Off Broadway
Meet Me in St. Louis For a Zing Zing Zing Heartstrings Great Time

I must first admit to you all, maybe shockingly, that I have never seen the movie, ‘Meet Me in St. Louis‘, the 1944 film that starred the iconic Judy Garland, that this altered stage version was based upon. But I do know the name, Melissa Errico, who dazzled the audience at the Irish Rep in 2018 when she took to the stage for another classic musical, On a Clear Day You Can See Forever. “Sublime” is all I can say, so when seeing her name attached to this production, and for that reason (almost) alone, I just had to tune in and see what this streaming musical show was and is all about. With a book by Hugh Wheeler and songs by Hugh Martin and Ralph Blane, Meet Me in St. Louis, the streamed musical adapted and directed by Charlotte Moore (Molly Sweeney: A Performance on Screen) for the IRT stage, is as delicious and delightful as one could hope for. The sound of that score is just spectacular, from the first few moments when the band, lead by music director John Bell (IRT’s Finian’s Rainbow) and orchestrator Josh Clayton (LC’s My Fair Lady) chimes in with the overture to the very happy ending had by all. “I just adore, so I can’t ignore” this impressive restructuring that the IRT did to stream this out to us all for the holiday season. It truly is a luscious musical gift it there ever was one.

Based on ‘The Kensington Stories‘ by Sally Benson and then that famous MGM motion picture, the tender sweet story of the Smith family, that takes place, unsurprisingly, in St. Louis, Missouri from 1903 to 1904, has found its way most beautifully onto our home tv fully intact, even though I have nothing to compare it to. IRT’s small screen streamed version of Meet Me in St. Louis finds connection in its “clang, clang, clang” delivery, singing forth the music and the gentleness of these people with effortless charm. The company had been planning on presenting this musical on its intimate stage this holiday season, but the pandemic forced it to be redesigned for our streaming pleasure. And they could not have found a more loving crew of fantastic and dedicated singers and actors to work their magic in front of a green screen for us all, so that the technical wizards, including editor, Meridith Sommers; scenic designer Charlie Corcoran (IRT’s The Seafarer); mix, music, and sound designer M. Florian Staab (Public’s Teenage Dick), lighting designer Michael Gottlieb (IRT’s On Beckett / In Screen); and costume consultant, Tracy Christensen (Broadway’s Sunset Blvd); along with production manager Brandon Cheney; Production Coordinator Pamela Brusoski (IRT’s The Emperor Jones); and Producing Director, Ciarán O’Reilly (IRT’s The Weir: A Performance on Screen), could find a magnificent way to combine and layer all the pieces together to give us the semblance of a staged musical. It’s as sweet as the musical itself, and made my heart strings go “zing zing” as happily as one could could sing the tune while riding a trolley.

The film, back in the day, was a major success becoming the second-highest grossing picture of 1944, and no wonder, as the story is just lovely in its sweet technicolor simplicity. Directed by Vincente Minnelli, and starring Judy Garland, who would later marry her director, ‘Meet Me in St. Louis‘ gifted the world with Garland singing such classics as the fun “The Trolley Song“, the romantic “The Boy Next Door“, and the ever-so perfect “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas“, all of which became solid hits after the film was released. Luckily for the Irish Rep production, the cast charmingly sings these standards just as beautifully, giving care and style to every classic note. https://c0.pubmine.com/sf/0.0.3/html/safeframe.htmlREPORT THIS ADhttps://c0.pubmine.com/sf/0.0.3/html/safeframe.htmlREPORT THIS AD
To open, the Smith family beckons us enthusiastically to meet them all in St. Louis for the upcoming World’s Fair that is arriving the following summer to their much loved hometown, St. Louis. At the head of the household dining table is Alonzo Smith, solidly portrayed by Rufus Collins (Broadway’s An Ideal Husband), who finds middle class happiness with his gorgeously patient and loving wife Anna, perfectly played by the golden voiced Errico, getting a little help from the sassy spirited Irish housekeeper, Katie, devilishly portrayed by the very funny Kathy Fitzgerald (Broadway’s The Producers).

