‘Babes’ Puts Morse Back at Center Stage

Robert Morse, who became a Broadway star in “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying” (for which he won a Tony in 1962, later starring in the movie), is well-acquainted with the highs and lows, hits and misses of an actor’s life. But he keeps smiling.

Today, he opens at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium in the California Music Theatre’s revival of Victor Herbert’s 1903 “Babes in Toyland.”

“I’ve also been on the other side,” Morse said. “I’ve done dinner theater. Five years ago, I lived in a walk-up in Brooklyn. Now I’m in a one-bedroom apartment in Hollywood. I don’t have a home in Bel-Air. There are people who don’t know who I am or where I’ve been.”

The Massachusetts-born actor, 57, who was tapped for the Toymaker’s role by Toby Bluth (who has reconceived, directed and designed the show from the ground up), is still a bit giddy about the scale--and pace--of the piece. “When Toby first called me, I said, ‘I might be interested in doing a little something in a church somewhere, maybe 10 or 12 people. But you’re asking me to do a full-blown musical between Dec. 8 and 30? Rehearse for something like 16 days, then play it for 16 days?’ ”

Morse quickly became convinced that “Babes” merited the effort.

“This will be a classic,” he said. “The original was more like a vaudeville. Songs didn’t necessarily pertain to what was going on onstage--they were just stuck in. Toby has culled lots of Herbert’s music and put it into the right places. And it’s updated, without being ‘hip.’ It’s still got Mother Hubbard, Jack and Jill, Simple Simon. But it’s also a fable of life today on this Earth, with polluted oceans and nuclear war. It says, ‘Let’s not do this to ourselves. Let’s love each other.’ ”

The actor extends that brotherly feeling to his fellow players. “I’m just a salaried minion--one of many,” Morse said. “I have my job to do, and I do it as well as I can.”

He admits, however, that his celebrity does set him apart with the audience: “I know I’m not an anonymous player. But I also know that in rehearsal and what’s really happening up there; there are no stars.”

Yet the word lingers, a memory of his glory days on Broadway.

“I don’t remember it--I don’t even remember yesterday,” Morse joked. “ ‘How to Succeed’ seems like a blink of the eye to me: ‘Who was that person?’ When you’re in the middle of it, you’re given an awful lot. People are always smiling at you and asking if you’re comfortable, and there’s a car waiting for you and first-class plane tickets, and do you want tickets for the ballgame? We can get them.

“You really don’t know how people are coming at you, because everything is money and power and prestige--and you can get very caught up in that.”

Morse sighed. “I’ve been able to understand a lot about values, about giving to other people and sharing my life. And I’m very grateful to be where I am now and still working. A lot of people my age are hanging up their dancing shoes. It’s a youthful business; people are replacing us every five or six years. But I’m a pretty lucky guy. I’ve got an old car and I feel good. I’ve got a nice family, a wonderful girlfriend. Life is fine.”

Morse attributes that calm to a deep-seated feeling of self-worth, independent of the fickleness and precariousness of his profession. “It must have been instilled by a fairy godmother or my mother and father,” he laughed, “that (others’ opinions) were no big deal, that I was OK. It doesn’t mean I don’t have emotional days when I wonder what I’m going to do, where I’m going and what life is all about.”

Morse doesn’t waste time being envious of others’ successes: “I don’t take anybody else’s inventory,” he said firmly. “That only gives me anxiety attacks. I’m not in charge, I don’t run things. If I start looking at other people, I have to say, ‘I’ll clean my side of the street, do the best I can.’ Live and let live. There are two ‘lives’ in there--a ‘live’ for you and a ‘live’ for me. Today, I’m working on self-respect; that’s something I can’t buy. And I can hold my head up because I know I’ve shown up for life and done the best I could.”

Growing up the son of a movie-house owner, Morse recalls being attached to performing early on.

“I’d put on Danny Kaye records and lip-sync to them. I got great joy out of music and movement. And I loved to make people laugh. Once I showed up at school with a bandage on my head and ketchup on it, saying I’d been hit by a branch. I was a precocious young fellow, disruptive and uncontrolled. I was asked to leave four of our finest private schools. But in high school, a music teacher decided to put me in charge of two musicals. . . . “

And he never turned back. His credits include “Sugar” and “Light Up the Sky” at the Music Center; in January he’ll begin rehearsals for the Broadway production of “Mike,” based on the life of producer Mike Todd.

“The joy is in the doing,” Morse stressed. “If tomorrow I became Magic Johnson, the beautiful feeling would be moving with the ball, shooting. It’s the same way with acting. I just enjoy doing it. If I weren’t an actor, I’d shine actors’ shoes.”