COMMENTS & CURIOSITIES:30 years and no cobwebs

It’s a hard-knocks life. It is if you’re Annie anyway. Yes, the terminally perky waif with the cute dog and the blindingly bald sugar daddy returns to the Orange County Performing Arts Center on Tuesday, part of the legendary show’s 30th anniversary national tour. As always, the only thing Annie and Sandy can count on is that the sun will come out tomorrow, and as always, Sandy’s only comment on the whole thing is “arf.”

The other anniversary of note is for the current Daddy Warbucks, veteran actor John Schuck, who joined the Broadway cast in 1979 and hasn’t stopped playing Warbucks since, with more than 3,000 performances under his belt as the crankiest, wealthiest, baldest tycoon in the world. Schuck has played everything on television but the volume control and is usually remembered as the lead detective on “McMillan & Wife” with Rock Hudson and Susan St. James.

Annie and her pooch are an institution, but I am surprised now and then when I run into someone, usually someone not old enough to wrinkle, who has no idea that her full name is Little Orphan Annie, thank you so much, and in her day she was America’s darling and the most popular mini-damsel in distress on the funny pages. I think Annie is holding up pretty well considering she’ll be 83 this year.

Of course, how old does that make Sandy? They should find out what that dog has been eating and patent it ASAP.

Annie and her orphanage pals made their debut on Aug. 5, 1924, a creation of cartoonist Harold Gray for the Chicago Tribune Syndicate. America went bonkers for Annie, and three years later, rival syndicate King Features, owned by William Randolph Hearst, came up with a strip of its own that would be hard to call “similar” while keeping a straight face. For starters, it was called “Little Annie Rooney.” While Little Orphan Annie and her faithful dog Sandy were constantly on the run from the mean-as-could-be Miss Hannigan at the Chicago Trib, over at King Features, Little Annie Rooney and her faithful dog, Zero, were constantly on the run from Annie’s legal but cruel guardian who was named — ready? Miss Meany.

Little Orphan Annie’s trademark expression was, “Leapin’ lizards!” Little Annie Rooney, “Gloriosky!” At the end of the day, Little Annie Rooney had lots of fans but just couldn’t keep up with Little Orphan Annie in the reader race. It was a big country, but there was only enough room for one America’s darling called Annie.

The difference might have been Daddy Warbucks and his totally strange staff, most of whom were downplayed in the modern stage and screen versions. There was Warbucks’ trusty servant, Punjab, a native of India who was said at various times to be either 8- or 9-feet tall, not including turban, which would definitely make him easy to spot in a crowd in either New York or New Delhi. Then there was his right-hand man, the Asp, who looked Asian, sort of, but you never really knew what he was or where he came from.

Punjab and the Asp had magical powers, which were never explained. The Asp could disarm any assailant in dazzling ways, and Punjab was a sort of Indian David Copperfield who could appear and disappear with a “poof” and make things vanish by wrapping them in his cape, including Annie and Sandy when something really bad was about to happen to them.

Rounding out the freak show at the Warbucks estate was Mr. Am, a mysterious but benevolent figure with a long white beard who hinted that he was thousands of years old and may or may not have been God. The original strip was an endless series of intrigues and adventures in which someone was always trying to kidnap or kill Little Orphan Annie and/or Sandy and/or cheat or kill Daddy Warbucks.

Annie was the original Energizer Bunny and refused to be done in, but both Sandy and Daddy Warbucks met their demise from time to time, which would send readers into uncontrollable crying jags. After an appropriate period of mourning, who’d show up but good old Mr. Am, who would make a speech about how the body may pass on but the soul and the energy within never will. And bada-bing, Daddy Warbucks or the pooch would step out of the shadows, a little woozy, a little worn out, but back in the game.

During the Depression, Daddy Warbucks got more people back on their feet than Chubby Checker, and during World War II, Annie and the pup and Mr. Baldy and his loopy staff outsmarted and did in more fascist thugs and Nazi and Japanese spies then the OSS, the FBI, the Secret Service and the French Resistance combined. So let’s get to the important stuff.

What kind of dog is Sandy? The faithful pooch, which Annie rescued from a gang of mean boys behind Mrs. Bottle’s store, has been described as part Airedale, part Collie, but most often as a multi-breed mutt.

Did the comic-strip Little Orphan Annie ever say, sing or even lip-sync the words, “The sun will come out tomorrow. Bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow there’ll be sun?” She did not. The song and lyrics were written for the stage version, music and lyrics by Mark Schoenfeld and Barry McPherson.

Who were the Annies on Broadway? Andrea McArdle, Shelley Bruce, Sarah Jessica Parker (yes, the same one), Allison Smith and Alyson Kirk. In the current run at the performing arts center, you’ll see the extremely able Marissa O’Donnell, all of 12 years old.

Notable Miss Hannigans? Dorothy Loudon, Alice Ghostley, Betty Hutton, Marcia Lewis, June Havoc, Nell Carter, Sally Struthers, and, of course, the film Miss Hannigan, Carol Burnett, who I thought stole the show along with Tim Curry.

Lastly, is it really a hard-knocks life? Depends. Dealing with Miss Hannigan, spies, thieves and assassins can wear a girl out, to say nothing of her dog, especially at 83. Arf.

I gotta go.