A Writer's Life-The Professional Stephen Cole Diaries

A Time We Would Never Forget

2011-02-26T05:50:00.000-08:00

Near the end of The Road to Qatar! Michael says, "this was a time we would never forget" He is referring to the incredible and zany experience the audience has just gone through with the characters, the making of Aspire, the first American musical to premiere in the Middle East. But every night as I hear him say the line, which is really from my pen and my lips and my heart, it touches me with its truth. And now that The Road to Qatar! is approaching its closing day at the York Theatre Company in NYC, I say it again...This was a time we would never forget. The chapters of your life, when you are writing, musicals, open and close and open and close. You write the show, the do the readings, the workshops and finally get them on the stage (if you are not only very lucky but very industrious and smart) and then you become close to a new family...director, choreographer, designers, actors, musicians. You all bond and form a unit that is your show. But I never forget that it all became with an idea in my head that I then translated into English and put to a collaborator and then our idea grew into something with pages, and words and notes. Sometimes I sit in that theatre and marvel that nothing would be there without the idea. Everyone would be doing something else or nothing at all. Of course in this case, fate lent a great hand. From "we want you write musical, how much" to closing night of the musical about writing THAT musical is now 6 years. It's quite a chapter. And don't think I not going to write this book! Oh yes, The Road to the Road to the Road to Qatar! will be written and will tell all. But back to the feelings, the emotions. It's been a wonderful rollercoaster ride...like any show, incredible highs and many dips and lots of learning how strong I am. You have to be very strong and resiliant to do this kind of work and I am. Show biz ain't for sissies. But I am a strong and lucky man. Not everything can go the way you want it to. But in this case I wrote the show I wanted to and got to see it the way I intended. Everyone on the creative team was on the same page. The cast is stellar, Stellar I tell you...Stellaaaaaaaa! (Sorry Brando just invaded my body...the muscular Brando, not the fat Brando) and this is the show we intended. A musical COMEDY romp. silly, funny, crazy, satirical...a living breathing Sid Caesar sketch with great tunes. In this age of Spiderman and Next to Normal we might be an anachronism...an off Broadway musical that wants to tell a story and entertain...but I think not. I think when we get those butts in the seats, they love us. Getting them in the seats was a challange, but as we near the last performance we have an overflowing Matinee and two very healthy houses. Next week we go into the recording studio and preserve the musical part of the show. We will toss in some of the comedy too but for that you will just have to wait and see the show again. Believe me you wil see it. I am one very very proud author. How many times can you say, I did what I set out to do? Yes, this is a time I will never forget.

So? What do you do? What CAN you do?

