(But lest you think we’re getting away from the subject of workplace harassment—alas, we’re not. Not totally, anyway.)

I was raised on Broadway musicals and their recordings, the lyrics of which I committed to memory, including the introductory patter. And that’s not just the major hits, but many minor ones that most people have never even heard about. To this day, my brother and I still have a little jokey game we play, one that’s probably either obnoxious or obscure (or both) to onlookers, in which we say just a couple of words from the lyric and the other fills in the song.

When I was a child, my parents used to take me to Broadway musicals quite regularly (and one straight play, “The Miracle Worker, which I saw with the brilliant originals Patty Duke and Anne Bancroft), when a ticket cost had a range of something like $2.95 to $7.95. Adjusted for inflation (according to this site, anyway), in 2017 dollars that’s $25.41 to $67.76. Try getting a ticket to a first-run top Broadway show for that these days.

Back then Broadway shows were magical. Later on, they seemed less so to me, and I really don’t think it’s just because I got older and more jaded. I’ve never been keen on the movie versions, either. Though some are better than others, all of them seem inferior to their stage originals. The suspension of disbelief that is relatively easy in the theater is not so easy in a movie musical, which always seems to teeter on the brink of the ludicrous (at least, for me). I say that even for achievements such as “West Side Story,” one of the very best movie renditions of a stage musical.

There’s an energy on the stage, an immediacy that is unavoidably diluted in a filmed musical. I’m pretty sure a lot of people will disagree with me, but I don’t think they would say that if they’d seen the originals I was lucky enough to see.

But that’s all a prelude to a clip that came to mind earlier today. Commenter “Mr. Frank” had written:

What is driving much of this is a major shift in the workplace that society has not adjusted to. Until fairly recently the workplace was a male place. There were a few female fields like teaching, nursing, and phone operator. Those jobs were largely dead end and not careers. Men at work were surrounded by men so sex was largely a non issue. Now that women have careers to lose, they can be pressured.

My reply was this:

Women have long been in the workplace with men, just in subordinate roles. The men were the doctors, the women the nurses. Lots of hanky-panky there. The men were the executives, the women the secretaries. I’m sure I don’t have to tell you how much sex there was.

I’m virtually certain that Mr. Frank is correct in saying that there are more women working alongside men today, and that in general their jobs now feature a higher percentage that are more career-like with higher relative pay than in the past. But those somewhat sex-segregated jobs he listed—or the ones I mentioned in which the interface with men in the workplace was constant—although not ordinarily a road to an executive position or a position of power and influence, were still jobs those women needed and were loathe to sacrifice. And there were still ways back then in which sex with a man in the workplace could earn advancement—either in the job, or the “advancement” of being promoted to the new position of “wife” (or “mistress,” depending on the level of aspiration).

But on reading Mr. Frank’s comment, what instantly sprung to my mind was this song from the Broadway musical “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,” which opened on Broadway in 1961. It was telling that I wasn’t taken to see this particular show at the time, probably because it was considered too racy.

But we had the record, and so I learned the songs. That’s why this song (the clip is, alas, from the 1967 film version and not the stage production) came to mind so quickly. Does it make you cringe a bit now?:

By the way, Robert Morse was the star of that show, and he also starred in the film version. But I never saw him in either. However, I have very strong memories of seeing Morse on stage before that, in a musical practically no one knows called “Take Me Along.” It was a musical version of Eugene O’Neill’s “Ah Wilderness,” and I had to look it up to see the year: 1959. Wow. It starred Jackie Gleason, who had been a big TV personality as Ralph Kramden (a show I used to watch), as well as Walter Pidgeon. But to me (and to much of the audience) the real star of the musical was Morse, who lent it tremendous charm, energy, and comic earnestness as he stopped the show several times.

But you know what? The show isn’t even mentioned in Morse’s Wiki link. Go figure.