tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-57733152629726166042024-03-16T07:59:00.756-05:00BlogfottGalen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.comBlogger168125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-42190095981460445822023-11-11T21:40:00.000-06:002023-11-11T21:40:26.585-06:00Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Missing Maestro<p> Over the last couple of years, I've had a great time playing "Sherlock" in <a href="http://www.symphonicaproductions.com" target="_blank">Symphonica Productions</a>' show <i>Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Missing Maestro</i>. It's written by <a href="http://www.enricolopezyanez.com" target="_blank">Enrico Lopez-Yañez</a>, and audiences love it. I performed the show with Enrico conducting earlier this year with the <a href="http://www.dso.org" target="_blank">Detroit Symphony</a>, with <a href="http://www.connergraycovington.com" target="_blank">Conner Gray Covington</a> and the <a href="http://www.utahsymphony.org" target="_blank">Utah Symphony</a>, and just today with <a href="http://www.christopherjameslees.com" target="_blank">Christopher James Lees</a> and the <a href="http://www.charlottesymphony.org" target="_blank">Charlotte Symphony</a>. Good times!</p>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-29515690785322156742022-08-04T22:57:00.001-05:002022-08-19T23:27:15.590-05:002017<p><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"> 2017 was probably the most action-packed year of my life, professionally speaking.</span></p><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">On the animation front, I:</span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• adapted, directed, and animated three book-to-film adaptations for Scholastic/Weston Woods: “Mother Bruce”, “Leo: A Ghost Story”, and “Du Iz Tak?”. For this latter film, I actually got to meet the book's author/illustrator Carson Ellis, which was a rare treat.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• conceived, designed, and animated the new motion graphics for NPT’s “Arts Break” segments.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• flew to Vegas to help my friend Brian Maffitt give an innovative keynote speech utilizing Adobe’s new Character Animator software.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• created animated scenic projections for the shows at The Little Engine Playhouse in Dollywood, directed by Brian Hull. This also involved creating (and narrating) opening video segments about Dolly’s Imagination Library program.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">On the performing front, I:</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• played Leontes in “The Winter’s Tale” for Nashville Shakespeare Festival, as well as Lepidus and the Soothsayer in their “Antony and Cleopatra”.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• played nine different roles in “Mr. Popper’s Penguins” at Nashville Children’s Theatre.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• was the standby for all three actors in “The Final Days of Wolfe Tone” at TPAC (and also sang a brief offstage solo).</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• learned and recorded two great “Disney Villain” roles for Music Theatre International's official reference recordings: Claude Frollo in “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” and Joseph Pulitzer in “Newsies”.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">• participated in readings/workshops for four other shows.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;"><br /></span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">That's 2017!</span></p>
<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px; min-height: 14px;"><br /></p>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-77847623548927468412022-07-29T23:03:00.013-05:002022-08-04T23:04:06.674-05:002016<p>Theatre continued to play an important part in my life in 2016. I appeared in the Studio Tenn production of <i>Evita</i> which was staged in Jackson Hall at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center, enabling me to achieve the trifecta of appearing on all three TPAC stages. I also appeared in <i>Smoke: A Ballad of the Night Riders</i> again this year, this time in the dual roles of the Storyteller and Dr. Amoss. A much better fit for me, really.</p><p>Nashville Public Library held the Nashville International Puppet Festival, and I was involved in two presentations there. Utilizing original puppets created by Tom Tichenor, I performed <a href="https://youtu.be/oodxL9FaGXg" target="_blank">a 10-minute scene</a> from the musical <i>Carnival</i> along with Rosemary Fossee. I also created animated projections for Brian Hull's epic puppet production of <i><a href="https://youtu.be/yQVAkApQqQI" target="_blank">Kaytek the Wizard</a></i>. Both were very well received, as was the entire wonderful festival.</p><p>I recorded the "cast album" for <a href="https://goldrichandheisler.com/project/junie-b-jones-musical/" target="_blank">Junie B. Jones: The Musical</a>, singing the roles of Lenny and Chenille.</p><p>My Weston Woods film <i>Grace for President</i> premiered this year.</p><p>We had a 25th anniversary reunion for the <i>Beauty and the Beast</i> stage show at Disney World, so the whole Fott family went down for a November vacation.</p><p>And, here's a weird thing: I was randomly mentioned in the "Five Hoda Kotbs" episode of <a href="https://vimeo.com/188662086" target="_blank"><i>The Last Man on Earth</i></a>. I'm actually glad I wasn't watching at the time, because I'm sure I would have been convinced I was hallucinating! Of course, Danny Bonaduce has appeared on <i>The Today Show</i>, so the IMDb link from Bonaduce to Katie Couric is actually much shorter....but I'm happy to be a link in that chain!</p><p>That's 2016.</p><p><br /></p>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-71481409975192973292022-07-29T22:50:00.001-05:002022-07-29T22:50:05.413-05:002015<p> I suppose any sort of record one is making about one's life is inevitably touched more and more by death. Until finally, of course...the record itself just stops. But hey, till then...let's take a look at 2015.</p><p>There was a lovely memorial service for Josie Helming in Memphis. At the 2001 MSU Theatre Dept. reunion, which also marked Josie's retirement, Clif Gordon had set up a video camera so people could record their thoughts about the department and Josie. For this memorial service, I took that 14-year-old footage and edited together a tribute that was screened at the service. (It's <a href="https://youtu.be/AVByaqcdSsY?t=1828" target="_blank">here</a>, for any interested parties.) </p><p>And a month after this memorial for Josie, my college friend Emily Woodward Macy died. So sad. Such a beautiful person.</p><p>Wanda Wilson, proprietress of the legendary P&H Café in Memphis passed away too. And one of our cats, spelled variably "Keypot" or "Kipat", also died.</p><p>I had two Weston Woods films released: <i>I'm Brave!</i> and <i>Scaredy Squirrel at Night</i>, both the third installments of what you might call "trilogies" I've made.</p><p>And just for kicks, I released my <a href="https://youtu.be/NdaWTQXbvUo" target="_blank">100 days of hair and beard growth</a> video.</p><p>I went to the National Puppetry Festival in Storrs, CT, which was a wonderful experience. Along the way there and back, I visited old friends and colleagues Lester Malizia, Eddie Powers, and I finally got to meet the staff of Weston Woods Studios in person! Brian Hull and I also made side trips to the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art and two locations in Pittsburgh where puppets and set pieces from <i>Mister Rogers' Neighborhood</i> were displayed. A lovely, fun trip.</p><p>There was more performing for me this year too. I played the leading role of Owen Hartley in <i>Smoke: A Ballad of the Night Riders</i>, a musical written by David Alford that is presented semi-annually in Adams TN. I also got to record the voice of King Triton for Music Theatre International's official reference recording of Disney's The Little Mermaid. Excerpts can be heard <a href="https://www.mtishows.com/disneys-the-little-mermaid" target="_blank">here</a>.</p><p>That's 2015.</p>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-39761834965622613852022-07-29T22:47:00.001-05:002022-07-29T22:47:32.831-05:002014<p> I have to look at 2014 as my return to acting. The last show I had done was <i>1776 </i>with Tennessee Rep in 2005. I had auditioned for a few things in the next couple of years without getting in them, but there was a good six-year period where I didn't audition at all. In 2013 the Rep announced they were doing <i>Chicago</i>, a show I found resistible to be a part of. But they got the rights taken away from them due to a conflicting national tour, and announced they were switching to <i>Company</i> instead.</p><p>I'd been a Sondheim fan for most of my life, but had never actually been in one of his shows. In <i>Company</i>, I knew I wasn't a "Bobby", but figured there were five other roles I was more-or-less right for. It was time to decide if theatre was "something I did" anymore, or if I was done with it forever. I auditioned. I got cast. And it was a great experience.</p><p>As it turns out, Company was the last Tennessee Repertory Theatre show, because the company changed its name for the 2014-15 season. And I also got cast in the first Nashville Repertory Theatre show, which was another Sondheim, <i>Sweeney Todd</i>.</p><p>But why stop there? I also was a SAG-AFTRA day player for the ABC show <i>Nashville</i>, where I played the leader of an AA meeting.</p><p>My career as an animator kept on moving along too. I had a great trip out west for the San Francisco International Film Festival, where <i>I Want My Hat Back</i> was screened, and also squeezed in a trip to Pixar! That film also screened in the New York International Children's Film Festival this year. And I also began work on <i>I'm Brave!</i>, recording the voice of Jonathan Banks.</p><p>The end of 2014 saw two deaths of important people in my life. Jack Dabdoub died, whom I had understudied for a few summers down in Galveston. He was a lovely, supportive person who had an amazing career. Sadder still was the death of Josie Helming, the main acting teacher of my college years at Memphis State. Josie also gave me my first professional acting job in The Red Balloon Players in Memphis.</p>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-50719519887884958602022-07-29T22:45:00.000-05:002022-07-29T22:45:03.777-05:002013...the rest of the story<p><a href="http://blogfott.blogspot.com/2013/07/1963.html">On 7/21/13</a>, I started a series of daily posts wherein I counted down to my 50th birthday, looking at each year in my life. An exercise in navel-gazing to be sure, but it's actually proved useful since then, when I've wanted to remember when exactly something happened. So I thought I would continue that effort, bringing things up to the present.</p><p><a href="http://blogfott.blogspot.com/2013/09/2013so-far.html">On my birthday that year</a>, I wrote about the first 2/3 of 2013, so here's what happened in the remaining third:</p><p>The now-defunct <i>Nashville Arts Magazine</i> published <a href="https://nashvillearts.com/2013/10/galen-fott/">a nice article about me</a>.</p><p>I attended a 50th birthday celebration for my dear friend Terry Fluker in Memphis.</p><p>We made a trip to Las Vegas to visit my brother and his wife; while there, we saw the Cirque du Soleil show <a href="https://www.cirquedusoleil.com/beatles-love" target="_blank"><i>Love</i></a>, and Penn and Teller.</p><p><a href="https://youtu.be/F2cbD_0lH1o"><i>I Want My Hat Back</i></a> won second place for best animated short in the children's jury of the Chicago International Children's Film Festival!</p><p>And there were two Nashville Public Library-related events: The library hosted a free screening of my animated films in October, and in December I got to puppeteer the Grandfather for Wishing Chair Productions' lovely <i>A Child's Calendar</i>.</p><p>That's 2013!</p>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-90732299391816995422022-07-28T23:26:00.002-05:002022-07-28T23:28:26.484-05:00Mister Rogers' Neighborhood — Daniel and the glass<p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: medium;">In 2017 I tuned in to the "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood" marathon that streamed on twitch.tv. I was particularly waiting for a scene I'd remembered all my life. (I was four when it aired.) Here's that scene, from the first season, episode 109. I can certainly see why it made such a big impression on me. The respect that is given to Daniel's emotions; there are no words spoken for such a long time. The beautiful, honest performances by Betty Aberlin and Fred Rogers. Amazing that so much time could be devoted to such a small and yet huge moment on children's television.</span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal; margin: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/U8wQ1U6QK7Q" width="320" youtube-src-id="U8wQ1U6QK7Q"></iframe></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><span style="font-family: times; font-size: large;"><br /></span><p></p>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-6053578117854690732020-10-12T09:02:00.021-05:002020-10-17T21:03:26.336-05:00Nashville's The Barn Dinner Theatre/Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre — production history<div style="text-align: left;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Primarily using newspapers.com, I researched a production history for The Barn/Chaffin’s Barn Dinner Theatre in Nashville. I'm pretty confident that all the productions on this list actually happened, but there certainly might be things missing that weren't covered in the papers. Comments below are welcome.</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’m so grateful I got back on the Barn stage last year to play Daddy Warbucks in "Annie". My only previous show there was "The 1940s Radio Hour" in 1988, before the vast majority of my "Annie" castmates were born. I'll always treasure riding the stage up last year after the curtain call, watching people wiping tears from their eyes. Isn't that what it's all about?</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Here are the 689 shows:</span></div>