It’s a picture perfect household, with four daughters and one son, Lon, well played by William Bellamy (IRT’s Finian’s Rainbow), embracing the world they live in with apple pie goodness. They all are almost too sweet for words, literally, but somehow the ladies; Kylie Kuioka (York Theatre’s Panama Hattie) as the youngest trouble seeking daughter, Tootie; Austyn Johnson (“The Greatest Showman“) as the other young singing mouse Agnes; Ali Ewoldt (Broadway’s Phantom of the Opera) as the feisty forceful Rose, and Shereen Ahmed (the current star of the National tour of LC’s My Fair Lady) as the apple of our, and John’s eye, Esther (the role that Garland made famous), find the solid sisterhood core of playful frivolity in their kind and testy interactions; not the easiest thing to do, I might add, when the story is just so darn goodie two shoes mixed with a dose of sweet apple pie.

Ahmed steals the show, quite naturally, just as Garland once did, bringing a clear, sweet sound to Esther’s pining for “The Boy Next Door“, John Truitt, played most wisely by the gentle Max Von Essen (Broadway’s Anastasia). It seems that he almost doesn’t notice her at first, but the two meet cute and properly as the lamps are dimmed, and the inner flame of innocent love grows stronger. Von Essen’s voice is as velvety as one could hope for, and he delivers a gentleness that sits very well alongside Ahmed’s strong Esther as they ride the trolley together into each other’s arms. Another long-distance gentleman caller, the handsome and rich Warren Sheffield, delightfully portrayed by Ian Holcomb (IRT’s It’s A Wonderful Life) can’t seem to take his eye off another Smith sister. The New York City ladies “can’t hold a candle to you, Rose” he tells her, as he charmingly almost demands her affection, and eventual her hand. It’s silly clear-eyed fun, a bit sappy and sweet on the edges, but the energy and dated emotionality is infectious, and its heart sits exactly at the correct address.

There are a few wrenches thrown in the way of all their happiness as the calendar months zing by, leading them all up to Christmas, the dressup dance, and that famous Christmas song, lovingly sung by Ahmed. The connection seems quite clear, and even if you think this might not be your style, like John is for Esther, the production easily holds a candle to the classic filmic tale of family and romantic love, as clean and neat as the story demands. So gift yourself this Christmas treat, and buy yourself a streaming ticket so you can all Meet Me in St. Louis, when a date was called an engagement, and where the gentleness of this holiday tale will fill you with Christmas joy. So please, during these difficult days, let your heart be light. Next year, hopefully, all our pandemic troubles will be miles away. Someday soon, we all will be together, if the fates allow. Until then, we’ll have to muddle through somehow. So “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” night.
This new digital production is an abridged version of the 1989 Broadway musical, based on the 1944 film starring Judy Garland, and runs online from December 11 to January 2. It will include two special “Meet Me Anywhere” days with screening times convenient for viewers in all time zones on Saturday, December 19 and Saturday, January 2. (screening times are all listed in EST) Reservations are available by clicking here. Pay-What-You-Can, with a suggested price of $25. Advance reservations are required. Your event link will be emailed 2 hours before your selected performance begins. |

