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C S.com shine26
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I found a Broadway star now Ah, I found me a Broadway baby She's a hit with me what a smash My Broadway baby Standing room only is on the marquee with my knee on Broadway beauty who could be afraid? Me and my Rialto cutie We'll leave the Easter parade together we'll climb. Hello and welcome to Broadway radios this week on Broadway for Sunday, June 14, 2020. My name is James Marino and in the broadcast today we have Peter, Felicia and Michael Portentier. Peter is a playwright, journalist and historian with a number of books. Peter's new day by day desk calendar, A show tune for today, 366 songs to brighten your year is available at finer retailers. Hello, Peter.
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Hi.
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Hello. And today's show tune is what let
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your freak flag fly from shrek. Because in 1916, 110 years ago, President Woodrow Wilson established flag day to celebrate the stars and stripes. And lyricist David Lindsay Abair expands the definition to include people of different stripes who deserve to be stars just for being themselves. So this song should help you to fly higher than you ever dreamed or dared.
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Also with this is Michael Portentier. Michael has been a theater journalist for more than 50 years. He's the founder and editor of CastAlbum Reviews.com. he is also a theatrical photographer whose photos have appeared in the New York Times and other publications and he writes reviews of cabaret shows for NightLifeExchange.com Additionally, Michael is known as a producer and director of shows at 54 below the Lori Beachman theater and other venues. Hello, Michael.
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Hello.
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So, Michael, Yeah, it's just a couple of weeks away now that you are going to be celebrating our country's birth.
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Yes, we're doing 1776 on Staten island for the 250th anniversary. It's going to be performed at the college of Staten island and it's a co production of the college of staten island with a company called ghost light players. As I mentioned, I really wanted to be in it because a, I love the show, but also B, in 1976, when I was a freshman in college at Wagner college, we did it that year for the 200th anniversary and I thought, wouldn't it be cool to be in the show again 50 years later? I thought, initially I hoped I might have my original role, which didn't work out, but, you know, that's all right. And actually, there's one other. One of my other fellow castmates was in that production as well. So we're kind of the relics there.
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What'd you play before?
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I played. Initially, I played Livingston, the guy from New York who gets to sing in. But Mr. Adams. Now, I'm George Reed from Delaware. So all I say is Delaware. Delaware seconds. That's all I say. Like three times. Three or four times. But you're off book. No, you say, yeah, I am off book. But, you know, it's funny. There's like, the lines come in, like there'll be like eight pages and then I have one line, you know, and then another six pages and then I have another line. And you have to really keep. Keep on your toes. But here's a cool thing. Here's a cool thing, because we're doing it around the anniversary. We're having a situation where it's almost like we're rehearsing the show in real. For example, the other day was June 7, 2026, and the epic scene in 1776, the one that's about a half hour long with no, takes place on June 7th. So, you know. And then it's going to happen again at least once, because one of the climactic scenes takes place on July 2, and that's the night of one of our performances. We will not be performing on July 1st 4th. Excuse me. So that won't happen then. But I. You know, there's something really cool about that, to think that. Well, it's exactly 250, you know, so I'm really loving all of that.
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You know, you were saying that you have to be on your toes, especially when you have a lot of time in between. It reminds me, I played the triangle in the orchestra.
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Yes, it's very similar. Very similar.
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So there we are. Yeah. The three of us have probably just awakened from our naps from the end of the season, but I don't know. Peter and Michael, did you see last night, the fans of the Lost Boys finally could not be contained and finally took to the streets of New York City last night. They were so angry about Schmegadoon winning everything.
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I don't know if you saw it. That's who those people were. Oh, thank you for clearing that.
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Times Square. Yeah, it's just millions of people.
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Yeah, it's funny. I was writing and I heard all these cheers and I said, oh, the next one. Okay, fine.
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You know, so, well, I was in Queens having dinner with friends and I got back to times square about 11:30 or 12, and. And it was weird because it was like, absolutely packed and. But I was like, well, why, you know, why exactly. You know, there's nothing actually there. I guess people were just getting ready to. I don't know, to celebrate maybe. And it really took me a long time to walk just from there to 9th and 10th Avenue and. But it was still, you know, quiet because nothing had actually happened. There was just all these people. And then when I got home at some point, you know, the game was one and I, I had to. I had to literally close my windows and put on the air conditioner because it was. But, but. And that went on really late. But when I woke up this morning at 9 and looked out there, nobody on the street. So they're all like sleeping it off.
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That's right.
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You know, people are saying it's a recent phenomenon. I have to say that when I was at school at Penn State University, we had a very big football rivalry with Notre Dame, and Penn State played Notre Dame in football at Notre Dame and Penn State won the game. And the students and various other fans went to the Beaver Stadium, which is the football stadium at Penn State, an empty Beaver Stadium where there was nobody and broke into the stadium and tore down the goal posts. So, I mean, this is many years ago. So this, this is some sort of weird phenomenon that happens with sports.
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You know, I do wish. I do wish the destructive part didn't have to be part of it. Yeah, yeah.
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The destructive part is kind of is unfortunate, but, you know, it's. It's only a matter of years before we burn down Radio City Music hall after one June presentation. So. Speaking of which, last Sunday were the 2026 Tony Awards. We talked about our predictions last week where, you know, it's been a week. Certainly everybody's heard everything, but I just wanted to see a few words from Peter and Michael, what you thought about who won.
