As long as we're in the mood, to cite a song title from an earlier decade, who remembers the Gaylords? Coupla Detorit boys who had a string of hits: "The Little Shoemaker," "From the vine Came the Grape," "Veni, Vidi, Vinci."
Here's a 1999 newspaper story aobut them. Note: One of them has since died.
'SUNSHINE BOYS' REALLY LIVE THE PART


Byline/Affiliation: MARTIN F. KOHN FREE PRESS THEATER WRITER

   
PubDate: Tuesday, 5/18/1999

"The Sunshine Boys" is fiction; Neil Simon made it up. But this weekend, when longtime Detroit entertainers the Gaylords -- Ronnie Gaylord and Burt Bonaldi -- play the title roles at the Macomb Center, it may be hard to distinguish fiction from reality.


Gaylord, 67, and Bonaldi, 71, share a history as colorful as Simon's

cantankerous comedians'.


In Simon's script the Sunshine Boys were together 43 years. The Gaylords have been together 50.


In the play the Sunshine Boys prepare for a TV special to be hosted by Flip Wilson. In real life the Gaylords appeared on "The Flip Wilson Show."


The Sunshine Boys went by the stage names Lewis & Clark; their real last names are Silverman and, well, Simon doesn't say. The Gaylords have gone by the stage names Gaylord & Holiday. Their real last names are Fredianelli and Bonaldi.

In the script, Clark says about Lewis: "Nobody could time a joke the way he could time a joke ...I knew what he was thinking, he knew what I was thinking. One person, that's what we were."

Greg Trzaskoma, who plays Clark's nephew Ben Silverman in this production, says about the Gaylords: "They're so in tune with each other's timing. Man,they know each other. It's almost like watching a married couple."

Ronnie Gaylord and Burt Bonaldi have, in fact, been together longer than either has been married. Gaylord has been married for 32 years (to his second wife). Bonaldi has been married for 49.

Unlike the Sunshine Boys, though, the Gaylords never broke up, never retired, never stopped speaking to each other. This is the secret of their professional longevity: "If he thinks it's funny, it's funny," Bonaldi says of Gaylord.

There's another crucial difference. The Sunshine Boys never had a string of hits on the pop charts. And the Gaylords?

Forty-five years ago, just before rock 'n' roll redrew the map and exiled what had been popular music to Miami hotels, Catskill resorts and Las Vegas lounges, the Gaylords would routinely chase Dean Martin, Tony Bennett, Eddie Fisher and Doris Day up and down the hit parade.

Among their big singles were "The Little Shoemaker," "From the Vine Came the Grape," "Veni Vidi Vici" and "Isle of Capri." They never had a No. 1 hit but they do claim a couple of No. 2's. "Tell Me You're Mine," they note, was edged out by Patti Page's "How Much Is That Doggie in the Window," while "The Little Shoemaker" was kept out of the top spot by the Crew-Cuts' version of "Sh-Boom."


The diminutive cobbler lives on in a commercial the Gaylords made in 1954 for auto dealer Roy O'Brien. The commercial still airs on the radio.

Gaylord and Bonaldi both grew up on Detroit's east side. In 1949, when Gaylord was still in high school and Bonaldi was just out of the Army, their church, Our Lady of Sorrows, wanted to hold a show as a fund-raiser. Bonaldi was involved with the Bonstelle Theatre, so the church approached him.


"They needed music," Bonaldi says. "I'd heard how Ronnie could get people to sing." And Bonaldi casually uttered seven words that would change their lives: "You want to get an act together?"

Their act was originally called the Gay Lords. "It just meant happy guys," Gaylord says. A newspaper typo converted it to one word. They decided to keep it and Ron Fredianelli began to use Gaylord as his name. In the late 1950s they put more emphasis on comedy and changed the name of their act to Gaylord & Holiday. They moved to Nevada in 1959 and spent a couple of decades as a lounge act.


Gaylord still lives in Reno, Bonaldi lives in Michigan and they continue to perform throughout the country.


"These two guys have worked together 50 years and they've never done a book

show" (a play with a precise script), says director Larry Carrico. "They're a

director's dream," he adds.


Among Bonaldi's souvenirs is a newspaper from Reno commemorating the city's

show business history. On its cover are photographs of major entertainers who

performed there: the Gaylords, Jack Benny, Jimmy Durante, Nat "King" Cole, Roy

Rogers, Marilyn Monroe, Bobby Darin ..."They're all dead," Gaylord says.


Except for the Gaylords, who are alive and well and getting ready to try

something they've never done. "We can't get sick," Bonaldi says. "We have work

to do."