MITZI GAYNOR, HOME/AWAY, NEXT "BETTY WHITE" FOR SNL,...AND MORE!

May 20, 2010

MITZI GAYNOR, HOME/AWAY, NEXT "BETTY WHITE" FOR SNL,...AND MORE!

Cabaret Review: "Mitzi Gaynor" by Jonathan Warman

Mitzi walks onto the stage of the Regency Hotel Ballroom dressed in a sailor suit identical to the one she wore in the movie version of South Pacific, the film that solidified her reputation as a Hollywood song and dance gal. She launches into “Honey Bun” from that film, which includes the lyric “broad where a broad should be broad.”
Gaynor’s club act, Razzle Dazzle! My Life behind the Sequins, is all about a show biz broad playing it broad. It’s very much like that Saturday Night Live homage to Ann Miller and Debbie Reynolds, “Leg Up!” Only it’s for real, Mitzi isn’t doing much dancing (the “leg up!” is all in the attitude), and the costumes are really truly by Bob Mackie! In a move unheard of in cabaret, Gaynor does no less than five costume changes, covered by energetically edited video footage culled from her television, concert and film work.

And it’s such a good time! The heart of the show is Gaynor’s hilarious show biz stories, several of which are almost dirty (she says she’ll tell you the really dirty ones, if you Invite her to your house and make her dinner). She doesn’t do very many songs — they might even be outnumbered by costume changes — but she has chosen them well.

Most memorable for me was her re-lyricized version of “Show Off” from The Drowsy Chaperone. She sings “I don’t wanna be camp no more” while giving her enormous pink boa an ironic, extra-large shimmy. And that’s before the pasties with tassels come out! So camp. Her musical arrangement’s are somewhat undone by Gary Nesteruk’s cheesy synthesizer fills, but I realized that if these kind of kitschy arrangements ever made sense anywhere, it would be in a show like this.

One of the reasons she does so few songs: she isn’t an incredible singer. With her it’s always been about showmanship, the “razzle dazzle” of the show’s title. She has so much charisma and chutzpah; you have to imagine she’d be able to put anything over. It would be hard to top this show for sheer glittery gay fun.

Mitzi Gaynor opened at Feinstein's May 18 (Source Andrew Gans, Playbill.com)

Hollywood legend Mitzi Gaynor made her New York City cabaret debut May 18 at Feinstein's at Loews Regency. The film actress, who has titled her show Razzle Dazzle! My Life Behind the Sequins, will play the Manhattan nightspot through May 29.

Gaynor, according to Feinstein's notes, will bring her "incomparable brand of showmanship to the stage in a glittering multimedia one woman tour-de-force of music and memories from her show-stopping life and career. The evening will feature classic elements of her fabled concert performances interspersed with video footage culled from her television, concert and film work and rare personal photos embraced in an all new, up-to-date setting."
Expect Gaynor's recollections of Frank Sinatra, Ethel Merman, Marilyn Monroe, Irving Berlin, Rodgers & Hammerstein, Howard Hughes, Marlene Dietrich and more.

In a statement actress Gaynor said, "Over the years I'd been asked to play New York on numerous occasions but the stars never quite aligned.
That's why I was thrilled when Michael Feinstein asked me to bring my show to his club and said I could have the Regency's Ballroom so I'd have more room to play. I really can't wait to be there.
There's no city in the world like New York."

Tony Charmoli directs the evenings, which feature musical arrangements by Dick DeBenedictis and Bill Dyer. Musical director/pianist Ed Czach leads a seven-piece band; orchestrations are by Ovation Award winner Colin R. Freeman and Helen Hayes Award nominee Nick DeGregorio.

Mitzi Gaynor starred in 17 motion pictures, nine network television specials (garnering 17 Primetime Emmy nominations) and returned to live performing with countless concert productions nationwide for over 40 years.
For ticket reservations call (212) 339-4095 or visit feinsteinsatloewsregency.com and TicketWeb.com.
(Source: Kevin Scott Hall, EDGE PUBLICATIONS)

The daughter of a dancer and a cellist, her mother and aunt took her to Hollywood from Detroit when she was eleven.

Once called "the number one female song and dance star" by the Los Angeles Times, Gaynor is best known for playing Nellie Forbush in Joshua Logan’s 1958 film version of South Pacific, one of the top-grossing movies of that decade, for which she received a Golden Globe nomination.
She also starred in There’s No Business Like Show Business with Ethel Merman, The Joker is Wild with Frank Sinatra, Les Girls with Gene Kelly, and Anything Goes with Donald O’Connor.
Gaynor later became a sellout at the Flamingo Club in Las Vegas, toured with her nightclub act and stage shows, and presented eight Emmy-winning variety specials during the ’60s and ’70s.
In the 1990s, she was also a highly regarded chronicler for the Hollywood Reporter.

EDGE spoke with Gaynor, 78, about her upcoming show and her celebrated life... with and without the sequins.

EDGE: I saw you last month at the Bistro Awards. We in the audience couldn’t believe how wonderful you looked.

Mitzi Gaynor: The talent in that room was amazing, wasn’t it? And the audience was so marvelous, I could have eaten them up with a spoon! The New York audience gets it right away.

EDGE: Do you still have the discipline of a dancer when it comes to a health regimen?

MG: I’ve always been a good eater but I’m very careful with what I eat. I don’t eat junk. In addition to being a musician, my father was a great chef. When the other kids were going to school with baloney and Miracle Whip between two slices of
Wonderbread, I had veal cutlets and eggplant in my brown bag.

EDGE: I think we were also surprised and delighted by your bawdy sense of humor. Can we expect more of that from your show?
MG: [Laughing] I’ve always been like that, but I wouldn’t say I’m bawdy; I’m "today." We’d think nothing of standing in the hallway talking to our boyfriends with nothing but a towel draped around us. As for the show, there are so many things to tell, so many songs to sing, and six costume changes.

EDGE: Are you serious?

MG: Of course I’m serious! I once had fourteen costume changes!

EDGE: Many of our readers might be surprised to learn that you were the first star to be dressed by Bob Mackie.
MG: It was around 1966 and I had been working with another designer. I was working on a new show but he couldn’t do it, so he sent his assistant over. I was rehearsing in my 4-inch heels-my mother said I was born in them-and this blond kid sticks his head in the door and introduces himself.
He was so young his voice hadn’t even changed!

EDGE: You are perhaps most famous for South Pacific, but you have worked with the best of the best: Ethel Merman, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, Donald O’Connor, Gene Kelly, Cole Porter... the list goes on. How do you put all of that into a one-hour show?