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Any surprises,
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Anything that you wanted to comment on about the Tony Awards? Peter?
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Oh, I dare say there was a big surprise because I don't know anybody, anybody at all who predicted that featured actor in a musical prize. And that's the one that really took everybody I know by surprise. Everybody starts talking about that. And this is not a value judgment on Ali. Louie. It as I understand it, if you think of Greg Burge, you have the first syllable. So it's Birdsley. According to. If you go on the Internet, there is a place where it is pronounced that way. They tell you that. So I take it on faith, Very nice young man. He appeared at Theatre World Awards and gave a very nice speech there. I know his speech was controversial at the Tonys, but nevertheless, my point is simply that nobody that I know saw this coming. I never heard anybody predict that he would win. Certainly Michael and I didn't. And James, I don't think you did either. Again, that was the big surprise.
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Michael, how about you? Anything to comment about on the Tony Awards?
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Well, I always say that if. No, if no one wins, that makes me angry, then I'm happy, you know, I mean, you know, you can't always get the person you. You wanted, but as long as it's not someone where you think, oh, that is just, you know, someone or something, some show, some score, as long as it's not something you think is totally unworthy, then, then that makes me happy. So. And then nothing like that happened here. So I, therefore I was happy.
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All right, so there was, you know, I, I guess to some extent you can say that Ragtime, Lost Boy, Schmigadoon, even catsejelicable, they sort of, they, they were the big winners of the season. Surprising. Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman took six awards where they were the leading award taker for the evening and not Nathan Lane.
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And. Yeah, and that is.
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Peter did pick. Peter did pick John Lithgow.
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Yeah, as I said, there was a lot of press on that. He made a lot of appearances, so that didn't surprise me.
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It does seem like everyone I talk to thinks that was. That award went to the wrong person. And so. But I guess the voters who count, you know, maybe they were responding to partly to the fact that Mr. Lythgoe was sort of campaigning and also that he is older and we don't see him as often as Mr. Lane. So it could partly be all of those things. To me, I really. The more I think about it, the less I like that play. I just really did not like it. I thought it had a few really gripping moments in it and a tremendous amount of it was just filler. So you compare that to Death of a Salesman, one of the greatest plays ever written in history, and it only seems natural to me that somebody's going to be able to give a better performance in that rather than the other one. And that's what happened, in my opinion. So that, that was, that was a shocker. And I guess that's the closest that I came to getting upset at something. But I couldn't get too upset because I love. I love John Lithgow. I just don't think this was his shining hour and I don't think he deserved it in this particular case.
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It's another situation where I wish that we could follow the way politics works where at the end of the night you see how many votes a person got. I mean, it may be humiliating for those third party candidates, but nevertheless, we find out what the votes are. And I would like to see how close or how far away Nathan Lane came. I would imagine he came very close because it is a memorable performance to say the least. And it really. In. In another year, another situation, I'm sure it would have won.
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So
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this would have been a nice situation for a tie, but I don't know. Those are very rare and understandably so. But, but, but anyway, you know, certainly. Even though Ms. Elaine did not go home with a trophy, certainly Death of a Salesman did
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post Tony's were seven days out now. Not the typical slew of closing notices.
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That's true. Yeah.
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Ragtime, which basically had a very, very good evening extended for two weeks.
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Yep.
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I, I thought that that would be much, much longer, but they are. Lincoln center has a schedule and they're moving forward with the other productions, so.
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And they probably just assume that. Not worth the cost of moving it to another theater.
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Yeah, there is. There's probably only three or four theaters on Broadway that could house Ragtime, and they're otherwise occupied.
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But on the other hand, considering the scenery they have there, I think it would fit to you all. And.
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Good point.
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But.
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But most, most Broadway theaters don't have even the dressing room size for the cast of Ragtime.
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Well, they were built at a time when they were big cast, so maybe they do. So I haven't been to many Broadway dressing rooms. I'm Kiana, and I leveled up my business with Shopify. Once I figured out that Shopify was a thing, I never turned back. I can create a site with my eyes closed. Shopify thinks ahead of us, you know, and it thinks about the customer more than anything. Every day I'm thinking about some other new business, but Shopify is doing it to me because it's so easy to use. It's like, I can't stop.
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Stop.
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I'm addicted.
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Start your free trial@shopify.com and then Liberation won one prize, but it was an important prize.
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Yeah, you know what? I. I wasn't aware. And this certainly speaks to my ignorance, but I wasn't aware that so many years had passed since a woman had won that award. That really surprised me. If somebody just said to me out of the blue, how long has it been since a woman has won the best play? I'd say about 10 years. You know, I wouldn't know what it was, obviously, but I was really surprised at that and I'm very glad that that dearth has been taken care of, at least for this year.
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Paula Vogel has been champion, championing Beswall for a while. We had Bess on many, many years ago, long, long before, long before she had a Broadway show, I believe. And so it I thought that if you look beyond the top line stories of the Tony Awards last week, I think there's a lot of interesting stories to be told to be learned in these, in what happened in the last 52 weeks on Broadway. And now we just reset and start again. So let's move forward into our review section. Peter, you got down to the Public Theater to see Girl Interrupted. So tell us about this girl.
