Johnny Depp has played a pirate, a boy with blades for hands and a man who loved a blade or two himself, Sweeney Todd, but Depp reveals to the UK...

Johnny Depp has played a pirate, a boy with blades for hands and a man who loved a blade or two himself, Sweeney Todd, but Depp reveals to the UK Mirror that his dream role would be to play a beloved Broadway icon. The actor told the Mirror that he would love to portray singer/actress Carol Channing in a biopic.
Depp has regularly donned a series of bizarre outfits for his movie roles, he even dressed up as a woman for his starring part in the 1994 Tim Burton comedy Ed Wood. And by all accounts he wants to to go even further by playing the 88-year-old Channing.

He remarked to the paper that, "My dream role would be to play musical legend Carol Channing in a biopic of her life.
I love her, I really do, she's amazing. With all the digital technology these days, I could probably pull it off!" To read more in the Mirror click here.

Films featuring Johnny Depp have grossed over $2.2 billion at the United States box office and over $4.7 billion worldwide.
Nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor three times, Screen Actors Guild Awards four times and Golden Globe Awards eight times, Depp won the Best Actor Awards from the Golden Globes for his role in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street and from the Screen Actors Guild for Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.

Depp's newest film, Public Enemies is currently playing in movie theaters. Depp plays outlaw John Dillinger in the motion picture.
On July 18th, for one night only, Carol Channing returnrd home to where she belongs in her first appearance after having to cancel late last year due to fracturing her hip.

The program was in San Francisco at San Francisco State University.





Since her Broadway debut in Blitzsteins' For An Answer and a Time Magazine cover story, which hailed her performance as Lorelei in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Miss Channing has been a star of international acclaim. Her Broadway appearances include some of the most memorable characters in theatrical history, winning three Tony Awards® including one for her legendary portrayal of Dolly Levi in Jerry Herman's Hello, Dolly! as well as one for Lifetime Achievement.
Carol's career has been varied and continuing. During her first film role in The First Traveling Saleslady starring opposite Ginger Rogers, she also gave newcomer Clint Eastwood his first on screen kiss. Among her numerous TV and Film successes was the madcap Muzzy in Thoroughly Modern Millie, which earned her an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe Award. In 2008, Carol was inducted into the Smithsonian Institute in D.C., along with eight other legendary ladies of stage and screen. She still performs with the gusto of a young aspiring actress and has recently committed her life to bringing a refocus on the Arts to the public educational system. Through the Carol Channing/ Harry Kullijian Endowment for the Arts Foundation, Carol offers lectures and performances, hoping to engage the public's support for education in the Arts while also creating scholarships.

After the surprising news of Johnny Depp revealing that his dream role would be to portray Carol Channing, star of stage and screen for most of the 20th century, on film, BroadwayWorld wanted to know what the legendary Channing thought of the announcement.

Ever the gracious delight, Carol Channing was happy to comment on Depp's desire to "dance in her shoes", she remarked, "It is not a new concept to me. Not at all. Men have been imitating me for as long as I can remember. In fact, most of the impersonations I have seen have had a five o'clock shadow.
I imagine, when or if Johnny should portray me, he will succeed.
Because a true artist, such as himself, is one who loves his or her creation and therefore represents their honest view of that which they are creating. I think he is a gifted performer and I would be very proud, as well as interested in seeing what his vision of me would be. Johnny is someone I would very much like to help me and my foundation (ChanningARTS.org) to bring the Arts back into the the public school system in America."

The celebrated actor told the UK Mirror that he would love to portray Broadway beloved icon Carol Channing in a biopic. Depp has regularly donned a series of bizarre outfits for his movie roles, he even dressed up as a woman for his starring part in the 1994 Tim Burton comedy Ed Wood. And by all accounts he wants to to go even further by playing the 88-year-old Channing.

He remarked to the paper that, "My dream role would be to play musical legend Carol Channing in a biopic of her life.
I love her, I really do, she's amazing. With all the digital technology these days, I could probably pull it off!" To read more in the Mirror click here.
Films featuring Johnny Depp have grossed over $2.2 billion at the United States box office and over $4.7 billion worldwide.
Nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor three times, Screen Actors Guild Awards four times and Golden Globe Awards eight times, Depp won the Best Actor Awards from the Golden Globes for his role in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street and from the Screen Actors Guild for Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.
Depp's newest film, Public Enemies is currently playing in movie theaters. Depp plays outlaw John Dillinger in the motion picture.





BWW thanks Harlan Boll for his efforts in helping to report this article.


In recent weeks, the folks who run the Tony Awards have defriended future Will Ferrells and Liza Minnellis, along with several score journalists.

In a recent e-mail, Tony Award Productions informed the 100 or so journalists who cast ballots for the annual prizes that our voting privileges had been canceled.

