And THAT is the state of the "ART", my friend...PART ONE

" Genius is the ability to act rightly without precedent-the power to do the right thing the first time."
- Elbert Hubbard, American writer (1856-1915)

Happy Tuesday!
I hope you are creating your OWN art today...whatever that may be! Harry Kullijian, Carol Channing's husband...and a wise man, says that if you are a plumber, a carpenter, a baker, a teacher, a "you fill in the blank", and you put your heart and soul into it, you are creating great art.

In his autobiography Moss Hart said he learned a lot from also seeing bad plays.
Danny and I pay our dues . We go to a lot of bad as well as good performances. The fun part is that we are together.

This morning, I posted on Facebook, "Today, I'm writing about those that try to stifle art and or "re-create" it. If you have any thoughts on this, please send my way."

I immediately got these responses: One thing I would like to know. My father was a fine artist and very good at his art but I think he would be confused by the amount of money that graffiti artists can make, aka Banksy. Banksy designed his own stencils and sprayed these stencils as a political comment. He hasn't been the first to do this and probably wont be the last. Now there is another artist, an ex filmmaker, who is copying his style and is making oodles of money. Why are 'stencils' valued at more than the painstaking hours that artists put into individual works?

"The most frustrating thing about applying to participate in many art shows is the request for a detailed--2-3 page- explanation of why you did the artwork, or why you chose the music you submitted. I paint because something struck me visually--there is no deep, Freudian reason.
I chose the song because I loved the melody, or the poetry of the text moved me....it's not part of the therapy my shrink prescribed to help me get over a breakup."

"Those who cannot create and who are hidebound in a mind set centuries out of synch with the world are frightened by the power of art, the freedom of creativity, and the fear that they are dinosaurs, so they must attempt to destroy what scares them. They do it in art and in politics as well. They make senseless destructive choices such as killing living beings to defend the so called rights of the unborn - i.e., bombing clinics. There is no cure for stupidity. Artists must just plow on!"
Francine L. Trevens

"I first heard about the Taliban when they tried to destroy those 3.000 year old statues of Buddah. I knew right then and there that people who destroy art are not really people at all. And to do it for "religious" reasons makes them even lower still in my humble opinion. As far as "re-creating it, well, that's kind of a double edged sword, isn't it? Look what is going on with the new and, dare I say it, improved version of Porgy and Bess. I think Stephen Sondheim hit the nail on the head in his critique of the changes being made at the conceit of the directors. I could go on for hours about this so let me just say "stifle art BAD!!! re-create art SOMETIME BAD SOMETIME GOOD!!!!"

"One of my favorite (analogies?) is the bumblebee. According to the rules of physics,the bee's little wings vs body size means the bumblebee cannot fly. He doesn't know this, so he flies anyway."





Very interesting and apt comments and questions. Who decides what art is and/or the value attached to it.

I LOVE the creative process and I especially love it when I'm sharing in that process with others who are working for the same goals. I recently wrote about a friend who used to begin every meeting by saying, "Either you're on my team or you're not. If you're not, please leave." A couple of people found fault with that statement. I think they missed the point of what she was saying. That doesn't mean everyone has to agree with everything she says. That means that everyone has the same vision or at least they honor her vision.

I have a rule of thumb when it comes to criticism...If it's going to help me, I want to hear it. If it's not going to help me (Trust me, EVERYBODY is a critic!), it will go in one ear and out the other. If it's going to hurt me, I don't want to hear it.

This is has been a very unusual year for me as far as my "art" is concerned. I have purposely not written about it for fear of legal repercussions and I have to be careful now for fear of "what might happen." The bottom line is that I have been performing as Carol Channing for over 20 years. I have always taken the HIGH road as far as my art is concerned. I have always treated Carol with the utmost respect. I am an anomaly. I always have been in. Sight unseen, "straight" bookers...or those that make the ultimate decisions in whether or not they will hire me are afraid they will be booking a "gay "drag show" or that they will offend someone...even with my press to back up who and what I am truly about. The "gay" venues, ie, pride events, cruise ships, special events, feel that I'm not "current" enough and/or edgy enough (read bitchy and catty). And then there is another whole category who don't take me seriously at all. In their eyes I'm neither an artist or an actor. I am a "drag queen", period. I just call myself an entertainer now. But over the years, when people have asked me what I do for a living and I tell them I perform as Carol Channing. They either laugh or say "that is very interesting". I don't think I would get the same response if I told them I was starring in "THE BOOK OF MORMON."

It's all about perceptions. Because of MY approach to what I do, the first time I went in to perform for Carol Channing, I said that if she didn't like what I was doing, I would never do it again. She has endorsed me, critics have praised me, press has lauded me, and audiences have embraced me? Why is it harder now than when I first started?