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Well, this was a book and then was a movie. And in fact, not only was it a much acclaimed movie, but Angelina Jolie won an Oscar in the 1999 film playing a sociopath named Lisa. And granted, when you get that type of role, you do have an edge up here. A woman named King Princess, that's her name, is playing the part and she's terrific. Terrific indeed. So is Juliana Canfield, who really has the lead in the show. She's Susanna, a woman who commits herself into an institution where she's going to have to follow a lot of rules and meet a lot of people and there's going to be a lot of bonding and there's going to be a lot of conflict and there's going to be a lot of tragedy. And I don't know the book. I don't know the movie. However, I'm glad I know the musical. I thought it was terrific. Beautifully, beautifully done, tremendously acted. And not surprisingly because there are so many tremendously talented people in this city. So such actresses as Mia Pack and Sally Shaw certainly did their part, too, playing women who go through a lot. And I remember a married couple once talking about wanting to do One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest as a musical. And I remember a lot of people laughing and saying, oh, that can't be done. In essence, this is that type of thing. It really is, because you do have a person who you're rooting for. And is this person going to get out of the situation. What's going to happen? We certainly know that Randall McMurphy didn't get out of the situation, but what's going to happen here? I urge you to go see Girl Interrupted 1 Wonderful Things is certainly the score. Now, this is by a songwriter who has had some sort of fame. Amy. Man 2 ends on man, but wow. The music is quite haunting and beautiful and the lyrics are quite fine as well. And it's very well been adapted by Martina Magic, who we know from the Cost of Living in Sanctuary City. So she has done a very good job, I would say, of adapting. I, I'm inferring that really more than anything else, because after all, as I say, it does come from a book and movie, but nevertheless, I thought it was quite powerful. This is a controversial work. It certainly did not get raves, and maybe that comes from the fact that people knew the other properties and felt they were superior. So maybe if you're going cold like me, you'll have a very haunting and very rewarding time.
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All right. Girl Interrupted at the Public is running through July 12, and we'll have a link to that in the show notes. Michael, you are at the. The revitalized Delacorte Theater. That public is actually including that in the title. They revitalized Delacorte Theater to see Romeo and Juliet?
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Yes.
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What are those crazy kids up to these days?
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Well, this was my first time at the revitalized theater. I couldn't make it last year, but I know Peter reported on it, and I think he basically said that there's nothing tremendously obvious in the change. I think most of the changes were in the backstage areas and technical things and things of that sort. I mean, certainly the layout of the theater is still the same, so. And I guess maybe the seats are new. I think the seats are new. Yeah. So it looks very nice. And it's always so magical to be in a, to see any kind of a show there. I, I, you know, I always loved Romeo and Juliet. This is a severely edited version of it, so which I would say for the most part is a plus. But just so you know that it's edited and yet I would say maybe about 40% of it is spoken in Spanish.
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40%?
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Yeah, yeah. I would say not much less than that. Spanish translations by Alfredo Michel Modenessi, choreography by Mate Natalio, directed by Sahima Lee. And yeah, and so both Romeo and Juliet are Latino, and a great deal of the rest of the cast is also, it seems like mostly when Romeo and Juliet were alone together is when they tended to speak more in Spanish than in English. And you know, I mean, I actually loved it because I know the place so well that it was lovely for me to hear those lines in Spanish and I have enough Spanish that I could make out a lot of them anyway. So for me it was a really a delightful little alternate way of experiencing the play. Very strange things in this production though, they. First of all, it opened up with an announcement From, I'm almost 100% sure was Patrick Willingham, executive director of Shakespeare in the park and Public Theater. If it wasn't him, apologies. But anyway, somebody came out and gave a tremendously long speech that seemed like really self serving and way too long. And we're just waiting for things to get started. And so I thought that started off on a bad note. Then all these political comments started. Then they said something about we're celebrating America for the 250th anniversary of America and we're celebrating that by having people tell their individual stories. So they brought up this delightful guy, this blue collar worker kind of guy who told a mildly amusing anecdote about his life that lasted about 10 minutes. And it had nothing to do with, you know, it had nothing to do with America really. It was just like about his personal life. And so I don't, I don't know what that was. And as if all that weren't enough, they worked a. An actual wedding, an exchange of vows into the play later on in the play. And the ceremony was performed by Francis Chu, who apparently has some kind of a, you know, some kind of a, what do you call that? Ministry. Some kind of a ability to marry people and you know, anyway, so, you know, so all of that I thought was too, you know, maybe just the wedding would have been fun and nice and sweet, but all that other stuff together. I really felt like they were trying to do too much in this production including. So on top of all of that and trying to tell the story of Romeo and Juliet, they really were so heavy handed. They tried to make it about ice. And they tried, you know, I mean, in terms of immigrants and they tried to make it about the wall. You know, there was a big sign that went up, tear down the wall or something like that, you know, death to ice. Signs like that which have zero to do with the plot of Romeo and Juliet. It's, you know, it's about conflict between two families. So as when they tried to make Julius Caesar all about Donald Trump a few years ago. I just thought it was very annoying and Silly. And I enjoyed this production when they stuck to the play itself because they had some really wonderful performances. Rami Latia Akins as Juliet. Daniel Bravo Hernandez as Romeo. How great is it to have Bravo as part of your name? If you're. Let's see. I want to. Oh, Mercutio Caleb. Joshua Eberhardt was really quite outstanding. Frances Jew, as I mentioned, Friar Lawrence. Deirdre o' Connell was spectacular as the nurse. Lachance is Lady Capulet, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. It really. The cast was excellent. I mean, there was no cohesive style throughout the show, but that's also common in these very multicultural Shakespeare in the park productions. And as I say, it was very, very, very, very heavily cut. For example, Mercutio had exactly one line after he was injured in the original. Of course, he's injured by a sword. And so he has a while before he actually expires. And he says several things, you know, but here he only. He was shot, not. Not stabbed. And he said, a plague on both your houses. And he died. So you're not going to see a lot of Romeo Juliet when you see this, but think of it just as a little. Well, you could think of as an adaptation or just a little gloss on Romeo and Juliet, maybe with a. With a very piquant Spanish flavor to it.