</div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">1967<br /></span></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Any Wednesday (opened 3/29)<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Blithe Spirit<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mary, Mary<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Hasty Heart<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ladies’ Night in a Turkish Bath<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Odd Couple<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Tender T</span>rap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Barefoot in the Park<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Paisley Convertible<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Boeing-Boeing</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1968<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Moon is Blue<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Rainmaker<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Period of Adjustment<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ready When You Are, C.B.!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">See How They Run<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Wedding Night<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Boy Friend<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Janus<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Private Lives<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Bell, Book, and Candle<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Mousetrap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Light Up the Sky<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Catch Me If You Can</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1969<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Girl in the Freudian Slip<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Star-Spangled Girl<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Drunkard<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tobacco Road<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Highlights of Broadway<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Impossible Years<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Come Blow Your Horn<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">You Know I Can’t Hear You When the Water’s Running<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cactus Flower<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Born Yesterday<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ladies’ Night in a Turkish Bath<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Never Too Late<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Take My Wife</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1970<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fantasticks<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lovers and Other Strangers<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Owl and the Pussycat<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Marriage-Go-Round<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Luv<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Send Me No Flowers<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Whoops, Someone’s Been Sleeping in My Bed<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Girls in 509<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Under the Yum Yum Tree<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Thousand Clowns<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Love Out of Town<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lo and Behold!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Pool’s Paradise</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1971<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Reluctant Debutante<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Charley’s Aunt<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Tunnel of Love<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Everybody Loves Opal<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Don’t Drink the Water<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">John Loves Mary<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Kiss and Tell<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Plaza Suite<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Barefoot in the Park<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Arsenic and Old Lace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">There’s a Girl in My Soup<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">My Three Angels</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1972<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Odd Couple<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Play It Again, Sam<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dear Ruth<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Curious Savage<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Forty Carats<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dollars to Doughnuts<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Critic’s Choice<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Last of the Red Hot Lovers<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Time Out for Ginger<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Make Mine Mink<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Norman, Is That You?<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Man Who Came to Dinner</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1973<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">How the Other Half Loves<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Gazebo<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Natalie Needs a Nightie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Gramercy Ghost<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ten Little Indians<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Roman Candle<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Halfway Up the Tree<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Visit to a Small Planet<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Black Comedy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Enter Laughing<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Saga of Roaring Gulch<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">See How They Run</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1974<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Not Now Darling<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Catch Me If You Can<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">No Sex Please, We’re British<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Do! I Do!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Relatively Speaking<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Prisoner of Second Avenue<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Mousetrap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Once Upon a Mattress<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">6 Rms Riv Vu<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Seven Year Itch<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Camelot</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1975<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Shot in the Dark<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Come Blow Your Horn<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Goodbye Charlie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Our Hearts Were Young and Gay<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Beginner’s Luck<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Good Doctor<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Kiss Me, Kate<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sunday in New York<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Accommodations<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Take My Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">My Daughter’s Rated X<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ll Get My Man</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1976<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to the Forum<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">My Fat Friend<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Hasty Heart<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Tender Trap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Marriage-Go-Round<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Twigs<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">God’s Favorite<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ladies’ Night in a Turkish Bath<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Sunshine Boys<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lo and Behold!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Star-Spangled Girl<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Busybody</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1977<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mr. Roberts<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Vibrations<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Champagne Complex<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dial M for Murder<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Odd Couple<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Damn Yankees<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Move Over, Mrs. Markham<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">See How They Run<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">We Must Kill Toni<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Little Mary Sunshine<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">It Pays To Be a Lady<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Subject to Change</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1978<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Arsenic and Old Lace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Here Lies Jeremy Troy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Don’t Drink the Water<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Time Out for Ginger<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Life’s Little Problems<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ten Nights in a Barroom<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Angela<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Who’s On First<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Captain’s Paradise<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">No Hard Feelings<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Wishful Thinking<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Paisley Convertible</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1979<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">An Almost Perfect Person<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Gentleman and a Scoundrel<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The White Sheep of the Family<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Boeing-Boeing<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Take a Number, Darling<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Wait Until Dark<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Gown for His Mistress<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">There Goes the Bride<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Butterflies are Free<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Count Dracula<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fiddler on the Roof<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Bell, Book, and Candle</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1980<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Apple Tree<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Do! I Do!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Last of the Red Hot Lovers<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Never Too Late<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Three Goats and a Blanket<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Second Time Around<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Thurber Carnival<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Rainmaker<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Girls in 509<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Seven Year Itch<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Two by Two<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Heaven Can Wait</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1981<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Same Time Next Year<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Robber Bridegroom<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Lady Who Cried Fox<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Deathtrap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">South Pacific<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Mind with the Dirty Man<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Chapter Two<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Any Wednesday<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cabaret<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Centerfold<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Catch Me If You Can<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Oklahoma!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Abie’s Irish Rose</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1982<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Gin Game<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fantasticks<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Odd Couple<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fiddler on the Roof<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ten Nights in a Barroom<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Star-Spangled Girl<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Hello, Dolly!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tribute<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Owl and the Pussycat<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Love My Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Annie Get Your Gun<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Under the Yum Yum Tree<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Applause<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dames at Sea<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Tribute to Broadway</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1983<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Ought to be in Pictures<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Grease<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">On Golden Pond<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Man of La Mancha<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mornings at Seven<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">God’s Favorite<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Will Rogers’ USA<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sweet Charity<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Come Blow Your Horn<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Gentleman and a Scoundrel</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1984<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Do! I Do!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sunrise on the Mississippi<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Barefoot in the Park<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">No Time for Sergeants<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Harvey<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Sunshine Boys<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Two By Two<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Annie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Mousetrap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mary, Mary<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Arsenic and Old Lace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Shenandoah<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Heaven Can Wait</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1985<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder at the Howard Johnson’s<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ain’t Misbehavin’<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Norman, Is That You?