Recent Playbill On-Line chat-room guest Karen Mason will bring her world-acclaimed cabaret act to Rainbow & Stars, March 4-22. Mason has been the "standby Norma Desmond" in Sunset Boulevard since the show opened Dec. 9, 1993 in Los Angeles. She's played the role more than 125 times.

The singer/actress will be backed by Dick Gallagher (tunemeister for Off Broadway's When Pigs Fly) and a three-piece combo as she sings standards and songs dedicated to her late, long-time partner, Brian Lasser. Her latest CD, "Better Days," on Zevely Records, will be receiving a special 1996-97 Back Stage Bistro Award for honoring and preserving Lasser's work.

Mason's most recent gig was with Skitch Henderson and the NY Pops Orchestra -- on a sold-out tour of Japan. In 1996, she appeared in three separate engagements at Rainbow & Stars, twice as part of the ASCAP Sunday Cabaret Series and once as a substitute for Rosemary Clooney.

Other Mason roles include a 1993 Off-Broadway revival of Carnival, for which she received a Drama Desk nomination, and Jerome Robbins' Broadway, in which she played Miss Mazeppa in the Gypsy segment.

Mason's engagement comes during "Cabaret Month," officially designated as such by the Manhattan Association of Cabarets & Clubs. --By David Lefkowitz