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B
All right, so Romeo and Juliet. The revitalized Delacorte Theater is running through June 28th. We'll have a link to that in the show notes. Peter, you made your way over to 59 East 59 to see Dan. David Copperfield. Not David Copperfield, but you saw David Copperfield.
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C
Yeah. We're not talking about the magician. And I wish I could say there was a lot of magic in this production. There wasn't for me. But this is another one of those stunty shows that have three characters, three performers playing a million characters. Though Eddie Payne, P A Y N E does play David Copperfield and nothing else. The other two performers, a man and a woman, do all the other parts. And of course, you have to eliminate something. So there's Peggy, who doesn't have a chance to get married to Barkus. Even though Barkus is willing, he doesn't appear at all. So of course it has to be tremendously cut down and all that. It was just a little too over the top for me. The. There was a great deal of overacting, especially from the gentleman who played the. All the other roles. And it was supposed to be funny. It wasn't. To me, it wasn't to the audience, either they didn't respond nearly as much as I think the actor would have hoped or the director would have hoped. I mean, after all. So there's a lot of running out one door and coming back another door in a different costume and that type of thing. So I. It's so funny that it was the night, the night I attended was the night of that ferocious rainstorm. Ferocious. And it was very interesting to see people in the lobby walking out to go to those doors to leave and then seeing the rain and rumbling and walking back to their seats. Though, believe me, some people with umbrellas did take their leave. I would say 10% of the audience did leave. So I'm not the only one who was disappoint by this. David Copperfield.
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B
All right, David Copperfield at 59 East 59 is also running through June 28, and we'll have a link to that in the show. Notes. Michael, you made your way out to the John Engerman Theater on Long island in Northport, to see a production of Camelot, but it wasn't the Lusty Month of May. It was in June that you saw, right?
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Yes. Barely into June. Yeah. We did our 54 Below sings Learner and Low show recently at 54 Below, and we opened with the Lusty Month of May because I thought it was appropriate. So here I got to see that song again and the rest of the score. And, you know, you never know, guys, this is why we travel. This was the best production of Camelot I have ever seen.
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C
Wow.
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Yes, it was. The revised version. The revised and extremely scaled down version by David Lee, a book adapted by David Lee that has been around for quite a few years. I've seen at least two previous productions of it.
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C
Me, too.
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A
But this one was the best of those. It seemed like either David Lee and. Or the director of this show, Drew Humphrey 3 made some additional tweaks that made all the difference. This one had a cast of, let's see, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 12. And that was a few more than some of the ones I've seen before. You got the feeling as if there was a little bit of an ensemble in the show, even though there sort of really wasn't. And, you know, you also need those male, all that male energy and the knights, which you got here. So. And then other little changes that I think may have been added by the director here, for example, here's a, here's a. Here's an example of a really, really smart thing. The show opened with A young, very young guy, maybe like 15, coming out and saying something like, you know, in costume and saying, this is the story of King Arthur and the Round Table in the days of Camelot. And at first I thought, oh, well, do we really need, you know, a narrator like that? You know, it's a long show as it is, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Well, it was fine. And then it turned out that at the end of the show, that boy was Tom of Warwick. Ah, yes, the young boy to whom Arthur says, you have to tell this story to keep this story alive. You have to not fight in the battle. You have to stay alive so you can tell the story of what we were trying to do with Camelot. So I can't tell you how much of an emotional payoff that was to have that boy at the beginning be the same boy at the end. So whether that idea was David Lee's or Drew Humphries or whoever, bravo to that person. Cast of this production, absolutely excellent. Montgomery Sutton, who I've known for, I would say, at least 10 years, you all may remember vaguely, quite a few years ago, I saw an off off Broadway production of King Lear that had Stephen Mohannon in the lead. Yeah. And Montgomery was Edgar. And I said at the time that he was the best Edgar I'd ever seen. I didn't even know, and I sort of lost track of him since then. I didn't even know if he sang at all. But, you know, Arthur is a role that has been played by classical actors in the past, and he did a wonderful job with the acting and with the singing. He had a lovely voice, so he was great. A woman named Liv Kurtz was a lovely Guinevere. And this fantastic guy played Lancelot Alexander Rios. Just perfect in terms of looks, voice, manner, physical presence. Just everything was great. And the smaller roles were perfectly filled. Mordred was appropriately very, very oily and scary. Some guy named James Kelly Carroll and the knights were all fantastic. And the one thing at the Ingaman, they really do excellent, excellent shows. I guess it's because of the limitations of maybe both budget and space. The orchestras tend to be very small. And that was my one real caveat here. I. I wish they could figure out a way around that. Of course, it matters in more in some shows than others. Camelot, I think, you know, it's some numbers, you want a really grand sound that they couldn't provide. But the next show is the Wedding Singer, and I think that's. That's, you know, that'll be a lot more satisfying. In that way because it's electronic. Electronic, you know, lets a lot of electronic instruments and. And things like that. So that one's definitely on my calendar. Plus I love the Wedding Singer. But in the meantime, if you can get to Northport, Long island by the 28th, please go see the best Camelot that I have ever seen.