<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fools<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Apple Tree<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Thousand Clowns<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum (closed in July)</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1986<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Odd Couple (opened 8/5/86)<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Celebrate Me Home<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">No Hard Feelings<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Last of the Red Hot Lovers<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">See How They Run</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1987<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder Among Friends<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Wally’s Cafe<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Squabbles<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sugar Babies<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Charley’s Aunt<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Come Blow Your Horn<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Pajama Tops<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Bad Year for Tomatoes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Little Shop of Horrors<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Talent for Murder<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Foreigner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ladies’ Night in a Turkish Bath</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1988<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Same Time, Next Year<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Claptrap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Chicago<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Brighton Beach Memoirs<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Nerd<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Alone Together<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cheaters<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Second Lady<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Don’t Drink the Water<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The 1940s Radio Hour<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Love, Sex, and the IRS</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1989<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Chapter Two<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Weekend Comedy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">They’re Playing Our Song<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">God’s Favorite<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sugar Babies<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">On Golden Pond<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Unexpected Guest<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Nunsense<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Biloxi Blues<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fiddler on the Roof<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Everybody Loves Opal<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Wife Begins at Forty</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Thanks for the Memories (opened 4/14)<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Southern Exposures — Three Portraits of the South<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The All New Avante Garage<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Almost A Midsummer Night’s Dream<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Hooray for Hollywood<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Love NashVegas<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lullaby of Broadway<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">a gigantic gaggle of gregarious groupies goes ga ga at glorious garage games<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Seasoned Greetings 1989</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1990<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Groucho: A Life in Revue<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Twice Around the Park<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Godspell<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Housekeeper<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Run for Your Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Perfect Murder<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Little Shop of Horrors<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Broadway Bound<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Pinchpenny Phantom of the Opera<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Bingo!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder at the Howard Johnson’s</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Love Avante Garage Style<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Bop She Bops<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fancy Show<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Whispers, Wigs, and Wenches<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Avante Garage Sale<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tomfoolery<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Greater Tuna<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Christmas Present</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1991<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Driving Miss Daisy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Saving Grace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Do! I Do!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">It Runs in the Family<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Rumors<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Oklahoma!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Bus Stop<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Busybody<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Steel Magnolias<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sorry! Wrong Chimney!</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Pasquo Precinct Phollies<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">One Mo’ Time<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Driving Miss Daisy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The All Night Strut!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Greetings!</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1992<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Barefoot in the Park<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Take This Man<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Singin’ in the Rain<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Arsenic and Old Lace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">There Goes the Bride<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Music Man<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lend Me a Tenor<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Born Yesterday<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tootsie’s Vaudeville Revue<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">My Three Angels</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Wally’s Cafe<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sorry! Wrong Chimney!</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1993<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Kiss or Make Up<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Columbo<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Kiss Me, Kate<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Rainmaker<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Run For Your Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Me and My Girl<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Social Security<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lie, Cheat, and Genuflect<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Pump Boys and Dinettes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Star on the Door<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Magical Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Gentleman and a Scoundrel</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1994<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">You’ll Love My Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Noises Off<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Two By Two<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Alone Together<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Odd Couple<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">South Pacific<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Here Lies Jeremy Troy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smoke on the Mountain<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Move Over Mrs. Markham<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ladies Night in a Turkish Bath<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Year Santa Almost Forgot Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Beyond the Fringe<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ll Be Back Before Midnight<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder By Misadventure<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Butterflies Are Free<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Corpse!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder at the Howard Johnson’s</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1995<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Foreigner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Beau Jest<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Fantasticks<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Let’s Murder Marsha<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Sunshine Boys<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Camelot<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Who’s Under Where?<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Robber Bridegroom<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Boeing-Boeing<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Love, Sex, and the IRS<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Christmas Robot</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder by the Book<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Same Time, Next Year<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cookin’ With Gus<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Angel Street<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Champagne Complex</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1996<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Plaza Suite<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Hasty Heart<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Forever Plaid<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">My Giddy Aunt<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Roomies<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Will Rogers Follies<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Not With My Daughter<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mixed Emotions<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Little Me<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Playing Doctor<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Outerspace Adventure</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Marriage is Murder<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Hamlet<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Who’s On First?<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ded Herring<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Take a Number, Darling</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1997<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Suitehearts<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Your Flake or Mine?<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Monky Business<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Nerd<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Funny Money<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Singin’ in the Rain<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Take My Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Clue: The Musical<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Turn for the Nurse<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Oh, Fudge!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Christmas Miracle</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Romeo and Juliet<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dial M for Murder<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Beside Yourself<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Winner Lose All<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Look, No Hans!</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1998<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Second Time Around<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dead Funny<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tintypes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cash on Delivery<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Moon Over Buffalo<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Guys and Dolls<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Par for the Course<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Pasquo Precinct Follies<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Senator Wore Pantyhose<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Nurse Jane Goes to Hawaii<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Magical Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Once is Enough<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Much Ado About Nothing<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Hiccup<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">An Evening with Sherlock Holmes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Christmas Cactus</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">1999<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Saving Grace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Any Wednesday<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sugar Babies<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Luck, Love, and the Lottery<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Bill of Wrongs<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fiddler on the Roof<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Run for Your Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Bop She Bops<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lend Me a Tenor<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Don’t Dress for Dinner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Christmas Caper</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Same Time, Next Year<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Comedy of Errors<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sylvia<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Another Evening with Sherlock Holmes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Having a Wonderful Time, Wish You Were Her</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2000<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Take This Man<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ghost of a Chance<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">State Fair<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Alone Together<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Hello, Dolly!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Foreigner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Proposals<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Love, Sex, and the IRS<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Out of Order</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Special Occasions<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Othello<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Cemetery Club<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Hound of the Baskervilles<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Late, Late Show</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2001<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Funny Valentines<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Wife Begins at Forty<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Remainders<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ghost Story<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Bad Year for Tomatoes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Annie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Rumors<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Second Lady<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sorry! Wrong Chimney!