Raggedy Ann/Rag Dolly (1984 Musical)

The Raggedy Ann Broadway musical went through many titles in its development; ***Raggedy Ann: The Musical Adventure**, **Rag Dolly: The Raggedy Ann Musical***, and the most recent, ***Raggedy Ann: The Musical with a Heart***. The book was written by William Gibson with music and lyrics by Joe Raposo. The show first started as a workshop in 1983, and saw its final performance on Broadway in 1986, when it closed after only three days. It features several of Raposo's songs from the 1977 Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure, but the plot was inspired by the legend of Johnny Gruelle making the first Raggedy Ann doll for his dying daughter Marcella. At one point, a workshop recording was created, but there were no official album releases.

During its short life, ***Raggedy Ann*** saw a brief cultural exchange in Moscow as ***Rag Dolly***, and has since inspired many spinoffs and adaptions by local theaters.

## Synopsis

### Act I

We start the show sometime during America's Great Depression, in a little shack by the Hudson River, New York.

A somber church bell chimes. Our ensemble of narrators, the Raggettes, open the show with a cheery tune [“Gingham and Yarn”] and present us with the backstory of Marcella and her father through multiple tableaus. Her mother ran off with another man, her pets have died, and she lies sick in bed as her father drinks. Poppa has spent his last dime on three bumbling doctors, who can only agree on one thing, that she won’t last the night. Marcella tells them not to open the closet door, through which disappeared her pets, a canary named Yellow Yum Yum and a puppy named Red Fang, and her mother, who Poppa says isn’t dead but ran away with a Rat in a Rolls Royce. To cheer her up, Poppa makes Marcella a rag doll, named Raggedy Ann, and tells her to get some sleep and she’ll see the dolls come alive in her dreams [“Carry On”]. She falls asleep and he looks out at the moon to yell at God, pleading for him to let his daughter live.

After Marcella falls asleep, Raggedy Ann comes to life and pokes her head out from underneath the covers. Marcella tries to tell Ann she’s dying, and the doll dismisses her until the three doctors appear again, this time in clown wigs, to reiterate her bleak outlook [“Diagnosis”]. Ann calls upon her brother Raggedy Andy and their friends, a stuffed bear named Panda and a Baby Doll, who appear out of the rag box [“The Light”].

Because Marcella tells him not to, Andy opens her closet door. Through a cloud of smoke emerges General D., who has been waiting there to collect a soul for his army of the dead. He is aided by his cronies; the beautiful and snarky Bat, and the oafish, mangy Wolf who is constantly pawing at her. He initially believes it’s Ann’s soul he’s after, but she tells him she’s only “Make Believe”. Realizing it’s not yet Marcella’s time, General D. departs with a threat, and on his way drops them and half of Marcella’s room in a junkyard in Miami.

There the clown doctors appear again, dragging in the worn-out Camel, and tell them this is where old dolls go to die. Camel has accepted his fate [“Blue”] but the other dolls haven’t, and since if Marcella dies they all cease to exist, Ann demands they help her. They decide to take her to a famous doll doctor in L.A., but to get all the way to the other side of the country they’ll need a boat to sail through the Panama Canal. Andy takes the lead to turn Marcella’s bed into a boat [“Make Believe (Reprise 1)”] and soon they’re floating safe out on the waters ["Make Believe (Reprise 2)”].

But General D. has followed them there, and appears as a giant fish to gobble them up. Frantically, Ann suggests they use the bed’s sheets as wings, and soon they’re flying up into the sky [“Something in the Air”]. There they’re greeted by a chorus of singing clouds [“Delighted”], and Marcella and Ann wonder if this heavenly sight could be heaven itself [“So Beautiful”]. The clouds offer Marcella three wishes, the first of which she uses to see her deceased canary Yellow Yum Yum [“A Heavenly Chorus”] and the second to see her father. She uses he third wish to see her absent mother, but soon into their dance, the Rat in the Rolls Royce appears to steal her away into a tango [“The Shooting Star”]. Poppa jumps in and fights him off, regaining Mommy’s affection. Marcella wishes they could be married again, and the clouds comply, creating a beautiful ceremony and bringing the happy family back together [“The Wedding”]. Before any vows can be said, the sky begins to storm and General D.’s ominous laughter is heard. The idyllic illusion shatters, and Mommy spits out “you’re a rope around my neck” before running away from the altar.

Marcella runs off, and Ann follows to try to cheer her up. The whole ordeal has only made the little girls’ outlook on life even more nihilistic, and she lashes out at Ann, calling all these dreams and make believe just useless lies before running off. This hits Ann right where it hurts, and she doubts her ability to save the day when she’s just a “Rag Dolly”. Nevertheless she refuses to give up, and soon gets the dolls back on the boat and ready to head off.

Bat flies in to interrupt their journey and cuts the rope anchoring them to the clouds, sending the bedboat and its inhabitants crashing to the ground.

### Act II

The act opens with the Raggettes again, reprising their narration and bringing us back into the tale [“Gingham and Yarn (Reprise 1)”]. We open on the roof of a factory, the dolls and pieces of the bed boat are scattered about and Bat hangs upside-down from the broken mast. Bat and Wolf’s bickering wakes Marcella, and soon the rest of the dolls crawl from the wreckage. Bat and her backup dancers serenade them, ultimately seducing Andy into giving her the map [“You’ll Love It”]. After the song, Bat and Wolf’s arguing reveals they’re actually Red Fang and Yum Yum, Marcella’s deceased pets whose spirits had been taken in by General D. and twisted into hateful monsters. She pleads with them to remember her, but to no avail. General D. appears in a cloud of smoke, and waxes poetic on the meaninglessness of life and his goal to bring peace to the suffering souls of the world. He shows off his opal thumb ring, which acts as a window to a giant eye in the sky, showing him anywhere in the world at his request. They ask if he can see the doll doctor, and he tells them he is the doll doctor, as well as every other kind of doctor, death curing everything in the end. The dolls decide to steal the ring, and sing a lullaby to put the trio to sleep [“A Little Music”]. The Camel, filled with the joy of music, rises into the air “on the wings of song”, and the rest grab ahold as they fly off for L.A.

