Following a delay due to a leg injury sustained during a pre-show warm-up Oct. 25, the opening night of John Leguizamo's new one-man work, Sexaholix... a love story has finally arrived. The show began previews Oct. 9 and was originally scheduled to run Nov. 4-Dec. 9; it will now run, extended, through Jan. 6, 2002.
Leguizamo spent the summer making his return to the live stage with a short national tour of a solo show titled John Leguizamo Live. (An RCA recording of the show was released Nov. 20 on CD.) The piece, produced by Robin Tate, developed into Sexaholix... a love story and plays on Broadway at the Royale Theatre.
Director Peter Askin, who helmed Leguizamo's Mambo Mouth and Spic-O Rama reteams with the actor for this, his fourth and final solo venture as Leguizamo told Playbill On-Line, "I think that's it. They're fun and I love them but I want to leave at the top of my game." (To read the full interview with John Leguizamo, point your browser to Playbill On-Line's Brief Encounter feature.)
As in his earlier award-winning one-man performances, Leguizamo employs an "in your face" comedic style, covering in his words "relationships: dating, trying to 'get some', breaking up, break-up sex, make-up sex, marriage, divorce," and other topics including Latino history, childhood, family, and finally fatherhood, referencing his own experiences and relatives.
The Colombian chameleon who first caught the eyes of the theatre world with his one man show Mambo Mouth — which won him an Obie and an Outer Critics Circle Award — later took the Drama Desk Award for Best Solo Performance for his Spic O-Rama. His most recent stage work, Freak: A Semi-Demi-Quasi Pseudo Autobiography, garnered him a Tony nomination. All three efforts were later aired on HBO and won CableACE awards. Also a viable film star, moviegoers may remember Leguizamo from recently as Toulouse Lautrec in Baz Luhrmann's "Moulin Rouge," in "To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar" in drag as Miss Chi-Chi Rodriguez or in Luhrmann's "Romeo + Juliet" as a Virgin Mary-gun toting Tybalt. His biggest role came in the 1999 Spike Lee joint "The Summer of Sam".
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The Oct. 25 evening performance was canceled as Leguizamo was taken to Roosevelt Hospital where they diagnosed his injury as a torn hamstring muscle. He was treated, released and was back on stage the following evening. Some alterations to the production have been made to not injure the muscle further according to press spokesperson Jim Randolph.
For tickets and information on Sexaholix at the Royale Theatre, 242 West 45th Street, call (212) 239-6200. At all performances, the first two rows of the orchestra will be sold on the day of the show for $15.
— by Ernio Hernandez
