I never met the actor/singer Jerry Orbach, who passed away last week of prostate cancer at the age of 69, but I've followed his career since he was a pup.
Best known for "Law & Order," Orbach was an actor's actor who studied with the famed Lee Strasberg. But he could also sing.
He introduced the hit song "Try to Remember" in the stage musical "The Fantasticks" in 1960. He went on to perform on Broadway in "Carnival" (1961), "Guys and Dolls" (1965), "Carousel" (1965) and "Annie Get Your Gun" (1966).
My first memory of him was his starring role on Broadway in the lighthearted "Promises, Promises," the joint brainchild of Neil Simon, Burt Bacharach and Hal David. Orbach portrayed Chuck Baxter, a corporate nonentity — a sad, lowly office worker in a huge insurance company who loans his apartment to executives for extramarital affairs. (It was a musical version of the 1960 movie, "The Apartment," starring Jack Lemmon.)
The musical ran on Broadway from 1968 to 1972, and Orbach won a Tony for his role. My wife and I had recently moved to Boston, and soon afterward we made an exciting trip to New York City to take in a Broadway play. We had good seats and I remember Orbach's acting and singing vividly in this playful romp. He was young (about 35), handsome, energetic and blessed with a beautiful, mellow baritone voice. I especially recall his soaring introduction of the hit song, "I'll Never Fall in Love Again."
Orbach was the quintessential New Yorker, born in the Bronx to a vaudeville/performer father and a radio-singer mother. I followed his career with interest as he performed in other musicals, such as "Chicago" (as Billy Flynn, the money-loving lawyer who sang "Razzle-Dazzle") and "42nd Street" — and I often bragged that I had seen Orbach perform in person. I expected him to be known as a long-term, forever popular singer like Frank Sinatra or Bing Crosby.
He also appeared in such films as "Crimes and Misdemeanors," "Dirty Dancing" and provided a strong singing voice for "Beauty and the Beast." When he portrayed a cop in the 1981 drama "Prince of the City," the "Law & Order" star was born.
On television he acted in "Perry Mason" and "Murder, She Wrote" — then in 1992, he signed on as Lennie Briscoe, a sleepy-eyed, wisecracking, hard-drinking detective in "Law & Order," a role he played for 12 fruitful years.
Ironically, it was only from television that he became a household word — and few remembered his wonderful singing voice — except those on the "Law & Order" set, like Ed Sherin, the producer who was quoted as saying that Orbach "was someone who would break into song at any moment."
At his funeral, Elizabeth Hepburn, a family friend, described Orbach's talent as "glorious and outrageous." Obviously, he was also versatile. It seemed that his career was given a mid-course correction from musical singing roles to deadpan cop roles.
But it wasn't an accident. Recently, Orbach was quoted as saying, "I used to say when I was working in the theater that if I ever had five seasons of a hit TV show I'd never have to worry about money and wouldn't have to do anything I didn't want to do. The 12 seasons of 'Law & Order' really made that possible."
I choose to remember him singing "Try to Remember" and "I'll Never Fall in Love Again."
E-mail: dennis@desnews.com