When they're far off in the distance, General D. wakes up, outraged to find his ring stolen. He orders Bat to track them down, but she refuses, jealous of his obsession with Marcella. Enraged by her insubordination, he grabs her by the throat and tosses her down the smokehouse chimney. Wolf is saddened by her death, but is given no time to mourn as he's sent out to hunt the dolls down.

Camel and his passengers crash-land in the Grisley Woods, and are soon lost in the darkness among the endless trees with ominous skeletons in their branches ["Gone"] and get completely separated. In a clearing, the Witch emerges, picking petals from a black daisy as she plays "loves me, loves me not" ["Why Not?"]. She takes a collection of miscellaneous things out of her handbag, such as a bottle of booze, a mirror, and a baby shoe, and looks at them each in turn before pulling out a clothesline. Raggedy Ann wanders in and asks the woman if she can help her find the way out of the woods, but the Witch is preoccupied with getting the rope tied into a running bowline. Marcella, Panda, and Camel find their way to the clearing, the Witch becoming increasingly distressed as they bumble about and are unable to help her with the knot. Baby Doll finally wanders in, and the Witch drops everything to run to her, reminded of her own baby and the life she left behind ["What Did I Lose?"/"Somewhere"]. Marcella realizes that the baby shoe is her own, and the Witch is her own absent mother. The two have a touching reunion, which is interrupted by the Wolf. He's been told to take them back to General D., but refuses, still bitter over Bat's death, and instead tells them to run off and make him look good. The Witch runs off into the woods while the dolls and Marcella finally head off to the doll hospital.

There they are greeted by a chorus of showgirl nurses ["Welcome to L.A."], and everything seems like it's finally going right. There's no sign of the Doll Doctor himself, however, and the hospital's doctors only repeat the same absurd nonsense as the ones before ["Diagnosis (Reprise)"]. The dolls look in the ring to see the real Doll Doctor in the cellar in chains, but before they can open the cellar door General D. climbs out, carrying with him Wolf's corpse. He says the animal died of "independent thinking", and with the deadline coming up, Marcella is next. The hospital changes to a dreary cemetery as he reveals it was a trap all along and gloats about the inevitability of death ["I Come Riding"]. First, however, he wants his ring back, but when he goes to take it from where it's pinned to Ann's apron, he brushes the candy heart on her chest and recoils, poisoned by its pure love. The dolls tie him up with the heartstrings from Ann's heart, and head down into the cellar to save the Doll Doctor.

They undo his chains and beg him to examine Marcella, which he first protests, as he is a doll doctor, not a girl doctor. His diagnosis is that the "chick" has a broken heart, and upon hearing her father's pet name for her, Marcella recognizes her Poppa underneath his mask. He takes a second to jog his memory, and they embrace. He says the only thing that will cure her is a heart replacement of a candy heart that says "I Love You". Free of his bonds, General D. appears at the top of the cellar stairs, waiting to collect his soul. Raggedy Ann sacrifices her "I Love You" heart, giving it to Marcella before ascending the stairs to meet the General. He boasts that he was right all along; it was always Ann's soul he was there to collect.

The dream fades away, and Marcella wakes up back in her room feeling better then ever. She tells Poppa about her strange dream, and he notes that Raggedy Ann's candy heart is gone, saying she ate it in her sleep. She denies it, and he says he'll get her a brand new one anyway. The whole company sings "Gingham and Yarn (Reprise 2)" as Marcella, Poppa, and her Raggedy Ann doll walk off hand-in-hand.

## Musical Numbers

*For the 1986 Broadway production.*

Act I
* "Overture" – Orchestra
* "Gingham and Yarn" – Company
* "Carry On" – Poppa
* "Diagnosis" – Doctors
* "The Light" – Marcella and Dolls
* "Make Believe" – Raggedy Ann & General D.
* "Blue" – The Camel & Raggedy Ann
* "Make Believe (Reprise 1)" – Raggedy Ann, Marcella, Dolls & Company
* "Make Believe (Reprise 2)" – Raggedy Ann & Marcella
* "Something in the Air" – Company
	+ "Delighted" – Clouds
	+ "So Beautiful" – Raggedy Ann, Marcella & Clouds
	+ "A Heavenly Chorus" – Yellow Yum-Yum
	+ "The Shooting Star" – Mommy, Poppa, and The Rat in the Rolls Royce
	+ "The Wedding" – Company
* "Rag Dolly" – Raggedy Ann

Act II
* "Gingham and Yarn (Reprise 1)" – Company
* "You'll Love It" – Bat, Raggedy Andy & the Batettes
* "A Little Music" – Marcella, Raggedy Ann and Dolls
* "Gone" – Dolls & Company
* "Why Not?" – Mommy
* "What Did I Lose?" – Mommy
* "Somewhere" – Raggedy Ann, Mommy
* "Welcome to L.A." – Nurses
* "Diagnosis (Reprise)" – Doctors
* "I Come Riding" – General D.
* "Gingham and Yarn (Reprise 2)" – Company
* "Rag Dolly (Finale)" – Cast

## Cast/Characters

* Fire Fins, who is portrayed by a puppet and voiced by the actor who plays General D. and whose puppeteer goes uncredited.

