Robert Of ‘La Mancha’ Goulet Stars In Tour Of Broadway Favorite

To those of a certain generation, Robert Goulet will always be the square-jawed Lancelot in “Camelot,” singing “If Ever Would I Leave You.”

To those of a younger generation, Robert Goulet is “that ESPN guy.” Goulet has been making campy basketball promos for the all-sports channel for two years, playing on his finger-snappin’ Las Vegas personality and singing lounge tunes such as “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown.”

“It’s amazing,” said Goulet by phone from a tour stop in San Diego. “People on the streets, in hotels, in restaurants, people who would not necessarily have said two words to me before, say, ‘Love those commercials.’ “

Maybe it’s not the highest form of recognition, but Goulet gets a kick out of it anyway. Meanwhile, his energies remain focused on the art that he is truly famous for, the art of the musical and the concert. He spends most of his time these days doing touring musicals (such as “Man of La Mancha,” which opens at the Spokane Opera House Wednesday) and doing pops concerts with orchestras. He can’t choose which one he likes best.

“When you’re doing one, you want to do the other,” said Goulet. “Therefore, I miss the fact that I can’t get up there on stage and say what I want to say and sing what I want to sing. (In a musical) I’ve got to be up there as part of a whole lot of other people. Like in a football team, you can’t have one star. You have to have 11 players, all doing their jobs, if you want to make a touchdown.”

He thinks this version of “Man of La Mancha” scores big, even though he says he never wanted to be the quarterback.

“I didn’t want to do this role, ever,” he said. “They asked me to do it 20 years ago, and I said no. That’s because once I talked to Richard Kiley, who of course originated the role. Hal Linden was backstage in the same dressing room. They had both done it. They both said, ‘Don’t do it.’ “

Why? Because it’s tough on the voice and on the body. As Miguel Cervantes (and his alter-ego, Don Quixote), the lead actor is onstage 95 percent of the time, and on his knees for much of that.

“It’s not the easiest role I’ve ever played, but I must say it’s rewarding,” said Goulet.

The role has already taken its toll on Goulet. He is having hip problems, and the rake of the stage had to be lessened because of it.

“I am performing in pain,” conceded Goulet. “But if I have to be in pain (in character), it’s very easy.”

One kind of pain he no longer has to worry about is the kind that once plagued him at the beginning of his career: stage fright.

He was accustomed to performing in front of microphones and cameras; he had been a young Canadian singing star. Yet when he got his big break in 1960 as Lancelot on Broadway with Richard Burton and Julie Andrews, he was petrified by all of those people out there watching him.

“I was afraid to even look at them,” he said. “They scared me. So one night Laurence Olivier came backstage and said, ‘We can’t see enough of your eyes. Can you wiggle your ears?’ And I said, ‘Yes, sir.’ And he said, ‘Well, try that.’

“And the next day, I said, ‘Well, he told me to do it, let me give it a try.’ So I looked up and wiggled my ears - I didn’t wiggle them, I just pulled them back a little bit - and it opened my eyes. I looked out there, and my goodness, they weren’t all ogres and terrible people with knives coming at me. They were little old ladies with blue hair, and they were looking at Richard Burton on the other side of the stage. And I said, ‘What am I frightened of?’ And from that point on, I’ve been having a marvelous time.”

Goulet has appeared in “The Fantasticks,” “On a Clear Day You Can See Forever,” “South Pacific” and “Camelot,” to name a few. In the latter, he moved up to the King Arthur role beginning in 1975.

This version of “Man of La Mancha” uses the same acclaimed set design as the original 1965 Broadway version. A dungeon is slowly revealed in the opening scene, where political prisoners await the Inquisition’s verdict. Another sub-dungeon is in the orchestra pit. The other scenes, as played out in Cervantes’ vivid imagination, are represented through abstract suggestions of scenery.

In the same way, “Man of La Mancha” is not a literal dramatization of “Don Quixote.” It is a fantasy on the theme, interweaving the life of Cervantes with the life of his character, Don Quixote. The score by Joe Darion and Mitch Leigh produced one of the greatest Broadway hits, “The Impossible Dream (The Quest”).

It became a Top 40 hit in 1966 for Jack Jones, as well as a show-stopper for an entire generation of Las Vegas performers.

By the way, Goulet doesn’t get to play Vegas much anymore, even though that is where he and his wife, Vera, make their home.

“Las Vegas is not the way it used to be,” said Goulet. “When I built my home there, I’d be working there 10 or 12 weeks a year.”

So what about that Las Vegas personality on those ESPN ads? Is that a put-on job, or is that the true Goulet?

“A little bit of both,” he said, chuckling. “You have to camp it up a little bit. But it’s pretty much me, I must say.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 color photos

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: SHOW “Man of La Mancha” will be staged at the Spokane Opera House on Wednesday at 7:30 p.m., Jan. 9 at 2 and 7:30 p.m., Jan. 10 at 8 p.m., Jan. 11 at 2 and 8 p.m., and Jan. 12 at 2 and 7:30 p.m. Tickets range from $32 to $42, available at G&B Select-a-Seat outlets or call (800) 325-SEAT.