Interview Transcript
Susan was a senior in high school when she wrote to Bernstein from her family home in Brooklyn, New York. I tracked her down via her husband, and we agreed to speak in July 2024. We talked about growing up in Brooklyn, her life-long passion for West Side Story, and fan-letter writing. She also shared her memories of meeting Bernstein after an open rehearsal, and how surprised she had been when he said he liked Elvis Presley.
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Dear Mr. Bernstein,
I am at this moment listening to ‘West Side Story’ for the millionth time and I felt I had to write and thank you for everything: for writing the music to this wonderful musical, for your Young People’s Concerts, for your other television programs, and for introducing me to the world of Classical music.
When I was in ninth grade – I am now a senior in high school – I attended a rehearsal of the New York Philharmonic followed by a ‘press conference’ at which you discussed your life and your love for music. This, coming shortly after I had seen ‘West Side Story’ for the first time, provoked in me an interest in music and a sincere admiration for you and your music.
I would appreciate it very much if you would send me a photograph of yourself, possibly autographed – and thank you again, Mr. Bernstein, for everything.
Yours very truly,
Susan Maldon
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I grew up in Brooklyn, New York. And I have tried to remove traces of the Brooklyn accent from my speech. I think I’ve done pretty well. My parents didn’t want me to grow up with the stereotypical Brooklyn accent … because it was stereotypical.
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My father was an attorney. He worked for the State of New York. He … he was in charge of the disability benefits section. He didn’t have an active practice, but he worked for the state. He was firm. He was uncompromising. He went to college and law school at night. His father had died and he had a mother and two younger sisters that he had to help. So he had to work during the day and then go to school at night. He put himself through school. I give him a lot of credit for that. But I think he emerged … very firm and very forceful.
She was … she was what they now call stay-at-home moms. He didn’t want her to work. You know, that’s how it was in the ’50s. She had – before they were married – she had worked maybe as a secretary, maybe in doing bookkeeping, things like that. And she would have continued I think. She was one of nine children.
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I was interested in music. We had a lovely baby grand piano in my living room that had been my mother’s, and I took piano lessons, but I really hated it because my father, who was my teacher, wanted me to play only classical music. And I really didn’t want that. So I didn’t make a lot of progress and that’s … that’s as far as that went. But I loved music. I loved the popular music of the day. I participated in shows and skits at school, at camp.
And when I was in college, I did my undergraduate work at Cornell University, and they have a theater group there called Octagon. And I did a couple of shows with them. And then I’ve done community theater here and I really do love it.
As for Leonard Bernstein. I saw Westside Story in its original production. And I do have the play bill from that. I also had a lifelong love affair, or I loved Larry Kurt, who was the original Tony. He … he was amazing. He died much too soon. And I really came to love the music from West Side Story and Leonard Bernstein.
The music is for me spellbinding. You know, when they made the first movie, they rearranged a couple of the songs from where they had appeared in the play. At the time, I … I was offended when anybody tinkered with it because I thought it was perfect.
I loved … I met Rita Marino. You know, she was Maria in in the first movie. I met her not that many years ago. She was very She was delightful. She was performing at an event where Roland and I were the photographers. And I was able to speak with her afterward as a matter of fact, and she grew up in New York and …
Are you familiar with the skate key? These are from the skates that the roller skates we used when … when I was growing up. It’s something that went on over your shoe, and it had the wheels, and then there was a strap around your ankle, and then there were metal plates on either side of the front of your foot. And the key, you tighten them, so your foot stayed in place. And you wore … generally wore them on a string your neck.
Anyway, I had found a website that had all this memorabilia stuff, and I brought about half a dozen of these things because I had friends who would appreciate them. And I gave her one when I met her and she put it around her neck. I thought that is quite nice. So I just I loved the music. I loved the dancing and Jerome Robbins was a genius, too. And it just it reached out to me.
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Mr. Bernstein was one of the people, I don’t know if I could say the person, but who really did get me interested in music and want to participate and learn more about it. He was such an impressive personality. I could listen to him. I just … he’s one of these people that if he was up there talking, I would want to listen. There are people like that. You know, we had once had a President at Cornell. I could listen to him read the phone book, and I’d be happy. He was actually British. He had this delightful British accent. That’s how I felt about Mr. Bernstein. He just was interesting.
He used to do Young People’s Concerts. I watched every one. He was such a great communicator. Explained things so everybody could understand what he was doing. And he had such an oversized personality. It was just terrific. I watched all of them. As a matter of fact, my father was usually not one to permit a lot of television watching or things like that. But I do remember one time when we were away and he made the effort for us to get home so I could watch the Young People’s Concert that was that day. And you know, that was before you could … you had VCR and all those things. Although I have to admit he also made it possible for me to watch Superman every Monday.