## Background

### Genesis

After finding success with their 1969 *Hallmark Hall of Fame* production of *The Littlest Angel*, Broadway producers Richard Horner and Lester Osterman searched for another property that they could adapt into a live-action TV special. "Raggedy Ann came up in our conversation," Horner recalled, "and I said, 'Gee, that would be a great thing for what we have in mind.'" Horner acquired permission from Bobbs-Merrill Company, who owned the rights to the characters, and set to work developing the project, with *Littlest Angel* co-writer (and Osterman's daughter) Patricia Thackray penning the script. At a 1974 Friar's Club roast for Johnny Carson, Lester and Osterman found themselves seated at a table next to Emmy-winning *Sesame Street* composer Joe Raposo, who took a shine to their idea. "I was then presented with about two dozen books of Raggedy Ann and Andy," Raposo recalled. The composer studied the books and composed 25 songs for potential inclusion. Titled *Rag Dolly: The Raggedy Ann Musical* (a title eventually used for some of the stage productions), the show was slated to feature Goldie Hawn and Dick Van Dyke as the rag dolls. "Then as we got further and further into the project, we realized that it had wider possibilities for acceptance than just as a television special," Horner said. "So we thought we should do it as a movie for theaters." Raposo personally worked his magic to get ITT, then the parent corporation to the Bobbs-Merrill Company, to produce and animator Richard Williams to direct the film. The result was the 1977 animated feature *Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure*. " It was going to be the kids movie of the season," recalled Raposo. "It opened on Sunday... and on Wednesday a little movie called *Star Wars* that nobody thought would do anything opened and the rest is history." In 1981, Thackray dropped the music and reworked the film's script as a play titled *Raggedy Ann & Andy*, which remains available to license for regional/school productions in the US and Canada.

### 1983 Workshop

Several years later, Raposo found himself joining the board of The Empire State Institute for the Performing Arts, (ESIPA) where producing director Patricia Snyder, who had caught the movie on television, urged him to adapt a stage musical for the character. The result was a workshop piece known as *Raggedy Ann and Andy* composed by Raposo and written by Tim Mason. It hit the stage for the last time December 10-20th, 1983, involving Patricia Birch, guest director Bill Gile, and cast from actors in house at ESIPA. It followed the dolls as they ran away from home to join the circus, but Raposo concluded, "It simply didn't work." Little is known about this script, which fans refer to as "the circus draft," aside from the track list and a handful of character names.

### Development

Soon after the show closed on Broadway, playwright William Gibson composed an undated, unpublished journal simply titled *Raggedy Ann*, which is known to exist in two drafts - the longest totaling 39 pages - both of which abruptly conclude. The story is one-sided, meandering (two pages are irrelevant), and incomplete, but It's the only detailed account of the early production that's come to light. In it, Gibson revealed himself to be an outsider among dispirate collaborators who were so intimidated by his stature that they were unable to provide challenging constructive criticism of his work, which he confessed "was a pity."

According to this memoir, Gibson was Snyder's first choice for the book, so she pursued him for several years with the persistence of "a tank." She retained the stage rights to the character after the closure of the previous play - provided that she got the production back on its feet by December 1984 - so she talked Gibson into giving his opinion on the script and music, which largely unimpressed him. In passing, she told the fabled story of Johnny Gruelle creating the Raggedy Ann character to entertain his sickly daughter, Marcella, who died at the age of 13. He recalled, "I stared at Snyder and said, *Wow. That's a potent item, didn't it occur to anyone that's where a book begins?'*" Continuing, he exclaimed, "I was hooked; death is a subject that always brings me to life as a writer." Gibson began sketching the plot that evening and had his first phone call with Raposo, he met with Snyder and director Pat Birch the next day, knocked out an 11-page short story, and composed the first draft over three weeks in August 1984.

Although they remained outwardly amicable toward one another, there was an internal rift between the playwright and composer practically from the start. Raposo was set to receive two royalty payments that totaled double Gibson's salary, so Gibson demanded a $10,000 advance. The two had scheduled a meeting to discuss the book, but after receiving the finished pages, Raposo attempted to back out of it. The meeting ultimately occurred, but after hearing why the script and music didn't compliment one another, Gibson was surprised when Raposo informed him that the Bobbs-Merrill Company had script approval. In turn, Raposo was surprised when the company approved it, so he refused to take Gibson's calls and attempted to have him ousted from the project. When that proved unsuccessful, Raposo finally relented, with nary a word of the coup attempt ever spoken directly to Gibson. It was only at this point when Gibson learned that *Raggedy Ann* had been Raposo's pet project for a decade, and he began to have empathy for the composer. Unfortunately, this occurred too late to halt production or seal the rift between them, so the show limped ahead.

Gibson tweaked the script endlessly to accommodate song-and-dance numbers, but his story structure and huge swaths of the dialogue remained unchanged throughout the various iterations. He had salvaged eight of the songs from *Raggedy Ann and Andy*, but Birch and Raposo ultimately decided to scrap four of them. Most that survived demanded lyrical substitutions, plus many new compositions were required. Raposo was overloaded with other projects, he wasn't on the same page with the writer and director concerning the lyrical tone, he was consistently late with new material, and his heart wasn't in it. However, despite whatever reservations he may have had, the show's eventual transfers to Moscow, Washington D.C., and Broadway were a direct result of Raposo's efforts.

## Production History

### ESIPA 1984-1985

Casting was held in a rehearsal studio at The Egg in Albany, New York over three days in October 1984. Landing the title role was Ivy Austin, who had pre-established ties with both Birch and Raposo. Portraying pigtailed "hot nerd" Francine, she was a featured member of the ensemble in *Grease 2*, which Birch directed and choreographed, and her father was Danny Epstein, a longtime collaborator of Raposo's, which afforded her the opportunity to perform on several *Sesame Street* albums prior to this production. The part of the Camel went to Joel Aroeste, who was a teacher at ESIPA, Carolyn Marble (Baby Doll), Tom Pletto (Wolf), Jeanne Vigliante (Panda) were members of the ESIPA company, while Tricia Brooks (Marcella) was a local Albany resident. The rest of the production team consisted of set designers Gerry Hariton and Vicki Baral, costume designer Carrie Robbins, lighting designer Richard Nelson, and musical director Ross Allen.

Gibson invited two friends to audition. An actress gave an impressive reading but was quickly dismissed because she wasn't a singer, which miffed the writer. The other friend was Shakespearian actor Paul Haggard, a self-described failure whom Gibson had gone out of his way to help out on numerous occasions. Reading for General D., Haggard was far too good to ignore despite his lack of musical credentials. At this point, his character was not intended to sing, but Birch sent him to Raposo for security, and after an hour-long session, the composer concluded that he could carry a tune, so he booked the part.

