Louis Jourdan: Ah, yes! I remember it well.

I just saw that Louis Jourdan has died. I saw him on stage in Gigi when I was in St. Louis in 1984-85. He played the young playboy Gaston Lachaille in the 1958 movie version. In the mid-80s he was playing Honoré Lachaille, the role Maurice Chevalier had played in the movie.

I saw him at the Fox Theater, one of the grand old movie palaces from the 1920s. It is called the Fabulous Fox for a reason. It had been completely restored a couple of years before I was there, and part of the deal the city had made with the restoration project was that a number of free tickets had to be made available to the local community for all performances that took place. It was only a few blocks from St. Louis University where I was studying. So some of us in the Institute for Religious Formation would go stand in line for free tickets. You wound up seated high in the nosebleed section, but after the first break, you could move down closer. 

Pop culture note: The title of this post refers to one of the songs in the play, in which two characters have very different memories of an earlier encounter:

We met at nine, we met at eight, I was on time, no, you were late
Ah, yes, I remember it well

We dined with friends, we dined alone, a tenor sang, a baritone
Ah, yes, I remember it well

That dazzling April moon, there was none that night
And the month was June, that's right, that's right
It warms my heart to know that you remember still the way you do
Ah, yes, I remember it well

How often I've thought of that Friday, Monday night
When we had our last rendezvous
And somehow I foolishly wondered if you might
By some chance be thinking of it too?

That carriage ride, you walked me home
You lost a glove, aha, it was a comb
Ah, yes, I remember it well

That brilliant sky, we had some rain
Those Russian songs from sunny Spain
Ah, yes, I remember it well

You wore a gown of gold, I was all in blue
Am I getting old? Oh, no, not you
How strong you were, how young and gay
A prince of love in every way
Ah, yes, I remember it well