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During the course of the royal family's fantastic but not very funny incognitos, Actress Boland gets a chance to re-enact her characteristic role of a matronly nibbertigibbet, gaily crying t;God save the Queen!" when she departs for her first date with Mowgli. The King falls in with a professional hostess patterned after Elsa Maxwell, who promotes him as a society prestidigitator. The Princess gets her man and the Prince gets the dancer (June Knight). Spectators seeking regulation musicomedy fun will find it in Jubilee principally when Actress Knight, fresh from Hollywood, is onstage. She does a sinuous dance called the Beguine and, dressed in about the same amount of clothing that serves a gun crew on a battleship, sings part of a song titled A Picture of Me Without You, which should replace Composer Porter's You're the Top h the hearts of parodists.
Picture Henry Ford without a car.
Picture Heaven's firmament without a star.
Picture Fritzy Kreisler without a fiddle.
Picture poor Philadelphia without a Biddle.
Picture Central Park without a sailor.
Picture Mr. Lord minus Mr. Taylor.
Add them all together and what have you got?
Just a picture of me without you.
Moss Hart & Cole Porter set out last January to go around the world while writing their show. Returning for rehearsals in August, it was rumored they had been anxiously approached by the British Embassy, which had heard that Jubilee was to satirize the celebration of George V's 25-year reign. Librettist Hart proclaimed: "There'll be no war if I can help it." In the interest of international harmony, he took the beard off his king, revised the makeup which had caused Mary Boland to look astonishingly like Mary Windsor.
One of the most successful and most nervous men in the U. S. Theatre, Moss Hart went into a dither while seeing As Thousands Cheer and Merrily We Roll Along through rehearsals. Slumped gloomily in his seat in the empty auditorium while Jubilee was being whipped into shape in Boston (see cut). Moss Hart fretted, chewed gum incessantly, lost 20 lb.