Rehearsal began at the end of October and spanned five weeks. Birch had a reputation for being good with performers and wanted to focus on her cast, so she excluded Gibson from participating on the first day of rehearsals, but was reprimanded by Snyder, who demanded he be present. From Gibson's account, she was receptive to some of his ideas, and he was initially very impressed by her manner of directing, but gradually began to feel that her staging was "overstuffed." Gibson had conceived a show for 14 actors, with 9 sets consisting of fabric scenery that could easily be switched, but expensed swelled when Birch brought in a chorus of 9 "ragettes" who doubled as stagehands, affording them the opportunity to utilize more elaborate sets which were often seamlessly rolled in and out by the ensemble during musical sequences.

Birch strived for a pleasant creative environment and was most at home doing choreography, which was not strictly confined to dances; she wanted to display the characters' emotions and intentions through movements. With musical supervisor and longtime collaborator Louis St. Louis at the primary piano - accompanied by a second pianist to enhance the sound - Birch guided the cast, creating routines on the spot at rehearsals, which she would keep track of in her head. Unfortunately, she was prone to making regular changes to the musical arrangement to accompany the ever-changing action, which ballooned the production costs.

Gibson had conceived General D. as a human incarnation of a rat, but he was never happy with the visual depiction (it eroded further in successive stagings, where the facial appliances were dropped altogether), and his collaborators were concerned that the character was too much, so they urged him to tone it down - which he did not. Meanwhile, Birch and Raposo were finding Haggard to be an aggravation. Gibson alleged that Birch gave him conflicting directions and became upset when he couldn't get it right. Raposo finally composed a song for Haggard's character, "She Comes Riding," which began a strenuous debate over pronouns and meaning before it was ultimately changed to "*He*." Haggard worked on the number for a week, with Raposo becoming increasingly hostile because he couldn't nail it, which served to further escalate tensions with Birch. Eventually, the song was given to the Wolf character, and Gibson complained that the whole debacle had ruined Haggard's performance.

The play opened at ESIPA on December 7, 1984 under the title *Raggedy Ann*. The show played a week of previews and a week of performances, with many occurring in the morning with audiences composed entirely of busloads of New York area schoolchildren.

Almost immediately controversy ensued when Ellen Allen, a mother from Albany, New York, took her children to see the show. Horrified by the dark subject matter, Allen first complained to producing director Snyder, and then she took her complaints to the local news. Following the broadcast, the Albany public school district abruptly canceled their reservations for the show, cutting their audience by a third. Gibson thought the entire controversy was absurd, but Snyder panicked, fearing censorship, and asked Gibson to go on the news to refute the controversy. Gibson obliged but didn't mince words, telling a reporter that it was a waste of airtime and that the parents making the claims were a danger to their own children. In a later interview, he remarked of the show, "The style is for children, the content is for me." Parents sought out Gibson at the performances to provide reassurance of his work, and several months later, when Snyder brought in famed child psychologist Bruno Bettelheim for a lecture, he directly addressed the blowup, supporting Gibson's comments by remarking that "parents who tried to shield their children from such experiences were not helping them develop."

Despite the negative publicity, the reviews were decent, and the audiences were wildly enthusiastic. On the final known page of Gibson's journal, he remarked that Raposo had set his sights on Broadway and invited a group of CBS executives to see the show, but they silently came and went. The production details become murkier at this point, but CBS was indeed interested in the project and ultimately financed the transfers out of Albany.

The show re-opened at ESIPA on October 25, 1985, under the title *Rag Dolly*, and played through November 1 as a dress rehearsal for the Russian production. Paul Haggard was terminally ill with cancer and died early the next year, although this likely had little to do with the decision to recast his part. David Schramm replaced Haggard as General D., Gibby Brand took over the role of Poppa, and two of the doctors were switched, but the rest of the principal cast was unchanged. Additionally, Nelson was replaced as lighting designer by Marc B. Weiss.

Presumably, while the cast was in rehearsal, they recorded an album of demos which leaked and went on to circulate endlessly. The specific details of this recording remain unknown, the songs don't align with any known version of the show, and it's commonly been incorrectly attributed to the Broadway cast.

### Moscow

In 1972, Pat Snyder met and befriended Natalya Sats, legendary director of The Moscow Children's Theatre (later renamed in Sats' honor), through work with the International Children's Theatre Association. As part of a cultural exchange agreement, Snyder staged a production of *The Wizard of Oz* in Moscow in 1974 (featuring Joel Aroeste as the Cowardly Lion), and she helped bring two of Sats' productions to the United States in 1977 and 1978. The New Cold War prompted U.S. President Jimmy Carter to abruptly halt the cultural exchange in 1979, but this didn't diminish Snyder's and Sats' friendship. Hoping to help thaw the icy Soviet relations, Sats journeyed to the US in September 1984 with a proposal for a new cultural exchange. A ban had been imposed on Russian flights, so Sats flew to Montreal, took a train to New York, and popped into Snyder's office for a visit. She arrived just in time to see preliminary work on *Raggedy Ann* and she made a return trip in December to catch a full performance. By March 1985, tentative plans were made to bring the show to Moscow, but this was not ensured until November, when U.S. and Soviet leaders signed a new cultural agreement at the Geneva Summit. At 5 a.m. on the morning of December 3, Snyder received a formal invitation via telephone, the deal was finalized six days later, and the cast began rehearsals in Moscow on January 2, 1986.

The trip for the 75 American cast and crew members was funded by CBS, with the Soviet government footing the bill for their stay. Among them was State University of New York alum Tom Gliserman, who wrote, directed, shot and edited a 30-minute documentary titled *Rag Dolly in the USSR*, which features cast and crew interviews as well as behind-the-scenes footage and performance excerpts. Decades later as the show's popularity swelled, Ivy Austin generously shared this chronicle on YouTube, providing fans with seldom-seen visuals and little-known information to accompany the rampantly bootlegged audio.