MG: Very fast! I can combine Ethel Merman with a movie and my honeymoon. Gene Kelly and Donald O’Connor and I were all Virgos, so we were all a pain in the ass! I do wait for the laughs, but I have to make sure I get them!

EDGE: Was it a conscious choice to leave films at such a young age?
MG: After South Pacific there were really no big musicals to do except Mary Poppins, The Sound of Music, and My Fair Lady and I wasn’t going to get those. Jack [Jack Bean, her husband and manager for 52 years; he died in 2006] and I had a long talk about it and we decided that I would go back to the stage, which is where I started and what I loved. We were offered a chance to do a show in Las Vegas at the Flamingo Hotel. It was an enormous amount of money, plus points in the hotel. I couldn’t turn it down. Jack negotiated; he was my everything. He created whatever Mitzi Gaynor is.

EDGE: The stereotype is that marriages don’t last in Hollywood, and yet you two were married for over fifty years and Jack was also your manager. What was the secret to your success?

MG: We could work together. When I went on the road, he went on the road with me. We were both from the Midwest and Catholic-when we were married, we were married! But I loved being a Mrs., cooking a great meal and taking care of the house. I was a great wife and he was a wonderful husband.

EDGE: When you see all these talent shows on television today, do you think the young people coming up have any idea how much work is involved in a showbiz career?

MG: You have to have a background and you have to have a technique. You can’t sing your guts out with one song and be done. A young person today makes a lot of money and then is left to her own devices. There is no guidance. From the time I started working in the Civic Light Opera at thirteen and then 20th Century Fox at eighteen, I worked for companies.
I was groomed. People don’t have that anymore. Back then, you had to work all day with your back out-that’s why some people got hooked on stuff.
But you developed a stamina and a work ethic. There was no "forget about it, I’ll do it tomorrow."

I was once on stage in Las Vegas when a man in the audience died of a heart attack. I just moved to the other side of the stage and kept performing while the staff carried him out.

You sing and dance and do whatever you can, whenever you can. No stage is too small.

EDGE: You’ve done so much in your career. What gave you the most fulfillment?

MG: To tell you the truth, I didn’t think I was all that good in the movies. I always felt the camera was in my way. TV was different because I talked to you and we could reach so many people in one night.
I feel more comfortable on the stage than anywhere else. It’s like having a party and inviting all your friends over.

EDGE: Here’s some trivia. You were on the same episode of "The Ed Sullivan Show" when the Beatles were introduced to America.
MG: [Laughing] No! They were on the same episode that I was on! I had top billing; Ed had been trying to get me for years. It was October 1963 and I had no idea who they were. By February, they had exploded all over the world. Later, I ended up singing some of their songs.

EDGE: And what about singing "Georgy Girl" on the 1968 Academy Awards?

MG: I was in Puerto Rico when I got the call. I didn’t even know what "Georgy Girl" was but once I decided to do it, I wanted my own choreographer, Ernie Flatt, and my own trio, which was unheard of! Of course, we stopped the show cold!

EDGE: I take it, the word "retirement" is not in your vocabulary.
MG: I wouldn’t know what to do with myself. I’m so excited! The last time I played New York, I was with the Civic Light Opera and I was still a brunette! It’s party time!

Mitzi Gaynor appears at Feinstein’s (www.feinsteinsattheregency.com) Tuesday through Saturday, May 18-29, 8:30 p.m. Tue.-Thu. and 8:00 p.m. on Fri./Sat.

Watch this tribute to Mitzi Gaynor and guest stars perform "The Little Things You Do Together" from Company:

The dazzling Mitzi Gaynor, who just won an Emmy for her DVD “Razzle Dazzle!,” will be appearing at Feinstein’s at the Regency (May 18-29; 540 Park Ave. at E. 61st St., feinsteinsattheregency.com), and I never pass up an opportunity to chat with this irrepressible dynamo who happens to be one of the best raconteurs in the business. “How are you, my Honolulu baby?” she asked, and we were off and running.

“Can you believe it?” she said. “The last time I performed in New York I was 14, at the Civic Light Opera. Through the years, every time somebody offered me something here, Jack [Bean, her late husband and manager] would book me on tour with my own show. But this seems to be the right time and place, and I’m over the moon about it. Michael [Feinstein] has been so fabulous. He’s opening up a couple of rooms and building me a stage.
I need my eight Bob Mackie costume changes –– what would a Mitzi Gaynor show be without constant costumes?

“It’s a new show which starts out with me saying, ‘Hello,’ and ends with me saying, ‘Thank you very much,’ and in between there are stories about my life in show biz with my husband

, in theater, films, with film clips and reactions to certain things, like Topsy and how I grew. I talk a little about when Jack passed away. I didn’t want to be Mitzi Gaynor anymore. I mourned for two years and then woke up one morning and thought, ‘Jack would not like this at all.’
His whole life was Mitzi, and I have so much more to do. There was a period when I really was not well and went out to his gravesite every day to talk to him, and finally I could feel him say, ‘Yummy, will you leave me alone, already, for God’s sake?"

Even the gardeners were saying, ‘Oh God, here she comes again!”

“Razzle Dazzle!” celebrates Gaynor’s TV specials from the 1960s, which were lavishly produced in a way that makes today’s “American Idol” or “Dancing with the Stars” look like cheesy cruise ship entertainment by comparison.
But, you know, my favorite thing is the costumes, like when they do a Viennese waltz and all the girls have are three beads –– one on each nipple and one on their pussy!”
And that’s why we love Mitzi, who in real life is so much juicily more than her onscreen girl next door image, and, as she says, “And then terrible things come out of my mouth! But you’re right. I was always the good girl, never a bad girl, and in my true life, I was never a bad girl. Boring, I think, is the word.”
All one has to do is mention a famous name and let Mitzi rip.

