Good Dolly, Miss Midler
QUEEN Midler will win every award besides those for poverty and modesty. Even if there came a return of the late Tonys — Randall and Curtis — she’d still out-Tony them.
But the allness of “Hello, Dolly!” can be exhausting. Before curtain she bitches and moans then grabs standing ovations. Donna Murphy covers for her once a week, but whispered is that once June 11’s moving van carts away all Bette’s trophies, she’ll cool it — and maybe Miss Murphy maybe fills in maybe for Her Midlergesty more often. Think: “Hello, Donna!”
Adored Bette gets a standing ovation when she enters. So how does such talent and success begin?
The ’60s. Steve Os-
trow, who now lives in Australia, owned the Continental Baths, which was the West Side’s gay meet market. It was in the basement of the Ansonia Hotel. He’s done a book. He’s prepping a Broadway musical and movie. At dinner in Sydney, he told me Bette’s beginning — as he remembered it.
Skinny, brown-haired, Upper West Side apartment, she began in a Manhattan gay bar. Ostrow’s job paid $50 a night. He considered it big money. She didn’t. She wanted a raise. Plus a pianist. He told his lawyer, Barry Slotnick, “Handle it.” Slotnick said, “We can’t afford a raise,” and remembers: “She called me a few names. One began with M, one began with F.”
She settled for piano player Barry Manilow, of whom you also may have heard and who has since unloaded his own story. Bette loved Manilow. Then. Why they no longer adore one another, who knows? Lawyer Slotnick recalls booking Bette in Westchester Premiere Theatre. And claims she’s a brilliant performer who excoriated whatever coworker might’ve made the slightest mistake during her act. Talent? Yes! Patient? No! Westchester’s deal included driving her home after the show. So one subzero night, the driver hadn’t turned on the heat. Yelling at him, in her fit of anger, she ran out of the car and onto the freezing highway. Clearly, she survived. She’s the highestpaid star on Broadway.