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B
All right. As Michael mentioned, it is running through June 28, and we'll have a link to that in the show notes. Peter, you heard. You heard. Probably heard. I did. You saw a lab presentation of a developmental reading called Industrial Strength. And while you're not going to really review it, but we wanted to talk about it a little bit. So tell us about it.
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C
Well, Stuart Ross and Steve Young have collaborated on a musical that is based on industrials. There was a time when indeed companies would pay writers, including the just starting out Candor and Ebb, the just starting out Bach and Harnick, to write shows about their products. And it was a funny idea to. To do this. And some of the things turned out to be rather catchy and nice in terms of songs, but. But some of the lyrics. Well, I mean, what do you do when you have to write a show for American Standard, which does products for bathrooms? Having a woman sing a ballad about how much she loves her bathroom is. Is a tough thing to do. And this is one where they actually did the entire song From Soup to Nuts, because many times they just do a few lines here and there. I was very much amused to hear the one for plymouth cars from 1965, which was set to Comedy Tonight, because when I interviewed Stephen Sondheim back In the late 90s, I said to him, I remember there was a Plymouth car commercial in the 60s where set to Comedy Tonight where there was lyrics, soon there'll be no room left in the showroom. And I said, that sounds like you. Did you write that? And he said he didn't, in fact. But it does sound like a Sondheim lyric, doesn't it? No room in showroom because people are going to be piling in to buy the cars. That was the concept. So they did a bit of the song, but they didn't get to that lyric. But this is a great idea for a show. It's tremendously funny to think about all these shows that even got cast albums. I'm not above admitting some of them live in my house. So I have a feeling we're going to see Industrial Strength as time goes on. Stuart Ross, of course, is responsible for one of the longest running reviews. Is it a Review. I don't know. I mean, it does have a book to it too. Forever Plat is what I'm talking about. Which was ubiquitous back in the 90s and deservedly so. So we'll see what happens with Industrial Strength, but I'm looking forward to the next iteration.
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B
All right, so we will keep our ears open for the next time that industrial streng comes around. Michael, you were at the Shubert Theater to see Celebrity Autobiography. So tell us about this.
- [39:27]
A
I really enjoyed it and you know, parenthetically it's interesting. It's interesting to me what bothers some people and doesn't bother others. You know, I've heard a lot of people say, why are they putting a show like that in the Schubert Theater? Well, I mean, it's empty, you know, and they got all of these celebrities to say that they would come and do this show, which has been a mainstay of off Broadway and in like nightclub spaces for years. I've seen it several times in the past, most notably at the Triad. But you know, now that they've got got really good people to be in it on Broadway and they just. What the concept is very simple. You have celebrities reading autobiographies of other celebrities and to often absolutely hilarious effect because the nine times out of ten the, the authors were meant to be taken 100% seriously. But sometimes it can come across as very self involved, very egotistical, very campy, or just weird and quirky. And I think it's a golden idea and has been brilliantly mined in the past and is here again. So I don't mind seeing Robert Shawn Leonard reading from Geraldo Rivera's autobiography. And with Mario Cantone coming in to play Liza as part of that story, as Geraldo talks about how he and Liza, you know, almost hooked up at 54 below one night. That was hilarious. Then we had the great Tony Shalhoub as Khloe Kardashian. Mario Cantone also did Carol Channing. Unsurprisingly, there was a, a section of the show devoted to poetry written by celebrities, including, you know, some like really unlikely suspects like Suzanne Summers. And that poem is maybe like just as ridiculous as you would guess it would be. A lot of other fun people, Ralph Macchio, who I guess that's how he pronounces it. I would have thought it was Macchio as Sylvester Stallone. Just lots of really, really fun things, one after the other. And the highlight of the show that I saw was an epic recreation of the whole Elizabeth Taylor, Eddie Fisher, Richard Burton, Debbie Reynolds scandal of the 50s with Eric McCormick playing Eddie Fisher and all of the other roles split up among the other celebs. That was really amazing. That took work because somebody went to all of the autobiographies of all those four people and excerpted the sections about that scandalous affair and then sort of put them together to tell a story from everyone's sort of Rashomon different viewpoint. So that was really great. And I think even if you are too young to know anything about that whole Eddie Fisher, Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, etc. Affair, I think it was still funny just because it was so vivid the way it was told. So I, you know, I'm told that the grosses of celebrity autobiography are very low, but I still don't mind it. I mean, they may be papering a lot. It was quite full when I went. The audience responded very, very well. It's keeping the Schubert filled. People are laughing. It probably doesn't cost all that much. So I, I have no negative thing to say about it.
- [43:56]
C
As Finch says, well, really, what's the harm?
- [43:59]
A
Yeah, exactly.
- [44:02]
B
So celebrity autobiography is at the Schubert and is running through August 16th. We'll have a link to that in the show notes. Peter, you. I don't know if this was an official event or you just got together with friends and Talked about the 40th anniversary of Jackie Meath and Jackie Mason show. The World According to Me. So tell us about this.