Production moved at a breakneck pace, with all of the performers from the second ESIPA staging reprising their roles, and a crew consisting of a mixture of persons from both countries. In preparation, Ivy Austin endured a few weeks of Russian lessons, and learned to sing "Rag Dolly" in the Muscovites' native tongue. Soon after arriving, Raposo panicked, realizing that the Russians couldn't provide some unusual instruments that he needed, so his wife had them expressed from New York. Only six of the twenty musicians were American, which required an interpreter to convey Raposo's intentions. The language barrier occasionally led to difficulties - most notably, when the composer wanted to evoke the sound of a Mariachi band - but musical director St. Louis was thoroughly awed by the orchestra's intensity.

The show was not widely advertised in Moscow, but word of mouth quickly spread, the performances sold out, and tickets were scalped for ten times their original cost. It opened under the title *Rag Dolly: The Raggedy Ann Musical* on January 6 and ran for two previews and eight performances. The play was largely performed in English, but each act opened with Russian narration and cast members learned key phrases, occasionally breaking the fourth wall with little Russian asides that resulted in thunderous applause. Ivy Austin also received a three-minute standing ovation after she crooned the title song in Russian during the first preview, and all these pauses helped to bloat the running time to nearly three hours. Only a small percentage of the audience indicated a knowledge of English, and they sometimes laughed and clapped unexpectedly, but they were receptive to words like Rolls-Royce, Buick and granny knot. The Russians provided zero criticism of the dark themes, but controversy would resume when the show returned to the USA.

The production became an outright spectacle. The cast were mobbed as they signed autographs and passed out letters from American kids who were seeking pen pals, the Moscow children performed rousing English folk songs during intermission, Raposo put on a concert of songs from *Sesame Street*, and prominent Russian figures like first lady Raisa Gorbacheva and minister of culture Pyotr Demichev attended performances. Russian audiences were generally very reserved, so their outpouring of emotion was highly unusual.

News traveled slowly prior to internet connectivity, so the crew returned home to find Ivy Austin's *Raggedy Ann* visage splashed across the front pages of The Daily News and The Economist, and their trip the subject of mass media coverage. Tensions had been high between the two countries for decades, with Hollywood fervently perpetuating the American perception that Russians were secretive villains and Russian propaganda depicting Americans to be General D.-like military extremists, so the media seized upon the heartwarming story of the company's goodwill trip to entertain the children of Moscow. Unfortunately, the English-language journalists largely neglected to remark on the play itself, and the state-controlled Russian press only lavished them with praises, which set the show up to be a punchline for countless mean-spirited jokes later in the year. The overwhelming experience led the company to believe that they'd be welcomed with a similarly warm reception in The Big Apple, rather than the red-hot roasting that they conclusively received.

The show was officially translated into Russian and has been performed countless times, but the legality of these stagings has been questioned. There are bizarre interpretations of the characters, the ending is frequently altered to reunite the parents, and Raposo's songs were cut from the show (although they've been sneaked in on occasion), leaving the companies to find their own songs, which wildly vary.

### Out-of-town tryouts

Plans had already been sketched to move the show to Broadway, but the worldwide media blitzkrieg surrounding the trip to Moscow solidified it, and gossip columnist Liz Smith even remarked that they would transfer to Los Angeles after the run in Manhattan. Birch admitted a tendency to leap before she looked; Gibson hadn't had a Broadway hit in decades and was eager to show up naysayers; and he claimed that Raposo was jealous of Stephen Sondheim, and aspired to top his success. Others associated with the production have remarked that many poor decisions were made.

Roger L. Stevens, founding chairman of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts had seen one of the ESIPA stagings and agreed to produce the show, but urged the creators to bring back the original title, which had built-in brand awareness. The production, now titled *Raggedy Ann: The Musical Adventure*, had a month-long tryout at the Kennedy Center from August 23 to September 21, 1986. Some critics questioned why the Kennedy Center was producing it, and were told that it was because "it took Moscow by storm!" However well-intentioned, this remark wasn't a glowing endorsement during the Reagan era.

Songs underwent changes, eight of the principal actors were replaced, and an expanded budget allowed them to add a flying sequence, pyrotechnics, and more elaborate set dressings for the ensemble to cart around. The new poster art, by Peter Georgeson, featured a blatant emulation of the logo from the popular *Indiana Jones* film franchise (though they reverted to the original Winslow Pels poster, an image of the winking rag doll, partway into the Broadway run). The flash and razzle-dazzle did little to mask the flaws in Gibson's book, which remained largely unchanged and a bone of contention, even in the good reviews. But there were many positive notices, so it moved onto Broadway a month later.

### Broadway

Although Birch was a veteran choreographer, she had never directed a Broadway show, and Gibson noted that she remarked to Snyder, "If I screw this one up, I'm all through in New York." As the pressures mounted, Birch stopped listening to Gibson altogether as she found herself contending with an assortment of people vying for her attention, many also trying to provide creative input.

The show went into previews on October 3, and officially opened on October 16, 1986, at the Nederlander Theatre, running for 15 previews and 5 performances before abruptly closing on October 19. An audio recording of one of these shows has been circulating among musical theater collectors for decades, although the precise date is unknown. The only known TV marketing focused on audience critiques rather than providing any glimpse of the show.

The press remained silent until the official opening. Austin recalled, "I cannot remember an audience that I felt rejected the show. The reviews on opening night were shocking to us all." Snyder elaborated, “It was just one bad review after another." Beneath a headline declaring the show was a "child's garden of bad dreams," The North Jersey Record's Robert Feldberg snidely quipped that Gibson "makes *Macbeth* look like *Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm*." The Headline from the New York Post's Howard Kissel was "Throw It Back Into the Rag Bag," and he summarized by stating, "Any little girl who prizes her own Raggedy Ann doll can probably tell better stories about it than this disjointed and distasteful musical." They weren't even safe from scorn from the New Jersey Pennysaver, which complained that it boasted "an uncurable case of the *cutes* coupled with an unnerving rush of boredom."