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Now the article I sent you was when I was in ninth grade, and this is the cover of the magazine. It was the junior high magazine. And they had different people writing poems and stories. And I was fortunate that … he had an open rehearsal of the New York Philharmonic, and students from junior-senior high school from the school newspaper and magazines were invited to attend. It was absolutely marvellous. And so I wrote this story about it, which was printed in the book.
And … He was… the thing that really surprised me was the question … I don’t remember if I asked the question or not, but he was asked, ‘What do you think of rock and roll music?’ And he gave a very surprising answer. You know … He liked Elvis Presley and I … I thought that was great. Then I had gone to some of his concerts when I was in high school, and he used to hold court in his dressing room afterwards and people could come through. He didn’t really have much of a conversation with anyone, but I got to shake his hand and see him in person. It was great.
There was a whole line of people, of course. And I remember being back there, and, you know, we each had … it’s kind of like when you go to see the crown jewels in London, you know? You have just a few seconds to file past and take a look. So just a few seconds there, but it was very inspiring.
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I didn’t write a lot of fan mail, but I did write to Larry Kurt and Carol Lawrence to tell them how much I admired their performances and asked that they would send me photo. Well, Carol Lawrence’s people sent back an eight-by-ten, you know, headshot, I suppose. But it wasn’t personally signed. It was a stamp or something. It was okay.
Larry Kurt – and I have this too, and if you care about seeing it, I have it … I … I digitized it – he wrote back and he signed it personally. ‘To Susan, Best wishes, Larry Kurt’. My friend, Carol – the same one I was with when we didn’t have money for a tip – we were in Manhattan and he put his return address on the envelope. So we decided we were going to go and knock on the door.
And we went. He lived in…it was probably … I don’t know if it was a walk up or had an elevator, but it was one of these places. It was not that far from Carnegie Hall, maybe four or five blocks. And we went in and, you know, they have down in the lobby, they have the mailboxes with the little thing that has your name on it. And there was his name, Larry Kurt. Ah! We did not have the nerve to ring the bell. We did not have the nerve to do that.
And years later, I saw him, he was here, he was performing in… I think he was the Boys from Syracuse. I’m not sure. And I went around, I went back and the waited at the stage door. And he came out and, as I’m sure you guessed by now, you know, I like to talk. I couldn’t say a word. I was speechless, and my friend … I have a picture my friend took of the two of us together. Unfortunately, it’s a rotten picture. But I just … And I can’t think of another time that’s happened to me. No. I’m able to make conversation.
And I’m trying to think if there’s anybody else I’ve written fan letters to. You know, I did write a fan letter when John Kennedy was running for President. And I wrote to him. Well, possibly he was already President, but I wrote to him because I know they would send pictures to people on their birthday, and I wrote to ask for a picture for one of my friends. And apparently their office did send a picture to her.
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I majored in science education. And I did actually teach for a year afterwards. But I had the different electives and yeah … It was not necessarily what I would have wanted to do. I … I thought about wanting to become a lawyer and my father said absolutely no. He wanted me to be a doctor, but I said absolutely no. And … or not in so many words.
And I’m losing my train of thought… Yes. Years later, when I was sorting papers and I looked at my transcript from Cornell, I saw that all of my better grades were the non-science grades. The music. … there was a speech class. I don’t even remember what else, but all of the my better grades were not in science.
And actually a friend of mine also my roommate pointed that out to me. She said to me, ‘Suzie, I really don’t think you cared that much about your major’. And I said, ‘Well, you know, maybe not’. But I think I … part of my mind was aware that I really didn’t have much choice because I had to major in a subject that was approved by my father. So that’s what I did.
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I don’t want to forget to tell you this. I think I told you I visited his grave in the cemetery. Did I tell you that? Well, as I’m sure you know, he is buried at Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn. And it’s a huge, huge place, big… probably bigger than some cities. And there’s a beautiful view over to Manhattan at one point. Well, we went to his grave and I was surprised to see that there was not a vertical…there was not a headstone. There was just that little clunky thing that sits in the ground with his name and the date he was born and died. And his wife was buried next to him. But that was it. It was so unassuming that I was surprised when I saw that. And of course, my husband and I, being photographers, took pictures of it.
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I think when I first encountered Mr. Bernstein, I was too young to really feel the kind of impact I would have today meeting people like that. But it was a memory that I cherish – the fact that here was somebody I admired and I was able to abs… actually get up close and shake his hand and have that context. So I… I think I didn’t realize there are a lot of things you don’t realize when you’re a teenager or even a little older that in retrospect, you say to yourself … one comes to realize in retrospect that something special happened.