirement? I’d rather keep moving.
“The second comes from my great friend, Brenda Vaccaro.
“Brenda is exceptionally bright and well-read. She was trained by her father to find the information she needed. ‘What does this word mean, Dad?’ Brenda would ask (Struthers going into Vaccaro’s familiar voice). ‘Look it up,’ her father would say. And she did. She looks everything up. Now she has an opinion about everything.
“When I’m in L.A., I look to get together with Brenda and her husband, Guy. I call about a particular night, and she’s booked. And maybe for a week after that.
I ask, ‘Brenda, don’t you and Guy have one night where you just stay home or can come over for some dinner and conversation?
“ ‘No, doll,’ she says. ‘Got to keep moving. It creates a breeze.’
“I love that. The whole image is stimulating. I like creating a constant breeze.
“Also, I’ve been performing so long, six decades, that I love making audiences laugh and think and seeing the humor in situations that aren’t always funny but need to have some release to keep from being depressingly sad.”
I mention how Struthers’ performance as an everyday Texas woman who befriends country legend Patsy Cline was so different from anyone else I saw play that part in the play, “Always … Patsy Cline.”
It became a case in point.
“I read the script and saw the humanity. I also saw that my character, Louise, becomes close to Patsy and gives her something she needs, someone to talk to who doesn’t fawn on her or treat her like a star but approaches woman-to-woman, as a person, not a celebrity.
“In the course of that play, Patsy, as is well-known, dies in a plane crash, not only devastating Louisebut leaving small children behind as survivors.
“I saw how crushingly sad that was. Naturally, the moment Louise hears of Patsy’s death has to be solemn, but the entire would be too sad if it didn’t have comic moments.
“I looked through the script and saw the places where I could provide comedy that would offset thatsadness, that would give it balance.”
Brenda Vaccaro is not the only smart one in that friendship.
In our hourlong conversation — which covered a lot of ground, heart surgery (Sally’s sister’s) and the death of a parent in addition to stories about a life in the theater and the roles Struthers played — Struthers displayed a lot of wisdom and perception.
“All in the Family” would seem to be an integral part of any talk with Struthers, but I consciously avoided it.
It is so far past and so much chronicled, I wanted to center on Sally, who she is, and what she’s doing now, since it’s plenty.
The one question I allowed myself at the end of the interview was whether Struthers thought “All in the Family” would have been accepted and been a hit today.
She immediately said “No.”
“People aren’t open to having discussions and hearing other points of view today, even in a comedy,” Sally says. “It’s why our show is usually seen after 2 a.m. It’s the opposite of woke. It might not play to people on either side of an issue who accept only one way and can’t consider something from a middle position.
“When I think of these times, I want to quote Rodney King and ask, ‘Can’t we all get along?’ ”
“All in the Family” made Struthers famous, but she’d done a lot of work before that, including appearing with Jack Nicholson in “Five Easy Pieces,” doing several commercials, and being the lone dancer on the short-lived “Tim Conway Comedy Hour.”
“Networks were always trying to find a good vehicle for Tim. Nothing worked. The producer of ‘The Tim Conway Comedy Hour’ had the idea that it would be funny if everything about Tim’s variety show was done on a budget. The set was minimal. When the Tim Conway Orchestra was introduced, it was Art Metrano humming a theme song.
“I was the ‘Tim Conway’ dancer. Singular. Not ‘dancers,’ ‘dancer.’ The joke was instead of Jackie Gleason’s June Taylor Dancers, who were like the Rockettes and did elaborate dances, shot from above while they made patterns, the ‘Tim Conway’ dancer was just me.
“I was allowed to improvise. I imitated the moves of the June Taylor dancers. I’d lay on the floor, thecamera above, and do scissors kicks. It was fun. But ABC didn’t like it.
“Well, they didn’t like me. They said I made the show look cheap, which, by the way, was the main premise the network agreed upon. I was let go after five weeks.
“Fortune was on my side. Being let out of my Tim Conway contract rendered me unemployed. I was a free agent, free to accept auditions.
“One of those was for Gloria. I wouldn’t have been able to take the part if I was under contract to Tim’s show. So all worked out well.”
Sort of as she described in her story about “Always … Patsy Cline,” Struthers always found a purpose in leavening tense situations by making people laugh, clowning to the point of silliness and zany antics if that what’s it took to make a difficult circumstance less harrowing.
Her first audience was her mother.
“My father left my mother, sister, and I, when I was age 5,” Struthers said. “The abandonment made by mother reclusive. She became clinically depressed. It destroyed her life.”
