By Seth Rudetsky
11 May 2009
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| Seth Rudetsky and Steven Pasquale |
A week in the life of actor, musician and Chatterbox host Seth Rudetsky.
Happy post-Mother's Day!
The beginning of May is a time when I focus a lot of attention on my mother because it features both Mother's Day andher birthday. Normally when I'm asked by my therapist, "How many phone calls a day can you endure from your Mother?," I respond as Betty Buckley once did when asked to name her TV series, "Eight is Enough." But when it comes to beginning of May, I up the number of calls endured to the name of the Jason Robert Brown show that shockingly didn't get a Best Score Tony nomination (13). If my mother is reading this, let me please make her aware that Mother's Week is over, and I would appreciate the amount of daily phone calls limited to the title of the Hal Prince show that played in Philadelphia…and hopefully with a less annoying spelling (3hree).
I took my mom to see the brilliant Kristine Zbornik at Don't Tell Mama's and, as usual, she was incredibly creative and intelligently hilarious. At one point she sang "Never Met a Man I Didn't Like" from The Will Rogers Follies and mid-way through told us that she felt it was one of the most insipid and annoying songs ever written. Yet, she said that when she sings it, she winds up hating herself because a part of her would love to be that loving. She started singing it again — trying to adopt a "I love everybody attitude" — while her pianist spewed out names at her. Hitler! Idi Amin! Kristine kept signing with a beatific smile. "That Sham-wow guy!" Kristine didn't waver. Suddenly, Barbra Streisand! That did it. Kristine's façade was broken. Later on, she had people pull a song out of a hat filled with comedy stuff she had been doing for years. Someone pulled out "Memory," one of my favorites. Kristine does it as someone who doesn't quite remember the lyrics: When the dawn comes…tonight will be what yesterday was (I'm obsessed with how that's true!) And tomorrow? S***, who knows? Which finally culminates with an angry: Touch me! I could puke when you touch me! Get your filthy hands off me (Suddenly romantically) But don't ever let go! At one point, Kristine was talking about doing yoga and suddenly noticed Jackie Hoffman, who doesn't do yoga, in the audience.. Kristine said, "It doesn't matter, Jackie. You're gonna outlive us all because you're so. . . " Jackie cut in with, "Disease-ridden?"
Monday night I hosted the Touring Broadway Awards and, speaking of my mother, got a big laugh when I announced that "The Best Score goes to Spring Awakening, or, if you're my mother, Spring's Awakening." Jerry Zaks was there and I introduced him as the first Jewish Kenickie (he did Grease on Broadway in the 70's!), and he then introduced three songs from the upcoming tour of 101 Dalmations. The songs were super-tuneful and Cruella DeVille was played with sass by Beth Leavel. Who knows if that was the final cast, but one of the producers did assure us that there would be live doggies. Although, not 101 of them. 13. Which is, again, the amount of daily phone calls I'll allow from my mother who always manages to leave me the same message on my cell phone and home phone because "you never listen to your messages all the way through."
I first met Steven when I interviewed Idina Menzel at my Chatterbox. She and Steven are friends (through Taye Diggs), and he came with her to the show. Idina's from Long Island (like me) and not that long ago Steven had to tell her that she misheard the expression for heavy traffic when she was a kid. He kindly informed her it's called "bumper to bumper" traffic because, until recently, she literally thought it was called "bumpita bumpita" traffic. Ouch…and yet…say it out loud. Doesn't it sound the same? But, my question is, who has she been around for all these years who never thought to tell her she sounded like a jazz musician describing a sassy drum vamp? Did Taye opt out because he secretly thought it was hilarious? PS, when I was a kid, I mixed up capital Ls for lower case ls, and I thought there was one state called Iowa and one called Lowa.
Steven has a Broadway musical career that keeps getting stymied. He was the original Fabrizio in The Light in the Piazza right up until it came to New York, but his TV show ("Rescue Me") wouldn't let him do the Broadway run. They felt they couldn't guarantee he'd be done filming in time to get to the theatre, and they were nervous that he'd be too tired etc., so he had to ixnay the part. Speaking of "Rescue Me," Steven said that the Mr. Softee man will come to the set when they're filming outdoors and has to be paid off so he doesn't ruin the shoot by playing the signature Mr. Softee song. Steven told us about the time when Dennis Leary angrily cursed out Mr. Softee, and during the long rampage of the most horrifying curses, the whole thing was accompanied by the sweet Mr. Softee song. That's like watching Reasons to Be Pretty while listening to a CD of Free to Be You and Me.
Steven's second brush with Broadway happened when he was cast as Lt. Cable in the recent revival of South Pacific and yet again had to give it up because of "Rescue Me." I've said it before and I'll say it again; I hate when I have to choose between doing a great part in a TV show or having a great role in a Broadway show. I'll also say I hate that it's never happened to me. The one link in these stories is that Matt Morrison got Steven's roles in both Light in the Piazza and South Pacific. And, he also makes an appearance in the life of my next interviewee: James Carpinello. Stay tuned… Continued...
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