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Christmas Robot</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Macbeth<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Boys Next Door<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Hostage<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Study in Scarlet<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Country Christmas, Carol</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2002<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Gone But Not Forgotten<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Steel Magnolias<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Man of La Mancha<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Caught in the Net<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Picture Perfect<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Sound of Music<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Gentleman and a Scoundrel<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ll Be Seeing You<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s a Wonderful Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Christmas Mystery</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tomfoolery<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sherlock Holmes: A Trilogy of Tales<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder in Music City<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Butterflies Are Free<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder at the Howard Johnson’s</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2003<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Barefoot in the Park<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Queens of Heart<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Forever Plaid<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lo and Behold!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Situation Comedy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">My Fair Lady<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Last Night of Ballyhoo<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ten Little Indians<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Natalie Needs a Nightie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Frozen Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Chaps!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sherlock Holmes: A Trilogy of Tales II<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Beyond the Fringe<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Artificial Jungle<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cookin’ with Gus</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2004<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Weekend Comedy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Catch Me If You Can<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cabaret<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Social Security<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">When the Cat’s Away<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Annie Get Your Gun<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Prisoner of Second Avenue<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Arsenic and Old Lace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Glad Tidings<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Christmas Santa Almost Forgot</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ladies’ Night in a Turkish Bath</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2005<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Odd Couple<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sunday in New York<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Nunsense<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Who’s Under Where?<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Goodbye Charlie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smoke on the Mountain<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Thousand Clowns<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ghost Story<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Mousetrap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Glad Tidings II: The Gift Returns<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Selfish Elf</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Country Christmas, Carol</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2006<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Foreigner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Suitehearts<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smokey Joe’s Cafe<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Boeing-Boeing<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">All My Love, Always<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Johnny Guitar<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Deathtrap<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Over the River and Through the Woods<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Glad Tidings III: Re-Gifted<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Christmas Caper</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Greater Tuna<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Tuna Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2007<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Any Wednesday<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Modern Love<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Chicago<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Saving Grace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mixed Emotions<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Snowderella<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smoke on the Mountain<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lend Me a Tenor<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Run For Your Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sorry! Wrong Chimney!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Frosty Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Game Show Show</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2008<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">On Golden Pond<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">My Way: A Musical Tribute to Frank Sinatra<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Beau Jest<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dearly Beloved<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Alone Together<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Bop She Bops<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">FishaFrogaPotaTurnip<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Bad Year for Tomatoes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Breaking Legs<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder at the Howard Johnson’s<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Lost Claus</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Greetings</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2009<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Don’t Dress for Dinner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Barefoot in the Park<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Winner Lose All<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Second Time Around<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Seeing Stars in Dixie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sarah and the Secret of the Cellar<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">There Goes the Bride<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Filthy Rich<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">See How They Run<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Christmas Belles<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sarah and the Secret of Santaland</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sanders Family Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2010<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Rumors<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Blithe Spirit<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Frankly My Dear<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Butler Done It!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Funny Money<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cinderella 8.0: Truly, Truly, Truly Outrageous<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smoke on the Mountain Homecoming<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Rear Widow<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Squabbles<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s a Wonderful Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Frosty Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">john & jen<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">An Evening with Sherlock Holmes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mixed Nuts<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Late, Late Show</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2011<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ll Be Seeing You<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">’Til Beth Do Us Part<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Foreigner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Rainmaker<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Everybody Loves Opal<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Annie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Writer’s Block<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Southern Fried Funeral<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Boeing-Boeing<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Got a Brand New Bag</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">’Til Death Do Us Part<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Country Christmas, Carol</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2012<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Modern Love<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Elvis Has Left the Building<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Too Old for the Chorus (But Not Too Old To Be a Star)<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Here Lies Jeremy Troy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fiddler on the Roof<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Odd Couple<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Dixie Swim Club<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Spreading It Around<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Glad Tidings: A Holiday Variety Show</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Totally 80’s, Totally Murder<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Wanted Dead or Alive<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Bop She Bops: Merry Christmas, Baby</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2013<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Run For Your Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ghost Story<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ded Herring<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Who’s Under Where?<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">All For a Song<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Southern Fried Nuptials<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Seniors of the Sahara<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sanders Family Christmas<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Longest Day</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">’Til Death Do Us Part<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sorry! Wrong Chimney!</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2014<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Driving Miss Daisy<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Always a Bridesmaid<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Chaps!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Bad Year for Tomatoes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Grease<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Fox on the Fairway<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ain’t Misbehavin’<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Gone, But Not Forgotten<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Christmas Carol<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Special Reindeer</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Greater Tuna<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Tuna Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2015<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Gentleman and a Scoundrel<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">I Take This Man<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Good Ol’ Girls<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cliffhanger<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Nobody’s Perfect<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">All Shook Up<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Arsenic and Old Lace<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Alone Together<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Yule Y’all<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Christmas Mystery</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sherlock Holmes<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Murder at the Howard Johnson’s</span></div></div></div></div></div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2016<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mixed Emotions<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Funny Valentines<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Taffetas<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Rumors<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Take My Wife<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Route 66<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Picture Perfect<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Playing Doctor<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Glad Tidings<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Santa’s Got a Brand New Bag</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Lockhorns — Together At Last<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Red, White, and Tuna<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Tuna Does Vegas</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2017<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Odd Couple<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Seeing Stars in Dixie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Nerd<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Beau Jest<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sister Act<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Smoke on the Mountain<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">In Stitches<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Mamma Mia!