Crazy . . . for Patsy Cline, Always
Patsy Cline’s journey into American mythology began, like many, with a death by misadventure: a plane crash that killed her at 30, after an up-and-down country music career, and brought a swooning crush of fans to her funeral.
In some ways the swooning has never stopped. By way of memorials, 36 years later she has:
* A 55-foot bell tower at the cemetery in Winchester, Va., where she’s buried.
* Monuments, official and home-made, at the site of her death near Camden, Tenn.
* A highway, Route 522 in Virginia, named in her honor.
* A U.S. postage stamp.
* An annual festival in her hometown of Winchester, Va.
* A Tabernacle Choir of impressionists, imitators and Las Vegas impersonators.
* A soon-to-come (but seemingly long-in-coming) star on the Walk of Fame.
* A three-hankie, star-vehicle, Hollywood biopic, “Sweet Dreams” (1985) and a memorable portrayal of her in another, “Coal Miner’s Daughter” (1980).
* A small library of books.
* And, most recently, a touring stage production, “Always . . . Patsy Cline,” that’s stopping for a two-week run in La Mirada this weekend.
The books, most of which followed the renewed interest in Cline inspired by the movies, are mostly a reaction to them. They purport to tell “the true story,” or “the full story” or “the stories never heard before.”
As if we didn’t already know her.
As if we didn’t know that she is sassy, brassy, lusty. Unlucky in romance. Long-suffering. Despairing, vulnerable but enduring. Earthy and honky-tonk angelic.
That she goes walking after midnight. Is crazy for loving. And, occasionally, falls to pieces.
That she sometimes wails but never sobs.
And that, in a lot of important ways, she is a lot like us.
We know it because we can hear it in the records, especially those that she recorded with Owen Bradley from ’61 on, in which her voice is framed (but never overwhelmed) by Floyd Cramer’s tinkling piano, a swelling and sighing string sectionand the genteel mourning of the Jordanaires.
It’s in the voice that reaches back to both Hank Williams and Bessie Smith and, like Elvis’, burst the confines of “hillbilly music” and echoes across pop culture.
It’s a large voice from an era of large voices: Mario Lanza, Dinah Washington, Edith Piaf, Mahalia Jackson and Roy Orbison--instruments that cut through the AM static and could make your new stereo console throb across its entire dynamic range.
Onstage, Cline looked like Annie Oakley, but when she opened her mouth she became Lucia di Lammermoor--a rhinestone Callas--and the model for singers from Linda Ronstadt to LeAnn Rimes.
Despite all this, it would be easy to dismiss the continued interest in Cline as the hysteria of grief-stricken fans or the obsession of pop cultists.
Except that she keeps making fans among people who haven’t seen the movies or the musical, who know nothing of her life and death and who may say that that they don’t even like country music.
Cline, a country cross-over artist, who never had a million-seller in her life, now easily sells more than that in a year and remains not only an influence but also a rival to today’s country-music performers.
Don’t believe it?
Try to find a jukebox that doesn’t have “Crazy” on it.
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The musical “Always . . . Patsy Cline” runs Friday through April 25. 8 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday; 2:30 and 8 p.m. April 17 and 24; 2:30 p.m. Sunday; and 2:30 and 7:30 p.m. April 18 and 25 at La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts, 14900 La Mirada Blvd. $34. (562) 944-9801.