Crying, she continued, “I made it my mission go cheer my mother up. It didn’t make a difference how kooky or zany I’d have to be, any smile, laugh, or grin would make it worth it.
“Besides cheering my mother, I learned timing, how to make what I was doing more entertaining, more certain to get the laugh. I was also a good imitator.
“When preparing for a role, I try to think of someone I know who resembles the character I’m playing. I think of their traits, their gait, their speech patterns.”
In “An Old-Fashioned Family Murder,” Struthers plays Mrs. Peck, who attends a dinner party with her son. A murder is committed.
The show is set in the 1940s, and spoofs many of the movie cliches of the period. Struthers describes her character as being sort of like Angela Lansbury’s Jessica Fletcher in “Murder, She Wrote.”
“This is the second time I’m doing this play. We have a successful run of it last fall. During that time, I found out something I didn’t know. For the last 23 years, I’ve done at least one show a year at the Ogunquit Playhouse in Maine.
“This particular year, I was appearing with Brenda Vaccaro, in ‘Nice Work if You Can Get It,’ which has a score by George Gershwin. Joe DiPietro, wrote the book. He received a Tony for the book of ‘Memphis.’
“I had no idea Joe was coming to a performance. But he did, and he liked my timing. It was only after I was cast in ‘An Old-Fashioned Family Murder’ that was I told Joe enjoyed my ‘knack for comedy.’
“He actually got permission to look at the performance Ogunquit taped for its archives. He wanted to study the rhythm of speaking. It turned out he was studying it because he was writing Mrs. Peck with me in mind.
“I think it’s the first time a playwright wrote a part for me. Naturally, that makes it even more exciting to play.”
Among Struthers’ stories is another about Ogunquit.
She was set to do two parts in the musical version of “Tootsie.” One was an agent and a male part in the 1982 movie on which the musical is based.
“I said I wanted to play the role as a man. I got a quick ‘no.’ ‘It doesn’t make a difference. It could be played as a woman,’ they told me.
“I didn’t want to hear that. I wanted the challenge of playing the role as a man. I was told it wasn’t in keeping with the show.”
“What?” I ask. “ ‘Tootsie’ is about a man who poses as a woman to get a part.”
“Exactly.” Struthers answered.
“I persisted and got my way. The most flattering thing was the audience didn’t know it was me. You see why I keep going?”
Yes, Sally, I do. And thank you.
“An Old Fashioned Family Murder” runs from Tuesday, Oct. 14 to Sunday, Nov. 2 at the George Street Playhouse in the New Brunswick Performing Arts Center, 11 Livingston Ave., in New Brunswick, N.J.
Visit www.georgestreetplayhouse.org or call 732-246-7717 for more information.
Fill-in 6abc reporter a Philly-area native
Elizabeth Worthington, a Philly area native and 2018 graduate of Bucknell University is filling in at Channel 6 while some of its full-time reporters are on maternity leave.
On her Facebook page, she says she is happy to be on the top station in her hometown.
Worthington previously worked for WMAR-TV, the ABC affiliate in Baltimore. She also worked in Scranton and Elmira, N.Y.
‘Tommy & Me’ broke new ground
While talking to WIP (94.1) retiree, but frequent guest during football season, Ray Didinger about his newest play, “Spinner,” one I consider a second success, he shared an interesting insight someone told him about why theaters like booking his first play and perennial hit, “Tommy & Me,” which begins performances this week at People’s Light Theatre in Malvern.
“Tommy & Me” was playing at New Hope’s Bucks County Playhouse and Alex Fraser, the producing director there, said among the reasons he was eager to book Didinger’s show was because it’s a challenge for all regional theaters to get men to come to shows.
(COURTESY OF MATT URBAN)
“Alex mentioned,” Didinger said, “men usually attend theater because their wives or significant others bring them there.”
“Tommy & Me,” Fraser explained was a show that appealed to men and changed that paradigm.
The People’s Light run featured the actors who originated the roles of Didinger and Eagles great, Tommy McDonald, in 2015: Matt Pfeiffer and Tom Teti.
It is directed by the original director, Joe Caruso.
I’ll be seeing the show for what must be my 20th time.
It, like “Spinner,” which appeared at Wilmington’s Delaware Theatre Company, illustrated Didinger’s knack for telling a strong story from sports but giving it a personal touch that stresses friendship, fellowship and relationships between people who build a special bond.
Source: Berkshire mont