By Harry Haun
18 Aug 2006

“Joan Rivers was not originally in the script. So much of the bits and the character stuff were written for Nicole and me, were written for Brooks Ashmanskas around his talents. He’s an amazing tap dancer so they wanted to do something that way. And I feel that’s such a rarity in this day and age. I think it’s an unusual show for Broadway, and I think it will appeal to a lot of people who don’t think they necessarily like musical theatre. It’s fun to do shows like this and know you’re attracting a whole new group of people to the theatre. My little sister is a total convert. She’s like a rock ‘n’ roll metal head, and she now goes to the theatre all the time just from having had this particular exposure.”

Capathia Jenkins is a sparingly, and smartly, used member of the ensemble: “I sing the opening number with the rest the cast. I do the nurse scene with Jiminy Glick. And then I stop the show.” Simple as one two three. Three is a gospel-flavored roof-raiser called “Stop the Show,” in which she socks across one particular line of choice Wittman wit: “something that Stephen Sondheim doesn’t know: Let the big black lady stop the show.”

Yes, she has heard from The Sisterhood: “I got a great fruit basket from Felicia Fields , who plays Sofia in The Color Purple. She told me, ‘Knock ‘em dead. Go get ‘em.’”

Jenkins also sang the praises of her peerless leader. “Martin Short is incredible. He is so generous and kind. He gives me the 11 o’clock number. Now, that's generous.”

Ashmanskas insisted fun is happening on both sides of the footlights. “He’s a wild man. It keeps you on your toes and in the moment. Well, you have to be in the moment to make it funny. You have to be, somewhat, honest. This is, literally, the most fun I’ve ever had.”

Director-lyricist Wittman departs Sunday for Toronto for the filming of his and Shaiman’s first Broadway musical, Hairspray. The next day, in New York, begins a workshop on their third Broadway musical, Catch Me If You Can, based on the Steven Spielberg thriller. Jack O’Brien will direct, and Jerry Mitchell will choreograph. Nathan Lane will have the Tom Hanks role.

“We’ve written a lot of new Hairspray songs,” said Shaiman, “but I think three will wind up being in the movie. It’s just like the play. You write a lot of things, and you realize, ‘No, that’s not quite right,’ or ‘Oh, we didn’t quite need that.’ The usual spots you’d imagine. We gave Link a more energetic rock and roll number. In the original movie it was a kind of iconic moment where they all did the Madison and we recreated that in the musical—but we realized we didn't need to repeat that because they did it so great in the movie. So we created a whole new song and kind of dance for that moment that Link sings and Tracy dances. Also, Tracy now has her own ballad.”

For the Short show, Shaiman and Wittman went with the skit-and-run flow. “That was our plan," Shaiman said. "Sometimes, Marty would say, ‘Oh, God! That’s such a great song. Write another verse.’ And I’d say, ‘No. Nothing more than 45 seconds.’ There’s only one song that goes on for three verses, and the truth is we should have cut it to two, but I won’t say what it is. There are probably 20 songs now [Marty said 18], and we probably wrote 40.”

Director Gordon Greenberg, the zesty resurrector of Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris, now in its sixth month at the Zipper, said he’s changing his tune—to Gilbert and Sullivan, of all surprising things, modifying that with a modern-day dash of Johnny Depp. In an adaptation he worked out with Neil Benjamin, book writer of the Broadway-bound Legally Blonde, and John McDaniel, late of Brooklyn: The Musical and “The Rosie O’Donnell Show,” The Pirates of Penzance crosses concepts with "Pirates of the Caribbean."

“Neil has written a new book and lyrics; John has done new arrangements; I’m directing; Warren Carlyle is choreographing, and Rick Sordelet is doing the fights. It’s all silly and buoyant and full of fantastic sword-fighting. We’ll open at Goodspeed this fall—first preview is Oct. 5, and it will run through Christmas—then we go to the Paper Mill in the spring.” The cast: Farah Alvin (Mabel), Ed Dixon (The Major General), Joanna Glushak, who followed Bernadette Peters into Sunday in the Park with George (Ruth), Andrew Varela (The Pirate King) and Jason Snow (Frederick).

Meanwhile back at the Zipper, said Greenberg, things couldn’t be more Francophile. In fact, to celebrate (if not solidify) the Brel spell over the French community in New York, there’ll be a one-time-only performance of the show at Jean-Claude Baker’s Chez Josephine Aug. 23 at 8 PM by the regular Brel-ringers (Robert Cuccioli, Tamra Hayden, Gay Marshall and Drew Sarich). Three just renewed their contracts, but Sarich, who joined this four-sided fold when Lestat folded its wings, will flap away soon to Les Miserables. His replacement, Greenberg promised, will be announced next week.

Gary Beach is also listing toward Les Miz. He’ll assume “Master of the House” duties as Thenardier in its upcoming Broadway revival (a chore he first undertook in 1989 in the original Los Angeles company), but first he has to be pried loose from his Tony-winning role of Roger De Bris, the transvestite theatre director and, in a pinch, Garlandesque Hitler of The Producers. Richard Frankel, one of the producers of The Producers, admitted the Beach hold is weakening, one finger at a time, and Lee Roy Reams has been flagged in from the road to take over the Broadway Roger. “God is finally going to let me wear a dress on Broadway,” beamed Reams, who was less than a week away from becoming Zaza/Albin when the original La Cage aux Folles folded. “I go in on Aug. 29, and my birthday is Aug. 23, so it will be a nice birthday present. I’ve got the same day as Gene Kelly, y’know—and Marian Seldes and Charles Busch.” He is signed through the end of January. Next, director-choreographer Susan Stroman wants him for a company she's putting together for Vegas after the first of the year.

When Beach did the La Cage revival last year, Reams was on the road with Roger De Bris. And it has always both a major career disappointment that he came so close to do La Cage on Broadway. “What they were going to do was put me on for the show’s last week at the Palace, and then they were going to transfer the whole production to the Mark Hellinger. But then they posted the closing notice, and the Mark Hellinger became a church, and I was on a street corner in a boa and a pair of high heels, going ‘Hey, sailor.’”

The cast of Martin Short: Fame Becomes Me thanks the audience for a wildly successful night.
photo by Aubrey Reuben

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