Austin remarked that the show's future hinged on the New York Times review, which was assigned to Frank Rich, who's disparagingly known as "The Butcher of Broadway." He declared that the play "is loaded with psychoanalytic subtext - sex, death, and even a holocaustal mass grave are always peeking through Marcella's nightmares - but the author apparently considers it beneath him to wrap his highfalutin message in a coherent, let alone exciting, story." Rich went on to attack the "faceless pop songs" that made up Raposo's score, as well as Birch's direction and choreography, remarking that the Act I finale was "what Busby Berkeley might have done if he had only a half-dozen dancers and several celestial Hula-Hoops at his disposal."

The Philadelphia Daily News critic, Nels Nelson, fired back squarely at Rich and denounced other reviewers for their unfair and hostile vilification, praising the show for having an "intellectual equilibrium" and providing "more than a mere suggestion of the seamy underside of the universe." Nelson proclaimed it "bright, tuneful, funny and such wonderful nonsense that I would have happily sat through it again." He would never get that opportunity because the final performance occurred one day before his review was published. The show's closure only garnered a two-line blurb in The New York Times.

Birch summarized the production in an interview published a few days earlier:

"This is an unusual, even bizarre, piece for the Broadway theater, but it has been done by three people who really care - myself, Bill Gibson and Joe Raposo - and a score of actors, a lot of whom are overqualified for what we've asked them to do. Those actors believe in this piece, and that's gratifying." -Patricia Birch

## Reception

From Albany to Moscow to the Kennedy Center to Broadway, there was one common criticism: The story was difficult to follow. In the US, the play was also plagued by complaints/warnings concerning the dark themes. Reviews were mixed to positive until they opened on Broadway. Suddenly, the critics' assessments became so vitriolic that they served to close the show and generate continued interest decades later. However, there were defenders until the bitter end, and Raposo and titular star Ivy Austin were routinely singled out for praise.

Ken Mandelbaum described it as "one of the most bizarre musicals to ever reach Broadway" in his book, *Not Since Carrie: 40 Years of Broadway Musical Flops*. Touching on commonality in the reviews, he pointed out similarities to *The Wizard of Oz* and *Peter Pan*, remarking that "it was difficult to follow and never managed, as those musicals did, to come up with a coherent plot." He concluded that it was "too grim and humorless for children and offered too little to entertain adults."

Of the Kennedy Center performance, The Washington Post's David Richards extolled, "For all the echoes of past shows, *Raggedy Ann* is potentially an original." He praised Raposo's score, calling *Rag Dolly* "as infectious as mumps." Richards' only major complaint was the Marcella character, whom he described as "peevish, whiny and ungrateful," although he was mindful not to fault actress Lisa Rieffel. He determined, "It has some puddles of confusion and one glaring error at its center. But assuming its creators can iron things out, they've got a rarity on their hands -- a musical that wants to talk to the child in the adult, just as it courts the adult in the child."

The Evening Sun's Lou Cedrone also remarked on the young audience's reaction, concluding, "Today's children, having listened to all those records and having seen all those horror movies, accept dark far more easily than adults."

Howard Kissel of the New York Daily News was very critical of the show, but he lavished the cast with praises, remarking that "Lisa Rieffel is especially appealing as the little girl, and Elizabeth Austin makes the most of her trampy mother. Leo Burmester, Gail Benedict, and Gordon Weiss are surprisingly winning as the villains." Jeffrey Lyons, an admitted classmate and friend of Raposo's, gave a glowing review. He raved about Ivy Austin, saying that she can "charm the rags off audiences, young and old," and Raposo's songs, which he called "some of the most endearing and inventive on Broadway in a long, long time."

## Cult following

By the 21st century, the play was largely only remembered by aficionados of Broadway flops, but that began to change after filmmaker Garrett Gilchrist, who'd garnered acclaim for releasing a fan-edit of director Richard Williams' *The Thief and the Cobbler*, leaked a print of *Raggedy Ann & Andy* on the internet, providing most viewers with their first opportunity to see it in its proper aspect ratio. Concurrently, cult movie blogger Vinnie Rattolle shared the film's soundtrack and was championing a revival of the notorious Broadway flop *Carrie* when he obtained bootleg audio of a Broadway *Raggedy Ann* performance as well as an album of demos. Gilchrist and Rattolle teamed up for some preliminary research into the play in 2013, but they hit various roadblocks and abandoned the project for many years. However, Rattolle posted some of the audio on YouTube which began to generate interest, and Ivy Austin responded by posting the *Rag Dolly in the USSR* documentary eight months later.

Around this time, the demos were discovered by a Raggedy Ann enthusiast named McKenah Rose, who spent years performing preliminary research and making contact with cast and crew members before becoming a key member of the revival effort. Outside of the doll community, there was no Raggedy Ann fandom and the character had largely fallen out of American consciousness since the animated TV series was last broadcast in 1991, but there was a boost of awareness with the 2013 release of *The Conjuring* and its 2014 spin-off, *Annabelle*, based on a true story of a Raggedy Ann doll that is alleged to be possessed by an evil spirit.

Over the next few years, interest in the play grew, but it was difficult to discern the plot without visuals to accompany the audio. The sparspe information that was available created a sense of intrigue, so a script was unearthed and started making the rounds in 2018, with fans gradually making the previously-unknown details public. The following year, Ivy Austin remarked that she had plans to help with a revival, and then popularity exploded in December, when YouTuber Colin LooksBack published a retrospective video. As 2020 was ushered in and the world was shuttered by COVID-19 lockdown, the YouTube algorithms began fervently recommending *Raggedy Ann* videos, introducing the characters to a whole new generation who excitedly created groups all over the internet.

## Raggedy Ann Revival Effort (R.A.R.E.)

In February 2021, a high-schooler named Gwyneth Gaunt, 15 years old at the time, found *Raggedy Ann & Andy* autoplaying while she was supposed to be doing schoolwork, and she quickly fell down the rabbit hole. The same day, she created Raggedy Ann Revival Effort (R.A.R.E.) pages on Discord and Tumblr. Within 15 minutes, the first member, Ronnie Ladder, joined, more than 20 others had followed suit by the end of the week, and membership gradually swelled to over 100.

