Streisand / LIVE 

Ray Stark, the producer of Funny Girl, was married to Fanny Brice's daughter, Frances (or Fran). It was his dream to make a musical about his mother-in-law’s life story. “We used to discuss doing a motion picture about her career,” Stark said. “We'd bring up various names of film actresses who could play her role. One suggestion in those years was Judy Garland. So, you can see this has been a long-range proposition with me; more than 10 years. After Fanny's death [in 1951], I kept on planning to do a film about her some day, and finally I got Isobel Lennart, one of the top screenwriters, to undertake the script.”

From a 1976 Funny Girl program:

Mr. Stark had previously commissioned treatments of [Fanny's] life from Ben Hecht and from Henry and Phoebe Ephron. There seemed to be a good deal of interest in Fanny Brice’s colorful life and career. Her third husband, the showman Billy Rose, wrote a story about her entitled "A Girl Called Fanny" that was published in McCall’s Magazine, and a record album in which singer-comedienne Kaye Ballard re-created Fanny Brice’s famous songs was enjoying great popularity.

Being married to Fanny Brice’s daughter, Ray Stark also had to retain firm control over the story so that none of its show business presentations could offend her heirs. To protect her image from any possible abuses, Mr. Stark bought out all future rights from anyone who had worked on the material, including the earlier writers whose treatments had already been rejected.

In a 1964 interview, Ray Stark explained: “[Lennart's] script was wonderful. But as the years passed and the motion picture business changed, I became interested in the stage, and I proved to myself with a couple of ventures that doing something first in the theater was a wonderful testing ground of material for an eventual film. That is why we are here now, with music by Jule Styne, lyrics by Bob Merrill, direction by Garson Kanin and choreography by Carol Haney. I hired the best.”

Pictured: An Al Hirschfeld illustration of Streisand in the mirror loooking at the real Fanny Brice. This appeared in the New York Times.

TIMELINE ... CONTINUED ...

• August 1963: Jerome Robbins quits the production, frustrated with the lack of progress getting the script ready for production, and rumored to be miffed that Stark will not replace writer Lennart. Through his lawyers he submitted an itemized list and stipulated that none of his contributions to the show could be used by Stark, causing Lennart to fundamentally start over.
• August-September 1963: Bob Fosse was hired to direct Funny Girl and worked on the show for approximately one month. Jule Styne elaborated: “We worked together for quite a while and Bob made some tremendous contributions that we kept in the show.” It was Fosse's idea to stage “Who Are You Now?” with Nicky behind Fanny, gambling. It's said that Fosse also wanted to cut “People.” Fosse, too, reportedly added the now-famous “Hello, gorgeous” opening scene. Carol Haney was hired as choreographer under Fosse. Fosse eventually quit the show, reportedly because he distrusted Ray Stark, and went to work on I Picked A Daisy—later retitled On A Clear Day You Can See Forever, and directed by Robert Lewis. Fosse allowed the production to keep his contributions, unlike Robbins.
• Director Sidney Lumet considered Funny Girl but declined because of the messy script.
• October, 1963: Garson Kanin replaced Fosse and Robbins as director of Funny Girl. With Streisand on the West coast for television and concert appearances, David Merrick and Ray Stark have a falling out; Merrick sold his share of the show back to Stark. Streisand's manager took advantage of this. Jule Styne's diary entry for this date reads: “Oct. 20, 1963: Barbra's lawyers found loopholes. She made large demands, Ray said he couldn't afford it. Ray and Barbra agreed. All seems well.”
• November, 1963: Sydney Chaplin  was cast as Nick Arnstein. Director Kanin told writer René Jordan: “[Ray] Stark was bearing another difficult cross, which was his wife, Fanny's daughter. My original choice for the part of Nicky Arnstein was Jerry Orbach, a fine musical-comedy actor who had done The Fantasticks and Carnival. I had him learn a couple of the songs, put a mustache on him, and he gave one of the best auditions I've ever seen. I was then told he was not acceptable. Frances Stark had come to the audition and she didn't want Jerry playing her father because she did not like his posture. That's how we ended up with Sydney Chaplin, whom I never wanted for the part.”
• December 15, 1963:  First rehearsal for Funny Girl.
• January 13, 1964: Funny Girl “tried out” at Shubert Theatre in Boston. Second act and over-length problems. “After the performance we all sat around a large table in a restaurant and for some reason I was chosen to read the reviews,” writer John Patrick recalled. “They weren't good. Barbra was depressed. Isobel Lennart bowed her head on the table and cried. It was not the happiest of evenings.”
• Streisand's acting coach from the Cherry Lane Theatre, Alan Miller, began working with her surreptitiously on Funny Girl scenes, strengthening her performance.
• February 4, 1964: Funny Girl previewed in Philadelphia at the Forrest Theater.
• Playwright John Patrick left the show. Norman Krasna flies in from Switzerland to work with Lennart on the script. Stark wants to fire Chaplin. Hal Linden and Darren McGavin fly to Philadelphia to audition for the role of Nick Arnstein.
• Feb, 19, 1964:  Garson Kanin left the production. Jerome Robbins was rehired to direct with the official credit “Production Supervised By...”
• Choreographer Carol Haney was fired but retained her choreography credit. (Haney died in May 1964 of pneumonia. Her ex-husband, by the way, was Larry Blyden, who starred as Warren with Streisand in On A Clear Day You Can See Forever).
• Stark postponed the Broadway opening five times in order to allow Robbins time to fix the show.
• March 26, 1964: Funny Girl opened on Broadway at the Winter Garden Theatre. Reportedly, there was a standing ovation and 23 curtain calls. The opening night gala took place at the Rainbow Room atop the RCA Building at Rockefeller Center.