- [44:27]
C
Well, this was a very modest celebration, but it has been 40 years since Jackie Mason did his one person show. Which, you know, people said, gee, here's Jackie Mason who got into a lot of trouble on his Sullivan one night because indeed people thought that he had done a crude gesture. I have watched that clip and show most slow motion and he did not do anything like people and certainly Ed Sullivan assumed so he had a tough time for a while. But he came to Broadway with a one person show and who knew that he would make not one, not two, not three, but nine different appearances on Broadway over the years. He got a Tony Award for that first show. So there was a celebration of Sardis where a cake was made and it was quite delicious. I'll tell you that right now. You really have to give credit it to the cake maker. God lover. Her name is Kim Goldfeather Clark. Okay? She won the Great American Baking show and it's no mystery that she did. But anyway, we all celebrated Jackie Mason for starting what really turned out to be a trend. I mean, when you think about it, Billy Crystal, John Leguizamo Colin Quinn, Mario Cantone, all of these people have done one person shows and they weren't common for comics until Jackie Mason really said, here I am. And people said, you know, this is a nice way to spend time. I mean, in a way, this is a reduced celebrity autobiography because you actually have the real person talking about himself, especially Billy crystal, talking about 700 Sundays and his relationship with his father and the sad thing that happened there. Certainly John Leguizamo is autobiographical, so. But Jack, Jackie Mason was there doing the jokes and some of the women misogynistic, no question about it. Talking about the fact that a woman, a wife, would often complain, I gave you the best years of my life to saying that to her husband. And Jackie Mason responded by saying, well, yes, because he paid for them. So if you find that type of thing funny, you would have found Jackie Mason very funny. If you don't, I understand entirely. But we did celebrate the fact that he was a pioneer, a pioneer in making comics stand up in a Broadway theater and getting a lot of laughs.
- [47:01]
B
All right, so next up, we have Michael, you were at 54 below where you saw 54 sings dames at sea. So it's the 60th anniversary concert. So tell us about this.
- [47:22]
A
Well, this show is very close to my heart because I directed a production in 1980 on Staten island, and I have to say, it turned out really, really well. I don't have a video of it, but I do have a complete audio and I was listening to it the other day and it's, it's. Maybe I'll share some of it someday. It really turned out quite well. So I love the show and I was delighted when I heard the Charles Ker show and Michael Levine had picked it for a concert presentation at 54. And 1966 is technically the 60th anniversary because that was when the first incarnation of the show opened at the Cafe Chino. It was later expanded somewhat and it went on to play at the Barry Lane Theater and then at the theater to Lys, which is now the Lortel. So it was really quite a. One of the big successes of the, I guess the nascent off Broadway movement. And it's, it's just delightful. I, I started, I reviewed the show for nightlifeexchange.com and I'll send it link to that review. But I started off by saying, you know, it's interesting. I've spoken to some people who really were not that thrilled that Schmigadoon won best musical because they seem to feel that shows like that, that are sort of like parodies or spoofs or pastiches, they sort of seem to feel like they're less than worthy. But I always say that if those shows are really well done, and that is a big if, but if they are really well done, I just love them, and I don't think there's anything wrong with them. And I think that's the case with both James at Sea and Schmidt Gadoon and several other shows we can think of Dames at Sea, you know, seems to me may have been the first example of this. Can you think of a previous one, Peter?
- [49:37]
C
Meaning what?
- [49:38]
A
Well, spoofing, parody, kind of.
- [49:42]
C
Little Mary Sunshine.
- [49:43]
A
Yeah, well, Little Mary Sunshine, Was that before or after?
- [49:47]
C
Yeah, that was 59.
- [49:48]
A
Okay. So that. Yeah, so that is specifically operetta, but that. That would be the same kind of thing. So. Yeah, and those are. These are all great shows. The score of Dames at Sea I think, is fantastic. Even though every single number is a pastiche. But the quality of the music and the. And the way it evokes famous songs and the. And the. And the excellence of the lyrics, the wit of the lyrics, I think it just. It's fantastic. I was trying to think of. Identify specific songs that are, you know, being pastiched, but. So, for example, Choo Choo Honeymoon, I suppose, is Shuffle off to buffalo. And that Mr. Man of mine seems clearly to be. I'm sorry, it seems clearly to be the man. I love the Gershwin song. And, oh, Good Times Are Here to Stay. Seems to me like it's that song. Great Day.
