Gary Beach received the 2001 Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for the role of Roger DeBris in the Broadway production of "The Producers." His other Broadway experiences include "Beauty and the Beast" (Tony nomination and Ovation Award nomination), "Sweet Adeline" (Encores!), "Doonesbury," "The Moony Shapiro Songbook", "Annie," "Something's Afoot," "1776", plus the national companies of: "Les Misérables," "Legends!," "Lend Me a Tenor," "Closer than Ever," and "Of Thee I Sing" (Helen Hayes nomination). On TV he has appeared in "Queer as Folk," "Kate and Allie," "Cheers," "Sisters," "Murder, She Wrote," "Late Show with David Letterman," "Jamie Foxx," "The Wayans Brothers," "Dolly Parton," "Saved By the Bell," "Arli$$." Gary’s Film credits include "Defending Your Life," "Space Works," and "Man of the Century." His recordings include "Beauty and the Beast," "Doonesbury," "Symphonic Les Missérables," "Sondheim at the Movies," and of course...

Gary Beach: From Candelabra to Hitler

June 3, 2001

NEW YORK (AP) -- Gary Beach received his first Tony Award nomination in 1994 for playing a candelabra, Lumiere in Disney's ``Beauty and the Beast.'' Now he's nominated for portraying a song-and-dance Adolf Hitler. Who says there are no good roles left in the American musical theater?

Actually, Beach is Tony-nominated this year for his outrageous performance as Roger De Bris, the beyond-flamboyant director who gets to go on as Hitler in ``The Producers,'' Mel Brooks' monster hit of a musical. He is one of three performers in the show (the others: Roger Bart and Brad Oscar) competing in the featured actor-musical category.

Beach makes his entrance dressed in a beaded gown looking as if he's the Chrysler Building, complete with a tiara that resembles the celebrated structure's sunburst peak. What more can he do for an encore?

Come back in the second act as the Fuehrer and join in ``Springtime for Hitler,'' the one song everyone still remembers from the 1968 movie version of ``The Producers.'' Not only does he sing, but he does a Judy Garland imitation: Beach's Hitler sits on the edge of the stage, like Judy playing the Palace.

The golden Garland moment was born out of a collaboration among Brooks, Beach and Glen Kelly, the show's music supervisor, who was teaching Beach some music from the show.

``For some reason, it sounded to me like the opening number in the old Garland movie, `Summer Stock,''' Beach recalls, softly singing a bit of Hitler's lyrics in a Garland-like lilt, ``Heil myself, heil to me.''

``Mel turned to me and said, `Are you doing Judy? ... I love it.'''

And a little bit of Broadway theater magic was born.

Not bad for a stage-struck guy from Alexandria, Va., whose parents -- Dad was a paint contractor, Mom a housewife -- were not in the theater. But at age 11, Beach saw the original road tour of ``The Music Man,'' starring Forrest Tucker, at Washington's National Theatre and was hooked.

``He's been a showman from day one -- Gary was destined,'' says sculptor Darryl Starr, who went to Grovton High School with Beach in Alexandria where they were members of the Thespians Troop 1899. ``Plus he has the most infectious laugh. Gary will start laughing and you will laugh, too.''

``I always wanted to be a performer, but it never occurred to me to be a television performer or a movie actor,'' Beach says with the enthusiasm of a true believer. ``To me, it was always Broadway. The idea that this is happening while I am watching it, amazes me.''

Beach started college at Old Dominion in Norfolk, Va., to major in political science, but read a magazine article about the North Carolina School of the Arts, where ``show business goes to school'' -- and found his true calling.

Now 53, Beach has toiled in the theater for 30 years. ``I've never done another job but acting,'' he says. Sometimes on Broadway, often not, but always working. One reason? He loves long runs. He's done over 1,000 performances in New York and on the road of three musicals: ``Annie,'' ``Les Miserables'' and ``Beauty and Beast,'' and over 800 performances in ``1776,'' the show that got him to Broadway.

There have been flop, like ``The Mooney Shapiro Songbook,'' a one-performance bomb in 1981 that also sunk such talented performers as Jeff Goldblum and Judy Kaye.

And there have been wonderful experiences, like the comedy ``Legends'' by ``Chorus Line'' author James Kirkwood and starring two real-life theater legends, Mary Martin and Carol Channing.

``The first day of rehearsal in Los Angeles, there I was, sitting between Peter Pan and Dolly Levi and trying to pretend there was absolutely nothing wrong with this picture,'' he says with a laugh.

Despite a yearlong, moneymaking tour, ``Legends'' never came to Broadway because of a disagreement between Martin and one of the show's producers, but Beach remembers its travels fondly.

``Still, there's nothing better for an actor than to be on Broadway,'' he says with a sincerity that disarms. ``If it's a hit, that's wonderful, but just being here is great.''

Yet after nearly 20 years in New York, Beach moved to Los Angeles. ``I fell in love with the idea of having a car like an adult,'' he says. He stayed in California for 13 years, only coming back to do ``Beauty and the Beast.'' It took ``The Producers'' and a broken ankle to get him to return to New York.

``I fell off a stack of dishes in `Beauty and the Beast' and was out in Los Angeles thinking I'd never do another Broadway show. You get to be a certain age and it's like, `There are not going to be any fun parts for me.'''

Then the phone rang, asking him to do a reading of ``The Producers.''

``From the very first moment, all we did was laugh,'' he says of the experience. He was immediately signed up.

``It's been the most fun I've ever had,'' he says a year later. ``I think the late Mike Ockrent (the musical's original director) came up with the idea of having Roger De Bris become Hitler and eliminating the Dick Shawn character, who played the part in the movie. Now it gives me the role of a lifetime.''

Beach's favorite moment in the show? A section of lyrics added to the ``Springtime for Hitler'' number during the pre-Broadway run in Chicago.

``It's when Hitler does the tap challenge with the Allies and ends up rolling the wheelchair-bound Franklin Roosevelt off the stage,'' he explains. ``Brooks wrote, `It ain't no mystery, if it's politics or history, the thing you've got to know is, everything is show biz.'''

Beach then told Brooks, ``You know what you've done? You've made `The Producers' the toughest satire on Broadway.''