[78-L] Mae Questel

[Michael Biel]

Randy Watts wrote:
>> at one point he said she did make the claim that her record of "On the Good Ship Lollipop"
>> sold over a million copies and "saved Decca." I was not aware that her record sold
>> extraordinarily well or that Decca was in need of salvation at the time.

From: Mark Bardenwerper <citrogsa at charter.net>
> She did suffer from Alzheimer's.
> Seriously, it is not that far fetched. At a time when record companies 
> were foundering in droves and a good selling record was perhaps 50,000, 
> a 2 million seller must have been quite a gold mine.

It is very, very, very, very, very, very, very far fetched that this
record sold more than 20,000 copies let alone 2 million.  NOTHING in the
1930s sold anywhere near that, even HUGE hits.  This is not a common
record.  How many copies have you ever seen??  I've never seen one.  But
I've seen dozens of Amapola.  

> Even the big boys were suffering. Look at the demise of Brunswick,
> which was swallowed by ARC (Decca).    Mark L. Bardenwerper, Sr.

ARC was not Decca.  The mergers were rather complicated, but Brunswick
was doing relatively well in the mid to late 30s as the full price pop
label of ARC before ARC was taken over by CBS in 1938.  In the early 40s
Columbia turned the pre-ARC part of Brunswick over to Decca.  Decca
never had anything to do with ARC.

>> Since we're talking about her, it's a good time to ask, does anybody have any idea
>> if there's any truth in what she said, or was she suffering from the kind of
>> career-enhancing "False Memory Syndrome" that sometimes plagues aging performers.

BINGO!!  

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com  



-------- Original Message --------
On 7/1/2012 6:49 PM, Randy Watts wrote:
> She had an album on Columbia's Harmony subsidiary in 1958 titled ON THE GOOD SHIP LOLLIPOP: FAVORITE SONGS FROM CHILDREN'S FILMS. I haven't heard it in ages, but as I recall they were new recordings.
> 
> Speaking of Questel, a friend once told me about running across a 1970s interview with her while he was looking for something else in microfilmed newspapers. He said the interview was largely concerned with her voice-over work in animated cartoons, but at one point he said she did make the claim that her record of "On the Good Ship Lollipop" sold over a million copies and "saved Decca." I was not aware that her record sold extraordinarily well or that Decca was in need of salvation at the time. Since we're talking about her, it's a good time to ask, does anybody have any idea if there's any truth in what she said, or was she suffering from the kind of career-enhancing "False Memory Syndrome" that sometimes plagues aging performers.
> 
>