Darryl Zanuck, her boss at Fox studio: “He was a charming man, very sweet and nice to me.
He asked me to come to him one day. I wanted to look gorgeous and sexy and fabulous, but I had just taken a ballet class and looked like hell.
All he said was, ‘You’re much better on film than you are in person. Okay, kid!’ He never chased me around the office –– I was only 17.”
Johnnie Ray, her co-star in “There’s No Business Like Show Business”: “Darling Johnnie. Whenever there was an argument on the set, he’d just pull both hearing aids out of his ears and go and read a newspaper until it was over. And, of course, there’s that line when Johnnie says, ‘Mom, Dad, you know I’m not like the rest of you. I’m a little different,’ and the audience would scream. Yes, Mary, we know! My God, it was just too cute.
He used to come up to me and say, ‘What do I do now, honey?’ And I’d say, ‘Watch me!’”
Dan Dailey, who played Ray’s father and loved to cross-dress: “I really wasn’t into all that.
I was madly in love with Jack Bean then, and not into all that gossip. But I understand that he’d say, ‘Yes, I’d like an Oscar de la Renta, 42 long, please.’ ”
Prickly pear director Stanley Donen, who worked with her on “Surprise Package”: “I got along very well with him. Now that I know him better, I think he’s a delightful guy.
He and [my co-star] Yul ‘The King’ Brynner got along extremely well because the egos were like epées –– you know, thrust and parry: ‘I have more Vuitton than you have Vuitton.’ ‘My Vuitton is solid.’ ‘Mine isn’t. Mine’s soft!’
You know, all these kinds of silly things –– on the island of Rhodes in the Aegean Sea, for crying out loud.
A donkey’s going to look at your luggage?”
“Yul was the king and really a dear, but anything that happened with him had to be bigger and better and more important than anybody else. The person I got on extremely well with was Noel Coward. I would go sit in his dressing room and we’d drink tea and smoke cigarettes and tell each other lies. Absolutely fabulous. He’d say, ‘You know, darling, I only pee Arpége.’”
George Cukor, her “Les Girls” director: “He was in a little bit over his head with

Gene Kelly because Gene wouldn’t put up with his crap. George would say things like, ‘You know, darling, Vivien Leigh and Larry [Olivier] and I were having a meal,’ and Gene would roll his eyes and say, ‘Yah, yah, well I gotta take a crap.’ And that would knock poor George off his throne. I’d say, ‘Gene, you just can’t say things like that!’ ‘Well, I don’t wanna hear about Vivien Leigh. Let’s go rehearse.’ And, yes, George would act things out for you. He’d say, ‘Now, darling, I want you to...’ And he would [hem and haw] with his teeth going and that big jaw and the lower teeth out like that. Of course he loved Kay Kendall and who wouldn’t love Kay Kendall? He loved her because she was going out with Rex Harrison at the time.”
Cukor was then bucking for the job of directing ‘My Fair Lady’ on screen.
SOURCE: DAVID NOH, GAY CITY NEWS)

Theatre Askew invites you to come to a place where every home has its story
Home/AWAY

Theatre Askew will present the World Premiere of Home/AWAY, written by Winter Miller in collaboration with the 2009-2010 Theatre Askew Youth Performance Experience (TAYPE) ensemble. Directed by Theatre Askew co-artistic directors Tim Cusack and Jason Jacobs. Shows run May 27-30, Thurs-Sat at 6 pm and 8:30 pm, Sunday at 5 pm at the Hudson Guild Theatre, 441 W 26 St, btwn 9th and 10th Avenues. Tickets are FREE!

When you think of home, what feelings, associations, and memories arise for you? TAYPE invited eight exceptionally talented young people from across the rainbow spectrum of LGBT and straight experience to spend several months together exploring this question. Through a process of theatrical improvisations and writing assignments, the ensemble embarked on a sometimes painful, often funny, and ultimately empowering journey of reflection. Home is watching Titanic with your mom five times in a row. Home is rapping it freestyle with your boiz. Home is a favorite dogwood tree in the backyard. Home is the fragments of memory and shards of relationships we carry with us wherever we go. And Home can also be found when we create theatre together. Home/AWAY is a theatrical response to all these experiences of home.

To make a reservation, please go to the Theatre Askew website:

http://www.theatreaskew.com/home-away

--
Tim Cusack
Co-artistic director, Theatre Askew
646-338-3057
www.theatreaskew.com

SNL Facebookers want a Betty White-style encore

The cult of Facebook isn’t finished trying to infiltrate our TV programming. More fan-page movements for iconic entertainment personalities to host SNL are making their way onto the site. The latest plea is for an SNL coup d’état by comedienne Carol Burnett; the 77-year-old actress was star of her own popular sketch comedy show in the 60s and 70s.

Other fan pages for potential hosts include Broadway superstar Carol Channing and actress/singer Liza Minnelli.
Even Betty White, the former “Mary Tyler Moore Show” and “Golden Girls” star who hosted a highly-rated SNL last week, has gotten an encore on Facebook because fans now want her to host next year’s Academy Awards broadcast.

White told CBS’ Early Show this week she was dumbfounded by the prospect. “Give me a break,” she told the program.

JUDY TENUTA “FULL FRONTAL TENUDITY”

WHEN: SATURDAY JUNE 19TH, 2010
8pm & 10pm
$20.00 and $25.00 VIP seating - Dinner also available

WHERE: JON LOVITZ COMEDY CLUB UNIVERSAL CITY
1000 Universal Plaza, Universal City CA 818.824.6545
JONLOVITZCOMEDYCLUB.COM

WHAT/WHO: JUDY TENUTA is th emost famous person who ever lived...and if you dont believe it, just ask her. Judy is a triple threat in the sense that she has strong stage, television, comedy and film credits with a large fan base. She has appeared in "THE VAGINA MONOLOGUES", "MENOPAUSE THE MUSICAL" both in LA and Chicago, and she's had her own stand-up specials on showtime, HBO and Lifetime. Judy was the first female stand-up comic to win "BEST FEMALE COMEDIAN" at the American Comedy Awards and is a two-time Grammy nominee for her comedy CD's, "ATTENTION BUTT-PIRATES AND LESBETARIANS!" AND "IN GODDESS WE TRUST." That same year, she became the National Spokesperson for a series of Diet Dr. Pepper commercials. The self-described "LOVE GODDESS" and "APHRODITE OF THE ACCORDION" has made hundred of guest and co-hosting appearances on such popular TV shows as "TheView," "Late Night with David Letterman," "Larry King Live," "Entertainment Tonight," and "Comics Unleashed."

Judy's stand-up routine is appropriately described as outrageous, mind-blowing comedy.

She recently became an ordained minister, and converts her audiences to her signature religion, "JUDYISM." A strong advocate for the gay community, children and women's issues, the fun-loving feminist preaches that all women should be worshipped as "LOVE GODDESSES!"

Some of Judy's roles include: An ex-showgirl turned wedding chaplain on "General Hospital," a snobby judge on "Corey in the House" and a featured role in the teen comedy hit "Material Girls," starring Hillary and Haley Duff and directed by Martha coolidge. Judy also produced and starred in "Desperation Boulevard" about a former child star who stops at nothing to make a comeback. Judy will soon appear in the Indie Film, "Sister Mary" with Bruce Vilanch.....SO WATCH OUT, MERYL STREEP! For more information go to www.judytenuta.com

Press Contact: BHBPR/B. Harlan Böll Tel 626-296-3757 E> h.boll@dcpublicity.com

‘The American Stage: Writing on Theater From Washington Irving to Tony Kushner’
A new Library of America anthology emphasizes theater as show over theater as art.

