Thursday, February 28, 2013

Broadway Backwards Announces Victor Garber, Malcolm Gets, Chad Kimball, Josh Young, Doris Roberts, Noah St. John

February 28, 2013

The company of this year’s BROADWAY BACKWARDS will now include five-time Tony Award nominee Jan Maxwell, four-time Tony nominee and five-time Emmy nominee Victor Garber, Tony nominees Malcolm Gets, Chad Kimball and Josh Young, five-time Emmy Award winner Doris Roberts and teenage spoken word sensation Noah St. John.

BROADWAY BACKWARDS is a one-night-only performance produced by Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS and benefiting BC/EFA and The Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center of New York. The eighth annual edition of BROADWAY BACKWARDS will be held Monday, March 18 at 8 PM at Broadway’s Palace Theatre (1564 Broadway).
This year’s line-up of celebrity performers has been collectively nominated for 34 Tony Awards, 25 Emmy Awards and two Oscars. Noah recently gained national fame after winning the top storytelling performance prize from NPR’s “Snap Judgment” for an inspirational poetry slam about his two moms. Other new additions to the BROADWAY BACKWARDS cast include John Bolton (A Christmas Story, The Musical), John Treacy Egan (Sister Act), Andrew Keenan-Bolger (Newsies), Eve Plumb (Miss Abigail’s Guide to Dating, Mating, & Marriage; TV’s “Brady Bunch”) and Howie Michael Smith (Avenue Q).
They join previously announced Academy Award winner and four-time Tony nominee Estelle Parsons, two-time Tony Award winner Judy Kaye, Tony winners Len Cariou, Brian Stokes Mitchell and Karen Ziemba, two-time Emmy Award-winning comedian Bruce Vilanch, Tony nominees Daniel Breaker (Passing Strange), Anita Gillette (Chapter Two, TV’s “30 Rock”) and Tony Sheldon (Priscilla Queen of the Desert), and Ward Billeisen (Anything Goes), Stephanie J. Block (The Mystery of Edwin Drood), Jim Brochu (Zero Hour), Ashley Brown (Mary Poppins), Tituss Burgess (The Little Mermaid), Robert Creighton (The Mystery of Edwin Drood), Jose Llana (The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee), Kyle Dean Massey (Wicked) and Stacey Oristano (TV’s “Bunheads,” “Friday Night Lights”).
BROADWAY BACKWARDS is an annual celebration where gays and lesbians see their stories told through the great songs of musical theatre, sung by their favorite Broadway performers. BROADWAY BACKWARDS began as a grassroots concert performed at the Center in 2006. In subsequent years, the event grew quickly, performing Off-Broadway, then on Broadway for the last four years.

BROADWAY BACKWARDS creator Robert Bartley will again direct and choreograph. Amy Jones serves as co-choreographer.
Tickets are available exclusively at broadwaycares.org or by calling 212.840.0770 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting

212.840.0770 FREE end_of_the_skype_highlighting, ext. 268. Prices start at $40.
VIP tickets include premium seats and a special post-show party with the cast. A limited number of “Backstage & Beyond” ticket packages also are available, which include the opportunity to see the dress rehearsal, exclusive backstage access, a “meet and greet” with some of the stars of Broadway Backwards, premium seats for the show and more.
The presenting sponsor of BROADWAY BACKWARDS is Lifetime Networks with generous support from The New York Times and United Airlines.

Friday, February 22, 2013

Dick Done

MOBY DICK cast member Jacey Powers made these wonderful whale cupcakes to celebrate our one and only presentation of the show.

Our fabulous gals Hannah Florence, Hannah Brown, Kirsten Wyatt, Jacey Powers, Christina Bianco, Brandi Best Ong, Lizzie Klemperer, Alice Lee, Robin Rothman, Claire Neumann, Erin Crosby and Gabrielle Ruiz

Travis Nilan, Brian Kilday, David Mizzoni, John Walton West, Noah Galvin, David Rossetti, Josh Bardier, Nathaniel Beliveau, Paul Winkler, Old Crock (missing: Nicolas Dromard)

Good show! Well done, chaps! And thanks to the wonderful Richard Hillman for these shots of the presentation!!

Thanks, Richard!

Drama League

The Drama League photos of the Audra tribute are now online.

Presenting the award to Stewart Lane and Bonnie Comley

"My Man's Gone Now"

Audra takes a bow

From Playbill.Com

NEWS

Tony Sheldon Leads Industry Reading of Moby Dick - A Whale of a Tale; Musical Hoping to Harpoon New York

By Adam Hetrick

22 Feb 2013


Tony Sheldon
Photo by Joseph Marzullo/WENN

The cheeky London cult musical Moby Dick - A Whale of a Tale, which retells Herman Mellville's epic tale as an all-girls school musical production, receives a developmental staged reading starring Tony Award nominee Tony Sheldon Feb. 22 in New York City. Producers are aiming for a future New York production.

