A Screening

I went to a screening of three short films at a venue called The Producer's Club on W44th St.
One of them,  COMMENTARY, had caught my interest because of some Broadway names in the cast including Alison Fraser, Chip Zien, Tom Hewett, Leslie Kritzer and Liz Larsen.
The first film to be screened, THE CALL, was preceeded by an introductory spiel by the director with a promise of a post-show discussion and DVDs on sale in the lounge. THE CALL, a heartwarming parable about emphysema featuring two small children on a beach, ran all of nine minutes. The came  COMMENTARY. The director Aaron Mark declined to make any preparatory remarks.

Apparently the audience wasn't expecting a semi-improvised showbiz satire of more than an hour's running time filmed with one stationery camera because before long there was a steady stream of walkouts, angry mutterings and the glowering of cellphones. Before the film was over even the director bolted. A shame because it is a lot of fun if overlong.

80 Blocks From Inwood Hill

A sunny Saturday morning seemed a good time to walk from my new home in Inwood down to Riverside Park

Then at 135th St...was it a mirage?

No!!  BRUNCH!

Highly recommended. Caught the subway the rest of the way.

Please Come

Opera Virgin no more

The gifted James Darrah who played the male lead in the PEG O' MY HEART readings with me also stage manages at the Metropolitan Opera and tonight he offered me free tickets (FREE!!) to a performance of CARMEN with a backstage tour thrown in before the show.

Now, I should point out that opera is not one of my interests and I've only ever sat through live performances of "Tosca" and "Otello", both almost thirty years ago, and I truly thought I would suffocate and die in my seat. But I am no fool and I realised the importance of the gift James was offering so I grabbed it with enthusiasm and excitement. I've always enjoyed recordings and film versions of CARMEN. I confess I actually prefer CARMEN JONES but now I was going to fill a gaping hole in my musical education.

 I decided to be brave and fly solo. James collected me at the Lincoln Centre an hour before the performance.

Backstage was much like any other theatre in the world except here they do 26 different operas in one season, taking down and putting up sets on almost a nightly basis. So the real jaw dropper is the size of the stage area which is three times the size of the space the audience actually sees. After Act One the entire set trucks off sideways stage right into the enormous wing space and another complete set is waiting to truck forward from behind the stage as well. In the other wing stage left is the set for the next production which is on a full stage-sized lift that comes up from the building workshop below.

The foyer is an event in itself with these gorgeous chandeliers overhead. The same design can be found in the auditorium.

I very much enjoyed Richard Eyre's production which first opened at the Met in 2009. Anita Rachvelishvili from Tbilisi has sung Carmen all over the world so she knew her lines and was
 good-o.

Korean tenor Yonghoon Lee was the crowd fave as Don Jose. Next year Teddy Tahu Rhodes takes over the gig.

Kyle Ketelsen was an immensely virile Escamillo who looked so disturbingly like my friend Alex Lewis (currently studying opera at Juilliard) that I thought perhaps Alex had pulled an Eve Harrington and had taken over the role.
I also really loved the choreography by Christopher Wheeldon. Acts One and Three opened with a pas de deux depicting the tragic lovers and the gypsy chorus numbers were intricate and very exciting.

I only dozed off once for about two minutes, and out of three and a quarter hours I think I did really well. James has suggested that I might enjoy upcoming productions of TURANDOT and AIDA. We'll see. I'd hate to get a reputation as an opera queen.

It Only Takes a MoMA

I was taken to the Museum of Modern Art by beautiful ex-pat Maree Johnston (who was all set to appear in REBECCA on Broadway before its very public demise) and visiting pal James Lee, fresh from the Australian tour of ANNIE.

The special exhibition was Century of the Child

which pretty much covered everything pertaining to childhood such as education and fitness around the world, clothing, toys, furniture, recreation. There were even props from Pee-Wee's Playhouse! But photos were forbidden so you'll have to go see it.

Afterwards we wandered around to see what is considered great art these days

Hmmm...

I see.....

Okay....

There were postcards of this one in the gift shop

Rothko for beginners

A thin artwork for a very small apartment?

Australian, of course! Boomerangs, the Harbour Bridge...

We fled to the outdoor courtyard

The Virgin Maree heard voices saying....time to go home.

Are These the faces of Scammers?

Stockbroker ran Broadway scam, authorities allege

By Brittany Brady, CNN

updated 11:15 AM EDT, Wed October 17, 2012

A production of "The Producers," a comedic Mel Brooks musical, on Broadway.