- [51:01]
C
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [51:02]
A
I mean, every single song has, like, at least one that it really seems to evoke. But these folks who wrote it, music by Jim Wise, lyrics by George Heimson and Robin Miller. I, you know, I think they did a really, really excellent job. They didn't just. They didn't just slough it off, you know, they didn't just count on the. The parody aspect to carry them through. It's really well done. And at. Below, a very interesting aspect of the show is almost always when shows are done in concert at places like 54 below, they're severely downsized in terms of the cast size. Here, it was the opposite. And what roles and songs that were originally covered by six people were here covered by 24 people and pretty great people. Paula Leggett Chase was originally. Originally signed to do one number, and then two other people dropped out. And so she heroically stepped in and wound up being like, really the heroine of the evening. She opened the proceedings with Wall Street. Then we had Kurt Peterson and Lonnie Ackerman and it's you. Both of them had been replacements in the original production, which I didn't know in the case of Lonnie Ackerman. So that was really sweet. Ro Hartramp, whom I haven't seen since. Diana. The musical was fantastic with Broadway Baby. Allison Tucker was featured in that Mr. Man of Mine. Rick Fano and Joyce Chiddick, the married couple did Choo Choo Honeymoon and as I said in my review, I guess maybe it helped that they were married and they had time to rehearse a lot together because it was so sharp and it was so, so fantastic and really quite a lengthy tap break in it which you didn't expect to see. Alexandra Socia, the sailor of my dreams. Tim Jerome came out and did. Yeah, he did. There's a musical little monologue reprise of Broadway Baby that his character Hennessy has in some versions of the show. I remember when we did it, we didn't include that, but he did that. Good Times Are Here to Stay was led by Paula Legate Chase, again with ensemble. Randy Skinner, who directed the short lived Broadway production of James at Se, spoke about his experience with the show Dames at Sea. The title song was done as an ensemble number. Steven derosa and Ruth Gottschall mined comic gold with the beguine reigning in my heart. Had Brittany Coleman in the solar spot with with ensemble, there's something about you was A.J. shively and Megan Stirner, both adorable. The Echo Wallace, Paul Leggett Chase. That was her final, her final thing star. A woman named Olivia Elise Hardy led that and she was great. Unfortunately, that was the one number that seemed to to kind of fall apart somewhat due to lack of rehearsal because there was a lot going on in that number. So it wasn't a complete disaster, but it was rather messy. But that's okay because the finale was let's have a Simple Wedding with Joyce Chittick, Brittany Coleman, Stephen Derosafut, Rick Fonio, Ruth Gottschall and A.J. shively. So it was really a lovely, lovely show. They did not do the one number that is now considered, I guess, undoable due to racial insensitivity. It's called Singapore Sioux. But that's okay. They did everything else in it and it was a lovely, lovely, lovely night. It's so great to hear that score again.
- [55:09]
C
Two observations. One, I'm embarrassed I didn't mention the boyfriend, which was a parody of the 20s when we were talking about what came before that. And that was several years before Little Mary Sunshine even. The other thing is, it was really interesting back in 1968 there was Bernadette Peters who had a Broadway job in George M. For she even won a Theater World Award. That's a Broadway salary is bigger than enough Broadway salary. And that's. And nevertheless she took a chance and said, I'm going to do this show. And that's the one that really made her noticed. So it was an important building block in Peter's career. So. And it'll always be remembered for that. So, yeah, Dames and C is quite wonderful. And I thought Randy Skinner's production some years back was terrific.
- [56:02]
A
Yes, it was. And yeah, thanks for mentioning the boyfriend, which of course came from England. And you know what that made me. What you said made me think of, I guess maybe Gilbert and Sullivan started all of this because those shows, they really are sort of parodies.
- [56:22]
C
Yeah. Yeah. So everything all this new again is a rich tradition. Yep.
- [56:29]
B
Hail Sinfonia. All right, so that was 54 sings Deems at Sea, a 60th anniversary concert that was June 9th at 54 below. We'll have a link to that in the show notes. Michael, what is coming up at 54 below that we want to highlight?
- [56:51]
A
Oh yeah, very exciting. I mentioned that EMT Cahill, who is really quite an international star, has been the lead singer with Celtic Thunder for years and has all these amazing credits. If you look him up, he's did two sold out concerts at Carnegie hall, but he had never performed at 54 below. And he actually asked me to help him sort of put together a show there. So I was happy to do so. And it's coming up on the 23rd of June at 7. I think he's going to have his fellow performer Emmett o' Hanlon as a special guest and there might be somebody else on hand also, but that's not said. Yeah, but I really think it. It's going to be great. The. I spoke with him last weekend and already the ticket sales were going really very well. So I think it's going to be very exciting. And his voice is really just phenomenal. So I would put it on the calendar if you, you, if you can make it there. I do think it's going to be extraordinary.
- [58:14]
B
All right, we'll have a link to that in the show notes. The Emmett Cahill from Dublin to Broadway on June 23rd. Well, Peter, you were over at Ars Nova. You saw and the Rodeo and then the Rodeo burned down. So tell us about this.
- [58:32]
C
Well, apparently it did. I will say that running into people, people the week before I saw this show, because it had been running for a week or so, said, well, I have no idea what was going on, but I wasn't sorry to see it. I have to say that, too. I have to admit that I was blindsided by what was going on. I wasn't sure. Some of it almost seemed like Waiting for Godot. And I would like to see these two women do Waiting for Godot. Their names are Chloe Rice and Natasha Rowland. And Chloe, by the way, is spelled with an X. They are a committed couple. They met in high school in Maryland and they've been together ever since. And they put on shows here and there. They did one about Lyndon Johnson a year or so ago that was very successful. And here they are with a new one and they're playing clowns. I guess one of them wants to be a cowboy, I think. I don't know. I. I really don't have any idea. But the fact is they are so engrossing and they are so centered. They know what they're talking about. And even the. Though they can't necessarily convey that to everybody in the audience, the fact remains that just watching them try so hard and do so many things and acrobatic things and things involving cigarettes, I mean, it's just a bizarre evening. But nevertheless, to watch these two women who have such a connection, such a galvanic connection, it keeps you really impressed. For the 70 or so minutes that they're on the stage, Hours no over. I have a feeling that these two women one day are going to come up with something really extraordinary. I believe in them as performers. I believe that they're still finding their way. For all of us to be saying we have no idea what they're talking about certainly would suggest that. That they're finding their way. But one day they're going to put it all together and they're going to become quite famous, quite acclaimed, and maybe even rich, who knows? But as for and then the rodeo burned down, well, some of that burning is the intensity that these two women give their parts. And I do believe they're worth seeing. And if anybody knows what they're talking about, let me know.