When you have lived within the skin of a character for as long as I have, sometimes there is a resistance to change. But I desire to grow and to continue to learn. My first director was the late great Jeff Matson. He really believed in me and really helped me get off on the right foot and "humanize" Carol rather than make her a caricature.

He also came up with a wonderful concept show, CAROL CHANNING + 2, celebrating the music of Jerry Herman and Jule Styne, who, of course, were partially responsible for Carol Channing's biggest hits, GENTLEMEN PREFER BLONDES and HELLO, DOLLY! He also brought on Miles Phillips (Millie) and Parker Scott (Miss Dorothy) as co-stars and it was one of the best experiences I have ever had as an entertainer! Talk about the creative process! EVERYONE brought the utmost to the table and it was an incredible time for all! CAROL CHANNING + 2 started out as a one night only event. Well, everyone involved knew within minutes of the first rehearsal that this was destined to be much more, and CC+2 was born. . .
The one night only show was a sold-out Standing Room Only smash! And we vowed to bring it back. We fleshed out the show to feature even more of Parker and Miles plus more new material for "Carol" (and of course, the 3 of us together) and started our new run in September 2001 . . . then put it on hold while the world got its bearings. But we came back with a vengeance! With knockout performances starting in November and raising the roof right through the Holidays - no better way to treat yourself to some genuine joy!
This show was a wonderful celebration of the music of Jerry Herman and Jule Styne, in the spirit of those great old Carol Burnett style music specials (right down to a fantastic 30-songs-in-5-minutes-medley, by our amazing Director/Lyricist, Jeff Matson and brilliant Musical Director, David Maiocco)! This was the genuine article. And it became a multiple MAC award winner as well!
Tom Lynch, in his BroadwayOnline column said: "This is real musical theatre. The stage at Don't Tell Mama may be smaller than the stages of the Broadway theatres a block east, but the talent onstage is just as large." And Carol Channing herself said: "The first time EVER that I have been shown with so much love!"
Miles wrote on his website: "For those of you who've never seen MAC and Bistro Award winning Richard as Carol, let me tell you he is AMAZING! I've had the pleasure of meeting Ms. Channing on a few occasions: over tea, at parties, etc., and Richard captures her heart, joy and genuine spirit (not to mention a dead-on, never mean-spirited impression) with heart stopping accuracy. Your face will hurt from smiling!"


CAROL CHANNING + 2
Celebrating the music of
Jerry Herman & Jule Styne!
Musical Direction by David Maiocco
Choreography by Susan Matsuki
Directed by Jeff Matson

It's been 10 years! Perhaps we should bring it back!

I miss Jeff very much. Several years later, I was asked by my friend LinDel Sandlin to bring my show to The Wings Theatre to fill a vacancy when a show had pulled out of their winter schedule. I called Miles and asked him if he would be interested in directing me.
I was ecstatic when Miles came on board. We did not always see eye to eye in terms of the arc and shape of the show. But one thing was always constant, my admiration and respect for him as an artist and as a director.But one thing I ALWAYS knew, Miles had the utmost respect for the work I do and that always shown through and I was VERY pleased with the final product. And speaking of Parker Scott, he has been busy cramming Russian, French and Italian into my head!

As part of Opera Slavica and Opera Project NYC, Parker has two performances coming up this month. If you are in the city - go on by and check them out.


1) Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin - on Thursday 25 August @ 7.30pm (Flyer above)
Parker will be Monsieur Triquet for that performance.

2) Opera Scenes night on Saturday 27 August @ 8pm @ Etc. Etc. on West 44th Street. (Yes - food and/or drinks are available)
Parker will be in two scenes - one from Massenet's Manon and one from Verdi's Falstaff.








My friend Judy Stadt writes, "My wish is that artists keep on pursuing their art ... for the love of it ... be as good as you can be and not listen to anyone, especially the "so called experts". Artists are magical creatures that see what nobody else does, so you can't always expect recognition for your discoveries.
Keep going darlings."

During my run at the Wings theatre,the wheels truly moving started moving towards a show concept in which I would tell MY story on stage. I had several discussions with an individual on this idea. I even signed a contract with this individual. I will admit that I did not know what I was doing but I essentially gave away the rights to my show (that's why you've seen less of my Carol shows this year). After signing the contract, I forgot about it. It sat in a file cabinet for two years. During that two year period, my focus was primarily on WEDNESDAY NIGHT AT THE IGUANA, which I was co-hosting with Dana Lorge. We were putting together a NEW show every week with a cast of 24 EVERY week. It became a full time job and THAT'S where my focus was. I do want to state, however, that during that two year period I also did over 20 appearances as Carol Channing with no acknowledgement of that contract during that time.