<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Southern Fried Funeral<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s a Wonderful Life: The Musical<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">’Twas the Night Before Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Tuna Christmas</span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2018<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Freaky Friday<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Almost, Maine (presented at the Darkhorse Theater)<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sister Act<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Minnie Pearl: All the News from Grinder’s Switch<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Newsies<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Elf the Musical<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">All I Want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ollie's Diner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Game Show Show</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2019<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Who’s On First?<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Kiss Me, Kate<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Esther<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Minnie Pearl: All the News from Grinder’s Switch<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Listen to Your Mother<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">God’s Favorite<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Annie<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Southern Fried Nuptials<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Wedding Singer<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ollie’s Diner<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Singin’ in the Rain<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sanders Family Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">BACKSTAGE:<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Stop Me If You’ve Heard This One<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Greater Tuna<br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Tuna Christmas</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">2020</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Schooled</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Breaking Up Is Hard To Do (closed 2/29)</span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">?</span></div>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-62917820900206776522020-05-18T21:44:00.001-05:002020-08-09T10:40:55.847-05:00Horrible GompieI've written obsessively about <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Tichenor" target="_blank">Tom Tichenor</a> and the puppets he created for the 1961 Broadway production of <i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnival!" target="_blank">Carnival</a>, </i><a href="http://blogfott.blogspot.com/2016/07/moonlighting-from-carnival.html" target="_blank">here</a> and <a href="http://blogfott.blogspot.com/2016/07/halsman-snaps-carnival.html" target="_blank">here</a> and also <a href="http://blogfott.blogspot.com/2016/07/from-burr-tillstrom-to-paul-berthalet.html" target="_blank">here</a>. But did I know that Tichenor's <i>Carnival</i> puppets were the stars of a children's TV show in the Netherlands? No, I did not.<br />
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So: It seems that Jaap Molenaar, a Dutch filmmaker, director, and performer, had a series of children's shows on public TV station NCRV in the Netherlands, in which he played Papa Wirrewarre. From his show <i>Het Koerhuis van Papa Wirrewarre</i> came a spinoff show called <i>Gompie en zijn vriendjes</i>, which concerned a walrus named Gompie, a fox named Ritsaard, a grande dame named Majolica, and a young rogue named Peentje. This show ran six years, from 1966 to 1972.</div>
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And somehow, the stars of "Gompie" were a set of the puppet characters Tom Tichenor created for <i>Carnival</i>! Horrible Henry became Gompie, Carrot Top was Peentje, Renardo was Ritsaard, and Marguerite was Majolica.</div>
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<i>How did this happen?</i> How did Molenaar acquire a set of <i>Carnival</i> puppets? Was this in any way an "authorized" enterprise, approved by David Merrick or Tichenor or anyone else?<br />
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Thanks immensely to the help of Erik Lippe on Facebook, I think we're beginning to unravel this mystery. It seems NCRV also broadcast TV versions of musical comedies in the 1960s. They did <i>Brigadoon </i>in 1964, they did one called <i>Jij en ikke</i> which was a Dutch version of <i>Me and My Girl</i> in 1965, and according to one source they did <i>Carnival</i> at around the same time too. I can't find any detailed info on their <i>Carnival</i>, but <i>Jij en ikke</i> featured Jaap Molenaar as one of the writers, probably a translator. It's not too hard to imagine that Molenaar worked on NCRV's <i>Carnival</i> in the same capacity as well, for which NCRV might have bought a set of Tichenor's puppets, perhaps from a European tour. After the show was broadcast...well, NCRV owned a set of charming puppets, Molenaar was doing children's shows for NCRV...it starts to add up.<br />
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It at least seems obvious that Molenaar was aware of the puppets' previous identities. He renamed Carrot Top "peentje", which is a Dutch word for a type of carrot, and also the similarities of Renardo/Ritsaard and Marguerite/Majolica suggest a knowledge of their <i>Carnival</i> names.</div>
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As far as I can find, no one has thus far made this Carnival/Gompie connection anywhere on the internet. Does anyone out there know anything more about how this came to pass?</div>
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Here are a bunch of photos and video clips from the show, including some book and record merchandising:</div>
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Some of the illustrations from this book are viewable <a href="http://verzameloord.blogspot.com/2016/12/gompie-en-zijn-vriendjes.html" target="_blank">here</a>.</div>
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Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-34707807820104160142019-07-04T10:39:00.000-05:002019-07-04T10:43:08.185-05:00It's the Hard-Knock Route for Us?As I'm rehearsing Daddy Warbucks in the musical "Annie", I was interested to find this panel from Harold Gray's "Little Orphan Annie" comic strip of 11/22/24, within the strip's first year of existence. Martin Charnin and/or Thomas Meehan must have seen this particular strip during their research for the musical, and derived the famous lyric "It's the hard-knock life for us" almost verbatim from it.<br />
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<br />Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-23903908612777946442019-05-25T21:41:00.000-05:002019-05-25T21:41:44.972-05:00Green Jeans in Black FuryWhile watching the 1935 film <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026121/reference" target="_blank">Black Fury</a>, starring <a href="https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0612847/" target="_blank">Paul Muni</a>, I had to stop and watch a scene again. No, it wasn't to closely study Muni's stagy, overblown performance. It was because there was a familiar face in the crowd:<br />
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In an instant I was sure this was the face of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_Brannum" target="_blank">Hugh "Lumpy" Brannum</a>, better known to folks in my age bracket as Mr. Green Jeans on <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047718/reference" target="_blank">Captain Kangaroo</a>! He's not credited as appearing in the movie on the IMDb, but I really do think it's him. Judge for yourself; here are some comparison photos:<br />
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Of course, I've searched for evidence that it might be Brannum in the film. Black Fury was released in 1935, and is set in Pennsylvania coal country. Brannum played as a musician with Fred Waring and His Pennsylvanians, and died in East Stroudsburg PA, but these Pennsylvania ties seem to be red herrings. According to Wikipedia and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/1987/04/22/obituaries/hugh-brannum-actor-dies-played-mr-green-jeans-on-tv.html" target="_blank">Brannum's New York Times obituary</a>, Brannum was born in Illinois (in 1910) and went to college at the University of Redlands in California. After graduating in 1931, he played in dance bands in California, and eventually moved to New York where he was discovered by Fred Waring. The IMDb says Black Fury was filmed in Hollywood, so perhaps Brannum participated as an extra in the film a couple of years after graduating? I dunno.<br />
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But anyway...it sure looks like him, doesn't it?<br />
<br />Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-41838136095452770302018-10-21T21:16:00.001-05:002019-02-02T16:11:05.839-06:00How old are Nora and Torvald?How old are Nora and Torvald Helmer, the central characters in Henrik Ibsen’s <i>A Doll’s House</i>? Ibsen doesn’t say. We know that they’ve been married for eight years and have three children, the oldest of whom (Ivar) has to be around seven. Torvald once refers to Nora as “young”. But other than that, we get absolutely no clues about their ages from Ibsen, who of course is the only person who could tell us.<br />
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But we’re not going to let that stop us from trying to figure it out anyway, are we? Of course not. I have developed a pretty good theory which suggests rather specific ages for them, to within a year or so. I propose that in <i>A Doll’s House</i>, Nora is around 29 and Torvald is around 37.</div>
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This is based on three things:</div>
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1. The ages of the original actors who played the parts in the world premiere on December 21, 1879 in Copenhagen. Betty Hennings was 29, and Emil Poulsen was 37.</div>
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2. The ages of Laura Kieler and her husband Victor. Laura Kieler was an acquaintance of Ibsen’s, and the real-life inspiration for Nora. Just before Ibsen wrote the play, Laura had actually done many of the actions Ibsen ascribes to Nora, and Victor’s involvement also corresponds to Torvald’s up to a point. (The fascinating story of Laura’s life, and her complicated relationship with Ibsen, should be a play unto itself.) But to the point: In 1879, Laura was 30 and Victor was 36, within a year either way of Hennings' and Poulsen's ages.</div>
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3. If Nora and Torvald are 29 and 37, and have been married for 8 years, then they were 21 and 29 when they were wed. When Ibsen married his wife Suzannah (in 1858), she was 22 and he was 30. So eight years into their marriage, they were 30 and 38, again just a year away from Hennings' and Poulsen's ages.</div>
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Flashing forward to Lucas Hnath’s play <i>A Doll’s House, Part 2</i>, which takes place 15 years after “<i>Part 1</i>”, Nora would be 44, and Torvald 52.</div>
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Of course, every production of either play must determine the characters’ ages for itself. But the very close alignment of the three points I raise above seems to suggest that these are more-or-less the ages that Ibsen had in mind.</div>
Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-60500967107403839872018-03-02T09:28:00.000-06:002018-03-02T21:20:09.280-06:00Lemuel Gulliver: a timelineAs I prepare to play Lemuel Gulliver in <a href="http://nashvillepubliclibrary.org/wishingchair/about-wishing-chair/" target="_blank">Wishing Chair Productions</a>' <i>Gulliver's Travels</i>, I have searched online in vain for a timeline of Gulliver's (admittedly fictional) life. Finding nothing, I have created one myself. I was aided greatly here by Isaac Asimov's terrific <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Annotated-Gullivers-Travels-Jonathan-Swift/dp/0517539497/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1520003937&sr=8-1&keywords=annotated+gulliver%27s+travels" target="_blank">The Annotated Gulliver's Travels</a>.<br />
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Where possible, dates are in year/month/date format, followed parenthetically with Gulliver's age that year. As a point of reference, it may be interesting to note that Jonathan Swift was born in 1667 and died in 1745.<br />
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Here is my timeline:<br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1661 — born in Nottinghamshire</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1675 (14) — goes to Cambridge</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1678 (17) — leaves Cambridge, apprentices with surgeon Bates</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1682 (21) — goes to study medicine in Leyden</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1685 (24) — sets sail as surgeon on The Swallow</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1688 (27) — returns, settles in London, opens medical practice, marries Mary Burton (who is probably no older than 17)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1690 (29) — his practice fails, sets sail to the East and West Indies</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1696 (35) — returns to England, tries to renew practice</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1699/5/4 (38) — sets sail on The Antelope; by this time has fathered Johnny and Betty</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1699/11/5 — The Antelope is shipwrecked; Gulliver arrives in Lilliput</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1701/9/24 (40) — sails away from Blefuscu</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1702/4/13 (41) — arrives back in England</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1702/6/20 — sets sail on The Adventure</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1703/3 (42) — leaves the Cape of Good-hope</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1703/6/16 — Brobdingnag is spotted</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1705 (44) — eagle carries Gulliver from Brobdingnag</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1706/6/3 (45) — arrives back in England</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1706/8/5 — sets sail on The Hopewell</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1707/4/11 (46) — arrives at Fort St. George</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1708/2/16 (47) — leaves Laputa for Balnibarbi</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1708/4/21 — sails to Luggnagg</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1709/5/6 (48) — leaves King of Luggnagg</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1709/5/27 — arrives in Japan</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1709/6/9 — arrives in Nangasac</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1710/4/20 (49) — arrives back in England (Gulliver writes he’s been gone 5 years and 6 months, but this is wrong); soon after arrival conceives third child</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1710/9/7 — sets sail as Captain of The Adventurer</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1711/5/9 (50) — is abandoned on Houyhnhnms Land</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1715/2/15 (54) — leaves Houyhnhnms Land</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1715/11/5 — arrives in Lisbon with Captain Pedro de Mendez</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1715/11/24 — leaves Lisbon</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1715/12/5 — arrives back in England; youngest child is now 5 years old (assuming it was born); Johnny and Betty are between 16-27</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1719 (58) — poses for frontispiece engraving</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1720-21 (59-60) — writes <i>Gulliver’s Travels</i>; Betty is now married with children</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1723 (62) — moves back to Nottinghamshire</span></div>