Off Broadway
Vineyard’s “Scene Partners” Gets Stuck Between Floors

“This is exactly how it happened “ we are told, followed by a big wide screen opening that descends upon us, but it does not quite land where it, and our leading lady’s character, most likely intended it too. Finally escaping the 11th floor on a folding chair and faulty pulley system, Meryl Kowalski, as portrayed as only the magnificently gifted Dianne Wiest (Broadway’s All My Sons; “Purple Rose of Cairo“) could, finds flight and falter inside this fascinating exploration of some sort of demented dream. Giving the “correct response“ to abstract questions and assignments, Wiest delivers a befuddled and determined performance that elevates a play that fractures realities every chance it gets. As written with a wild wandering spirit by John J. Caswell, JR. (Wet Brain), the play is an absurdity of utter invigorating complexity, playing with and sometimes delivering itself forward in a fascinating but distancing dementia. Is it a post-traumatic disassociation of epic proportions or a fractured descent into grief and mental illness, played for a laugh or a tug at the heart? Or is it something quite else that was lost on this avid fan of this Oscar-winning actress? And I don’t even know if there is a clear correct answer to this. But that is half the fun in this half-fun exercise in abstractionism and determination.
It’s big on ‘concept’, directed with a strong forward vision by Rachel Chavkin (Broadway’s Hadestown), obviously enjoying the ride and the wandering with glee. The visuals ride and slide in and about, thanks to the incredibly detailed and smooth work of video and projection design by David Bengali (Broadway’s The Thanksgiving Play), lighting designer Alan C. Edwards (Vineyard’s Harry Clarke), and scenic designer Riccardo Hernández (Broadway’s Indecent), giving depth and clarity to this otherwise meander into fractured and fantastical thinking. Supported by clever extravagances by costume designer Brenda Abbandandolo (Broadway’s The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window), the effect is a fevered dive into the mind of a woman beaten down hard to the ground by a now-dead husband whose death has freed her to her desire; her dream and determination to be a big famous movie star, and she’ll point the barrel at anyone who might stand in her way or say otherwise.
Scene Partners feels anything but safe and secure, as we join Wiest’s 75-year-old widow from the Midwest as she steadily abandons her needy mess of a daughter, played with clever calculations by Kristen Sieh (Broadway’s The Band’s Visit), to jet, train, or sled herself off to Hollywood to become a big gloriously famous movie star even before her now-dead violent abusive husband has been buried six feet under. The framing is slanted, with efforts to keep us off balance. Finding a flavor in its madness and splitting. The name of Wiest’s woman is Meryl Kowalski, and she’s not to be ignored. She is told quite clearly and quickly that she must change it if she really wants to be an actress, as that first name of hers has already been taken by that other, already famous and award-winning actress with the same first name that we all know and love. But this Meryl holds firm, inside and out of her first acting class somewhere out there in Los Angeles. It’s there, when confronted by her over-the-top acting teacher, played with wild abandonment by the perfect Josh Hamilton (Broadway’s The Real Thing), that she reveals another level of strong abstractionism. This particularly twisted Meryl’s dead husband was named Stanley Kowalski, and her Streetcar husband made Tennessee Williams’s character seem like quite the gentle nice guy.
At this point, the play stands shakily in some abstract parallels that are fun, clever, complicated, and a bit distancing, playing with fragments of trauma and grief that don’t fully come together. It pulls and pushes at about the same level of conflicted engagement, until Johanna Day (Broadway/MTC’s How I Learned to Drive) as Meryl’s half-sister comes into play, shifting the formula with a centered grounding that makes us sit back and question what’s really going on. When a doctor also enters the picture, played well by Eric Berryman (RT’s Primary Trust), a medical diagnosis once again adds a different framework that could alter the whole process. Where are we with these two half-sisters and their shared knowledge of a non-collaborated trauma of abuse? Especially after a (pre-recorded) interview with a very well-positioned Sieh asking pertinent questions that illicit praise from Hamilton’s pompous character and a disappearing act of a half-sister who might never been. It plays with the head, in both an engaging and disassociating manner that works, and doesn’t.
Scene Partners doesn’t play easy with our unpacking, leading us down blind endless alleyways decorated with an abundance of movie imagery that either leads us to brick walls or bottomless pits to fall into. Wiest’s Meryl has necessarily immersed herself in these vintage cinematic panoramas, probably to unconsciously avoid the abusive reality she found herself trapped in, and in that trauma response, Wiest has found the perfect embodiment for Mrs. Kowalski, bringing feisty and forceful complexities to the forefront as she shuffles and stabs herself into frame. And even if it doesn’t, in the end, add up to much, this Vineyard Theatre production is flavorful in its twisted construction and projections. The “Doctor Zhivago” impressions and pop-culture references overwhelm, not just our heroine, but also our connections to emotional clarity and authenticity, leaving us hanging halfway down and in between floors waiting for something to fully make an impact.