This dictat came hard on the heels of a ruling that shed “Special Theatrical Event” from the awards.
That’s the category in which Minnelli was a Tony winner in June over Will Ferrell, both of whom had lucrative, popular limited runs on Broadway last season.
So Carrie Fisher’s highly anticipated solo show, “Wishful Drinking,” which arrives in the fall, will have to compete for Tony recognition against full-scale, well-populated new plays like Tracy Letts’s “Superior Donuts” and David Mamet’s “Race.” Poor Carrie won’t stand a chance.
Such head-in-the-sandism is business-as-usual for people who as individuals can be very smart but in concert tend to perform with all the savvy of Shakespeare’s rustics.

The Tonys show no sign of recognizing plays that don’t open on Broadway real estate, for example. Such as “Ruined,” the powerful Lynn Nottage war drama still running at the Manhattan Theatre Club long after many a Tony-nominated show has closed.



And now, in dumping the press, the Tony brains have eliminated the only voting group with no axe to grind beyond personal quirks and taste. The 700 other voters are the producers themselves and members of the various Broadway unions -- people who can generally be counted on to vote for their own shows (or ones their friends are in).


Tony Award Productions said the reason for dropping journalists is because voting represents a conflict of interest for us.
That’s quite a fantastic argument: Restricting the votes to only those with a true conflict of interest, the logic seems to go, somehow sanitizes the voting process.

This from a group which, after more than half a century, still won’t police its members to be certain they bother to see the shows they vote for. While other entertainment industries are busily breaking down barriers and opening up doors, Obama- era inclusionism seems to have escaped the notice of the producers and landlords who run the country’s best-known theater awards.




I was hoping the Oliviers, London’s big theater prizes, might show us how it’s done. Unfortunately, they’re even more Byzantine than the Tonys. British journalists don’t vote. And nobody cares about them (possibly because the press has no stake in them, and anyway they don’t even rate a TV show).

One British press agent told me the Tonys get more play in London than the Oliviers.

Still, at least the Brits have a special events prize to cover oddball entertainments, and forward-looking venues like the nonprofit Donmar Warehouse are right in there competing with commercial shows in the West End. The Tony managers, meanwhile, are protecting a brand whose sell-by date is long past, rather than creating a whole new model.




(Jeremy Gerard is an editor and critic for Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own.)

To contact the writer of this column: Jeremy Gerard in New York at jgerard2@bloomberg.net. http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2009/jul/18/wynton-marsalis-interview



What happens to child stars when they mature? It's too early to tell about Daniel Radcliffe, but some, like Shirley Temple, can't make the transition to grown-up parts, yet aren't forgotten. Others, like Gary Coleman, are forgotten but not gone. A few, like Elizabeth Taylor and Natalie Wood, become even more successful as adults. And others, like Mickey Rooney, keep working without ever regaining the fame they once had.
Patty Duke enjoyed early acclaim, then honed her craft by steady appearances that expanded her range. She became an award-winning actress with an enviable career. Currently portraying Madame Morrible in Wicked at the Orpheum Theatre, she will appear at the Castro Theatre on Monday, July 20, in a tribute arranged by San Francisco's legendary impresario Marc Huestis. Following a reception and an onstage interview with Duke conducted by Bruce Vilanch, Huestis will screen her best-known film, Valley of the Dolls (1967).

Born (1946) in Elmhurst, New York to an alcoholic father and a mother who suffered from clinical depression, Anna Marie Duke began acting on television in 1957. Her film debut was playing the young Emily in The Goddess (58). She attained Broadway stardom in 1959 as Helen Keller opposite Anne Bancroft's Annie Sullivan in The Miracle Worker.
Both repeated their triumphs in the acclaimed 1962 film, and each won an Oscar, Duke beating Angela Lansbury's fierce mother in The Manchurian Candidate in the Best Supporting Actress category. At that time, she was the youngest actress to win a regular Academy Award.

She starred as look-alike teenage cousi
Patty Duke as Madame Morrible in Wicked .
ns in a television series, The Patty Duke Show (1963-66), then made the transition to an adult in the infamous Valley of the Dolls, based on Jacqueline Susann's tawdry, bestselling roman a clef.
Duke was Neely O'Hara, loosely modeled on Judy Garland. She gets fired from a Broadway show because her singing threatens veteran musical comedy star Helen Lawson (Susan Hayward), a character inspired by Ethel Merman. Neely becomes a major star and a pill-popping egomaniacal diva, every bit as monstrous as Lawson. (Garland was originally cast as Lawson, but was fired when she failed to appear on the set – probably because she had second thoughts about playing such a bitch.) Barbara Parkins and Sharon Tate co-starred with Duke. Despite horrendous reviews, the picture was a box office smash. Its notoriety, however, haunted Duke, much like Faye Dunaway was tarnished after her portrayal of Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest (81).
Until recently, Duke disowned Dolls and her performance in it, both of which became camp classics beloved by contemporary gay men. Four decades later, the film is a fascinating take on an era, and Duke's gutsy, over-the-top emoting is riveting and completely in keeping with the sensationalist material. In a featured role, Hayward, well-known for intense characterizations, matches Duke. But the lovely Parkins and the stunningly beautiful, doomed Tate are too restrained.

