“There’s No Business Like Show Business”

“There’s No Business Like Show Business” is a recurring song that marks both Puck and Einar’s exuberant friendship and Puck and Trillium’s impromptu wedding. First remembered as the audible signature of their late-night arrivals, it returns at the wedding as a duet, carrying an old performance joke into a new ceremony.

Late-Night Refrain

A woman recalls that Puck and Einar both performed Ethel Merman’s material. They would arrive at four in the morning singing “There’s No Business Like Show Business,” their voices growing louder as they approached from blocks away. The neighborhood never complained, making the song less an isolated number than a familiar announcement of their arrival and a shared ritual of friendship.

The Wedding Performance

The song’s later appearance follows Puck and Trillium’s night of nonstop partying. The couple obtain a marriage license at the county courthouse, go straight to the Wee Kirk O’ the Heather, and marry; Einar serves as best man, then decides to elope with another groom-to-be whose intended bride has cold feet. For the recessional, Puck and Einar persuade the electric-organ player to accompany their duet of “You’re Not Sick, You’re Just in Love,” another Ethel Merman favorite from Call Me Madam. The familiar uncertainty over who will sing Merman’s part resurfaces, linking the wedding performance to the pair’s earlier musical routine.

Recurrence and Comic Effect

The song’s significance lies in its return: a memory of two friends singing through the night is echoed by their performance at a wedding, where Puck’s life has abruptly shifted into marriage and Einar is himself on the verge of eloping. The scene keeps the old joke alive rather than turning the song into a solemn emblem. Its theatrical title and repeated Merman impersonation lend the wedding an improvised, performative quality, while the unresolved question of who gets the lead preserves the comic awkwardness of a shared act.