2011-02-10T04:57:00.000-08:00

As Michael in The Road to Qatar! says, "this is a time we would never forget." Six years after receiving that first email "one cold morning in February" saying "We Want You Write Musical...How Much?" The musical about the writing of that musical premieres in New York City. Hometown of the two authors. The Road to The Road to Qatar has been blessed with a wonderfully received production in Dallas that got rave reviews and won the Best New Play or Musical from the Dallas Fort Worth Drama Critics Forum. So when we worked our asses of to bring an even better, funnier, slicker, more inventive version of that show to NYC, one would have thought (well, one would hope) that we would also be welcomed as a new musical comedy. But real life has a way of unfreezing the best moments. Oh yes, the audiences love us. They laugh from the first line to the finale and cheer loudly for our brilliant cast. We did the most wonderful work during the beginning of previews, cutting a scene and a song and trimming the fat to come up with 90 laughfilled and delightful minutes...We were lulled into a false sense of security by a laughing happy audience. Who knew? Opening night was filled with stars (stars that David Krane and I know and gathered to make it all look great. To get photo ops, to celebrate, the raise the bar at this tiny theatre under a church. We succeeded...down the stairs came Chita Rivera, Marlo Thomas and Phil Donahue, Marni Nixon, Christine Ebersole, Mary Testa, Judy Blazer, Celeste Holm (she took the elevator), Alice Hammerstein, Anne Kaufman (George S's daughter), Richard Maltby, Maury Yeston, Tom Meehan, Sheldon Harnick, Danny Burstein, Beth Fowler, John Cullum, Judy Blazer...on and on...the house filled. the show started, the audience laughed and applauded. It was a magic night. But not better than our previews where other show biz pros and audience members proclaimed us "brilliant...a hit!" I can remember the Friday night I was ordered by our wonderful director not to laugh, but just listen to where the laughs were. It was magic. The laughs were everywhere. The opening night party was a delight. Everyone came. Everyone praised. The performances after the opening were wonderful. The audiences loved us. I chose early on in this process to let people know I would not be reading reviews. Of course, deep in my heart I was scared. And of course, deep in my heart, if someone said the reviews are raves, I would read them. But you know when they are not great when the volunteer ushers scowl at you, and the homeless people outside the church look at you with sympathy and give YOU a handout. And yet there were some great reviews and there was that audience, which lifted me when I was down. And there is this small five person company who are so gifted and committed to the material and what they are there for, that it makes want to weep. Last night, with the cold, the non-supportive notices and the air filled with what? the sense of giving up? It's hard to tell...with all that there was a small house. A very small house. And yet, I put in four new lines that I thought might improve the show. Or deepen the characters. I don't know. I feel like a two faced woman...or Dorothy Collins singing Losing My Mind. Can't go left, can't go right. I adore this show. I sit through it and it zips by in 90 fastpaced clever entertaining minutes. I did what I set out to do...the write a funny musical comedy about writing the musical we wrote for the Middle East. Where did I go right? Well, onward and up. Getting it recorded and produced in London is next on our agenda. You have to wear blinders and run your race, but wouldn't it be nice if people weren't slinging camel crap in your face while you did it? Judy Garland's mother said it best..."You Wanted This!"

I did. I still do. I just want to not wake up at 6AM in a panic.

Not Just Another Opening in Qatar!

2011-02-09T04:41:00.000-08:00

The stars came out on the opening night of

The Road to Qatar!

Here is what some of them had to say:

"We need to laugh in this day and time. I had a blast!"
Chita Rivera

“A remarkable story! And now it’s a hilarious musical!”
Christine Ebersole

"If you are sophisticated enough to like the romping antics and the inspired silliness of one-liners then The Road to Qatar will be right up your street. Cleverly written, composed, produced, played and directed, it is hard to believe that it is actually a true, adventure story, which it is, with lots of fun. Go and get a good laugh on The Road to Qatar! You deserve it."
Marni Nixon

"The Road To Qatar is such a fun and tuneful romp through the Middle East, performed by one of the most versatile and hard-working casts I've seen in a long time!"
Maury Yeston

"I loved it! Funny, smart and inventive. The cast is superb and I left humming the tune "Aspire". Go, you'll have a great time!"
Danny Burstein

"So thrilled with the production. It was such a class act, so smartly done. The values of the evening were suited to the wonderful material. It was a truly memorable night!
Beth Fowler"

A fun evening. What a story and you did it up brown. Made me wish I'd seen the show in Qatar. You may not have had the Shah in the house last night but you certainly had some potentates of the New York theater there. Good luck with the rest of the run.
John Cullum

"If you wanna have a great time and lot's of gut splitting laughs at an unbelievably TRUE story, go see ROAD TO QATAR.! A truly imaginative production packed with talent!"
Judy Blazer

"The Road to Qatar! is fun. Genuine fun. When was the last time you could say that about a musical?"
Richard Maltby

"The Road to Qatar! is a delightful trip and a great evening"
Celeste Holm

"The true story is pretty hilarious, and the cast is wonderful!!!
Mary Testa

"The Road to Qatar is fresh, funny, fantastically cast and an absolute delight."
Jim Brochu