In February of last year, I was contacted by Dori Berenstein to be part of a documentary celebrating Carol Channing! I was ecstatic! Dori and Adam Zuker came to my house and spent an entire day with me. You can see the final product tomorrow night if you are in New York as part of Tavern On The Green's Summer Under The Stars Series.

Dori said that she would like to film me getting into make-up and transforming into Carol.

I told Dori that I really did not want to do that in my home. I felt that it would de-legitimize what I do. I also didn't want to give viewers the impression that I dress like this around the house. I told her that the next time I appeared as Carol, if they were still filming AND if they were still interested, I would LOVE to have them come in and film me. That way they would get a chance to see me preparing for a real performance. Dori agreed that that would be the route to go.
Shortly after that, I received a call from Herb Goldman. I had been referred to him by Steve DePasse.

Herb was going to be doing a series called GREAT ENTERTAINERS ON BROADWAY!

Great Entertainers on Broadway would be presented on eight evenings -- Monday through Thursday, July 26, 27, 28 and 29 and Monday through Thursday, August 2, 3, 4 and 5 at 7 PM and 9:30 PM each night - in an elegant 300-seat venue (to be renamed the Broadway Emporium for this engagement). Some performers would headline single shows while others would perform both shows on a given night.

Star performers (in alphabetical order): Christine Andreas, Tony Babino, Liz Callaway,Steve DePass, Rebecca Luker, Donna McKechnie, Mark Nadler, Marni Nixon, Faith Prince and yours truly in the concert series being presented by producer/promoter Herbert G. Goldman, the author of books about Eddie Cantor, Fannie Brice and Al Jolson.

As soon as I got on board, I immediately called Dori Berenstein and she lined up a film crew to film me that night!

Tune in tomorrow to find out what happened next!





The following is from The New York Times: There’s a spanking new version of “Porgy and Bess” on the way, one that seeks to transform the classic 1935 opera into a commercial Broadway musical. To that end, the director Diane Paulus and the playwright Suzan-Lori Parks have added new scenes, punched up some dialogue, invented biographical details and — most radically — added a more upbeat ending. Such tinkering with the renowned Gershwin work was bound to draw fire from some quarters, and indeed it has, following the publication of an Arts & Leisure article by Patrick Healy about the production, which stars Audra McDonald and Norm Lewis. It begins performances at the American Repertory Theater next Wednesday in Cambridge, Mass., with plans to transfer to Broadway next winter.

Nearly all the readers who responded expressed some degree of concern over this effort to refresh this landmark of American culture for modern audiences. (Michael Musto in The Village Voice even had a little fun with it.)

Among those most rankled was the composer Stephen Sondheim, himself no stranger to bold re-interpretations of his own work, who sent in this letter to the editor on Tuesday.

The article by Mr. Healy about the coming revival of “Porgy and Bess” is dismaying on many levels. To begin with, the title of the show is now “The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess.” I assume that’s in case anyone was worried it was the Rodgers and Hart “Porgy and Bess” that was coming to town. But what happened to DuBose Heyward? Most of the lyrics (and all of the good ones) are his alone (“Summertime,” “My Man’s Gone Now”) or co-written with Ira Gershwin (“Bess, You Is My Woman Now”). If this billing is at the insistence of the Gershwin estate, they should be ashamed of themselves. If it’s the producers’ idea, it’s just dumb. More dismaying is the disdain that Diane Paulus, Audra McDonald and Suzan-Lori Parks feel toward the opera itself.

Ms. Paulus says that in the opera you don’t get to know the characters as people. Putting it kindly, that’s willful ignorance. These characters are as vivid as any ever created for the musical theater, as has been proved over and over in productions that may have cut some dialogue and musical passages but didn’t rewrite and distort them.

What Ms. Paulus wants, and has ordered, are back stories for the characters. For example she (or, rather, Ms. Parks) is supplying Porgy with dialogue that will explain how he became crippled. She fails to recognize that Porgy, Bess, Crown, Sportin’ Life and the rest are archetypes and intended to be larger than life and that filling in “realistic” details is likely to reduce them to line drawings. It makes you speculate about what would happen if she ever got her hands on “Tosca” and ‘Don Giovanni.” How would we get to know them? Ms. Paulus would probably want to add an aria or two to explain how Tosca got to be a star, and she would certainly want some additional material about Don Giovanni’s unhappy childhood to explain what made him such an unconscionable lecher.

