Following two successful stints on the West Coast and a quick winter stint at Queens Theatre in the Park, King Levine, Richard Krevolin's take on the King Lear story, finishes its three-week run at Nyack, NY’s Helen Hayes Performing Arts Center on April 22.
In Krevolin's version of "Lear," Moishe "King" Levine, who made a million bucks out of bagels and bialys, decides to leave his bakery to his three daughters, only to have them try to ship him off to an old folks' home. His struggle to keep his freedom -- and some of his hard-earned dough -- provides many comic twists.
Comedian Sammy Shore, who’s been with the show from the start, continues to play the lead, though Melonie Mazman Hayden now plays the three daughters -- roles originated by Bari Hochwald, who’s working on another project.
After a hit run at the Odyssey Theater in L.A., space, King Levine, directed by Joe Bologna, had a two-month commercial run at the Tiffany Theater, May 1-July 1.
Krevolin is a playwright, screenwriter, poet and teacher. His one-man play Yahrzeit was a hit in Los Angeles and New York in 1997 and is now touring the country. He is professor of screenwriting at USC Film School. Shore founded the Comedy Store in Hollywood in 1972. A well known stand-up comic, he has opened for such stars as Frank Sinatra, Bop Hope and Barbra Streisand. His 1993 solo show The Warm-Up Man was a hit at the Santa Monica Playhouse. He’s also Pauly Shore’s real-life dad.
Hochwald has appeared locally at such theatres as the Tiffany, Ventura Court and Met. Bologna's most recent theatrical venture was the long running comedy Bermuda Avenue Triangle, in which he co-starred with wife Renee Taylor and Bea Arthur (Nanette Fabray in New York).
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Finishing the season at the Hayes Center will be Shirley Valentine (with “M*A*S*H” star Loretta Swit), April 29-May 20, officially opening May 4. The show, supervised by Ronald L. Nash, takes the place of previously-announced Driving Miss Daisy.
Jerry Herman’s Mame arrives June 17-July 9, starring Carol Lawrence (the original Maria in West Side Story, Kiss of the Spider Woman, the original national tour of Funny Girl and Sugar Babies). Norb Joerder directs. The venue will then offer a summer mini-series of three events in July and August.
As for next season, the venue is tentatively looking at Oliver! the female Odd Couple, Annie, an as-yet-to-be-determined world premiere, The Last Night of Ballyhoo and A Chorus Line.
-- By David Lefkowitz
