NEW YORK, Sept 18 (Reuters) - Three of America's leading
stage performers - Barbra Streisand, Liza Minnelli and Aretha
Franklin - paid tribute to Marvin Hamlisch on Tuesday, honoring
the late composer for his contributions to Broadway and movies,
as well as their personal lives.
The invitation-only tribute for the composer of numerous hit
records, movies and musicals such as "A Chorus Line" was held at
the New York's Juilliard School for the Arts where Hamlisch
studied as a boy after three years earlier displaying at the age
of 4 a gift for mimicking music.
Hamlisch died after a brief illness in Los Angeles on Aug. 6
at the age of 68, causing an outpouring of grief from well-known
entertainers and fans and prompting Streisand, Hamlisch's friend
for the past 45 years, to organize the tribute.
Streisand performed "The Way We Were - one of Hamlisch's
best known songs and one of Streisand's biggest hits - in the
tribute's finale. She also recalled how they first met in 1963
when Hamlisch was the rehearsal pianist for Streisand's movie
"Funny Girl," who would also on occasion fetch the cast coffee.
"Because I didn't drink coffee, he was assigned to get me a
chocolate doughnut," Streisand told the laughing audience filled
with friends, family and stars including Michael Douglas, Sarah
Jessica Parker and lyricists Alan and Marilyn Bergman. "But
instead of just one, he always brought me two and so our love
affair began."
Streisand told how she forged a friendship with the New
York-born composer based on a shared passion for "music, film
and food," and "without explaining why or how, we understood
each others anxieties," while joking about their shared Jewish
heritage.
MINNELLI'S CONSTANT
They ended up with a long history of working together,
including Hamlisch's turn as musical director and arranger of
Streisand's 1994 U.S. concert tour as well as writing the score
for Streisand's 1996 film, "The Mirror Has Two Faces." Hamlisch
had called Streisand "the best voice there is."
Earlier Liza Minnelli, who performed "If You Really Knew Me"
from Hamlisch's Tony-nominated 1979 musical, "They're Playing
Our Song," said she met the composer, "when I was 14 and a half,
and he was 15 and three-quarters," and soon became best friends:
"He was one of my few constants that I had in my life."
Aretha Franklin sang a rousing version of Hamlisch's power
ballad "Nobody Does It Better," which he wrote as the theme song
for the 1977 James Bond film "The Spy Who Loved Me." She
inserted the lyric, "Marvin, you are the best" to audience
cheers before lowering her voice for the spiritual ballad "Deep
River."
Other performers included Chinese pianist Lang Lang, British
stage singer Maria Friedman and trumpeter Chris Botti who all
performed songs from the 1975 musical "A Chorus Line," for which
Hamlisch won a Tony award and a Pulitzer Prize and which at the
time became the most successful show on Broadway.
Hamlisch worked right up until the days before his death and
the tribute showed off one of his more recent songs about his
love for life, "While I Still Have The Time," from the Jerry
Lewis stage-adapted comedy musical, "The Nutty Professor," which
opened this year.
Hamlisch had the rare distinction of winning Emmy, Grammy,
Oscar and Tony awards.
His wife, Terre Blair Hamlisch, began the tribute recalling
how Hamlisch often said he believed in the power of music to
connect people, and Streisand ended it 90 minutes later.
A scholarship program at The Juilliard School was
established in Hamlisch's memory.
(Editing by Bill Trott)