“If I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere…”

A RECENT VARIATION ON A FAMOUS SONG LYRIC: “Now that we’ve made it here, we'll make it everywhere.”        Evan Wolfson        American civil rights attorney and leading advocate of same-sex marriage        Comment in a June 25, 2011 news story about the recent state law legalizing gay marriage in New York

ORIGIN OF THE FAMILIAR LINE: “If I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere It’s up to you, New York, New York.”         Fred Ebb        American song lyricist        Lyrics from the song “Theme from New York, New York” (1977)        This song, often referred to simply as “New York, New York,” was originally used as the theme song for Martin Scorsese’s movie musical New York, New York, released on June 21, 1977. Ebb wrote the lyrics and his longtime songwriting partner John Kandar wrote the music. The song was sung by Liza Minnelli in the film. Frank Sinatra recorded a popular version in 1979 and made it one of his signature songs. Ebb and Kandar’s “Theme from New York, New York” is sometimes confused with the song “New York, New York,” which was written by Betty Comden, Adolph Green and Leonard Bernstein for the 1944 Broadway musical On the Town. (That song includes the famous lyrics “New York, New York, a helluva town / The Bronx is up but the Battery’s down.”)

THE L.A. VERSION OF THE OLD BIG APPLE ADAGE: “When did the old adage about the Big Apple become: ‘If you can make it there, it’s probably because everyone else has set a really low bar’? Um...just now, I guess. (Start spreadin’ the news.)”        Amy Reiter        American pop culture critic        Her dry comment in a June 23, 2011 post on the L.A. Times “Show Tracker” blog regarding an episode of America’s Got Talent that featured people from New York

AN OLD BLUES MUSICIAN’S TAKE ON L.A.: “Well, if a man can make it Los Angeles, he can make it anywhere But you got to have one of those used Cadillac cars, yes boys, and you can stay square.”        Charles “Crown Prince” Waterford (1919-2007)        American blues and jazz musician        In his song “L.A. Blues,” included on the album The Very Best of Crown Prince Waterford

THE EXTREMOPHILE VARIATION: “The recent discovery of bacteria on Earth in the most unlikely spots-under the ocean floor, in rivers orange with dissolved iron-has lent support to the argument that if life can make it there, it can make it anywhere.”        News story in the January 2006 issue of Popular Science magazine        (Scientists call organisms that live in extremely harsh environments “extremophiles.”)

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