Those were the glory days when television featured opera stars regularly on variety shows — back when there actually were variety shows on television. While we must acknowledge the opera singers who brought opera to television in the 1950s, I was born in 1960 so I will leave that to others. Many of us remember a time when on any given night (or day), you could tune in and see Leontyne Price, Joan Sutherland, Anna Moffo, Martina Arroyo, Roberta Peters, Marilyn Horne, Shirley Verrett, Beverly Sills, Franco Corelli, Richard Tucker, Robert Merrill, just to name a few. One of the divas featured regularly on television was Mary Costa.

The performance that never fails to put me in a festive mood is Costa as a guest star of the 1971 Bing Crosby Christmas Special. Costa appears in four parts of the special.
First (18 minutes and 24 secs into the special), she sings a Christmas solo. She exudes Hollywood glamour, her voice aglow. Right after her solo, she joins the show’s legendary star for a duet (21 mins and 38 secs in). The medley sung by Crosby and Costa is a wildly entertaining mad whirligig which careens from song to song for over four minutes.

Next up (32 mins and 42 secs in), in what could be described as an erstwhile salute to vaudeville, Costa joins Crosby and Goulet in a uber-campy song and dance routine that has to be seen to be believed – all served up by the three stars in matching Santa Claus outfits.

Lastly (39 mins and 5 secs in), Costa joins Robert Goulet for an abbreviated but heartfelt “O Holy Night.”

The video quality of the full special posted at the top is not particularly good, but the video quality of the two excerpts – the Costa & Crosby Christmas Medley, and the Costa & Goulet “O Holy Night,” are of excellent quality.

So, break out your Christmas sweaters, spike your eggnog, and venture back to the early 70s when sugar beat spice and stardom was nice.

Comments