<div style="font-stretch: normal; line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1726/10/28 (65) — publishes <i>Gulliver’s Travels</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">1727/4/2 (66) — writes letter to cousin Sympson</span></div>
Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-7892029160968168082017-01-03T23:13:00.000-06:002017-01-03T23:17:18.108-06:00Junie B. Jones: The MusicalYay, my copy of "Junie B. Jones: The Musical" arrived today! We recorded this last year, and I must say it sounds sensational! Kudos to all, especially David Weinstein, Dan Rudin, and Lori Casteel (who is terrific as Junie!).<br />
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What you get from Amazon <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Junie-Jones-First-Ever-MUSICAL/dp/0147523427/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1483504350&sr=8-1&keywords=junie+b+jones+musical">from this link</a> is a 2-CD set, one CD being a Junie B. Jones audiobook, and the other being the studio cast album we recorded. The latter will soon be available on iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, etc.<br />
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One correction from the credits: In the song "Lucille, Camille, Chenille", I am Chenille and the wonderful Chris De'Sean Lee is Camille, not vice versa. Let's set the record straight! (Or in this case, the CD.)<br />
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Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-35523621981812777342016-12-26T11:40:00.005-06:002016-12-26T11:41:53.760-06:00Of Angry Birds and Rath-ful PigsI can find no <span style="font-family: inherit;">evidence that Jaakko Iisalo, the Finnish designer of Rovio Entertainment's "Angry Birds" franchise, owns up to any influence from Lewis Carroll. But I see a connection!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">At its simplest, the goal of the "Angry Birds" video game is to catapult birds through the air in an attempt to destroy fortresses constructed by green pigs.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">In Chapter One of <i>Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There</i>, Alice reads the poem "Jabberwocky", which famously begins:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves</i></span> </blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>All mimsy were the borogoves,</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>And the mome raths outgrabe.</i></span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">In Chapter Six, Humpty Dumpty explains parts of the poem to Alice, including that a rath "is a sort of green pig". Furthermore, i</span><span style="font-family: inherit;">n Martin Gardner's <i>The </i></span><i style="font-family: inherit;">Annotated Alice</i><span style="font-family: inherit;">, Gardner states that in Carroll's day, rath "was a well-known old Irish word for an enclosure, usually a circular earthen wall, serving as a fort and place of residence for the head of a tribe."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">So the word "rath" connotes both "green pigs" and "fortresses"! Also, "rath" is a homonym of "wrath", which is a synonym of "anger", which again reminds us of those catapulting birds. Is Iisalo a reader of <i>The Annotated Alice?</i></span>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-49644518228357455072016-12-08T14:00:00.003-06:002021-02-18T11:37:29.126-06:00What happened to Emily's baby?Thornton Wilder's <i>Our Town</i> is my favorite play. But a question recently occurred to me that I'd never thought of before, and I couldn't find anyone else wondering about it anywhere online. That question is this:<br />
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<i>What happened to Emily's baby?</i><br />
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In Act 3, we learn from Emily's cousin Sam Craig and the undertaker Joe Stoddard that Emily has died:<br />
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<i>Sam Craig: Joe, what did she die of?</i> </blockquote>
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<i></i><i> Joe Stoddard: Who?</i> </blockquote>
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<i>Sam Craig: My cousin.</i> </blockquote>
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<i></i><i>Joe Stoddard: Oh, didn't you know? Had some trouble bringing a baby into the world. ’Twas her second, though. There’s a little boy ‘bout four years old.</i></blockquote>
</blockquote>
The now-dead Mrs. Gibbs confirms that Emily died "in childbirth". Emily then joins Mrs. Gibbs and the other dead onstage:<br />
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<i>Emily: My boy is spending the day at Mrs. Carter's. (She sees Mr. Carter among the dead.) Oh, Mr. Carter, my little boy is spending the day at your house.<br /><br />Mr. Carter: Is he?<br /><br />Emily: Yes, he loves it there.</i></blockquote>
Clearly, Emily is talking about her four-year-old son. Later:<br />
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<i>Emily: But, Mother Gibbs, one can go back; one can go back there again…into living. I feel it. I know it. Why just then for a moment I was thinking about…about the farm…and for a minute I </i>was<i> there, and my baby was on my lap as plain as day.</i></blockquote>
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<i>Mrs. Gibbs: Yes, of course you can.<br /><br />Emily: I can go back there and live all those days over again…why not?</i></blockquote>
The "rules" of Wilder's afterlife seem only to allow reliving days, not resuming life as if one had never died (the 1940 movie notwithstanding). So the baby Emily refers to here must again be her now-four-year-old son.<br />
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Finally, when Emily is advised to relive only an "unimportant day", she says:<br />
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<i>Emily: Then it can’t be since I was married; or since the baby was born.</i></blockquote>
Once more, "the baby" has to be her firstborn. And that's the last mention of Emily's offspring in the play.<br />
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So...what happened to the baby Emily died delivering?<br />
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• Did it live? Emily never mentions it, or who's taking care of it during the funeral, as she does with her four-year-old son (whom she mentions three different times). Emily notes that the farm "won't be the same to George without me", but doesn't express a word of notice that George has been left alone to raise a newborn baby? This option doesn't seem likely.<br />
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• Did it die? In that case, why doesn't it join Emily among the dead onstage (as impractical as it would be to stage this)? I mean, is there some sort of afterlife daycare somewhere? And why is there no mention or sign of a funeral for the baby, from Joe Stoddard or anyone else?<br />
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Wilder's notion of Emily dying during childbirth is deeply poignant. But by choosing it, he introduces a question into the play that doesn't seem to have a satisfactory answer.<br />
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However, it's clear that the ambiguity was deliberate. The first published edition of <i>Our Town</i> from 1938 reflects the script before it went into rehearsal, and there are numerous differences. In this version, Wilder firmly answers the question:<br />
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<i>Sam Craig: Joe, what did she die of?</i> </blockquote>
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<i></i><i>Joe Stoddard: Who?</i> </blockquote>
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<i></i><i>Sam Craig: My cousin.</i> </blockquote>
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<i></i><i>Joe Stoddard: Oh, didn't you know? Had some trouble bringing a baby into the world. Let's see, today's Friday—'twas almost a week ago now.</i> </blockquote>
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<i></i><i>Sam Craig: Did the baby live?</i> </blockquote>
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<i></i><i>Joe Stoddard: No. 'Twas her second, though. There's a little boy 'bout four years old.</i></blockquote>
So there it is: an answer, of sorts. Of course, the deliberate ambiguity in the standard script does leave the question open, and a production that featured someone holding a baby at Emily's funeral could seem to imply the opposite answer. But personally, I'm not feeling good about the baby's fate.<br />
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Thanks to Rosie Strub of The Wilder Family LLC and Lincoln Konkle of the Thornton Wilder Society for helping to solve the mystery.Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-26699126855833094982016-11-22T23:20:00.001-06:002016-12-07T15:03:09.769-06:00PizzeRizzoOver the weekend I had the pleasure to be among the first several thousand guests at PizzeRizzo, the new Muppet-themed restaurant at Disney's Hollywood Studios in Orlando. There are several "easter eggs" hidden around the place, for the delight of Muppet geeks like myself. Here are a few:<br />
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The animated neon sign outside proclaims "THE CITY'S TOP RATED PIZZA". But every now and then some of the letters flicker off, making the sign momentarily read "IT'S RAT PIZZA"! The flickering lasts about 12 seconds, and happens approximately once per minute. So if you just happen to glance up at the sign for a few seconds, chances are you'll never see the secret message!<br />
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Tucked away on a shelf in the main lobby area is an ancient can of <a href="http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Wilkins_Coffee" target="_blank">Wilkins Coffee</a>.<br />
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And finally, the most incredible, subtle, layered easter egg I've ever seen anywhere: Upstairs at PizzeRizzo is the gloriously tacky "Rizzo's Deluxe Supreme Banquet Hall". Outside the Banquet Hall there's this sign:<br />
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This is an easter egg reference to The Muppets Take Manhattan, where Kermit encounters advertising executives named Jill, Bill, and Gil. Cute, huh? <i>Ah, but underneath!</i> If you look very closely, beneath the changeable letters on the sign, through the faux fading and dust, you'll see that this sign <i>used</i> to read: Pa Otter Memorial Service with tribute performance by The Frogtown Hollow Jubilee Jug Band.<br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">You can read all about Pa Otter <a href="http://muppet.wikia.com/wiki/Pa_Otter" target="_blank">here</a>. Kudos to the PizzeRizzo designers for including such an incredibly subtle, even touching, reference.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "helvetica" , "arial" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><br /></span>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-19475155941181815852016-11-13T06:39:00.001-06:002016-11-15T20:58:11.337-06:00Thornton Wilder in "Our Town"On September 29, 1946, Theatre Guild On The Air broadcast a radio adaptation of Thornton Wilder's Pulitzer Prize-winning play "Our Town". The adaptation was by Erik Barnouw, and the production featured Thornton Wilder himself.<br />
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Wilder played the role of the Stage Manager onstage numerous times in "Our Town", beginning as a replacement in the original Broadway production. As far as I know, this radio adaptation is the only surviving record of his performance. The cast features Dorothy McGuire as Emily, the role she understudied and performed during the original Broadway run. Original cast members Doro Merande and Arthur Allen are heard as Mrs. Soames and Professor Willard, respectively.<br />
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As grateful as I am to be able to hear and share this recording, I must say I think it's a poor adaptation of the play. Barnouw made his adaptation without knowing that Wilder himself would be performing the Stage Manager role (which Barnouw renamed "Narrator"), and the part is greatly rewritten. In his book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Media-Marathon-Twentieth-Century-Erik-Barnouw/dp/0822317281/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1479040838&sr=1-1&keywords=media+marathon+barnouw" target="_blank">Media Marathon</a>, Barnouw writes of being very nervous during the first readthrough, but Wilder was apparently quite game about the whole enterprise. Wilder's performance is good, although it would be nice to hear him reading more of the lines he actually wrote. The syrupy, overblown music is also a serious detriment to the production.<br />
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Admittedly, it's an impossible task to reduce Wilder's three-act play to 60 minutes, and the play itself is granted only about 45 of those minutes, due to sponsor messages. It is, as they say, what it is. And here it is. The photo in the video below shows McGuire and Wilder, with John Craven (the original George Gibbs on Broadway).<br />
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The full cast of the radio production:<br />
Emily: Dorothy McGuire<br />
Narrator: Thornton Wilder<br />
George: James Dobson<br />
Dr. Gibbs: Cameron Prud'Homme<br />
Mrs. Gibbs: Barbara Weeks<br />
Mr. Webb: Bill Adams<br />
Mrs. Webb: Dorothy Sands<br />
Mrs. Soames: Doro Merande<br />
Mr. Morgan: Will Geer<br />
Simon Stimson: Philip Tonge<br />
Professor Willard: Arthur Allen<br />
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<br />Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-45839848895521186052016-08-14T09:59:00.002-05:002024-02-28T09:07:38.601-06:00Jim Henson Was Not Left-Handed.Jim Henson is included on many lists of "famous left-handed people". A lefty myself, I would be proud to share this trait with Jim Henson. But he did not puppeteer left-handed, and he did not write or draw left-handed, so there is no basis on which to claim he was a lefty.<br />
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With few exceptions, puppeteers of hand/rod puppets like the Muppets put their dominant hand inside the puppet's head. There are thousands of photos that demonstrate Henson used his right hand for his characters' heads, like this one:</div>
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Or this one:</div>
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But hey, what about this one:</div>
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He's using his left hand there, yes? Actually, no. As could very easily happen back in the old days of film and negatives, this photo has been mirror-flipped. You can tell by the way his shirt buttons, and where the pocket is, and the direction of his hair part. It should really look like this:</div>