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Businessman and stockbroker Mark Hotton is arrested at his Long Island home
• Authorities say he created fake investors to fool producers of "Rebecca: The Musical,"
• Hotton promised the show a $4.5 million investment from four overseas investors, officials say
• When pressed, he said one investor had died of malaria, authorities say

New York (CNN) -- It was producers who cooked up a money-making scam in the Broadway show "The Producers," but officials allege it was producers who were the victims in a real-life Broadway scheme.

Authorities arrested businessman and stockbroker Mark Hotton at his Long Island home Monday morning on charges of defrauding Broadway producers and a Connecticut-based real estate company in two separate ruses, the U.S. district attorney in Manhattan and the FBI said in a news release.

From September 2011 to October 2012, Hotton created fake investors and businesses to fool producers of "Rebecca: The Musical," the release said.

Hotton promised the show a $4.5 million investment from four overseas investors in return for $60,000 paid to Hotton and entities that he owned, authorities allege. He also is charged with a separate $750,000 real-estate scheme.

The "Rebecca" producers were introduced to Hotton through the investment community in February 2012, when they had fallen about $4 million short of their budget, producer Ben Sprecher told CNN Tuesday.

The producers signed an agreement with Hotton's TM Consulting Inc. on February 7 that entitled Hotton to a $7,500 fee and a guarantee of 8% of any money he raised in excess of $250,000, the government said.

Hotton claimed to have secured the $4.5 million from four investors, identified in the news release as Paul Abrams of Hawthorne, East Victoria; Roger Thomas of St. Peter Port, Guernsey; Julian Spencer of Crocker Hill, Chichester, Sussex; and Walter Timmons of London. All of them Hotton allegedly created and portrayed himself through e-mail.

Sprecher said he had not doubted the legitimacy of the deal because of the phone conversations and e-mail correspondences that he had with supposed investors. Hotton had even introduced him to a woman he said was Paul Abrams' niece, he said.

But when producers started pressing Hotton for the money, Hotton told them Paul Abrams had suddenly died of malaria, Sprecher said.

Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara said that in an investigation begun in September 2012, officials uncovered that the investors' e-mail accounts and the websites for businesses associated with the investors were all controlled by Hotton.

"As part of one alleged scheme, Hotton concocted a cast of characters to invest in a major musical -- investors who turned out to be deep-pocketed phantoms," Bharara said in the news release. "To carry out the alleged fraud, Hotton faked lives, faked companies and even staged a fake death, pretending that one imaginary investor had suddenly died from malaria."

Producers had already spent $6 million on Rebecca.

My Fillum

So, this little epic we're shooting is a period piece and the cast is positively littered with brilliant performers in roles large and small.

Diane Louise Salinger is best known as a cinema actress and will forever be remembered by devotees of PEE-WEE'S BIG ADVENTURE as Simone, the small town girl who longs to go to Paris. In fact, there is a rock band named after Pee-Wee's final line to her, "Au Revoir Simone", and Diane spends every year attending conventions packed with devoted Pee Wee fans (of which tt and I are but two). 

Terrence V. Mann is a Broadway legend having created the leading roles in BEAUTY & THE BEAST, CATS, LES MISERABLES, THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL and RAGS. He also plays Larry in the movie of A CHORUS LINE, is the baddie in the Angela Lansbury tv musical MRS. SANTA and is currently rehearsing Diane Paulus's new production of PIPPIN in which he will play Charlemagne opposite his wife Charlotte D'Amboise as Fastrada. He is doing a royal wave in the picture, not giving me the finger.

Bill Nabel was on Broadway in A CHORUS LINE (replacing Don Percassi as Al), HOME SWEET HOMER, 42nd STREET, AIN'T BROADWAY GRAND, SWEENEY TODD, THE MOST HAPPY FELLA, and in BEAUTY & THE BEAST from its first workshop to its closing thirteen years later.

It was a great thrill for me to discover Phyllis Bash in the cast. Phyllis played Bess in the Australian tour of PORGY & BESS in 1965 and I remember her performance vividly to this day. Her daughter Erica Gimpel played Coco in the tv series FAME.

 

Jan Neuberger, who was in the original cast of WICKED and a longstanding cast member of FORBIDDEN BROADWAY, helps Diane with her lines while Akeesha hovers

Still cramming, Diane tromps the moors like Charlotte Bronte

Extras mingle with crew members

Or hurry up and wait

Finally, a call to action

let's get this funeral on the road!

This man has no sense of period

 

Diane, dressed for her next scene, obliges the papparazzi

The always dignified Jan Neuberger

 Terrence in a state of collapse. Heigh Ho, the glamorous life!