Talk about not catching a break: Eclipsed by movies on the pop culture front, the theater also gets shunned at literary functions. Now the Library of America has thrown salt in the wounds with "The American Stage," a mishmash of more than 200 years of theater writing.

A grab-bag sensibility is probably unavoidable, but by including not just criticism but also memoir, journalism and other varieties of scribbling, editor Laurence Senelick — a professor of drama at Tufts — practically ensures the book's lack of usefulness. Reports of rowdy audience apple-throwing are in; Gertrude Stein is out. The result is a collection only a theater professor at war with his more textually oriented English department colleagues could love.

"Whether it is a playgoer complaining of the hardness of the seats or a critic comparing interpretations of Hamlet, the most vital accounts are by eyewitnesses," Senelick writes in his introduction. He announces that the book isn't a documentary history or a series of scholarly appraisals or a collection of playwriting voices. What he fails to consider, however, is how his anti-literary corrective to theater studies can so easily reinforce anti-intellectual biases.

Theater as show trumps theater as art. Melodrama, particularly a 19th century blockbuster adaptation of "Uncle Tom's Cabin," is the subject of much attention, including recollections by Mark Twain, Henry James and Willa Cather. Senelick, in one of many fuzzy formulations, contends that melodrama "was congenial to the American temperament" and that it has gone on to have a life in the works of "the most honored American playwrights, from O'Neill, Maxwell Anderson and Elmer Rice, to Lillian Hellman and Tennessee Williams

to Sam Shepard and David Mamet."

What he fails to consider adequately is that it was the dominant 19th century form of theater in Europe as well. And while vestiges of melodrama can be found wherever a dogged scholar seeks them out, a more instructive model for understanding 20th century American playwriting exists in the European rebellions against melodrama waged by such seminal figures as Henrik Ibsen, August Strindberg, Anton Chekhov and George Bernard Shaw.

America's colonial past has played a role in the culture's cowering subservience to English theater. It's hard, though, to countenance Senelick's imprecise remark on the transatlantic relationship: "Even today, a ‘think play' from the West End is transferred to Broadway each season as the theatrical equivalent of the coffee-table book." But then, Senelick doesn't want to consider the impact of our government's anemic support of the arts on substantive drama. In fact, he has the temerity to complain that American funding organizations are prejudiced against " ‘mere' entertainment." (Would he have the NEA support road companies of "Legally Blonde: The Musical"?)

"The American Stage" offers a good deal to savor, from the gold dust of praise for great actors (Stark Young on John Barrymore, John Mason Brown on Lee J. Cobb, Gore Vidal on Kim Stanley) to diamond-sharp insights into master dramatists (George Jean Nathan on Eugene O'Neill, Harold Clurman on Clifford Odets). But to find it, you have to pick your way through piles of detritus.
I found it difficult to understand the short shrift given to avant-garde performance, which along with musical comedy and our domestic brands of Method acting is the most original American contribution to world theater. ( Elizabeth Hardwick's desultory "Notes on the New Theater" barely scratches the surface, and how can there be no sustained discussion of the Wooster Group, Richard Foreman or Robert Wilson?)

But harder to justify is what has been included.

The two selections of James — one a roundup, the other an excerpt from his memoir "A Small Boy and Others" — offer virtually no indication that his theater criticism represents some of the most resplendent in the English language.

Mary McCarthy, notorious for getting it wrong when covering drama for Partisan Review, makes a cameo with a ludicrous attack on Tennessee Williams as a commercial hack. John Simon's "Boredom in the Theatre," riddled with peremptory potshots at Arthur Miller, Thornton Wilder and Harold Pinter, offers a polemic destined for the trash bin not marked for recyclables.

Perhaps these critics could have been better represented, but why not substitute in the more expansive Richard Gilman and Robert Brustein, both inexplicably exiled? Frank Rich has to be considered the best theater reviewer at a daily newspaper in more than a generation, yet his only appearance is a lightweight piece on Carol Channing reprising her turn in "Hello, Dolly!" And what do we make of the single piece by Walter Kerr, one of the 20th century's most dashing journalistic stylists? His middlebrow aesthetic led to some obtuse verdicts (he was immune to Beckett), but there are far more dazzling jewels in his oeuvre than the tidbit titled "Barns," a parasol-twirling paean to summer theater.

"The American Stage" succeeds perhaps only in reassuring us that the problems of the commercial theater are perennial. (Thomas M. Disch's "The Death of Broadway" and a selection from William Goldman's classic "The Season"

make this depressingly clear.) Although it's disappointing how little interest the book has in what's going on outside New York, no one should be surprised that John Lithgow was asked to write the foreword. The star system is alive and well — and not just on the Great White Way.

McNulty is The Times' theater critic.

charles.mcnulty@latimes.com

David Cromer to Direct Broadway Production of ‘Yank!’
(SOURCE: PATRICK HEALY,New York Times)
The acclaimed director David Cromer (“Our Town,” “When the Rain Stops Falling”) has been enlisted to lead next season’s expected Broadway production of “Yank!,” a musical about two American servicemen who fall in love during World War II, the producers said on Monday.

Mr. Cromer will replace Igor Goldin, who has been with “Yank!” since its inception at the New York Musical Theater Festival in 2005 and who directed the Off Broadway production of the show this winter. Theater critics also pointed to some problems with the musical during this winter’s run, at least some of which Mr. Cromer will undoubtedly address for Broadway.
Mr. Cromer has also drawn critical praise and theater honors as director of the 2008 Off Broadway musical “Adding Machine” and the Lincoln Center Theater production of “When the Rain Stops Falling” this spring. His Broadway debut came last fall, with the revival of Neil Simon’s “Brighton Beach Memoirs,” which drew generally positive reviews but closed just a week after opening night because of poor ticket sales.

A spokesman for “Yank!” did not immediately respond to a message about why Mr. Goldin was being replaced.
No performance schedule or casting has been announced for the Broadway production, only that it is expected to come during the 2010-11 season. The actor Bobby Steggert, who starred in the Off Broadway production and was just nominated for a Tony Award for featured actor in a musical for “Ragtime,” has said that he would like to return for the Broadway run.

The High Price of Facebook

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg spoke at a conference in San Francisco on April 21, 2010
By Daniel Lyons | NEWSWEEK
Published May 13, 2010
From the magazine issue dated May 31, 2010

If you don't spend your days glued to tech blogs, you might not know about the latest trend among hipster techies: quitting Facebook. These folks, including a bunch of Google engineers, are bailing out because Facebook just changed its rules so that much of your personal profile information, including where you work, what music you like, and where you went to school, now gets made public by default. Some info is even shared with companies that are special partners of Facebook, like Yelp, Pandora, and Microsoft. And while there are ways to dial back on some of this by tinkering with your privacy settings, it's tricky to figure out—intentionally so, according to cynics.