After Dolls, Duke worked steadily and restored her luster. For the big screen, she starred in Me, Natalie (69), as a young woman struggling to find herself and romance in Manhattan during the Go-Go years. It won her a Golden Globe Award. Television, however, gave her far more opportunities.
She guested on countless hit series and starred in small-screen movies, playing melodrama, suspense, and comedy with growing assurance. From 1974 to 1999, she garnered eight Emmy nominations, winning three times, for My Sweet Charlie (70), Captains and Kings (76), and, most memorably, as Annie Sullivan in a remake of The Miracle Worker (80). She was also touching as Sook in the 1997 television version of Truman Capote's moving A Christmas Memory.

Her first marriage ended in divorce, and a second was annulled. In 1972, she wed actor John Astin, and for years was billed as Patty Duke Astin. They had two children, but divorced in 1985. Since 1986, she has been married to Michael Pearce.
They have one son. She became the first woman President of the Screen Actors Guild (1985-88). Her autobiography, Call Me Anna, was filmed for television (90), and she played herself starting at age 30. For years, she had battled bi-polar disorder, and wrote courageously about it in 1992's A Brilliant Madness: Living With Manic Depressive Disorder. She has been an early and tireless advocate for people with AIDS.

During the 60s, Duke had a modest recording career, and in 2005 played Aunt Eller in the Broadway revival of Oklahoma!. Madame Morrible in Wicked adds another memorable character to her remarkable career. Her appearance at the Castro should be among the most exciting ever arranged by Huestis.GO SEE A LIVE SHOW THIS 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

Follow me on Twitter @RichardSkipper


AND DON'T FORGET: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: NYC



WE WERE SRO LAST WEDNESDAY NIGHT (7/8/09)!
Now a night out in NY to see a show at a VERY AFFORDABLE price!
Richard Skipper, along with Dana Lorge, is hosting a weekly variety show in NYC at The Iguana VIP Lounge in the heart of NYC (240 West 54th Street 8-11PM/with an intermission). WEDNESDAY NIGHT AT THE IGUANA! What they are doing is NOT being done anywhere else! Each week will showcase 5 entertainers. Other entertainers that show up will be inserted throughout the show as time permits/this is done by lottery!
AND each are joined by Barry Levitt on keyboard and Saadi Zain on bass.Each week will be different. The price is ONLY $10.00 with NO food or drink minimum (although the food at The Iguana is top notch). This is a nice night out with the family! The show will also be done with class and elegance.
A "throw back" to the variety shows we grew up with. For more info, please call 845-365-0720 or visit www.RichardSkipper.com. RESERVATIONS A MUST!!!!!!!!! 845-365-0720. No one admitted before 7:30.
TONIGHT (July 15th) guests include: Suzannah Bowling, Diana LeBlanc, Mitch Kahn, Gretchen Reinhagen, and Kim Schultz Improv Group... and a few other surprises as well! Remember $10.00 Cover/No food or drink minimum!

WEDNESDAY NIGHT! July 22nd: Jonathan Long, Sue Matsuki, Maria Ottavia, and Felicia Strassman AND Sharon McNight


July 29th: 2009 Bistro Award Winner for Outstanding Debut: Deb Burman, Kristopher Monroe, Marcus Simeone, Maureen Taylor, and Susan Winter.


August 5th: Sandi Durell, Bobbie Horowitz, Carolyn Ohlbaum, Brent Winborn, and Yaffa

August 12th: Barbara Gurskey, Rachel Stone and Leslie Orofino confirmed (Others TBA)



THE FOLLOWING COMMENTS ARE FROM 7/8/09
"What a bright, warm, funny host you are! Thank you so much for allowing me to jump up and enjoy my craft last night. Looking forward to the next one!” –Sierra Rein”



“That was a great evening, glitches or no glitches. My friend Deb Mayer (who I introduced you to, and is a fabulous actress) said she absolutely loved the format you have devised. XXXOOO Diana LaBlanc

“Such a deal!! 3 hours of excellent live entertainment for $10 deserves SRO every week!!!!” Carolyn Kalmus

“Thank you so much for last night! And thanks to Dana also! I had an absolute ball! Looking forward to coming back on August 5, and hopefully sooner.”
Carolyn Ohlbaum