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<a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-joE_qEkEB08/V7CswfBBfRI/AAAAAAAAAZk/OL52tWDIkSQDyZVPchCYlPp1T_JrxX3GgCLcB/s1600/young%2Bhenson%2Bflipped.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="219" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-joE_qEkEB08/V7CswfBBfRI/AAAAAAAAAZk/OL52tWDIkSQDyZVPchCYlPp1T_JrxX3GgCLcB/s320/young%2Bhenson%2Bflipped.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Okay, so Henson puppeteered right-handed. But what about writing and drawing? Well, here's a clip from the 1968 film "Muppets on Puppets", where Henson draws with his right hand as he talks to puppet builder Don Sahlin:</div>
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Here's a one-minute clip from 1994's "The World of Jim Henson" with ten shots that show him holding and using a pencil with his right hand:</div>
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'Nuff said. So, how did this Henson-was-a-lefty rumor get started? Perhaps it is based on the fact that most Muppet characters seem to be left-handed. This is most obvious in a group like the Electric Mayhem, where characters play guitar "backwards", like left-hander Paul McCartney does:</div>
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But this is only a function of the puppeteers themselves being right-handed. The puppeteer's right hand goes inside the puppet's head, leaving the puppeteer's left hand free for simulating the guitar playing. If you're going to fake guitar playing by moving only one hand, the "strumming hand" is a much more effective choice than the "chording hand". And while the puppeteer could reach across their body and use their left hand to manipulate the puppet's right hand, if you've ever tried it, it feels very strange. It's much more natural to just flip the guitar around, and use the puppet's left hand for strumming.</div>
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Hence, most Muppet characters seem to be left-handed, and I suppose this has led people to assume this means the puppeteers are too. While there are left-handed puppeteers who have worked with the Muppets (like me), just like the general population, Muppet performers are largely right-handed. And so was Jim Henson.</div>
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Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-35759569535683786412016-07-04T11:37:00.005-05:002022-08-15T23:05:13.672-05:00Moonlighting from the CarnivalNashville Public Library recently acquired three puppets that Tom Tichenor created for the original Broadway production of <i>Carnival</i>: Carrot Top, Horrible Henry, and Renardo. For the Nashville International Puppet Festival last month, it was decided that we would present a 10-minute scene from the musical, to showcase the puppets. We borrowed a Marguerite from another set of <i>Carnival</i> puppets which were created under Tichenor's supervision, and went to work.<br />
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Here is the result, performed live at the festival, with Rosemary Fossee as "Lili" and me puppeteering and voicing all four puppets. (Special thanks go to my unseen assistant Rebecca Harwood, who was busy pulling the puppets on and off my hands as the show went on.)<br />
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It was a thrill and an honor to perform these characters, following in the footsteps (handprints?) of Jerry Orbach, with whom I worked in a <i>Beauty and the Beast</i> concert at the Waldorf Astoria in 1992. (I sang the part of Gaston, with Jerry of course as Lumiere.)<br />
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During my research, I uncovered a couple of interesting things. <i>The Shari Lewis Show</i> appeared Satur<span style="font-family: inherit;">day mornings on NBC, from 1960 to 1963. Jerry Orbach made more than a dozen appearances on the show, performing the <i>Carnival</i> characters in various adventures with Shari and her puppets!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Here is <span style="font-family: inherit;">a list of the episodes Orb</span>ach apparently appeared on, with synopses where available:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>11/18/61: A Job for Mr. Gladly</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>11/25/61: Horrible Henry Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Jerry Orbach and his puppets Horrible Henry and Carrot Top are featured guests.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>1/29/62: Car Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Horrible Henry and Carrot Top offer to give Shari driving lessons.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>2/24/62: Horrible Henry’s Book Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>3/17/62: Horrible Henry’s House Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Horrible Henry and Carrot Top turn Shari’s house into a shambles when she invites them to stay with her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>3/31/62: Horrible Henry’s Newspaper Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Shari decides that Horrible Henry would make a good newspaperman.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>5/12/62: Perry Comet Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Horrible Henry asks Perry Comet’s advice on a career in show business.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>5/26/62: Reynard Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>6/9/62: Hayes and Henry Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Bill Hayes visits the show, and Horrible Henry and Carrot Top try ruses to have him sing into their “hidden” microphone so they can sell the record.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>9/29/62: Horrible Henry Contest Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>10/13/62: Circus Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>11/17/62: B.J. Barney Show</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>5/4/63: Invisible Man Show</b></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Shari and Jerry Orbach try to figure out if an invisible man really exists on a carnival midway.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Here's a brief clip from one of the episodes:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">It's so weird to think of these characters "moonlighting" from their regular jobs on Broadway. But while all <i>that</i> was going on, and also on NBC, Tom Tichenor himself performed Carrot Top, Horrible Henry, and Renardo on the 12/20/61 episode of <i>Perry Como's Kraft Music Hall</i>!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">As Jack Gaver reported for UPI:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>This has been the most successful year Tom Tichenor of Nashville, Tenn. has experienced, yet there has been a little frustration involved.</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>His puppets have been a huge success, but he hasn't opened his mouth in their behalf. A puppetmaster doesn't mind being unseen by an audience — that's an essential of the calling — but he does like to be heard.</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>Tichenor will get a big chance to wipe out the frustration the night of Dec. 20 when he and the famous puppets he created for the Broadway hit musical, "Carnival," appear on Perry Como's NBC-TV hour at 9. Tichenor will manipulate Horrible Henry, the Wonderful Walrus, Carrot Top, a peppy boy, and Renardo, the fox.</i></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>"We will do material especially prepared for the television show by Como's writers," Tichenor said. "For some reason, they didn't want Marguerite, the opera-singer puppet we use on the stage. I'm a little sorry about that, and, of course, Marguerite is pretty mad at being left out."</i></span></blockquote>
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Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-11526993892331937932016-07-04T09:38:00.000-05:002016-07-04T09:39:21.901-05:00Halsman snaps CarnivalCelebrated photographer <a href="http://www.philippehalsman.com/" target="_blank">Philippe Halsman</a> took several wonderful shots of Anna Maria Alberghetti and the puppets she co-starred with in the Broadway musical <i>Carnival</i>. These puppets were created by Tom Tichenor, who posed the puppets for Halsman during the photoshoot. The first two shots are from Life Magazine, the third from Theatre Arts, and the fourth I found online:<br />
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<br />Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-16675771852152823232016-07-04T09:06:00.002-05:002016-07-10T14:24:32.522-05:00From Burr Tillstrom to Paul Berthalet<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The TV show <i>Kukla, Fran, and Ollie</i> (about which I've written at length <a href="http://blogfott.blogspot.com/2012/11/burr-fran-and-burr.html" target="_blank">here</a>) featured Fran Allison, who stood in front of a puppet booth where she talked and sang charmingly with numerous puppet characters, all performed by Burr Tillstrom. Inspired by the apparent love between Fran and the puppets (which obviously extended behind the scenes to Tillstrom), Paul Gallico added a romantic spin, and wrote a short story which appeared in the October 28, 1950 issue of The Saturday Evening Post.<br />
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It's entitled <i>The Man Who Hated People</i>, and it can be read in its entirety <a href="http://kukla.tv/manwho.html" target="_blank">here</a>. It tells the tale of Milly Maynard, a young woman who appears on the Peter and Panda show, on which she talks to six puppet characters. The puppets are Peter (a leprechaun), Panda (a fat panda), Arthur (a raffish crocodile), Mme. Robineau (a French lady), Doctor Henderson (a stuffy penguin), and Mr. Tootenheimer (an elderly toymaker).<br />
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These puppets are performed by Crake Villeridge, a Canadian whose aborted hockey career left him with disfiguring facial scars and a dark temperament. In the story, Milly is fed up with the abusive Crake, and is leaving the show to marry Fred Archer. After what is to be her final show, she's crossing through the darkened TV studio when the puppets (as performed by Crake) call out to her from their puppet booth, begging Milly not to abandon them. Milly realizes that she is actually in love with Crake, and stays.<br />
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It's Gallico's concept of this final scene — an antisocial puppeteer using his puppets to beg a woman not to leave — that seems to have a hold on audiences. (Never mind that Tillstrom himself was a charming, handsome, gregarious gay man who clearly relished sharing the spotlight with his puppets!) It's commonly thought that Gallico adapted his Post short story into the novella <i>Love of Seven Dolls</i>, which Helen Deutsch then adapted into the screenplay for the movie <i>Lili</i>, which Michael Stewart then adapted into the libretto for the Broadway musical <i>Carnival</i>. All of these iterations end with the same basic scene.<br />
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One problem though: <i>Lili</i> premiered in 1953 but <i>Love of Seven Dolls</i> wasn't published until 1954. So how could the movie be inspired by the subsequent novella? It's clear that <i>Lili</i> was not simply adapted from <i>The Man Who Hated People</i>. While <i>Lili</i> and <i>Seven Dolls</i> are quite different in tone, they do share common story elements not to be found in <i>The Man Who Hated</i>, to an extent far beyond possible coincidence. In both <i>Lili</i> and <i>Seven Dolls</i>, the setting is changed from an American TV studio to a French carnival. A young orphan girl, rejected by the carnival, is diverted from committing suicide by a charming puppet named Carrot Top. The girl's easy rapport with Carrot Top and the other puppets (including a raffish fox named Reynardo) makes this new act the hit of the carnival, although the girl hates the bitter, antisocial man who performs the puppets. But despite a possible romantic entanglement between the girl and another performer, the bond of love between girl and puppeteer ultimately prevails. (The name "Golo" also figures in both <i>Lili</i> and <i>Seven Dolls</i>; Golo is a puppet in the former, the puppeteer's assistant in the latter.)<br />
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There is a "missing link" in the chain of works that takes us from <i>Kukla</i> to <i>Carnival,</i> and which explains the common elements between <i>Lili</i> and <i>Seven Dolls</i>. That link is an unpublished story by Gallico entitled <i>The Seven Souls of Clement O'Reilly</i>. The credits for <i>Lili</i> state only that it is "based on a story by Paul Gallico", so it's understandably assumed that this story is either<i> Man Who Hated</i> or <i>Seven Dolls</i>. But the <i>Clement O'Reilly</i> title surfaces in August of 1951, where a syndicated newspaper story lists it as actress Pier Angeli's next film for MGM. Ralph Meeker and Fernando Lamas are later listed as cast members. Of course, this is the film that, with a different cast, would ultimately become <i>Lili</i>. In July of 1953, another newspaper story announcing the film's release notes that it is based on Gallico's original story <i>The Seven Souls of Clement O'Reilly</i>.<br />
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So it seems clear that Gallico first adapted <i>The Man Who Hated People</i> into <i>The Seven Souls of Clement O'Reilly</i>. This is where the French carnival setting came into play, and all the other elements that <i>Seven Dolls</i> shares with <i>Lili</i>. He then adapted <i>Clement O'Reilly</i> into his <i>Seven Dolls </i>novella<i>.</i> (Note that the puppeteer in <i>Seven Dolls</i>, named Michel Peyrot, inherited the "wiry reddish hair" one might expect from someone named "O'Reilly".) Helen Deutsch adapted <i>Clement O'Reilly</i> into <i>Lili</i>, adding her own plot points, and renamed the puppeteer Paul Berthalet. And finally, <i>Lili</i> was adapted into <i>Carnival</i>. While this task was first attempted by Deutsch herself, the musical's director Gower Champion was unhappy with the results, and brought in Michael Stewart for the job.<br />
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But interestingly, while <i>Carnival</i> is officially credited as "based on material by Helen Deutsch", buried in the original Playbill program it also states "<i>Carnival</i> was originally based upon a story entitled <i>The Seven Souls of Clement O'Reilly</i> by Paul Gallico." <a href="http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/archival/collections/ldpd_4079714/" target="_blank">The Paul Gallico papers are housed at Columbia University</a>; perhaps the <i>O'Reilly</i> story is in there?<br />
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Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-24082466479903733962016-02-09T12:03:00.000-06:002016-04-25T14:19:32.552-05:00The Animals...The Animals...<span style="font-family: inherit;">The wife and I are late to the “Orange is the New Black” party, but enjoying it greatly. Am I the only person on the Internet who, upon hearing Regina Spektor’s theme song “You’ve Got Time”, thinks of Gilda Radner singing “Let’s Talk Dirty to the Animals”? Both songs start “The animals/The animals…”, with identical rhythms (but admittedly different melodies).</span><br />
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Regina uses musical and lyrical quotes with some regularity, from the obscure (quoting Eric Biondo’s “Your Daughter” in her “Somedays”) to the obvious (quoting “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” in her “Oh Marcello”). So it may be a stretch, but I don’t think it’s entirely out of the question.<br />