The Morning of the First Preview

2011-01-25T05:30:00.000-08:00

In the wee small hours of the morning (alright it's 831am)as my space heater hums and the snow is coming down I am contemplating our first NYC audience for The Road to Qatar! Happily for me there is a rehearsal today to clean some stuff up, put in a few tiny changes and rehearse them. But ultimately it's like letting your baby go to school for the first time. This baby went to pre-school in Dallas and did pretty well for itself. But now the poor Qatari is about to face New Yorkers who paid money to sit in the dark and be entertained. I grew up as a New York audience. Saw my first show in 1967 and fell in love with musicals. So I know that New York audiences are wonderful people. But that doesn't stop mommy and daddy from wanting to still keep control of our little bubala. Losing control is hard. I won't be able to run up and fix a line or change a lyric. Hell, we just wrote a whole new song that has been rehearsed for one whole day. But that's fun. The fixing, the writing, the fiddling. It's the watching without control that can give you an ulcer. But I am breathing deeply and trusting in this fabulous cast of Bruce Warren, Bill Nolte, Sarah Stiles, Keith Gerchak and Jamie Beaman...trusting in the great band of 5 strong and trusting that our baby can walk and dance and sing and entertain the world in a time it really needs it. Something funny is going on in the Middle East and it's The Road to Qatar! So get ready, Daddy. It's time for baby to take it's first steps and speak it's first words...oh my God, the baby speaks Arabic~! Shukran! Shukran to all.

From Good to Verse

2011-01-23T19:50:00.000-08:00

In my last post, I talked all about the wonderful new verse we wrote for the lovely song The Other Side of the World. The truth is The Other Side of the World was one of the first songs written for The Road to Qatar! I once had a verse that began with the words "Ever since 9/11..." It was original written as the song for one of the guys to convince the other to go to the Middle East. It switched characters and finally found it's home as a duet late in the show. And it worked. In Dallas. It worked fine. But shows change and the chemistry of the book, music, lyrics, set, cast, lighting etc. changes the feeling of it all. And add a verse to the song that is really right to transition and right for the characters and suddenly the old song itself didn't seem as right. Sure it would work. But why couldn't the characters sing more in their real quirky, natural, funny vernacular? Why retain the poetic nature of the song? Well, it was worth an experiment. So I wrote several versions of a lyric that would say the same thing ultimately, but say it in a style that was keeping more with the show that surrounded it. Of course, it would have wonderful to have written the new song BEFORE rehearsals started, or even early in the short but wonderful rehearsal process...but there was no way of truly knowing what was needed until we saw the show in run thoughs...so here is where the craft comes in. Here's where you can't be scared. Here's where you write the lyric and your brilliant collaborator David Krane writes the music and you refine it and send it off to the wonderful actors who now have the task of learning it and getting it into the first preview of the show in a day. It's like the old days out of town. Jerry Herman playing Before the Parade Passes By for Carol Channing. Rodgers and Hammerstein giving Gertrude Lawrence Getting to Know You. Jule Styne and Stephen Sondheim writing Smile Girls for Ethel Merman in Gypsy (okay so they cut it after one performance...never mind!) Writing musicals is not like writing a prescription. It's some other kind of alchemy that makes it all work and you gotta be...flexible...and on your toes, as Larry Hart wrote. So all those years of writing special material and fast, is like a warm up for when you really have to do it. When all eyes and ears are on you. You deliver. Tomorrow I will hear a whole new song called Who Knows...too bad the playbill will call it The Other Side of the World. Well, that's what inserts are for.

On the Wonderful Road to Qatar!