The reading of the 1992 musical, originally produced by Cameron Mackintosh in the West End, is directed by Michael Chase Gosselin. Adam Podd is musical director. Attached to the project, according to producers, are Chris March ("Project Runway," "Mad Fashion") and set designer Beowulf Borritt (Chaplin, Spelling Bee).
A future New York production is the goal.
Sheldon (Priscilla Queen of the Desert) takes on the role of the headmistress in a cast that also features Nicolas Dromard (Mary Poppins), Jacey Powers (Falling), Erin Crosby (Shout! The Mod Musical), Christina Bianco (Newsical), Kirsten Wyatt (A Christmas Story) and Noah E. Galvin (Our Town).
The reading reflects an updated version of Moby Dick, originally penned by Robert Longden and Hereward Kaye, and newly adapted by Michael Chase Gosselin.
Here's how it's billed: "Moby Dick tells the story of St. Godley's, an all-girls British Catholic boarding school which sets out to stage Mellville’s masterpiece in the school swimming pool. Their Headmistress, played by a man in drag, takes the coveted role of Captain Ahab, and leads the anarchic girls through a campy, yet incredibly accurate, production."
A cast album preserves the original production, which famously flopped in its West End debut. It has since garnered a cult following and has become a popular regional title. A revised version returned to London in 2011 at the Landor Theatre.

Thursday, February 21, 2013

Call Us Ishmael

They said it couldn't be done but our tireless little band has rehearsed 34 songs in four days and tomorrow we present MOBY DICK The Musical to...whoever. I've grown very fond of the score but it's a little like singing the Ring Cycle eight times a week so we're exhausted and brain dead.

Our esteemed composer Hereward Kaye.

Chase, our director and motivating force behing the show's resurrection.

Adam, our inspiring and indefatigable musical director.

Some of our cast, including (front row) David Mizzoni, Noah Galvin, Erin Crosby and Nicolas Dromard.

These boys aren't usually blurry. In fact, Josh Bardier and Nathaniel Beliveau run a performance coaching business together so they're pretty sharp.

Christina Bianco, Jacey Powers, Brandi Best Ong, Claire Neumann and (back row) Nathaniel Beliveau, Travis Nilan, David Rossetti

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

One Down, One to Go

Today was PEG day at the York

The walls of the foyer are adorned with posters of productions past. Fascinating to see some big names who were just starting out.

We had time for one quick runthrough onstage to get used to the space

Our brilliant musical director David Hancock Turner was partially hidden from us by an unexpected wall.

Which meant he had to strain to hear us and vice versa

But Kelly Grant had no trouble keeping time

Our director Lee Roy Reams supplied a last minute coup de theatre. Peg has a dog named Michael in the show and we had been working with a most amusing stuffed floppy toy, but Lee Roy arranged a clever switch in the last scene and suddenly Michael appeared as a living breathing ball of gorgeousness!

Bill & Dorothy Berloni, who supply all the animals on Broadway, brought us "Minnie" who was very well trained and a true crowd pleaser.

We had a full house including the lovely Anita Gillette, Norma Doggett, Nancy Ford (who wrote I'M GETTING MY ACT TOGETHER.....) and Randie Levine-Miller and the audience seemed to enjoy it a lot. Now we have to hope someone throws money at it and picks it up for a regular run.

It was splendid working with the terrific cast and to enjoy some dressing room gossip with Frank Vlastnik and Allen Read. And watch out for Alaina Mills. She was really something as Peg and has a bright future.
And speaking of Minnie, you may recall my friend John in London has a rather traffic-stopping pup of his own with the same name. He recently sent me a pic to show me how she has grown into a huge hulking brute and completely lost her charm. Tragic.

Monday, February 18, 2013

Next!

Alrighty then. The presentation of PEG is tomorrow but today I began another project here at the Five Angels Theater on 10th Avenue. As I usually don't come this far west I had no idea this place existed.

I suspect it operates as a Young People's Theatre but the venue is very schmick.

Another venue dedicated to Laurie Beechman!

This is the view from the foyer

It looks sunny but it's 32 degrees F outside.

Follow me, folks...

This is where a group of us will be presenting a reading of a musical by Robert Longden and Hereward Kaye called MOBY DICK: A Whale of a Tale! A fairly faithful telling of the Herman Melville novel as presented by a St. Trinian's-like girls school, it was produced some years ago in the West End by Cameron Mackintosh and didn't do terribly well. It's had a couple of workshops in the U.S. over the years and even yielded a studio cast album with Bryan Batt as Captain Ahab (my role) but now a young director named Chase Gosselin has optioned it with an eye to presenting it in New York and Mr. Mackintosh is inspired to see the show have a new life. The composer is here working with us and we have an expert cast of 24 currently learning the terrific score.

This young man is Paul Winkler who took part in the last workshop when he was 15. He is now 48.

Sunday, February 17, 2013

Rediscovered Peach

Caught the last night of the Musicals in Mufti staging of TWO BY TWO, the 1970 Richard Rodgers/Martin Charnin/Peter Stone musical about Noah and the Ark which became notorious for its star Danny Kaye's unprofessional behaviour when he injured his foot and played a portion of the season in a wheelchair and on crutches, subsequently turning an ensemble piece for eight actors into a Danny Kaye sideshow.

With a revised book by Stone and Charnin and two added songs (one of which used the tune "Willing & Eager" from the movie STATE FAIR), tonight's presentation was far more evenly balanced with very charming and funny performances from Jason Alexander and Tovah Feldshuh as Mr. & Mrs. Noah and some lush vocals from Natalie Cortez (GIANT) and the delicious Tiffan Borelli in a role created by Madeline Kahn. Based on a Clifford Odets play, "The Flowering Peach", the musical presents the Biblical characters as a squabbling Jewish family trying to deal with generational conflict.

As it was the last performance, author/director Martin Charnin posed for a cast portrait after the curtain call and as I was in the second row I boldly took a couple of snaps myself. What have I turned into????