For more go to frontmezzjunkies.com
Off Broadway
Make Me Gorgeous Tells Of One Man’s Authenticity

Make Me Gorgeous! playing at Playhouse 46 in a nut shell is about the life and times of LGBTQ+ trailblazer Kenneth Marlow. Embodying Marlow is Wade McCollum, who tells us how he was born in 1926 in Des Moines, Iowa, and how he became a hustler, private hairdresser, stripped in mob-controlled nightclubs, became a female impersonator, a madam of a gay prostitution ring, until in the 70’s when he became Kate, throwing a “Ball to End all Balls” to fund gender-affirming surgery. We learn how she documented her life in books. In between he was a private in the U.S. Army; a Christian missionary; a mortuary cosmetologist and a newspaper columnist.
In a sense Marlow was raised to be who he was dressed in girls clothes as a child, then became drawn to feminine clothes and his female relatives encouraged him. In high school he ran around in drag. in Iowa in the 30’s took some kind of guts. His father never showed him love and left, his mother was a raging alcoholic. He took to the cinemas populated by men to find what was missing in life, then to the church. When he is shipped off to California, he meets and hangs out with the transgender prostitutes finding feeling at home. He ends up with a sugar daddy who is unattractive, ends up in Chicago, ends up as a hairdresser and then a stripper in Calumet City as “Mr. Keni Marlo, Exotic Queen of the Boys” and that takes us to the 40’s.
In the end he ended up becoming the hairstylist to Phyllis Diller, Lucille Ball, and Gypsy Rose Lee, among others. His side job need up being documented in Mr. Madam: Confessions of a Male Madam, Cathouse Mother, Male Oral Love, and Around the World with Kenneth Marlowe.
I have loved McCollum’s work ever since Ernest Shackleton Loves Me. This man is a consummate actor, whose rich voice and glamours gams make him perfect to tell this story. He brings everyone he is talking about to life. You feel as if you know each character. McCollum’ has oodles of charisma, so the tawdry tale he is telling comes off less crass. With lines like “I liked that men paid to have sex with me. And those who appealed to me usually didn’t have any money…so I did a lotta pro-bono work” if you are not exactly open this may not appeal to you. A couple walked out the night I went. McCollum is a natural with Sally Rand’s Fan Dance and glorious performing a song Marlow wrote with jazz pianist Reggie DuValle. The most pignut part of the story comes when he is drafted and is raped by 14 men. There is however a disconnect as on a book cover he wrote “He was raped by fourteen men in his barracks — and enjoyed it!”
The theater is styled like a cabaret, with velvet curtains and bistro tables. Black and white photographs of drag queens hang on the walls. On the stage Walt Spangler’s set looks like a cross between Barbie’s house and cotton candy. I really want the black dress designed by Jeffrey Hinshaw and the lighting by Jamie Roderick’s and sound by Ien DeNio’s really help to enjoy the evening
Smartly directed and written by Donald Horn, I was on the edge of my seat the whole performance and definitely learned a thing or two or three about this culture.
Make Me Gorgeous! Playhouse 46, 308 W 46th Street, through Dec. 31st.
Music
Here We Are Or The Search For The Meaning of Life

Let me just state that I love the Stephen Sondheim/David Ives musical/play Here We Are. It’s as if the genius, known as Sondheim was trying to resolve his life. The first act is cynical and the characters are hypocritical, while the second act is about coming to with grips with life’s choices and surrendering to the inevitable.