- [60:56]
B
Ars Nova is the place where so many of these amazing careers get started. So.
- [61:02]
C
That's right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Good point.
- [61:06]
B
So check that out. We'll have a link to that in the show notes. And it makes me wonder, Peter, when you go to the rodeo I guess, depending upon where the rodeo is. Can you ride a camel? Have you ever ridden a camel?
- [61:20]
C
No, no. A horse is the best I can do. But Stephen Cole certainly wrote a camel when he was in Qatar. What had happened was. Stephen Cole, a rider of musicals, the Night of the Hunter is certainly an accomplished one. After the fair. All right, these may not be household names, but nevertheless, they're terrific shows. And he is certainly a very, very fine lyricist. Very fine. So, anyway, well, out of the blue, he got an email saying, we want you to write a musical. How much will you charge us? And of course, he assumed that this was a scam. You know, after all, all the things that crowd our email box. Well, but you never know. So he called his agent, and his agent said, okay, I'll check it out. He said, that's for a lot of money. He never told us so much, but a lot of money, and see what happens. And so did David Crane, who is very, very famous for doing a lot of work in music, in. In movie musicals, and certainly has worked on Broadway, too. So they got together and they really hit. They. They just knew that they'd have a great collaboration. And they were flown to Dubai and then to Qatar, and they were asked to write a musical about a young boy who is sent to his room by his father, the sultan, and the father won't let him leave. And what they insisted is that Muhammad Ali be part of the plot, and so Stone Age be part of the plot. I mean, it was just so bizarre. Stephen wasn't able to incorporate everything that he wanted to put in there, but he's gotten a lot of mileage out of this property because he and David Crane actually wrote a musical that was done in the York Theater called the Road to Qatar. And the title comes from the fact that Bob Hope and Bing Crosby used to have all those Road movies in the 40s, even extending into 1962 with the road to Hong Kong. So they did a show that was essentially on this in the spirit of the Bing and Bob Road movies. So. So that that musical actually happened. There is a cast recording. But then Stephen decided to write a book about this experience called Camelton. And we talked about it the other day. I interviewed him at the Museum of Broadway, and a good time was had by all as he told one amazing story after the other. Indeed, he was to be. He and David were to be paid in three parts. Well, two of those parts got paid, the third one didn't. But they wouldn't have traded this experience for the world watching the Amir in a soccer stadium. Seeing this show that had everything in it, including Camelton's Camels, I should say so. Anyway, it's a delightful book to read and it's a delightful show to hear. The cast album is still available. I recommend it highly. All right,
- [64:26]
B
so that wraps it up for this week. Before we get on to our brain Teaser and our musical moment, I want to remind everybody that you can subscribe to these broadcasts by going to the front page of broadwayradio.com there's a subscribe link that we each and every time there's a new episode of this Week on Broadway be automatically downloaded to Apple Podcasts for you. Of course, you don't have to get us an Apple podcast. There's many ways to get us. You can check out the new Broadway Radio app on the Apple App Store and we're working on an Android app as well for us. Or you can check us out at patreon.com broadwayradio where you can subscribe there and support all of Broadway Radio's offerings as well as get us a little bit early and a few bonuses here and there. Contact information for Peter from Michael and me can be found in the show notes@broadwayradio.com as well as links to some of the things we've talked about today. So Peter, do you have an answer to last week's Brain Teaser?
- [65:24]
C
I do. Two performers co starred in a famous musical movie. Her last name is part of a song title found in a musical that played previews on Broadway but never opened. He, on the other hand, saw his full name as a song title in a Tony winning musical. I'm Talking about funny girl. Dear Ms. Streisand is a song in the never officially open Rachel Lily Rosenblum and Don't yout Ever Forget at it while Oma Sharif is a song in the band's visit, Tony Janicki catapulted from his three last place finishes to retain his crown. Regain his crown, I should say, followed by Paul Witty, Josh Israel, Seth Kristenfeld, Steven Sokolov, Sean Logan, Mike Meaney, Jack Lesner, Ingrid Gammerman, Brigad, Fred Abramowicz and Lee Korn. This week's Question A musical nominated for six Tony Awards but one none start a performer who had earlier appeared in the film that had inspired the musical. The name of the first song that this star sang in the show became word for word. The name of a restaurant on West 57th street has stayed in business more than 50 times longer than the musical. What's the musical? What was the film? Who was the star of the both? What was the name of the song in the restaurant?
- [66:45]
A
Hmm.
- [66:47]
B
Okay. If you have an answer for this, email us@triviabroadrayradio.com we'll let you know if you're on the right track. So, Michael, what do we have in this week's musical moments?
- [66:58]
A
Oh, we have two little audio excerpts from 54 sings Dames at Sea. Our opener is a bit of Broadway, baby, as sung by Rohrtrampf. And our closer is Good Times are Here to Stay, featuring Paula Legate Chase and J. Aubrey Jones as soloists, along with Brian Osterman, Alexander Rios and Megan Stirna. So enjoy these wonderful moments from that wonderful show.
- [67:30]
B
All right, so on behalf of Michael Portentier and Peter Felicia, this is James Marino saying thanks so much for listening to Broadway radios this week on Broadway. Bye bye.
- [67:42]
A
Bye bye,
- [68:25]
C
Sam.