During a rehearsal one day, Elaine Stritch began to sing, "When the tower of Babel fell," and pronounced the line to rhyme with "scrabble." Noel Coward promptly corrected her: "It's 'baybel' Stritch." "I've always said 'babble,'" the actress replied. "Everyone says 'babble.' It means mixed-up language, doesn't it? Gibberish. That's where we get 'babble' from." "No," replied Coward. "That's a fabble."
Sources
William Marchant, The Pleasure of His Company