The group began readying a new version of the script in hopes that it can be made available to license for high school and regional theater productions, with aspirations of a run off-Broadway. Largely working from Gibson's early drafts, they've attempted to stay true to his vision while clarifying and correcting various issues that were never ironed out in the original incarnations. Marcella has been made a stronger character, the scene with the Witch/Mommy has been reworked, and Andy and the Camel were fleshed out. Additionally, they worked in Andy's song, "*(I'm) No Girl's Toy*," a fan-favorite from the film, and subsequently received sheet music that contained Gibson's dialogue, eerily indicating that Raposo had once intended to include the showstopper precisely where they'd placed it in the new script.

One of the biggest challenges was the Panda character, depicted as a magical Asian who spouts off Confucius-like wisdom in Gibson's version. Although this was a common storytelling trope in the 1980s, it became an offensively outdated stereotype in the ensuing decades. Following debate, they first substituted Babette, a French doll that was featured in the film, but concluded it didn't work, so they created original character Teddy, an educated, swashbuckling British Teddy Bear. They held their first table read of the new script in February 2022.

The fact that the group is also a fandom has elevated enthusiasm. Through fan art and creative writing, cosplay, makeup design, and even dollmaking, they've created prototypes for what they ultimately plan to put on the stage. They've also held fundraisers with pins adorned with quotes from the play.

There were dual purposes in the group's efforts, with the most obvious being the intent to revive the show themselves, since many of the young members are studying for careers in the theatre. Their second motivation was to gather production materials for preservation because the show was considered lost media. Building on work begun by others, they've amassed a collection that includes numerous variations of the script and sheet music, Gibson's journal, publicity photos, press, and Russian videos and materials.

The group was alternately told that no video footage existed and that Patricia Snyder retained the only copies, but a deep search through the NY Archives revealed a tape of an early ESIPA performance. It was listed as the show's first act, but following a drawn-out process of raising money and awaiting digitization, it was found to be complete, excluding a few brief moments where the tape seemed to have been accidentally stopped. Learning there were no copyright restrictions, they compiled detailed closed-captions and shared it on YouTube, where it garnered additional attention for the show as a lost media find, although they're quick to caution that this is a very rough early version of the play. The group is on the hunt for more materials, including a video of the Moscow performance which has been confirmed to exist.

The group has been in contact with original cast and crew members, they've garnered the support of the Joe Raposo estate, been in talks with the William Gibson estate, and hope to obtain approval from the Gruelle family.

## Previous Variations

### Early Drafts

Gibson wrote a series of early drafts when he was first brought onto the project. The first of these are narratives, only a handful of pages long, and there is one full script. The dying Marcella and journey into dreamland are a constant, though these early versions feature even darker subjects such as General D. (or, "The Stranger" as he is called in this) plucking out Bat's eyes to use when his ring is gone, even more references to his devouring of souls, and intent to feed the smokehouse fire until it consumes the world. Besides The Stranger, other characters have different titles, Bat is a Hawk, Panda is a Monkey. There are also several other side characters, such as the watchmen who Wolf unceremoniously murders offstage in order to give Bat their flashlights as a gift, the backpackers in the woods who help the Witch hang herself, and Smokey the bear who, what else, tells the Witch to put out her cigarette.

The script version features eight songs taken from the previous workshop in 1983, before Gibson's involvement, but by the next version it was whittled down to only four. These four that were cut are "Movin' Along," "The Worst Little Carnival on Earth," "I'm No Girl's Toy," and "Meg of Galloway", with "Somewhere," "The Light," "Rag Dolly," and "Blue" being the ones that survived.

### 1984

This is the version the most well-known by fans, as it's the only production to have full footage found. By this point the main plot and cast of characters had been solidified, but there were still notable changes in the songs and scenes. The suite of "*Make Believe*"s were years ahead, and the boat-building scene was instead scored by the song "Mexico", a cheery vaguely-Latin tune about their plans to sail south through the Panama Canal. The song Something in the Air had yet to see Mommy and Poppa in any form, and instead was a much more vapid detour to the serenading of various celestial figures, the clouds being joined by the Sun and Moon. He Comes Riding had been given to Wolf instead of his master. The tone is lighter than the earlier drafts, but there will still dark aspects to be cut, such as the General forcing the dolls to listen to the cries of "the animals to be slaughtered", and the Witch's scene ending not with Marcella forgiving her mother, but with Ann calling upon the Wolf to test if Mommy will stay true to her word and not run away again (a test she fails). Wolf doesn't get his moment of redemption, but his and Bat's scenes together are far more fleshed out. Other differences are expected of an early draft, many songs are earlier, less-complex versions that would be expanded upon later.

Also in this show, General D. appears as a giant rat. This was Gibson's intent from the beginning, and he was sad to see it cut in later productions.

### 1985

This era of the show is when the infamous workshop or demo recordings were taken, though it's still unknown exactly when. There have been a handful of scripts found from this time period, but the changes made were fairly simple. Despite the notorious scandal after the 1984 production, many of the darker elements went unchanged. This is also the closest known version to the January 1986 Moscow performances, whose English/Russian hybrid script has not yet been uncovered.

A notable change for the better is the addition of Mommy and Poppa to Something in the Air. The "Shooting Star" verses which existed previously were applied to Mommy, and "The Wedding" was added in. He Comes Riding was finally given back to General D., though keeping the third person pronoun, and a new song was added to welcome the dolls to the doll hospital (Welcome to L.A.).

### 1986 out-of-town tryouts

The only notable difference in the pacing of the show was when the song "Blue" was moved up so that it was *during* "Mexico". During a pre-existing dialogue break the song switches gears, the Camel and Ann sing their song as before, and everyone jumps back in for one last verse before the sequence is over. This change was reverted for Broadway, when Blue was solidly placed in the junkyard before the ship-building begins.

While the script didn't change much, the Kennedy Center production saw a huge increase in budget after their success in Moscow. Now not merely lifting straight up, the bedboat rested on two hydraulics that could make it rock with the waves. Bat upgraded from a dancer to an aerialist, flying in on a wire to attack the boat and performing dangerous stunts midair. The Camel got his "wings of song" and genuinely lifted a few feet via a fly system. More ensemble members were added, the dance sequences got bigger, and the actors found themselves swamped by the elaborate sets.

