Verdugo Views: Glendale High grad sang her way to stardom
Some time ago, local history fan John Hammell Jr. sent me an envelope filled with information about Mary Costa, a 1948 graduate of Glendale High.
Included was a copy of a May 17, 2001, Glendale News-Press article by the late Chuck Benedict. Reading it brought to life Costa’s successful singing career.
Benedict wrote that — back in 1946 — Costa and her family, who lived in Knoxville, Tenn., came to visit relatives in Los Angeles. At a party given by her aunt, Costa and others were standing around the piano and singing when a woman who was a prominent supporter of the opera took her mother aside and told her that Costa had great potential.
The woman suggested that the family move here and that she would arrange for Costa to study voice at the Los Angeles Conservatory.
The Costa family traveled back to Knoxville, talked it over and decided to make the move. They stayed with relatives in La Crescenta for a while, then settled on Eden Avenue, “where the Glendale 2 Freeway now passes over Glenoaks,” she told Benedict.
Costa enrolled as a junior at Glendale High and auditioned for the lead role in an operetta, “The Prince of Pilsen.” She got the part, but, she told Benedict, the first dialogue rehearsal “was a disaster” because of her accent.
So, she added visits to drama teachers to her already busy schedule and, by opening night, she spoke the lines perfectly.
During her senior year, Costa concentrated on drama classes, which led to TV and radio commercials. She wrote a play for local radio station KIEV, performing the lead role.
One of her close friends at Glendale High was fellow classmate, Gloria Talbott, who she admired “because she had so much poise and talent,” Costa told Benedict. Talbott became a film star and, several years later, when Costa was singing with the San Francisco Opera, came backstage to say hello.
In 1952, Costa was chosen to sing the lead in Walt Disney’s “Sleeping Beauty,” which was released seven years later, in 1959. Meanwhile, she told Benedict, she made her opera debut in 1958 at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, playing the lead in Guild Opera’s “The Bartered Bride.”
Her Guild Opera performance led to appearances in England, at the San Francisco Opera and, in 1964, at the Metropolitan Opera in New York.
For years, Benedict wrote, Costa was the opera world’s most-in-demand Violetta, the lead in “La Traviata.”
Eventually, after a successful career, Costa retired to care for her mother, who passed away in 1993 at age 101. Costa later moved back to the Knoxville area.
In 2015, Costa, along with Bobby Jones, BB King, Loretta Lynn and Cormac McCarthy, received a Distinguished Artist Award from the Tennessee Arts Commission. According to its website, Costa continues to be a positive example and leader through her mentorship of the next generation of great singers at the University of Tennessee and other schools.
“In the same way that she signs her name ‘Princess Aurora’ when sending letters to sick children in need of a smile, Costa has used her talent and dedication to make a difference in the lives of all those she has touched, and continues to shine a beautiful light on Knoxville and the state of Tennessee,” according to the website.
And it all started in Glendale.
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To the Readers:
John Hammell Jr. also sent me an email link to a March 8, 2016, special edition of the Glendale High Explosion by the beginning journalism classes, under adviser Patrick Lancaster.
Editors Aaron Alexander, Tiana Cortada, Allison Flores and Valerie Jimenez issued 12 pages of tidbits about the high school’s history, celebrities and famous sports figures including Frank Wykoff, Babe Herman, Dwight Stones and Marion Morrison. Morrison, of course, became John Wayne and was one of the high school’s celebrity students, along with Gloria Talbott, Madeleine Stowe, Mary Costa, Terry Moore, Daron Malakian and Bob Eubanks.
The issue, which includes lots of text and photos, can be found online at bit.ly/2cqlB3Y
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KATHERINE YAMADA can be reached at katherineyamada@gmail.com or by mail at Verdugo Views, c/o News-Press, 202 W. First St., Los Angeles, CA 90012. Please include your name, address and phone number.
