By Harry Haun
15 Dec 2006
The veteran performer is conspicuously overqualified for his slim pickins but, otherwise, happy with his lot. "I just wear these different hats, and I have a wonderful time. They're treating me very well, and I got wonderful billing. Working with these people has really been a joy. Brian d'Arcy James, I knew. We'd worked in Follies. Marc Kudisch played my son at Goodspeed in Shenandoah in '94, the 20th anniversary production. The only one of the leads I hadn't work with was Kristin, and it's like I've known her all my life. She's an angel, a great trouper, and I haven't seen talent like this in many, many a moon. She's a Star. There isn't anything she can't do. She shines. It's like they wrote it for her."
As he was in the "Encores," the inestimable Rob Fisher is waving his baton to beat the band. "Actually, I have a nice view," he contended. "I get to see them sing — up close."
Numbering among the first nighters were Anne Kaufman Schneider, Jim and Julie Dale (preparing to holiday in Mexico), songsmith Maury Yeston (taking a brief holiday from his Death Takes a Holiday), Jerry Stiller, Olivia d'Abo, Garrison Keillor, Margaret Colin, director Scott Ellis and choreographer Rob Ashford (getting ready to hoist Curtains at the Al Hirschfeld), Dee Hoty with Actors' Equity president Mark Zimmerman, playwright Lynn Nottage, Sara Gettelfinger, Tony winners Jane Krakowski and Marian Seldes, Stephen Lang with daughter Lucy, Mario Cantone and those Jersey Boys Boswells, Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice.
When asked what they were doing these days, Neil Simon and Moises Kaufman said the exact three words you want them to say: "A new play." Called? "I didn't call it yet — I'm just still writing it," smiled Simon. Kaufman was equally parsimonious with the particulars but said "we'll probably start it at the Arena Stage in D.C. next year."
Victoria Clark and Kelli O'Hara, the mother and daughter of The Light in the Piazza, struck a together-again pose for photographers. Clark arrived late from The Agony and the Agony, the new Nicky Silver opus that's having a work-in-progress run at the Vineyard. Silver actually performs in the piece (which Agony is uncertain), and Clark was trilling like a star was born. "Ohmigod, he's such a fantastic co-star, so hysterical, so much fun to work with." O'Hara is off to Los Angeles for a "Reprise!" of Sunday in the Park with George next month, "then I'm going to come back home and see what's next — maybe a concert at Carnegie Hall in April with the Pops maybe, maybe." The joint must be habit-forming; only a few weeks ago she helped Barbara Cook out with her Carnegie gig. Cook was asked if she could hear distant echoes of She Loves Me in the Apple Tree score. "I didn't notice," she shot back. "I did," chimed in her date, Harvey Evans.
Adam Heller, who survived a benefit concert of Charles Strouse and Stephen Schwartz's Rags on Monday night ("The music was gorgeous. Unfortunately, it was underserved. If anything, it was just a reminder of how terrific that score is."), revealed he was working on an anthology of William Finn songs, Make Me a Song, with Sally Wilfert and Joe Cassidy. "We did it in Hartford, and we're hoping to put it in an Off-Broadway theatre in April."
Erin Dilly was last at the Hilton for the opening night of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. "I'm doing some television work, but mostly I'm just being a mother and that's pretty extraordinary," she said. "I'm here tonight to support my best friend, Kristi. We met 10 years ago at the Guthrie, doing Babes in Arms, and we became best friends basically from the first week we worked together." Dilly's hubby, Steve Buntrock, replaces Donny Osmond next week as Gaston in Beauty and the Beast.
Another of the leading lady's bosom buddies in attendance: Katie Finnernan. "I'm just so excited to see Kristin. We kinda started off together, and it's always so great to see your friends in theatre do so beautifully." Also: Susan Stroman, who set Chenoweth to tapping on Broadway in Steel Pier. The director-choreographer had just spent the day readying her latest Max Bialystock, Tony Danza. "I just rehearsed with him today. He's spectacular. He can really sing, and he can really dance. And he's a real New Yorker. As Mel Brooks always said, 'Max is New York first, and then he's Jewish.' Thing is, he has the energy to do it — he's in great shape — and he understands the comedy, the tone of it."
Next stop: Las Vegas. In January, Stroman starts rehearsing David Hasselhoff (as Roger DeBris!) for a lickety-split version of The Producers. "We got it down to 90 minutes for Vegas. It's a fast show. They want you back at those gaming tables, that's for sure."
A double layer of Grease is keeping director-choreographer Kathleen Marshall really cookin' these days. "I'm working on the Grease TV show and the Grease Broadway show," she said. "We're casting our Danny and Sandy on this 'American Idol'-type TV show for NBC called 'You're the One That I Want.' Then, those two — whoever America votes on — are going to be our Danny and Sandy, and we go into rehearsals in the spring."
"Star Search" having gone the way of "Ted Mack's Amateur Hour," Marshall feels these "American Idol"-type venues are valid in creating stars. "Look at Jennifer ["Dreamgirls"] Hudson. It's a launching ground for new talent. There used to be variety shows to introduce new musical theatre performers to audiences, and they don't exist anymore so now we have these other kinds of outlets to introduce new performers to people."
The wordsmith behind Urinetown and Pig Farm, Greg Kotis, said that when his next opus with composer Mark Hollman — Yeast Nation — sees the light of stage, it may really be out of town: like the Perseverance Theatre in Alaska.
The Oscar-winning Carradine ("I am, so far," Keith tactfully inserted) attended The Apple Tree as a show of support for d'Arcy James. They were, too briefly, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels together on Broadway.
"I just finished playing at Joe Pub's last night — a concert, all my stuff," said Carradine, who was Oscared for Best Song of 1975 ("I'm Easy" from "Nashville"). "I had planned to do this while Scoundrels was running, but it closed. I'd already talked to the guy so I said, 'Well let's do it anyway,' so I got my old band together and came back from California. We rehearsed a couple of days and did it — about 70 minutes of my own songs."
Tony Walton, who designed the sets for the original Apple Tree, was present, partially anyway. "It was an extraordinary night in terms of stirring up all those memories," he admitted, still a little misty from the exposure. "I just love the score so much. Jonathan Tunick did such an astounding job of orchestrating it." His view of Eden, he noted, was quite different from Beatty's — "just a little more caricatury, but Barbara was a very real Eve, very Earth Mothery. I adore Kristin. That's a pretty tough challenge — to go up against memories of Barbara Harris, who made Barbra Streisand look like an amateur."
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| Marc Kudisch, Kristin Chenoweth and Brian d'Arcy James take their opening night bows.
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| photo by Aubrey Reuben |
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