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Anyway, I finally Googled the matter to see if anyone else had ever commented on it, and I found nothing. So now, when you do it, you will. You're welcome.</div>
Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-84313340335334196012016-01-25T11:58:00.000-06:002019-12-27T14:46:34.059-06:00Sondheim's Poker Pals<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">In his <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=gOICAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA16&dq=%22new%20york%20magazine%22%20june%202%2C%201969&pg=PA66#v=onepage&q&f=true"><span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; color: #b45f06;">New York Magazine puzzle of 6/2/69</span></a>, Stephen Sondheim imagines a poker game between eight men. Their names begin with the first eight letters of the alphabet. As one aspect of the fiendishly difficult puzzle, you need to figure out the equivalent numeric values of each name (A=1, B=2...Z=26). Three of the names have numeric values of 21 (Alec, Ben, and Hal), so that even if you arrive at the "21" value first, you still wouldn't automatically know which of those three names it applied to. Tricky, huh?</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">Even given all those parameters, it's interesting to speculate about the names Sondheim chose, and hard to imagine he would resist giving a "shout out" to his pals if convenient. Let's speculate, shall we?</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">• <b>Alec</b>: This is one of the "21" names, so it's possible that might be the only reason the name is used. But one wonders if Sondheim knew New York composer Alec Wilder (1907-1980). <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alec_Wilder"><span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; color: #b45f06;">Wikipedia</span></a> tells us "Wilder loved puzzles: he created his own cryptic crosswords"!</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">• <b>Ben</b>: Ben Stone is one of the lead characters in <i>Follies</i>. While Sondheim was writing <i>Company</i> when this puzzle was published, <i>Follies</i> was in development at the same time.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">• <b>Chuck</b>: This might be Sondheim's college friend, theatrical producer Chuck Hollerith.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">• <b>Dave</b>: Meryle Secrest's <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Stephen-Sondheim-Life-Meryle-Secrest-ebook/dp/B004N6367Q/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1453737316&sr=8-1&keywords=sondheim+secrest"><span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none; color: #b45f06;">biography</span></a> tells us that in 1953, while assisting John Huston's direction of <i>Beat the Devil</i> in Italy, Sondheim played poker regularly with David O. Selznick!</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">• <b>Eddie</b>: Possibly Sondheim's college friend Edward Gushée? "Eddie" is also a character in <i>Do I Hear a Waltz?</i>, so that's another possibility.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">• <b>Frank</b>: A tough one. Loesser, perhaps? The character "Franklin Shepard" in Sondheim's 1981 musical <i>Merrily We Roll Along</i> has a different name in the 1934 Kaufman and Hart original, so we can rule that out.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">• <b>George</b>: Not Seurat, even though his name does figure into another of Sondheim's <i>New York</i> puzzles, many years before he wrote <i>Sunday in the Park with George</i>. It's most likely Furth, the librettist of <i>Company</i>. But let's not forget <i>By George</i>, the show a 16-year-old Sondheim wrote while attending George School.</span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;">• <b>Hal</b>: Who else but Hal Prince, director of <i>Company</i> and <i>Follies</i>? (Okay, possibly Hal Hastings, music director of <i>Company</i>. Or both gents. But I'm sticking with Prince.)</span></div>
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Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5773315262972616604.post-90040665204878597532016-01-06T21:18:00.009-06:002023-11-02T22:47:09.179-05:00The RSC's Nicholas Nickleby, from stage to screen<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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The Royal Shakespeare Company’s 1980 production of “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby” was a landmark theatrical event. Presented in two parts, the entire production lasted eight and a half hours, with audiences either seeing the two parts on consecutive evenings or viewing the entire production within the span of a day. Part One of the play was broken into two acts, and Part Two into three.<br />
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Happily, the production was adapted for television broadcast. In England, Channel 4 broadcast "NN" in four weekly installments, starting on November 7, 1982. Mobil Oil presented it on US television over four consecutive nights, starting January 10, 1983. On that date, the New York Times reported: "David Edgar, the adapter for the stage, submitted a revised script, attuned to the requirements of the television breaks."<br />
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Indeed, when compared against the published playscript, the piece was radically revised. The most striking change was in redividing the five-act theatrical structure into four acts for video. Acts 1 and 2 of the video correspond to the first two acts of the play. The third video act contains all of the play’s Act 3, plus some of the play’s Act 4. The fourth video act contains all the rest. Of course, this made it necessary for Edgar to find a new “act break” to end the third video act, which occurs after Squeers captures Smike.<br />
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But Edgar had to plan for still more breaks. As explained in the "official full colour magazine" produced by Channel 4: "Because of transmission requirements Nickleby was taped so that it could be transmitted in the UK and USA over a four-night span, three of two hours and one of three hours: and for the rest of the world in nine one-hour segments." In the US at least, the three two-hour evenings were each broken with an intermission, and the final three-hour evening had two intermissions. Thus the nine-part division was utilized even in the four-night broadcast. (Each of these nine segments was actually 53 minutes long; the remaining time in the US broadcast was filled with <a href="https://youtu.be/iU8i9F-EkWY" target="_blank">an animated opening, and wraparound segments by Peter Ustinov</a>.)<br />
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But Edgar’s video adaptation saw changes in content as well. In the theatre, there was a recap at the beginning of Part Two (or the third of the play’s five acts), speedily explaining and re-enacting key moments of Part One for new audience members. For the video version, similar recaps were written and staged for Acts 2 and 4 as well.<br />
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The last two scenes that resolve the Mantalini storyline, which occur in the first part of the script, were moved into Act 3 of the video. There are a few scenes and exchanges of dialog in the video that are not found in the script, and many more instances where the reverse is true. In fact, it’s tempting to suspect the script was trimmed for video, but 477 minutes (53x9) is just about the perfect running time for what's referred to as "an eight-and-a-half hour play", if you factor in an additional 35 minutes or so of intermissions.<div><div><br /></div><div>Still, more of the script was shot than made it into the final edit. In Act 4, Squeers is lying in wait to retrieve from Peg Sliderskew the will upon which Madeline Bray's fortune hinges. In the script, after a soliloquy, Squeers retrieves a letter from Mrs. Squeers, which he reads.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9mW6UwdCsjAFLVnRFfgjIXaZLrYsomCT3IyDzQi2X_aj486PtwwiR7kRZdpZIasYuobK9quq6T3mrxnrJ2a6EQ87nqVP9CiJdaxhHeKBADAF7iMHqatyUpt3rL_qiUUGPGSYeS7jZg8-J30c4Wb9pxCHqgAJaGkL8DCb_h-r5MsOcC0BaGh0xFn3Q9fY/s1264/squeers%20pocket.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="956" data-original-width="1264" height="242" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9mW6UwdCsjAFLVnRFfgjIXaZLrYsomCT3IyDzQi2X_aj486PtwwiR7kRZdpZIasYuobK9quq6T3mrxnrJ2a6EQ87nqVP9CiJdaxhHeKBADAF7iMHqatyUpt3rL_qiUUGPGSYeS7jZg8-J30c4Wb9pxCHqgAJaGkL8DCb_h-r5MsOcC0BaGh0xFn3Q9fY/s320/squeers%20pocket.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>In the video, we see Squeers reach into his coat pocket for the letter, but then there's a cut to a wider shot where we can just glimpse the letter going back into his pocket. While the edit goes by smoothly, clearly the reading of the letter was shot, but then left on the cutting room floor.<br />
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In 1983, CBS Home Video released "NN" on four VHS tapes, one intermissionless act per tape. (The cost was $300, and it was also available in Beta.) Probably due to physical tape length limits, there were changes from the broadcast version to the home video. Around 25 minutes were cut from the beginning of Act 4 (after the recap), and placed at the end of Act 3. These 25 minutes included John Browdie’s release of Smike, and so the end of the Act 4 recap was edited to remove the reenactment of Squeers’ capture of Smike. This change made Act 3 end at a much weaker point, dramatically speaking.<br />
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Act 4 also saw the complete removal of the scene where the loony, cucumber-bearing "Man Next Door" visits the Nicklebys, a loss of about two and a half minutes. But the home video version actually included a lengthened conversation about the French language between Nicholas and Mr. Lillyvick, which added around 80 seconds to Act 2.<br />
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Interestingly, the home video version reveals that for the broadcast, an effort had been made to render John Browdie’s thick Yorkshire accent and archaic speech a bit more intelligible. Several of Browdie’s lines in the broadcast are looped; as one example, “Where’s this glass of summat, then?” in the home version is “Where’s this glass of something, then?” in the broadcast. It’s possible these changes were made for the US broadcast only, and thus not included in other versions.<br />
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Some changes from broadcast to home video were decidedly for the worse. There are clumsy and distracting attempts to dub in audience reaction sounds during Nicholas’ thrashing of Squeers, during the schoolboys’ rebellion against Mrs. Squeers, and (most damagingly) during the play’s final moment of Nicholas picking up the “other Smike”. There are also over 20 musical cues completely missing from the home video version, whether due to artistic decision or mere editorial fatigue we cannot know.<br />
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One notable difference comes at the end of Ralph Nickleby’s unraveling at Ned and Charles Cheeryble’s, after Ralph whispers the name “Smike”. In broadcast, there’s a very lengthy closeup of Ralph’s face, during which only somber string music is heard. In the home video version, the music is gone, but two lines are instead added from the script, spoken by the Cheerybles offscreen. Ned says (referring to Ralph’s accuser, Brooker) “Unhappy man. Unhappy man.” and Charles then adds “But doubly, trebly, ten times more unhappy must <i>you</i> be, Ralph Nickleby.”<br />
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Years later, A&E re-released "NN" on VHS, in a nine-tape set. There are opening and closing credits on each installment, but otherwise the contents of this version are exactly the same as the CBS version. The breaks follow David Edgar’s original nine-segment plan for broadcast, with each tape ending precisely where its corresponding broadcast segment ends. Within the seventh segment, the 25 minutes that should rightly come after the Act 4 recap instead come before it.<br />
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The only thing A&E "cut" from the CBS version is the proper Act 2 bows, with the company bowing in Romeo and Juliet attire as the video credits roll. A&E used the final (Act 4) bows under the end credits for all nine segments.<br />
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A&E later released their nine-part version on DVD, with the nine segments spread out over four DVDs. This release has drawn a great deal of ire in the comments section on Amazon.com, with viewers bemoaning A&E’s “butchering” of the masterpiece into nine parts, and holding the CBS Home Video release as a “gold standard” which they suppose is an entirely faithful record of what happened onstage. As I’ve shown here, this is all very far from the truth. There are perfectly good reasons to dislike the home video version of "NN", but A&E is not responsible for most of them.<br />
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So then, what is the “gold standard” for viewing “The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby”? I humbly offer <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-ROvb_6o0JHxixU3Za99x3nrK6dHzRZh" target="_blank">my version</a>, which I make available on YouTube until told not to by The Powers That Be. (Hopefully this will be because TPTB have taken the time to restore and release it properly.) My four-act version draws almost entirely from the A&E DVD media, with occasional pieces of the CBS version, the original music soundtrack, and the broadcast version (from 30-year-old VHS tapes) as well. My goal was to create the most complete "NN" possible, so I’ve included all available scenes and music cues, painstakingly editing and restoring everything myself.<br />
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I hope this makes it easier for interested parties (including me) to enjoy this masterpiece. I’ve cherished it since the original broadcast, and even acted in a version in Memphis in 1985. My wife (then-girlfriend) and I binge-watched it straight through one night, just weeks after we met. Roger Rees, David Threlfall, Edward Petherbridge, and Alun Armstrong give unforgettable performances. Lines and moments from the show come into my head with great frequency. It’s a part of me. As Bernard Levin wrote of the original production in the London Times:<br />
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<i>“There is only one way to behave at the Aldwych; to surrender completely to the truth, which is that not for many years has London's theatre seen anything so richly joyous, so immoderately rife with pleasure, drama, colour and entertainment, so life-enhancing, yea-saying and fecund, so — in the one word which embraces all these and more — so Dickensian. This production of “Nicholas Nickleby” is ceaselessly entertaining, dramatic, funny, touching, beautiful and right; it is a tribute to England’s greatest writer of prose and of the teeming world he conjured up; it is an evocation of England herself; but it is something more than all of these. It is a celebration of love and justice that is true to the spirit of Dickens' belief that those are the fulcrums on which the universe is moved, and the consequence is that we come out not merely delighted but strengthened, not just entertained but uplifted, not only affected but changed.”</i></blockquote>
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-ROvb_6o0JHxixU3Za99x3nrK6dHzRZh" target="_blank">Watch it here.</a><br />
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<br /></div></div>Galen Fotthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11320908010368532193noreply@blogger.com16