Original Publication: Newsweek – June 27, 1977
What an hour for Broadway babies to say good morning! A little past 8 a.m. recently, actress Alexis Smith was vamping across center stage in the Waldorf-Astoria’s Grand Ballroom in New York City in front of 3,000 out-of-town clothing buyers and garment manufacturers. She was dressed in a tailored gray suit slit up the side. The music was “You Do Something to Me” but the lyrics were decidedly not: “Something happens to me,” cooed Smith, “as soon as I’m wearing Visa flannel.” A few minutes later Van Johnson trotted out singing a version of “Betty Coed” that included the line: “We got perfection right here in lounge-wear.” Then Ann Miller, whose gams are as gorgeous as when she starred in “Easter Parade” in 1948, tapped an old routine dressed in gold lame, and Gloria Swanson “drowned” in a green, swan-shaped bathtub filled with bubbles made of foamed-plastic balls.
Behind all of this early-morning merriment unfolded a sketchy plot featuring Rene Auberjonois and Marilyn Sokol playing detectives in an endless series of disguises, trying to solve the murder of a feckless designer named Falston. It was all part of a curious staple of the showbiz world called the “Milliken Breakfast Show,” a star-decked extravaganza designed not so much to entertain as to advertise the products of the giant Milliken & Co. textile firm.
Today many companies, from IBM and Union Carbide to Sylvania and General Motors, are choosing to wrap their sales pitches in this sort of showbiz razzmatazz. Actors Equity in New York reports that the number of industrial shows for which it has supplied performers increased 50 per cent last year over 1975. With its 23-year history and a cast that usually numbers around 70, the Milliken show is by far the largest and most prestigious one around. “This show,” says its producer, Myron Sanft, “has more stars than any Broadway show.”
Higher Rewards: It’s probably true. Past Milliken shows have featured the likes of Angela Lansbury, Gwen Verdon, Bert Lahr and Nancy Walker. Michael Bennett of “A Chorus Line” choreographed the Milliken show for two years. “A lot of things I did in the Milliken show,” he says, “ended up on Broadway later in other shows I did.” But why would a seasoned actor want to deliver lines of dialogue detailing how Vista polyester releases perspiration odor in the wash? Simple. “An actor can make here in two weeks what it would normally take two and a half months to clear on Broadway,” says Jerry Orbach, whose part in the current show is to hype new polyester prints. Stars reportedly get $25,000 for thirteen appearances for Milliken, as well as limousines and suites at the Waldorf provided by the company. “Actors aren’t used to being spoiled, especially in the theater,” says Smith.
Is the star sell effective in the Seventh Avenue showrooms to which the audience is whisked after the show? Apparently so. But the polyester pitch doesn’t necessarily get through to the performers. “No, I don’t wear polyester if I can help it,” admits Alexis Smith. “I prefer real silk.”
This article is typed from the original material. Please excuse any errors that have escaped final proofreading.
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