2011-01-20T05:21:00.000-08:00

Well, January is swiftly flying by. We are now in the home stretch before the first preview of The Road to Qatar! We began rehearsals right after New Years with a marvelous comically brilliant cast, only two of whom did their roles last year in Dallas. The space at the York Theatre Company is ideal for this show. Last year we did it on a large stage and it worked, but now with the intimacy and smaller scale, combined with a really clever set and bold comically colorful costumes and props, the show is finding it's natural home. It was born for off-broadway and that's where it's going. Although we did very well in Dallas, got wonderful reviews and were named Best New Musical of 2010, we have continued to hone and change and rewrite to make it even better. Just yesterday, during the first tech rehearsal we added a button for the opening song Come Down to Dubai and wrote (in record time) a short verse for the only ballad in the show. Why a new verse? The song played well in Dallas. Our wonderful director Phillip George had a smart thought. After 80 minutes of brakeneck farce and comedy we are suddenly putting on the brakes to take a moment and figure out why the boys (the two short writers of musicals) are even doing this when everything points to imminent disaster. The song tells us that they have a bigger purpose (they are only discovering that for themselves) to bring peace and love to the other side of the world. Subtexually they two very different personalities bond during this song. They finally become friends for good. So to get over the hurdle of just slamming on the comic breaks, we wrote a verse to the song, which emerges from one of the writers melting down. Michael answers him in song that is in the new verse uptempo and funny but slowly as he says, "who knows" slows down to something more questioning and contemplative

JEFFREY
Why are we doing this? Did we do something wrong in some past life? Why are we here?

MICHAEL
SURE, WE'RE UP TO OUR ASS IN CAMEL CRAP
THE PRODUCTION COMPLETELY BLOWS
AND YOU ASK ME WHAT ARE WE DOING HERE?
WHO KNOWS? WHO KNOWS?

WHO KNOWS WHY WE WERE CHOSEN?
WHO KNOWS HOW WE WERE FOUND?
BUT SOMEHOW WE BOTH HAVE BEEN GIVEN THE CHANCE
TO MAKE A JOYFUL HEALING SOUND
AND THAT SOUND WE CREATE
WILL REVERBERATE FAR AND WIDE
BRINGING PEACE AND LOVE
TO THE OTHER SIDE
OF THE WORLD

ETC.

I am very proud of this new rewrite. The interesting part is that on the weekend, we all decided, no changes for this week until the previews. But meanwhile with the input of the theatre and our own instincts, we have put in about 18 changes including this new verse. Today the band of five strong meets the cast of five strong and they will make beautiful music together for the first time. The Road continues...Next week we face our first audience. It's terrifying and exciting and every other emotion you can wish for or not wish for. I am confident and scared all at the same time. This show is unique. It's our lives up there. But then when you write with passion and love, isn't it always your life up there?

