"The Best Damn Musical!"/The First Fifty Years of the Fabulous "Gypsy." In Seven Parts. Part 4.

Of all the people who have been associated with "Gypsy" in one form or another over the years, the most fascinating is Robert Tucker.

Hands-down.

Here are a few Robert Tucker factoids...

Robert Tucker was assistant choreographer to Jerome Robbins on the original 1959 production of "Gypsy." His son Ian Tucker played the role of Angie, one of the dancing framboys in the production. (The senior Tucker also assisted Robbins earlier on "Bells Are Ringing" and "Peter Pan.")

Robert Tucker recreated Robbins' original choreography for Mervyn LeRoy's 1962 film version of "Gypsy," with son Ian once again essaying the role of Angie for the movie.

Robert Tucker also recreated Robbins' choreography for Arthur Laurents' 1973 London production of "Gypsy" and Laurents' first Broadway revival of the show in 1974. In both productions, the role of Louise was played by Zan Charisse, Tucker's daughter. Tucker's wife is Nenette Charisse, sister of Cyd. Zan took here mother's maiden name professionally. (When "Gypsy" was revived in '74, most people assumed Zan was Cyd Charisse's daughter. The resemblence was striking.)

Robert Tucker also did the choreography for the main credits of David Swift's "Under the Yum Yum Tree" in 1963 (produced by Frederic Brisson, husband of Rosalind Russell, who of course played Rose in the film version of "Gypsy") and designed Elizabeth Hartman's go-go dances for Francis Ford Coppola's "You're a Big Boy Now" in 1966.

Robert Tucker also worked variously as vocal suerpvisor and vocal arranger on such film musicals as "The Sound of Music" (1965), "My Fair Lady" (1964), "Jumbo" (1962), "West Side Story" (1961), "Can-Can" (1960) and such MGM titles as "Gigi" (1958), "Silk Stocking" and "Les Girls"(1957), "It's Always Fair Weather" (1955) and "Kiss Me Kate" (1953).

That's just a partial list. There are many more. And his Broadway credits are even more innumerable. Now you know Robert Tucker.