The fear is that people are being lured into Facebook with the promise of a fun, free service, and don't realize that they're paying for it by giving up loads of personal information. Facebook then attempts to "monetize" one's data by selling it to advertisers that want to send targeted messages.

Most folks using Facebook have no idea this is happening. Even if you're very tech-savvy and do know what the company is up to, you still have no idea what you're paying for Facebook, because people don't really know what their personal data is worth.

The biggest problem, however, is that the company keeps changing the rules. Early on, you could keep everything private. That was the great thing about Facebook—you could create your own little private network. Last year, the company changed its privacy rules so that a lot of things—your city, your profile photo, the names of your friends—were set, by default, to be shared with everyone on the Internet. Sure, you could change everything back and make it private. But most people probably didn't bother. Now Facebook is going even further by insisting that unless you agree to make things like your hometown, interests, and friends' names public, then you can't list them at all.

The whole kerfuffle is a misunderstanding, according to Elliot Schrage, Facebook's vice president of communications and public policy. In his version of events, the company is simply making changes to improve the service it provides to users by giving them more "granular" control over what they share, and if people don't share information they have a "less satisfying experience." Facebook is innovating so rapidly, he says, that people don't fully understand what the company is doing, and that change is scary.

Midnight Masquerade is back after a terrific run in March!

During a period of five years after World War II, Bernie Bierman – alongside his partner Jack Manus – wrote dozens of songs on Tin Pan Alley that made the top of the Hit Parade charts. His songs have been sung by Big Band greats like Don Cherry, Frankie Laine, Eddy Howard, Sammy Kaye Harry James, Billy Eckstine, and even Frank Sinatra.

While Jack Manus is no longer with us, Bernie Bierman is alive and well at the ripe old age of 101.75, making him one of the last surviving lyricist/composers of the 1940’s American Songbook!
For one night in May, consummate host and singer Joe Bachana and his big band of tuxedo-dressed musicians bring back a glamorous night of lush music from that vibrant period in American history.

Here’s what some of the reviewers said about the show:

Roy Sander on Bistroawards.com, wrote that “Midnight Masquerade” was “a lovely and loving evocation of that other time, that other view of life” and “Bachana is the ideal person to present these songs, for he embodies the very same qualities; charming and completely disarming, with a smooth, attractive baritone, he is the quintessential band singer—as pleasing to listen to as to be with.”

Rob Lester on NightlifeExchange.com wrote: “Nostalgia reigned supreme, optimism and sweetness fought cynicism, and came up the victors. Joe the pro, with arms outstretched and singing sincerely and irony-free was like a big band singer of yore, also championing the songs and their sensibilities.”

Don’t miss this incredible and charming night of authentic 1940’s-era music – we guarantee you will be transported back in time!

Joe Bachana, a native New Yorker, has been performing on the New York stage since childhood. In the past, Joe hosted the ever-popular MetroJam cabaret night at the Metropolitan Room in Manhattan and also produced and hosted at the New York Friars Club weekly Cafe Night on Thursdays in the early 2000’s. In addition to the Metropolitan Room, Joe has performed at Birdland, the West End Gate, the Duplex , the River Room of Harlem and many other venues throughout Manhattan and beyond.
Along with his career as a singer, Joe also is a classical pianist, having recently performed a solo concert at the National Arts Club. Clips of that performance and others by Joe may be found on youtube.com

20.00 Cover + 2 Beverage Minimum

LA CAGE AUX FOLLES Announces Opening Of CLUB LA CAGE

(SOURCE: BROADWAYWORLD.COM)

LA CAGE AUX FOLLES, nominated for 11 Tony Awards, including Best Revival of a Musical, is pleased to announce CLUB LA CAGE, the official post-theatre entertainment and dining experience!

After catching the smash hit musical revival of LA CAGE AUX FOLLES at the Longacre Theatre (220 West 48th Street), the evening continues next door at CLUB LA CAGE, nestled within the newly renovated 3rd floor bar and terrace at Hurley's (232 West 48th Street) . CLUB LA CAGE is open Saturdays at 11:15 PM and Sundays at 10:15 PM.

At CLUB LA CAGE, acclaimed singer and performer Raven O hosts a nightlife spectacle featuring a revolving cast of New York City's top drag entertainers and an assortment of exciting and surprising special guests. CLUB LA CAGE will feature appearances by drag personalities Peppermint, Sherry Vine, Lauren Ordair, Flotilla DeBarge and more.

There is a $12 cover for CLUB LA CAGE. Present your LA CAGE AUX FOLLES ticket for a 10% discount on all food and beverages. Restrictions apply.

Visit www.ClubLaCage.com for more information.

CLUB LA CAGE BIOGRAPHIES

Raven O is gearing up for the summer run of his one-man show, Raven O - One Night With You at the Bleecker St. Theater, NYC. He continues to be the star of the outlandish nightclub The Box on Thursday nights. Raven just completed a two-and-a-half year run of nightly shows at The Box where he was known as "the glue" which helped make the club one of the most famous clubs in the world. Raven was a recent hit as the Master of Ceremonies and performer at Simon Cowell's 50th birthday celebration in England. He is known as the entertainer the famous come to see. Jude Law, Sting, Josh Lucas, Lindsay Lohan, Mary J. Blige, Alan Cumming, Kevin Spacey, Kate Moss, Simon Cowell...the list is endless. In his early days he studied everything from classical ballet to traditional Hula, using his talents to get gigs in musical theatre, dance concerts, and even as a stripper in a women's only club. Raven hit New York City at 18 and quickly became a fixture in the punk and post-punk scenes. He toured as a singer with Sylvain Sylvain of The New York Dolls. He was first a go-go boy at the notorious Limelight and a Cat Clubdancer. Before landing his gig at The Box, Raven spent three years in Las Vegas as one of the stars of the Cirque du Soleil show, Zumanity. www.raven-o.com