Micaela Diamond, Amber Gray, Steven Pasquale, Bobby Cannavale, Rachel Bay Jones and Jeremy Shamos Photo by Emilio Madrid
The music is like playing Sondheim jeopardy. His motif’s from other shows are blended into new songs that make you want to have a pen and paper to play the game. I can’t wait until the CD comes out. I’ve been told that it is being recorded in January.
The show is highly surreal, with life’s journeyIn question. Think “The Outer Limits” or “The Twilight Zone,” very Rod Serling.
Based on two Luis Buñuel films “The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie” (1972) and “The Exterminating Angel” (1962). Act one has Leo Brink (Bobby Cannavale) a entitled tycoon whose opinion is the only one that matters, his wife Marianne (Rachel Bay Jones) who lives for beauty and is a bit on the vaped side, their friends Paul Zimmer (Jeremy Shamos), a plastic surgeon celebrating his 1,000th nose job, his wife, Claudia (Amber Gray), an agent who lives for the celebrity of it all, Raffael Santello Di Santicci (Steven Pasquale), an ambassador from Moranda who lives for the number of notches on his belt and Fritz (Micaela Diamond), Marianne’s younger sister, who wants a revolution, while also wanting to live the good life, searching for brunch. It turns out Leo, Paul and Raffael run a drug cartel. As the day goes down the hill Marianne keeps asking Leo to “buy this perfect day for her.”

Amber Gray, Jeremy Shamos, David Hyde Pierce, Bobby Cannavale, Steven Pasquale Photo by Emilio Madrid
Act two is a little more dark. While they finally find food, the consequences of their choices keeps them trapped in purgatory. Enter a colonel (Francois Battiste) whose parents were killed for $26.15, a soldier (Jin Ha) who has feelings for Fritz due to his dreams and a bishop (David Hyde Pierce) who wants another job, has a shoe fettish, and plays piano, until there is no more music. This act is very reminiscent of Steambath. I love the homage to “The World According to Garp” and the bear.
Playing butlers and maids and assorted restaurateur’sare the incredible Tracie Bennett and Denis O’Hare. Kudos has to go out to the wigs by Robert Pickens and Katie Gell and the neon various establishments. white box set and costumes by David Zinn.

Jeremy Shamos, Amber Gray, Bobby Cannavale, Denis O’Hare, Rachel Bay Jones, Steven Pasquale, Micaela Diamond Photo by Emilio Madrid
Joe Mantello’s staging is exquisite, allowing for each of these brilliantly talented performers to take center stage. This is true ensemble acting and I hope when the Drama Desk is giving out awards this wins.
Where many have criticized the lack of music in the second act, it makes perfect sense. The music stops. The concept very much reminds me of Davids Cromer’s Our Town, when Emily dies and suddenly things are in color and have smells. It makes complete sense that once you are trapped the music would die.
Natasha Katz’s lighting really helps the shinny set take shape, Tom Gibbons’s sound makes the inner world come to life and Sam Pinkleton’s choreography is just enough to make this move seamlessly.
Alexander Gemignani, and Jonathan Tunick, make Sondheim’s music an art and I for one appreciate the subtlety and musicality. Many may not know that Sondheim was a game master and in this it is like he won the final game of “putting it together”.
Here We Are, is intelligent, witty with so much to say and if you ponder the meaning of life you to will walk away extremely fulfilled.
Here We Are, The Shed, 545 West 30th through January 21st
Off Broadway
Jerusalem Syndrome at Off-Broadway’s York Theatre Company

