The Copacabana
 An Illustrated History by Kristin Baggelaar
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Oh, Those Memories!.
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 "I will finish my show at Lindy's"
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Tony MartinAfter his early days as a big-band sax player, Oakland native Tony Martin followed in the footsteps of his childhood idols Bing Crosby and Russ Colombo (and later Al Jolson) and turned to singing.  With a couple of hit records and some movies behind him, he shipped off to serve in the U.S. Army air force during World War II.  When he returned, the romantic balladeer had a hit record with his To Each His Own and was asked to go into the Copa.  The following is a recounting of one of his memorable nights as a headliner at the Copacabana: 
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           I remember one time Jan Peerce, who had a great record called Bluebird of Happiness, came in.  He had just done two operas at the Met that night, and he came into the Copa with his children.  One of his children had a birthday.  They sat right up front.  That night was so crowded - it was a Saturday night - they eliminated the chorus girl numbers and put in extra tables.  
           I was doing my show and I had hardly any room to spread my hands when I sang.  There was a fellow sitting ringside with his girl, and he said to me, "Hey, how come you stay so thin?"  
           "Cause fat singers don't make any money," I said.  
           Just then Jan Peerce said, "I'm a fat singer and I make a lot of money. 
           Doug Coudy put on all the house lights.  
           "Who is this up here?" I said.  
           Jan Peerce came down onto the stage and he sang a song.  He broke up the audience.  He tore it apart.  
           I offered him the microphone, and he says, "I won't be needing that."  
           When he was finished, I said, "And now, ladies and gentlemen, I will finish my show at Lindy's," and I walked off.  
           Doug said to me, "Why don't you go and finish your show?"  
           "The show is finished," I said.  "You got a pretty good start.  Finish the show out there.  Jan Peerce."  
                                                      Tony Martin and Cyd Charisse 
              Tony Martin was the recipient of the 1992 Society of Singers ELLA Lifetime Achievement Award and is vice president of the board of directors of SOS.  One of the only entertainers to have four stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the ninety-five-year-old Tony Martin still performs in concert attended by his lovely dancer-actress wife Cyd Charisse, whom he married in 1948.  
        
            Tony Martin and Cyd Charisse are pictured here at a champagne reception following his show at Feinstein's at Loews Regency, January-February 2008.
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Jokingly, they locked me in the freezer - then they left"
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Johnnie Ray As the personal manager of Johnnie Ray - the successful singing sensation of the early fifties - Bernie Lang (who also handled Julius LaRosa, the Four Lads and later, Englebert Humperdinck, Shirley MacLaine and others) was with the young star when he hit the big time:  his opening at the Copacabana.  "When Johnnie opened in April of 1952, it was a huge, huge success.  The Copa never had an opening like that - before or after." 
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.Bernie had worked with Johnnie Ray's A & R (artists and repertoire) man at Columbia Records, Danny Kessler, to bring this new and unique talent to New York in September 1951, before his recording of Cry / The Little White Cloud That Cried became a two-sided, two-million-plus-copy seller.  A deal with Jack Entratter of the Copa was made with GAC (General Artists Corporation) while Johnnie was performing at the Boulevard, Queens, for about  $350.  "Pretty much right after that Johnnie's record of Cry came out, and it put a different complexion on the deal with the Copa," says Bernie.  The deal was renegotiated to $2,000, without an option agreement, and led to the following incident, as Bernie tells it: 

           There was no option agreement - no commitment on a future date.  So opening night they said: 
           "Let's make a deal." 
            I said, "No, the agency (GAC) handles that." 
           They wanted me to commit on a future date, but we hadn't even played the first show yet! 
            I said, "We have all this time" - we were there for two to four weeks - "let's not worry about it tonight.  I'm too nervous about the opening." 
            So Julie and Jack picked me up under the armpits and carried me to the walk-in freezer, opened the door, said something like, "Why don't you think it over in here while you come up with a commitment," and put me in! Johnnie Ray and Rosemary Clooney 
           We were all laughing.  Jokingly, they locked me in the freezer - then they left!  Everybody was kibitizing, but I was in there for a few minutes before the bartender came around and got me. 
           But then we did make a deal and Johnnie did go back nine months later. 
           Right from the Copa he played the Paramount (N.Y.), the Oriental in Chicago and Ciro's in California.  Everything flowed from that date - April 10, 1952 - that was the major launching of his career.   

            Johnnie Ray and Rosemary Clooney are shown at the Copacabana at the close of his 1952 spring engagement.
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"You found me just in time . . . "
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Roberta SherwoodA middle-aged mother and housewife, broke and unknown, Roberta Sherwood became one of the all-time great nightclub success stories, capturing the hearts of audiences everywhere with her strong, sweet voice, her simple, sincere approach to ballads, and her trademarks - banging a cymbal, tapping her foot, wearing glasses and draping a sweater over her shoulders.  The elder daughter of old-time minstrel showman, Robert Sherwood, she and her sister Anne started their own vaudeville and nightclub act, appearing in 1932 in a Miami Silver Slipper revue, directed by handsome ex-Shubert Broadway vet, Don Lanning.  She quit show business to marry him and struggled to continue to perform while raising a family - singing in lounge bars, at a Kiwanis Club party, a firemen's ball or with a local dance band.  With her future seeming more and more hopeless, she finally landed a job at a small late-hour drinking joint called Murray Franklin's in Miami Beach, and the rest is history, as Walter Winchell recounts the story: 
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Magic Wand
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            Song star Roberta Sherwood was my biggest show biz skewp.                
            She tried for nearly twenty-five years to "make" the Big Town.  The nearest she got to New York was Elizabeth, New Jersey.  She married Don Lanning, a Broadway musical comedy star, and they raised three sons and once owned the largest restaurant on Biscayne Boulevard, Miami.  Then, several sour breaks - including Mr. Lanning's grave illness - put them out of business.  Roberta had to take whatever bar and grill owners could afford - to feed her family. 
             "Sometimes," she said, "I got as low as ten dollars a night." 
             "Oh, Roberta," I said, "who works for ten dollars a night?" 
             "Hungry people," was the reply. 
             On January 15, 1956, I found her in a cafe at Miami Beach.  She was singing love songs, torch songs, sittin'on the porch songs - You're Nobody 'Til Somebody Loves You, Cry Me A River, Take Your Shoes Off Baby and Start Runnin' Through My Mind - and so many other greats. 
              A few columns later I reported:  "Att'n Networks, Recording Execs, et. al:  Take the fastest plane, train or bus and go to Murray Franklin's place opposite the Roney Plaza, Miami Beach, and find yourself a gold mine named Roberta Sherwood!" 
              The Copacabana landlord, J. Podell, booked her "blind" at five thousand per week.  She jammed his Copa every night.  Top spots around the nation booked her for as high as ten thousand per.  Her records and albums made her wealthier. 
              When I was at ringside at her premiere nights, she never looked at me until she got to You're Nobody 'Til Somebody Loves You.  The line that made my heart smile, however, is when she grinned at me and tenderly sang, "Just in time. You found me just in time . . ."
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Manhattan (Rogers, Hart) sung by Tony Martin from Tony Martin At Copacabana, with Michael Durso and
his Copacabana Orchestra, directed by Hal Borne.  Recorded May 14, 1956 at the Copacabana, NYC.
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*The Copacabana by Kristin Baggelaar
Arcadia Publishing, Images of America series
ISBN 0-7385-4919-3