Peppermint, the hardest working woman in show business, she has conquered the New York scene with her high-energy and engaging personality. With consecutive shows 7 nights a week, Peppermint has the largest following of ANY drag performer in NY and has been named Best Breakthrough Artist, Best Host/MC, and Entertainer of the Year and nominated Best Pop Video, Best Vocalist, Best Dancer by L Magazine, The Village Voice & HX Magazine. From her comedic and lively hosting to her live music performances of pop, rock and hip-hop, Peppermint's refreshing style has helped develop a dedicated and eclectic audience. With an inherent versatility, she's made the ultimate leap from fun entertainer to serious recording artist.
"Servin it Up"* was named one of the Top songs of the Year by Next Magazine and HX Magazine. The "Servin It Up" video held its position on MTV/Logo's Top 10 for severAl Weeks.
Peppermint was recently featured on MTV's The Real World Brooklyn and has been featured in videos with Debbie Harry and the Scissor Sisters. She has also performed alongside Chaka Khan, Martha Wash and Ultra Nate' for packed houses around the world and she recently took her show (complete with backup dancers and pyrotechnics) overseas to London and Australia. Peppermint has helped raise over $100,000 for the Human Rights Campaign (including a large bid from Vanessa Williams). She is deeply involved in the fight against HIV/AIDS and participant in the M.A.C. Aids Fund and Project Achieve. www.peppermintonline.com

Sherry Vine was born in the Amish country. On her 16th birthday, she discovered she was adopted and actually Jewish. Running away from home she became a "show girl" in Las Vegas before relocating to NYC where she has established herself as one of the leading ladies performing her all live singing and comedy show internationally on stage, TV and film. Miss Vine lived in Berlin from 2001 ‘til 2005 and is now happy to be back home in Manhattan. Sherry has starred in the smash theatrical productions of The Bad Weed '73 (in NYC, LA and Provincetown), e.s.p. - Eyes of a Supermodel Psychic ("The Underground hit of the Season" - NY Times), The Final Feast of Lucrezia Borgia ("Move over gals, NYC has a serious stage diva in Sherry Vine" - Paper Magazine), her one-woman/ten character hit, Kitty Killer, the completely sold out mega-hit Charlie!, the off-Broadway transfer of Tell-Tale at the Cherry Lane Theatre ("Almost impossible not to have a good time" - NY Times), Doll ("One of downtown's most innovative and eye-popping Theatre Companies!" - Encore) and most recently in the wildly successful sold out adaptation of Stephen King's Carrie. All shows were produced by Theatre Couture, of which Sherry is co-Artistic Director with Joshua Rosenzweig and Erik Jackson. Sherry can be seen in the films Charlie, Francesca Page, Wigstock, Stonewall, Scream, Teen, Scream ("the best comedic performance of the year" - LA Weekly), The RuPaul Christmas Special, Mutti The Movie, Raspberry Reich, The Charmed Life, Squeezebox The Movie and Mr. & Mrs. Porebski (co-written with Marec Porebski). Sherry was voted Entertainer of the Year by her peers and honored with the first Glammy Award. HX Drag Queen of the Year, 2007. www.sherryvine.com

Lauren Ordair is a Michigan transplant, but has been living it up in New York for quite some time. However, she has only been Dragging for about a year, but even though she is a youngster, she will give you a run for your money! With a vocal performance background from The New School and a Musical Theatre Certificate from The American Musical and Dramatics Academy this young girlie is ready to show people the powerful voice of a Midwest Lady. As well as her performance here she has performed in a selection of bar cabarets around the city and is excited to just keep on singing! In addition to her love for singing she enjoys horror movies, wine from a box, and being with good friends. She send a special thanks out to God, her mom, D squared, Matty, Chaddy-pooh, and bayba.

Flotilla DeBarge, the Empress of Large, has long been a popular figure within the New York City nightlife scene. She has been cast in several movies such as To Wong Foo, Thanks For Everything! Julie Newmar, Marci X and the miniseries version of Angels in America. Flotilla appeared on Broadway in The Threepenny Opera as well as performing an Off-Broadway one-woman show, The Flotilla DeBarge Minstrel Show. DeBarge garnered considerable attention in 2005 when PETA featured Flotilla, as Star Jones, in an anti-fur ad. Jones reportedly threatened to sue both PETA and Flotilla as a result of the ad, DeBarge created a new solo show based on her jail time experience, Flotilla DeBarge: Freshly Released - Black, Blessed & Free. Of her time in jail DeBarge would later say, "It certainly wasn't OZ, honey. There was no Chris Meloni in sight."

www.ClubLaCage.com

LA CAGE AUX FOLLES opened on Broadway to rave reviews on April 18. The production has been nominated for 11 Tony Awards including Best Revival of a Musical, Best Actor in a Musical (Kelsey Grammer), Best Actor in a Musical (Douglas Hodge), Best Featured Actor in a Musical (Robin De Jesús), Best Direction of a Musical (Terry Johnson), Best Choreography (Lynne Page), Best Scenic Design of a Musical (Tim Shortall), Best Costume Design of a Musical (Matthew Wright), Best Lighting Design of a Musical (Nick Richings), Best Sound Design of a Musical (Jonathan Deans) and Best Orchestrations (Jason Carr).

LA CAGE is the winner of four Outer Critics Circle Awards, including Best Revival of a Musical, Best Actor in a Musical (Douglas Hodge), Best Director of a Musical (Terry Johnson) and Best Costumes (Matthew Wright) and has also been nominated for seven Drama Desk Awards, including Best Revival of a Musical and three Drama League Awards, including Best Revival of a Musical.

LA CAGE AUX FOLLES features music and lyrics by Jerry Herman and book by Harvey Fierstein, based on the play by Jean Poiret. This freshly reconceived production is choreographed by Lynne Page and directed by Terry Johnson.

LA CAGE AUX FOLLES stars five-time Emmy Award-winner Kelsey Grammer as Georges and Olivier Award-winner Douglas Hodge as Albin, and also stars Fred Applegate as Edouard Dindon/M. Renaud; Tony nominee Veanne Cox as Mme. Dindon/Mme. Renaud; Chris Hoch as Francis; Elena Shaddow as Anne; A.J. Shively as Jean-Michel; with two-time Tony Award nominee Christine Andreas as Jacqueline; Tony Award nominee Robin de Jesús as Jacob; with Heather Lindell as Colette; Bill Nolte as Tabarro and David Nathan Perlow as Etienne.
Also starring as the notorious and dangerous Cagelles are Nick Adams as Angelique, Sean A. Carmon as Phaedra, Nicholas Cunningham as Hanna, Sean Patrick Doyle as Chantal, Logan Keslar as Bitelle and Terry Lavell as Mercedes. The production also features Christophe Caballero, Todd Lattimore, Dale Hensley, Caitlin Mundth and Cheryl Stern.

Douglas Hodge and Nicholas Cunningham are appearing with the permission of Actors' Equity Association. The producers gratefully acknowledge Actors' Equity Association for its assistance to this production.

Georges (Kelsey Grammer) is the suave owner of a glitzy drag club on the French Riviera. Partnered romantically with his high-strung star performer, Albin (Douglas Hodge), the pair live a charmed life-until Georges' son announces his engagement to the daughter of a conservative right-wing politician who's coming to dinner.