That Was the Year That Was 2010 Revisited

2010-12-29T14:13:00.000-08:00

As the year draws to a close, critics and journalists compile their top ten lists. Last year at this time The Road to Qatar! made several top ten lists in Dallas. One year later, we are poised to go into rehearsal for the Off Broadway premiere of the show at the York Theatre Company. This is very gratifying to a writer of musicals. After all, so many writers write and their shows either sit on the shelf or suffer through endless readings and workshops, never quite seeing the light of a lighting designer or a set or a costume or heaven forbid an orchestra. So I am feeling pretty lucky. There are years and there are years. This one began with the hope that Qatar would move on to NYC but really found me in Pittsburgh for a lengthy 6 week rehearsal period for the world premiere of Time after Time. Jeffrey Saver and I have actually been working on and off (lots of off) on this show since the mid 90s! So to finally see it realized with a wonderful set and projections and beautifully directed by Gabriel Barre (not to mention orchestrated for 10 by the great Steve Orich) was a kind of minor miracle. The show opened during several blizzards but we still managed to get wonderful reviews. But good reviews don't help when the storm clouds of snowdom keep New Yorkers from coming to Pittsburgh. So the show closed and we have to start all over again to get another production or get it closer to the goal, which for this not so small show would have to be Broadway. The good news is the material and the production were wonderful. The score is especially good and the book (if I do say so myself) is really excellent. During the whole rehearsal period I worked via phone and email on the Drama League's Angela Lansbury Tribute. I have been writing these tributes (with special material songs) for maybe 20 years, but the Angela Tribute turned out to be the best one I had been involved with. Everything went right at the Pierre Hotel. I might have had to trudge through snow to get from Pittsburgh to NYC for the show, but it was worth it. Right after Time after Time things started heating up with the NYC production of Qatar and most my focus was taken up with that. Meanwhile another of my shows, Rock Odyssey came out of retirement. Several years ago Walden Media decided to branch out into the theatre biz and commissioned 2 seasons worth of Family musicals for their Seattle Theatre. I was commissioned to write two of them: Rock Odyssey and Merlin's Apprentice. The former decided to rear it's Greek head this year and like the Cyclops it grew and grew. First was a spring production in Miami at the Adrienne Arscht Center which was unlike any children's show I have ever seen. It was huge with real sets and costumes and effects and a large cast whopping it up for thousands of kids who were brought in bus after bus. The publicity was huge and the center decided to do it again in the Fall...and then they decided to take a ten year license to do it and do it and do it. So if you see Rock Odyssey anywhere in the next ten years, let me know. I took the upfront money and ran! Seldom has such a deal happened with a show that I thought was dead in the water for 8 years. Hallalu! Another older show came back to life this fall: The Night of the Hunter. Hunter had it's world premiere in SF and was beautifully presented in the New York Musical Theatre Festival, but this production had something the other two did not have: a full 24 piece orchestra that made me cry nightly. Claibe Richardson's gorgeous music was so well served by the great cast led by Davis Gaines and Julie Johnson. Claibe is gone and he was notoriously picky, but I think even he would have been happy to hear that orchestra and those voices. So what else? With all this activity, I have also worked on new stuff, songs, shows I have had in my head that aren't quite all there yet. Recorded things. Came up with special material for Marlo Thomas, Chita Rivera, Dick Van Dyke (got to meet him for the first time! wow)...A year...another year. Now 2011 promises to be very exciting right out of the gate with The Road to Qatar! and maybe some of these other projects that seem to want to get born will be born. Maybe Qatar will open all new doors. I have nothing but hope and fingers and toes crossed. And you know what? I want to write another book too! Musicals are fun but so much stress...a book you write, it gets edited it gets published you get paid. nice.

Happy New Year.

Casting About...

2010-12-21T16:22:00.000-08:00

You write it, you rewrite it, you finally get great artists to say they will produce it, direct it, design it, sell it and then...you have to cast it! It would seem to be the easiest thing in the world unless you have written a musical COMEDY with an emphasis on the comedy but still want great singing (after all, it's a MUSICAL comedy, not just a comedy)Last year when casting The Road to Qatar! we couldn't afford a casting director so the authors did the casting about themselves depending on On-line casting services which did very well for us. We saw many good people, some of whom did not want to go to Dallas to do a new musical for bupkis. But ultimately with a lot of help from friends both professional and non, we cast the show and we did very well with the critics and knew that we wanted to keep several of the cast members if and when we got to the NYC production. In some cases we were able to keep them and in some we were not. So we found ourselves having to cast three out of the five actors all over again. But this time we had a professional casting director helping us out. You would think it would be easier. But the truth is, there are just so many brilliantly funny comic types who fit your show who can also sing like the wind. The pool is not as deep as one thought. Think about it...how many Nathan Lanes are there? If you have great comic chops like that, you get whisked away to TV or movies and hardly ever think about singing again until your sitcom is cancelled and you can command a huge salary in a revival of a show that is only running because you had a sitcom and well you know the rest. But try to find those brilliantly funny musical comedy COMIC types who can SING who don't have sitcoms and who will work for New York bubkis...well, that's a camel of a different color. But...to make a long story short, after a stressful few weeks of hunting, we have pulled those proverbial rabbits out of a hat...no they are not big name stars who will immediately sell tickets...but these are the future. The people who will get to show off what they seldom get to show off in a show that let's them show off and shine. Comic singers who act, sing, dance, use puppets, talk in funny accents, play Gays, Jews, Arabs, Italian Opera Directors, Indian Airline Stewardesses, Bratislavan Opera Singers and other assorted bananas. I can't wait.