Then there is Ms. Paulus’s condescension toward the audience. She says, “I’m sorry, but to ask an audience these days to invest three hours in a show requires your heroine be an understandable and fully rounded character.” I don’t know what she’s sorry about, but I’m glad she can speak for all of us restless theatergoers. If she doesn’t understand Bess and feels she has to “excavate” the show, she clearly thinks it’s a ruin, so why is she doing it? I’m sorry, but could the problem be her lack of understanding, not Heyward’s?

She is joined heartily in this sentiment by Ms. McDonald, who says that Bess is “often more of a plot device than a full-blooded character.” Often? Meaning sometimes she’s full-blooded and other times not? She’s always full-blooded when she’s acted full-bloodedly, as she was by, among others, Clamma Dale and Leontyne Price. Ms. McDonald goes on to say, “The opera has the makings of a great love story … that I think we’re bringing to life.” Wow, who’d have thought there was a love story hiding in “Porgy and Bess” that just needed a group of visionaries to bring it out?

Among the ways in which Ms. Parks defends the excavation work is this: “I wanted to flesh out the two main characters so that they are not cardboard cutout characters” and goes on to say, “I think that’s what George Gershwin wanted, and if he had lived longer he would have gone back to the story of ‘Porgy and Bess’ and made changes, including the ending.”

It’s reassuring that Ms. Parks has a direct pipeline to Gershwin and is just carrying out his work for him, and that she thinks he would have taken one of the most moving moments in musical theater history — Porgy’s demand, “Bring my goat!” — and thrown it out. Ms. Parks (or Ms. Paulus) has taken away Porgy’s goat cart in favor of a cane. So now he can demand, “Bring my cane!” Perhaps someone will bring him a straw hat too, so he can buck-and-wing his way to New York.

Or perhaps in order to have her happy ending, she’ll have Bess turn around when she gets as far as Philadelphia and return to Catfish Row in time for the finale, thus saving Porgy the trouble of his heroic journey to New York. It will kill “I’m on My Way,” but who cares?

Ms. McDonald immediately dismisses any possible criticism by labeling anyone who might have objections to what Ms. Paulus and her colleagues are doing as “Gershwin purists” — clearly a group, all of whom think alike, and we all know what a “purist” is, don’t we? An inflexible, academic reactionary fuddy-duddy who lacks the imagination to see beyond the author’s intentions, who doesn’t recognize all “the holes and issues” that Ms. Paulus and Ms. McDonald and Suzan-Lori Parks do. Never fear, though. They confidently claim that they know how to fix this dreadfully flawed work.

I can hear the outraged cries now about stifling creativity and discouraging directors who want to reinterpret plays and musicals in order to bring “fresh perspectives,” as they are wont to say, but there is a difference between reinterpretation and wholesale rewriting. Nor am I judging this production in advance, only the attitude of its creators toward the piece and the audience. Perhaps it will be wonderful. Certainly I can think of no better Porgy than Norm Lewis nor a better Bess than Audra McDonald, whose voice is one of the glories of the American theater. Perhaps Ms. Paulus and company will have earned their arrogance.

Which brings me back to my opening point. In the interest of truth in advertising, let it not be called “The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess,” nor even “The Gershwin-Heyward Porgy and Bess.” Advertise it honestly as “Diane Paulus’s Porgy and Bess.” And the hell with the real one.

I also want to recommend the following blog on my theme today.

Thank you for joining me on these nostalgic journeys! I've added a new aspect to my blog. (See yesterday's blog). Every five days, I'm going to answer a question on video that YOU send to me. You can ask me ANYTHING and I will answer your question on video within my blog. Send your questions to Richard@RichardSkipper.com Next question will be answered on Saturday!



Thank you to all who have encouraged me! Thanks to all who have tried to stifle my art. I have learned from ALL of you!
Here's to an INCREDIBLE day for ALL!


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Tomorrow's blog will be PART TWO of today's blog! Tune in!!

Cowardly Lion: All right, I'll go in there for Dorothy. Wicked Witch or no Wicked Witch, guards or no guards, I'll tear them apart. I may not come out alive, but I'm going in there. There's only one thing I want you fellows to do.
Tin Woodsman, Scarecrow: What's that?
Cowardly Lion: Talk me out of it!

Please contribute to the DR. CAROL CHANNING & HARRY KULLIJIAN FOUNDATION FOR THE ARTS:
http://www.carolchanning.org/foundation.htm

And help us get Carol Channing the 2011 Kennedy Center Honor!
Contact me for details!

TILL TOMORROW...HERE'S TO AN ARTS FILLED WEEK!
Richard Skipper, Richard@RichardSkipper.com