I'm always shy when I meet people I admire so I wouldn't be able to say anything rather than, 'How do you do? Love you! Bye!'
Until I got married, when I used to go out, my mother said good bye to me as though I was emigrating.
I wanted to have a go at a pop career. My first single, 'Baby I Don't Care', was a hit, and the second, 'Bye Bye Boy', reached the Top 20.
In 1957, 'West Side Story' had introduced the musical to the reckless dark side of teen-age life; 'Bye Bye Birdie,' set in Sweet Apple, Ohio, where the citizens apparently dress mostly in chartreuse, mauve, orange, periwinkle, and turquoise, was a walk on the bright side.
Initially, I wanted to be an ice skater, but then when I was 13 I saw Bye Bye Birdie, and that was it - I wanted to be on Broadway.
I was thrown into a community production of 'Bye Bye Birdie' or something when I was a kid. I wanted to just build the sets, but I wasn't allowed to just build the sets unless I auditioned for the play. So I auditioned for the play and was thrown into the chorus. During the course of that I fell in love with it, and I never really turned back.
I know that one of the great arts that the writer develops is the art of saying, 'No. No, I'm finished. Bye.' And leaving it alone. I will not write it into the ground. I will not write the life out of it. I won't do that.
I wasn't originally taking drama, but the drama teacher asked me to audition for Bye, Bye Birdie. I did and got the lead role. Initially I was kind of scared, but once I did it I got bitten by the bug and loved it.
The worst way of flying, I think, is standby. It never works. That's why they call it standby. You end up standing there going, 'Bye!'
We didn't have movies in this little mining town. When I was 12 my mom took me to New York and I saw Bye Bye Birdie, with people singing and dancing, and that was it.