The Jerusalem Syndrome is a real psychological phenomenon that affects approximately 200 tourists per year who visit Israel. They come to believe that they are iconic figures from the Old and New Testaments.
Just in time for Chanukah is The York Theatre Company’s world-premiere musical The Jerusalem Syndrome. The book and lyrics are by Laurence Holzman and Felicia Needleman, with music by Kyle Rosen.
The show follows Phyllis/Sarah (Farah Alvin) who is hoping this trip will reunite her and her cell phone workaholic husband Alan. In the opening number “El-Al Flight,” we also meet an awkward rookie tour guide Eddie Schlosser (Chandler Sinks), whose alter ego becomes Moses, gay resort tycoon and furniture designer Charles Jackson, who takes on Jesus. Mickey Rose (James D. Gish) is the hunky and vain daytime actor who becomes Abraham. There is also a barbie-esq nurse Rena (Laura Woyasz,) who falls for Rose and sings an energetic number called “Room Seventeen.”
The standouts are Ms. Alvin who has always been a talent with her fabulous vocals and comedic touches, which show her vulnerability at the core. Mr Green who knocks it out of the park and Gish, who I expect will be able to propel this role into more.
The cast also consists of Dana Costello, Danielle Lee James, John Jellison, Karen Murphy, Jeffrey Schecter, Jennifer Smith, Curtis Wiley and Lenny Wolpe.
Directed by Don Stephenson and choreography by Alex Sanchez, this show moves at a nice pace.
The six-piece orchestra (Aveion Walker, Sean Decker, Kate Amrine, Jessica Gehring and Nicholas Urbanic under musical conductor and keyboardist Miles Plant, bring the music to life. Memorable songs include “The Power of Israel, ” “I’m Sorry,” “Doing It,” “Is It Crazy?” and “Daddy Loved Jesus.”
James Morgan’s set, Caite Hevner ‘s projections, Fan Zhang’s costumes, sound by Josh Liebert and and Rob Denton’s lighting all service the show.
The Jerusalem Syndrome, is a show that should uplift you for a pleasant night out.
The Jerusalem Syndrome: York Theatre Company, Theatre at St. Jean’s, 150 East 76th Street, until December 31st
Off Broadway
‘Til Death in Need of a Epitaph

It is so obvious Elizabeth Coplan’s ’Til Death, being presented by the Abingdon Theatre Company on Theatre Row is a vanity production by Ms. Coplan. Sadly the play stars Judy Kaye and Robert Cuccioli, who are saddled with this bitter melodrama.
The plays about death follows a well off Mary (Judy Kaye), who is dying from ovarian cancer, and wants to end it all. She is married to her second husband, Michael (Robert Cuccioli), who her daughter Lucy (Amy Hargreaves), resents. Well actually, this rather miserable girl is none too happy about anything, as she takes her mothers pills, drinks and turns down offers for a better job by a prestigious law firm. Her hotshot lawyer brother Jason (Dominick LaRuffa Jr.), has set this up for her, but she’d rather stay put. The most redeeming part of Lucy is her teenage soccer star son, Nick (Michael Lee Brown). Telling the story is the stand in for Ms. Coplan, Anne (Whitney Morse), a photographer who was the black sheep of the family and my guess still is.
Anne and Michael do not want Mary to kill herself, however Lucy seems gung ho. During the course of this Michael is constantly reminded by Lucy that he is nothing and has no claims to the house, even as Mary is dying. Why he doesn’t slap her is beyond me. I wanted out of my seat to do just that.
This play is kept on life support for 75-minutes but seems more like an eternity with these rather nasty characters.
Kaye is warm but has very little to do. Cuccioli’s role requires him to deliver completely lame jokes while emasculating him, to boot. Hargreaves does well in the bitch role. LaRuffa Jr. has nothing to do nor does Morse or Brown. The “secrets” that disclosed, in this day and age are blah, blah, blah..
Chad Austin’s direction keeps this monstrosity going like the energizer bunny.
The most confusing part is Lisa Renkel’s projections, which appear to be Ms. Coplan’s photography of her family. They do not resemble one person on stage.
What is even more confusing, is why some playwrights insist on dragging their audiences through their therapy.
‘Til Death: Abingdon Theatre Company at Theatre Row , 401 West 42nd Street until December 23rd.
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