The original production of LA CAGE AUX FOLLES was one of Broadway's biggest hits of the 1980s. It opened August 21, 1983 at the Palace Theatre, where it played for over four years and 1,761 performances. The show won six Tony Awards in 1984, including Best Musical, Best Score (Jerry Herman) and Best Book (Harvey Fierstein).

The new production of LA CAGE AUX FOLLES played from November 23, 2007 to March 8, 2008 at the Menier Chocolate Factory, earning across the board raves and moving to the West End's Playhouse Theatre On October 30, 2008, where it was nominated for seven 2009 Olivier Awards, winning for Best Musical Revival and Best Actor in a Musical for Douglas Hodge and won the 2009 Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Musical.

"A glorious night of showbiz razzle dazzle!" exclaimed Charles Spencer, Daily Telegraph. "At last a musical to sweep away those credit-crunch blues. This joyous show deserves every hurrah and standing ovation it receives." "Suddenly, the West End sparkles," cheered Sam Marlowe, The Times.

"Sew on a sequin, slip into some heels and go."
The production features set design by Tim Shortall, costume design by Matthew Wright, lighting design by Nick Richings, sound design by Jonathan Deans and wig and makeup design by Richard Mawbey. Musical supervision, orchestrations and dance arrangements are by Jason Carr. Musical director is Todd Ellison.

LA CAGE AUX FOLLES is produced by Sonia Friedman Productions, David Babani, Fran and Barry Weissler and Edwin W. Schloss, Bartner/Tulchin, Broadway Across America, Matthew Mitchell, Raise the Roof 4 Richard Winkler/Bensinger Taylor/Laudenslager Bergère, Arlene Scanlan/John O'Boyle, Independent Presenters Network, Olympus Theatricals, Allen Spivak, Jerry Frankel/Bat-Barry Productions, Nederlander Presentations, Inc/Harvey Weinstein.

Tickets ($132.50 - $36.50; Premium $251.50; Table Seating $251.50) are on sale through Telecharge.com at 212-239-6200, online at www.telecharge.com/lacage and at the Longacre Theatre box office (220 West 48th Street). Performances are Tuesday through Saturday at 8:00 PM, Sunday at 7:00 PM, with matinees Wednesday and Saturday at 2:30 PM. Special Sunday matinee time on June 13 at 2:00 PM. Beginning June 20, Sunday matinees are at 3:00 PM.

www.LaCage.com

Actors lose out on health benefits as SAG, AFTRA keep separate plans

Actors find it increasingly difficult to meet earnings thresholds for receiving benefits, because their income is carved up between the unions. That's one reason a merger is again under discussion.

(SOURCE: Richard Verrier, Los Angeles Times)

Fred Ochs' second career as an actor took off last year. The 62-year-old former software engineer landed gigs on nine TV shows, playing the singing policeman in the crime series "The Mentalist," Judge Belford in Showtime's dark "Dexter" and a probate attorney in the A&E drama "The Cleaner."

Now if he could just get health insurance to go along with the steady work. Ochs' pulmonologist has urged him to get examined for a shadow on his lungs. Because his acting work is divided between the two actors unions, Ochs will have to pay for the exam himself.

"It was a great year for me, but because of the way my work was split between SAG and AFTRA, I didn't make enough in either union to qualify," said Ochs, who lives in Hollywood. "It's just plain absurd."

Like children caught in the middle of a parental spat, actors are enduring unintended consequences of a feud that erupted two years ago when the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists suspended its longtime partnership with the Screen Actors Guild to negotiate prime-time TV contracts.

Journeyman actors like Ochs have traditionally earned middle-class wages from playing supporting characters in countless TV dramas, sitcoms and movies.
But now they are finding it increasingly difficult to meet the earnings thresholds required for receiving benefits, which range from about $10,000 to $30,000 a year, because their income is carved up between two unions. Each union has separate health and pension plans, and they don't allow contributions to be combined.

"People are very, very upset and worried," said Kevin E. West, founder of the Actors Network, a professional business organization for actors.
"It's a huge problem that affects several hundred working actors."

The sparring between AFTRA and SAG — over turf and strategy — paved the way for AFTRA to clinch its own contract with the studios, which rushed to embrace the ambitious union as a hedge against the more unpredictable SAG.

As a result, the studios swung many of their labor contracts covering network prime-time TV pilots to AFTRA, an incursion that's led to near-100% penetration this year when the smaller actors union won contracts for 81 of 83 pilots.
Health coverage wasn't always a problem.

When SAG dominated prime-time TV contracts, the actors in those shows worked largely under one union roof. But with the landscape now shared by two unions, an actor may work on an older TV series covered by a SAG contract and next take a role on a newer TV series under an AFTRA contract, often not earning enough in either union to meet health plan requirements.
Actors for years have debated merging their unions, but previous attempts in 1999 and 2003 failed, reflecting long-standing mistrust between member factions.
But growing concern over how the status quo is affecting health and pension benefits for actors has renewed the impetus to consolidate the two unions so that a single plan could be offered.

Leaders of both have had preliminary discussions about merging.
"Pension and health benefits are a cornerstone of union protection," SAG President Ken Howard said. "When actors' work is split between two unions, that protection is weakened or, in the worst cases, eliminated. That's not acceptable, and it's one of many reasons merging SAG and AFTRA makes sense."
AFTRA President Roberta Reardon said gaining leverage in bargaining and union organizing was the driving reason to merge but added: "I completely agree it would be great to have one health insurance policy and one retirement plan."
That AFTRA, which until recently was pegged as a secondary union for actors who worked mostly on soaps and some cable programs, would emerge seemingly overnight as the go-to union for prime-time TV is a reversal for the more prestigious SAG, which still has exclusive jurisdiction over feature film work.
Although the unions have agreed to resume joint bargaining in the upcoming round of negotiations this fall, actors are still feeling the fallout from the dispute.

"One extra SAG job would have put me over the earnings threshold," said Ochs, who says he can't afford to pay $600 a month for private insurance.
"It's a kick in the gut."

And the kick couldn't come at a worse time.

Both unions have steadily raised earnings requirements for insurance at a time when reality TV programs have taken away jobs, movie stars increasingly are filling guest star roles on TV shows and the income that actors get from residuals — the fees paid out when shows rerun — has shrunk.

Cost-cutting in Hollywood also has made it much harder for actors to get their "quotes," the fees that reflect their experience, thereby lowering their earnings and ability to qualify for health insurance.
Beyond earning enough to qualify for insurance, Los Angeles-based actors like Wendy Worthington also complain that the situation is weakening pension benefits.

