Vivienne Martin

An outstanding leading lady of the British musical theatre, Vivienne Martin was born in Kartaia, New Zealand, in1936, educated at New Zealand’s Wellington College and came to England to train at RADA. In 1953 at the Lyric, Hammersmith, she was in the cast of the Alan Melville-Charles Zwar-Donald Swann revue At the Lyric, transferring to the St. Martin’s in 1954 when the show was renamed Going to Town.

Her first appearance in a musical was as Moonbeam in Vivian Ellis’s musical for children, Listen to the Wind, at the Oxford Playhouse in December 1954. The next year at the Winter Garden she was cast in a supporting role as Daisy Fig in the A. P. Herbert and Vivian Ellis romantic excursion into canal life, The Water Gipsies. When its star, Dora Bryan, had to miss performances because of a suspected pregnancy, Martin took over her role with tremendous success. Her mark was made, but when Bryan announced that she was leaving the show the closing notice was put up.

Martin played in the revue For Amusement Only at the Apollo in 1956, and subsequently took over one of the major roles in its tour. There was to be much more revue work, beginning with Fine Fettle, a Benny Hill vehicle at the Palace in 1959. In 1963 she played Lady Viola in the Ned Sherrin-Caryl Brahms -Malcolm Williamson musical No Bed for Bacon at Croydon, but a greater opportunity came when she took over the role of Nancy from Georgia Brown in Oliver! at the New, playing for a year. Another revue, Chaganog, had originally been seen in London with its one leading lady played by Patsy Rowlands, but when the show reappeared briefly at the St. Martin’s in April 1965, Martin took over.

It seemed to be a career dominated by take-overs, but now three British musicals offered her leading parts. Martin did sterling work in them, but all three flopped. She played Kate, the captain of the striking factory girls who rebelled against atrocious working conditions in Bryant and May’s match-factory, in the unusual, interesting and innovative The Match Girls at the Globe in March 1966. It was a towering performance that showed she was a considerable talent, but the writers (Bill Owen and the composer Tony Russell) perhaps didn’t quite come up with strong enough material. The grittiness of the piece didn’t help. Nevertheless, the show brought her excellent notices, but only a short run.

Mary Holland in Plays and Players wrote that:

‘the most tangible asset of all is Vivienne Martin. A thin, perky girl with straggling red hair and a pale urchin’s face she sings, dances and - most of all - acts the part of Kate with reckless, unreasoning spunk and tenderness, a Joan of Arc ready to fight like an alley-cat or croon with love. She has cut through the surplus fat of sentimentality in the book and gone to the bare bones of the character. Her portrayal of Kate remains when the inadequacies of the musical fade. She makes The Match Girls an evening worth weeping through.’

Patrons had to be quick to see her next two leads. A few months later she was back at the Saville starring as Mary Grimaldi opposite Ron Moody in his show about the great Regency clown Joey, Joey. Again, she was splendid and had a clutch of good numbers including the delightful ‘Flowers’ but the box-office did no business, the press sneered at Moody’s effort, and the show collapsed in disarray.

 

Vivienne Martin at the time of

The Match Girls

Troubled Musicals

Her subsequent musicals were mostly troubled. It didn’t seem the time for another take-over, but she stepped into Gloria de Haven’s dressing room when she left the cast of the American musical Golden Boy at the Palladium. On her first night in the leading role, the company manager suggested to Martin that she might like to introduce herself to her leading man, Sammy Davis Jnr. Martin replied that if he wanted to meet her, she would be very pleased to see him. In the event, they met on stage in her first scene. In 1970, she played Golde in a touring production of Fiddler on the Roof, and the next year Ron Moody used her again, casting her as Dru Brown in his musical Saturnalia which played for a season at the Belgrade, Coventry. Throughout her career, she had also turned up in various provincial productions, including an Ipswich staging of The Boy Friend in which she proved herself one of the finest Madame Dubbonets, and in Jane Eyre at Windsor.

Vivienne Martin with George Ogilvie as

‘La Dame au Caramel’ in the revue Chaganog

For an inferior Jule Styne musical, Bar Mitzvah Boy, she was cast as the hairdresser Sylvia. At the beginning of the pre-London tour she had two scenes and a song, but by the time the show arrived at Her Majesty’s Theatre in October 1978 the role had been reduced, leaving little to justify her third-star billing. Bar Mitzvah Boy was soon finished with. There was a supporting role in the revival of Little Me at the Prince of Wales in 1984, and she played in the revival of Once Upon a Mattress at the Watermill, Newbury. She was a gallant Fr¬ulein Schneider for Gillian Lynne (who had directed her in The Match Girls) in the revival of Cabaret with Wayne Sleep as the MC at the Strand in 1986, but the production was blighted with various difficulties (including the orchestra’s relationship with the leading man) and played its final performances without the benefit of musicians. She played in Sunday in the Park with George at the National Theatre. A great deal of television work included the musical of The Good Companions in which Martin played Elsie Longstaff. But it was difficult for her to find parts in musicals that showed her many-sided talents to their best advantage. Perhaps audiences, or even managements, were confused as to what she was: a singing actress, a leading lady or a comedienne, for - after revues died out - her marvellous comedic talents were mostly used on radio or television. Vivienne Martin showed she could range from the charged tragedy of The Match Girls to the most expert comedy playing, and the versatility perhaps clouded the issue.

Discography: Vivienne Martin

The Water Gipsies Original London cast (chorus only)
The Match Girls Original London cast
Bar Mitzvah Boy Original London cast
The Good Companions Yorkshire Television cast
Annie Get Your Gun Cover version (as Annie)
No, No, Nanette Cover version (as Nanette)