George Furth Tribute

I was a young,happy sailor on the USS Ticonderoga when George Furth came aboard my universe and changed my world forever. From the very first day I met him, he was noticeably different from the rest of our rather naive, mostly rural and, in retrospect, rather innocent shipmates from around the states that made up our crew back then in the early 1950's. We didn't know the name for "it" then, but George brought to our ship a "Star Quality" that would have us sitting around and listening to this young man's ramblings about entering the world of acting and "Hollywood"! He was a sailor who was never lost for words when there was an audience to be entertained.
He would talk about rubbing shoulders with actors whose names were familiar to us, at the "Actors Studio" in New York City and then back it all up by receiving mail from Marilyn Monroe onboard the ship. Yet, he was far from a shipboard braggart or boaster. George had a limitless interest in other people and would endlessly listen to other guys talk about their lives and the various locations that they came from, making each sailor feel that he was important and had something to contribute to George's general knowledge.
When I recently read his obituary in the newspaper, I got out all my saved letters from George, that I had received over the years and reread them. The earliest letters were about missing we sailors who had been discharged from the navy as George remained on the ship and as his circle of old buddies thinned out he felt bored and alone. Letters that would follow in the early sixties would cover his developing theatrical career and the stage actors perpetual cycle of auditions, rejections and enthusiastic reports of projects he was working on.
George settled in New York City and with my own career in Banking bringing me to New York as well, we talked the standard conversations of young men: touching on lost or found relationships, to marry or not to marry, what would the future hold for us? George's future would move him West to Hollywood, leaving me in New York while continuing to receive his letters. How very poignant it is today, to reread his first mention of roles in various films that would be quoted in his obituary. "Did a thing with Paul Newman, called 'Butch Cassidy'" a letter from 1969 quickly mentions; how interesting that people would remember the loyal railroad employee, Woodcock.
"Wrote some Broadway material for Hal Prince"another letter breezily states, "Stephen Sondheim is doing the lyrics and music." Can I ever forget "Company" or my phone conversation with George on his successful opening on Broadway."Well I hope you like It" he responded to my compliments over the phone, "it's all about you, after all!"
But perhaps it is the closing line of a letter in 1966, that brought a tear to my eye. "The Navy, which was so very long ago," he wrote, "seems like the briefest moment now. It's interesting how life is only seen when it's summed up!" Summing up the time and years that we have known each other, I can only say "Thank you George" for making it a more entertaining and fasinating world for myself and many others.