After a nearly two-decade career playing roles on TV shows including "Desperate Housewives" and "Ghost Whisperer," Worthington, 55, has earned enough credits to be fully vested in the Screen Actors Guild pension plan. With more TV jobs swinging to AFTRA, however, she has less money to pump into her SAG pension, damping the eventual payout she will receive when she retires.

And because Worthington spent most of her career working in SAG, it's doubtful she will qualify for AFTRA's pension plan any time soon.

"I like to joke that I wish they would just send me the cash that I earned under my AFTRA contracts so I could put it in the shredder myself, because it's just lost money for me," she said.
richard.verrier@latimes.com
Copyright © 2010, The Los Angeles Times

I'll give the guy credit for promptly resigning in the face of his hypocrisy.
Ironically, there was also a video on YouTube featuring the congressman & the same staffer having a moderated discussion about the importance of abstinence-only sex education in the schools.... until it was removed this soon after his announcement.

Marriage is between a man, a woman – and a mistress

Indiana Rep. Mark Souder – a Republican – is resigning because he had an affair with a female staffer.

So perhaps it’s not a surprise that he’s also a proponent of marriage being only between a man and a woman. He voted to Constitutionally ban gay marriage because, he says, it’s an assault on American values.

From Souder’s website:
“I believe that Congress must fight to uphold the traditional values that undergird the strength of our nation. The family plays a fundamental role in our society. Studies consistently demonstrate that it is best for a child to have a mother and father, and I am committed to preserving traditional marriage, the union of one man and one woman.”

So…mistresses are OK. But two gay people in a committed relationship? That’s anti-American.

So far, he hasn’t blamed gay marriage in DC for weakening his own marriage – but that’s gotta be the next step.

Soap star Michael Park plays multiple roles in a new musical

Michael Park has spent fourteen years playing Detective Jack Snyder on As the World Turns, but he’s had less than four months to develop four characters in the new Off-Broadway musical The Burnt Part Boys.

That’s certainly a departure from his soap opera gig, and not just because he only plays one character on television. For one thing, the series regularly requires him to learn up to forty pages of a script overnight. “My short term memory has completely taken over my long term memory,” Park says. “That doesn’t lend itself to theatre work, really. [In the theatre,] it’ll take me two seconds to learn a scene, but I have to retain the knowledge of that scene, the beats of that scene.”

Yet this isn’t the first time he’s had to juggle his stage and soap commitments. In 1997, the year he joined As the World Turns, Park was also in the musical Violet, produced at Playwrights Horizons. (The company is also staging The Burnt Part Boys—in a coproduction with The Vineyard Theatre—so this show is something of a homecoming.)

Then as now, he values the freedom that the theatre gives actors to experiment and grow, and he says that playing multiple roles in The Burnt Part Boys is pushing him in unusual directions.

With a score by Chris Miller, lyrics by Nathan Tysen, and a book by Mariana Elder, the show follows a young boy who decides to detonate the West Virginia coal mine where his father was killed in an accident.
He imagines he’s John Wayne in The Alamo, and Park plays an assortment of characters from that film (including legendary figures like Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie) that crop up in the boy’s fantasies and help guide him on his journey. “I’m not the one driving the show,” he says, “But I add a little bit of salt and pepper to it.”

Director Joe Calarco has encouraged Park to adlib during the show, meaning he’s apt to run through the audience. The actor wanted to know whether he was allowed to wake patrons who might be dozing in the front row. Calarco said yes.

Park also credits Tim Sanford, Playwrights’ artistic director, with creating a relaxed atmosphere. “It was really a treat walking in those doors again,” he says. “I’m a lot looser and a little more carefree this time.”

That said, he recognizes the all-too-serious relevance of the show’s subject matter. The musical is set in West Virginia in 1962, but with the recent West Virginia mining tragedies still making headlines, things don’t seem all that different now. “In a way, I feel like we’re celebrating what these people do and the dangers that they face every day. But we’re not trying to profit off the tragedies of the past month,” he says.

As the show’s opening on May 25 draws near, Park is working to balance the historical, fantastical, and contemporary elements of his performance. However, he expects that he’ll keep refining his work well into the run. “You can’t be complacent,” he says. He likens this sentiment to the experience of being in front of the camera on As the World Turns.
“Every time I see that red light go on, I have a heart attack,” he says. “But the second you’re not having that heart attack, quit. You’re done.”

Laura Hedli is a theatre critic and reporter based in New York City

Support THE ARTS! LIVE THEATRE! Go see a show this week!

Send me your reviews and suggestions and I will put them in my next blog coming out May 25th.
Here's to an ARTS-filled week! Don't forget to contribute to the DR. CAROL CHANNING & HARRY KULLIJIAN FOUNDATION FOR THE ARTS: http://www.carolchanning.org/Foundation.htm

With grateful XOXOXs for your support!

Richard Skipper

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HERE IS WHAT AUDIENCES ARE SAYING ABOUT MY WORK:

Sandee and I love Richard and Dana, We always have a good time at Iguana. The food is good and reasonable. Richard and Dana are the best host and Hostess in town. The talent is top notch, the jokes can make you laugh, and one can get home at a decent hour...
Michael Janin, Long Beach New York

I look forward to Wednesday night at the Iguana where I know I will be entertained in style and comfort. Richard and Dana are not only exceptional talents, but are also exceedlingly humorous and warm and gracious hosts.
I enjoy spreading the word to my friends who are now part of our expanding group on Wednesday nights.
Rita Golub, NYC

Hi Richard,
I had the pleasure of attending WEDNESDAY NIGHT AT THE IGUANA this past Wednesday evening. I have to commend Richard Skipper and Dana Lorge for presenting a thoroughly delight-full evening with a talented array of performers.It was great hearing and seeing Richard & Dana performing live. As General MacArthur said, "I SHALL RETURN."
Len Schlosberg, Leonard Talent Associates Inc.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: NYC THE AWARD WINNING WEDNESDAY NIGHT AT THE IGUANA STARRING DANA LORGE, RICHARD SKIPPER, AND FRIENDS!
Dana Lorge and I have put our OWN spin on the variety show format and are now hosting every Wednesday night in NYC at The Iguana VIP Lounge (http://www.iguananyc.com) in the heart of NYC (240 West 54th Street 8-11PM/with an intermission).

Cover: $12 - no food or drink minimums – but remember – the food is great!
WINNER OF TWO 2010 MANHATTAN ASSOCIATION OF CABARETS AND CLUBS AWARDS (MAC) FOR OUTSTANDING VARIETY SHOW AND OUTSTANDING HOSTS!
or more info, please call 845-365-0720 or visit _www.RichardSkipper.com_
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