MARY MARTIN & ETHEL MERMAN: THE FORD 50TH ANNIVERSARY SHOW APPEARANCES (NBC-CBS 6/15/53) Mary Martin, Ethel Merman

On June 15, 1953, the Ford Motor Corporation threw itself a 50th birthday bash on the NBC and CBS television networks. The Ford 50th Anniversary Show pulled out a lot of stops befitting its status as the “nation’s car’, but nothing on the show surpassed the joint-appearance by the two reigning divas of the American musical theatre, Mary Martin and Ethel Merman.

Martin and Merman were pretty much at opposite poles in terms of their performing style. It would be as difficult to imagine Merman as the Nellie Forbush of South Pacific as it would be to picture Martin as the fierce stage mother of Gypsy. Both ladies did descend that fabulous staircase in Hello, Dolly!, but Dolly Gallagher Levi is a rather more homogenous character who found a safe harbor with such dissimilar interpreters as—Pearl Bailey and Betty Grable.

The Ford special was wide-ranging. Marian Anderson and Kukla, Fran and Ollie were among the guest performers; but it was Martin and Merman who were given the lion's share of the program and, with their now-legendary duet which high ighted the show, they made television history.

This release compiles all of the musical numbers performed by Martin and Merman on the telecast, including a couple of Merman solos, a delectable fashion-show pantomime by Martin, a lip-synched vaudeville turn and, finally, The Duet. Now, more than 70 years after the event, the excitement of that magical evening endures again for an entire new generation of viewers.