### 1986 Broadway

The show faced a huge downsizing from the Kennedy Center and had to scrap may of its sets and adjust the effects. To add to the chaos, here we see a whole slew of songs being swapped out and adjusted in previews. Sometimes with lines and entire sections changing day to day. "Make Believe" was added, as well as it's reprise on the boat ("Make Believe (Reprise 2)"). Later these songs would gain two more iterations, the "Make Believe (Reprise 1)" replacing "Mexico" as the main boat-building song, and "Why Not?" being added on to the end of "Gone". Before it was outright replaced by the much shorter song, "Mexico" saw a lot of cut lines and verses during previews. Bat's song "Never Get Away" was slowly re-written into "You'll Love It", with many iterations occurring in the transition. The new song featured a similar melody but a much jazzier and sultrier tune that focused on Andy more than the rest of the dolls, and along with the change came new choreography. While Bat was getting more dancing, she was getting fewer and fewer lines as her scenes with Wolf were cut, leaving their backstory with Marcella as merely a hint for particularly attentive audiences. Panda's lines were continuously cut down as well, as the actors and stagehands sought to lessen the racist caricature's presence while the creatives steadfastly refused to outright remove him. This only added to the show's confusing tone, as many of these lines had driven the plot.

"Something in the Air" saw the addition of the Rat in the Rolls Royce, and his dastardly tango as he tries to steal Mommy away, and A Little Music added an operatic duet between Raggedy Ann and The Camel. Several songs, such as "Blue" and "Welcome to L.A.," become more upbeat, and the General's "He Comes Riding" was changed to the more boastful "I Come Riding" now featuring a supporting choir. Many of these song changes, as well as the Witch's scene ending with unquestioned forgiveness, gave the whole show a cheerier and saccharine tone, making the few dark aspects that remained seem even more out-of-place.

### Narrative Drafts

Also found have been several drafts of the story in narrative form, written as a novel instead of a script, though unfortunately they all end abruptly once the dolls are on the boat. These drafts are difficult to place on the timeline, since the bird is "Yellow Yum Yum" like she would be later, but General D. is still a rat, and there are lines alluding to the placement of songs like Make Believe, and yet story aspects that would never pop up in any known script. It's likely whenever they were written, Gibson was writing with less input from his collaborators.

The most interesting addition to these drafts is Marcella's pet fish Fire Fins. In the backstory, Andy gets his arm bit off (as opposed to getting his foot stuck in the floor crack), and when General D. appears in Marcella's room he eats the fish alive. The giant fish we see later with the voice of General D. is then said to be Fire Fins reincarnate.

## Gallery

Ivy Austin singing "Rag Dolly" 1984The evil trio, Marcella, and Ann, Moscow cast 1986Raggedy Andy, Moscow 1986David Scramm backstage as General D, Moscow 1986Andy, General D, Bat, and Wolf, Moscow cast 1986Bows, Moscow 1986General D.'s lair, Moscow 1986Raggedy Andy and Ann in Moscow, 1986Raggedy Ann and Andy in D.C., 1986Raggedy Ann and the Camel, 1986The boat lifts into the clouds, Kennedy Center 1986Wolf, General D, and Bat, Kennedy Center 1986General D.'s entrance, Kennedy Center 1986Andy and Bat, Kennedy Center 1986Raggedy Ann comes to life, Kennedy Center 1986Raggedy Ann and Marcella, Kennedy Center 1986Happy wedding day, Kennedy Center 1986The Clown Doctors, Kennedy Center 1986Nederlander Theater marquee, Broadway 1986Leo Burmester backstage, 1986Macmillian advertisement featuring the show listed as "Rag Dolly," Broadway 1986
## Videos

Lost Raggedy Ann Musical (Recovered ESIPA Footage 12-15-1984) -CC-Rag Dolly In The USSR, A Documentary-2RAGGEDY ANN (1986, Broadway)Raggedy Ann review with Stewart Klein
## External Links

* Wikipedia: *Raggedy Ann* (musical)
* Archive.org: Raggedy Ann Review by Jeffrey Lyons

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Canemaker, John (1977). "CHAPTER IV: Setting the Gears in Motion". The Animated Raggedy Ann & Andy. The Bobbs Merrill Company. ISBN 978-0672523298.
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 O'Haire, Patricia (1986-10-12). "And a Little Doll Shall Lead Them". New York Daily News. Retrieved 2021-08-15.
3. ↑ Canemaker, John (1977). "CHAPTER V: The Richard Williams Story". The Animated Raggedy Ann & Andy. The Bobbs Merrill Company. ISBN 978-0672523298.
4. ↑ Rosenfeld, Megan (September 24, 1986). "MUSICAL BECOMES RAGS TO BROADWAY STORY". The Washington Post. p. C6.
5. ↑ "Dramatic Publishing: Raggedy Ann & Andy". 2022-05-08.
6. ↑ Patricia, Hall (2001). Raggedy Ann and Johnny Gruelle: A Bibliography of Published Works. Pelican Publishing. p. 180. ISBN 9781565541238.
7. ↑ "Egg Subscription Series Opens With Orson Bean". The Press and Post. 1983-08-31. p. 3. Retrieved 2022-05-08.
8. ↑ Mandelbaum, Ken (1991). Not Since Carrie: 40 Years of Broadway Musical Flops. pp. 211–212.
9. ↑ Richards, David (1986-08-25). "Theater: Raggedy Ann". The Washington Post.
10. ↑ Cedrone, Lou (1986-08-27). "'Raggedy Ann' is Spectacular but Baffling". The Baltimore Sun. p. 22.
11. ↑ Kissel, Howard (1986-10-17). "Throw It Back Into the Rag Box". New York Daily News. p. 149.
12. ↑ Lyons, Jeffrey (1986). "Raggedy Ann Review". Internet Archive. Retrieved 2021-08-18.