Debbie won my admiration from the day I first saw her on screen as boop-boop-a-doop girl Helen Kane in Three Little Words back in 1950. I think her work in Singin’ in the Rain (1952) and The Unsinkable Molly Brown (1964) -- which earned her a well-deserved Oscar nomination -- is among the best that movie musicals have to offer. Her live stage performances evoked cheers and applause, as my husband Larry and I witnessed while enjoying her show in Las Vegas many years ago.
My first personal interaction with Debbie came in 1995 as an assignment to cover the opening of her Hollywood Museum in Las Vegas. Happily, my husband and I were the first members of the public to enter that opening.. After the wonderful show, Debbie led a tour of some famous costumes from Hollywood movies. I gathered up the nerve to ask her about what song one set was from. She didn’t blink an eye before singing to eveyrone “Fit as a Fiddle and Ready for Love” from Singin’ in the Rain.
My second interaction took place in 2006 when Debbie came to Puebo, Colorado, as a keynote speaker for the YWCA Tribute to Women program. She impressed the large audience with a serious speech peppered with humor. When one member of the audience asked her to sing something, Debbie gave us her beautiful rendition of :”Tammy” from Tommy and the Bachelor. And I had the good luck to talk with Debbie before the night was over.
The last interaction was when Debbie agreed to be a guest on my Movie Addict Headquarters radio show in 2010. She was so entertaining! She even made jokes about her ex-husbands. Before the show was over, she was inviting us all to film critic James Colt Harrison’s lovely La Jolla home for a party – all in fun.. She made it clear that her goal involved making people laugh.
It was my good fortune to know Debbie. She even phoned me once to say how much she enjoyed IT HAD TO BE US, the romantic memoir Larry and I co-wrote under the pen names of Harry and Elizabeth Lawrence. That telephone conversation.went something like this:
DEBBIE: Hello! This is Debbie.
ME: Debbie? (pause) The real Debbie?
DEBBIE: I’m Debbie Reynolds
ME: Oh! Are you the real Debbie?
DEBBIE: Yes. I’m calling about IT HAD TO BE US. I loved it!
ME: That’s wonderful. So glad you like it, Debbie. Thanks for reading it.
DEBBIE: Just wanted to tell you and Larry.
ME:: We are so happy to hear from you!!!
And then I felt like fainting.
As all Debbie fans, I loved her dearly -- and I still do.
Debbie Reynolds – April 1, 1932 – December 28, 20i6
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