After You Type "Curtain"

2010-12-14T09:39:00.001-08:00

A very nice person wrote to me privately tell me that I shouldn't be so hands on about the casting of my show. She told me a story about a composer who wanted to really be there for every second of the rehearsal process, etc. And she thought that could never work. Mind you, this composer had no experience in the theatre and might very well have been a block to the process of putting on a show. But the thought that people might think that after you type "curtain" you are done, is absurd. This is when the hard work begins. Some say they love having written, I prefer the actual writing, the creation. It's what comes after when you are lucky enough to actually get a production that is hard. The negotiations, the casting, the rehearsal, the rewrites, the misconceived notions that threaten to ruin the work that is on the page. The politics. The huge collaboration. Now I am not saying that I don't love collaboration, don't get me wrong. It's the heart and soul of musical theatre. But it's hard. Right now we are casting a very important role...it just happens to be the role based on me, but it has turned out to be a hard role to cast for some reason. Why, I haven't a clue. It's a short funny Jewish guy between 35-50 who sings really great. This is NYC...where are they? Yes, they are out there if you are paying big bucks, but for an off-Broadway not-for-profit theatre, where are they? It's wildly frustrating and makes you wonder why you typed the words "Scene One" let alone curtain. You write a book, it gets published, people buy it, and that's that. You write a musical with five fabulously funny comic roles and you get...tzuris! That's my thought for today. Am I lucky to get my show on? You bet your ass. Am I frustrated right now. Oh baby! Oh Baby! Oooooooooh Baby! But I have been here before and I hope to be here again. So that's today's rant.

A Little Chat with Cole and Krane

2010-12-08T18:08:00.000-08:00

A short interview that turned into a conversation with Stephen Cole and David Krane about their upcoming York Theatre production of The Road to Qatar! Performances begin on Jan. 25th, 2011
Go to www.yorktheatre.org to get tix.
S=Cole
D=Krane
Question:
The Road to Qatar! is based on the true experience you both had writing a new Broadway-style musical for the Emir of Qatar. How exactly did this all start?

S: One day, five years ago, I got an email that said "We want you write musical...HOW MUCH?"
D: I got the same email. We didn't even know each other yet.
S: They told me to call a number in Dubai and at the time I had never even heard of Dubai, but once I looked it up I realized they were really rich there...
D: Oil, you know!
S:...So I wrote back and told them to call me. The called immediately and repeated the phrase in a broken English...
Both: ""We want you write musical...HOW MUCH?"
S: I passed them on to my agent and told him to ask for a lot of money! I also asked about the composer and...
D: I asked about who was going to write the book and lyrics...
S: They said they had composers in Rome and Lithuania. That was scary. I wanted someone I could work with here. One day an email came and said I would be writing the show with David Krane. I was thrilled. A New Yorker. With Broadway and Hollywood credits.
D: We met and it was like looking into a short Jewish mirror. We wondered how they put us together
S: Later I asked how they found us. They said, "your website" Good lesson for us all, always keep your website looking spiffy!

Question:
And what was the original musical you were asked to write about?

S: At first the show was to be about a little boy whose father wouldn't let him go to a sports academy. I remember sarcastically thinking..."wonderful...sounds like a hit to me!" Then they changed the premise to "a sultan's son is locked in a palace and is very spoiled and only wants a star in the sky." I thought, "okay. Better, but how do I fill a whole evening with this?"
D: The answer was 20 camels, 5 Arabian stallions and a dozen falcons.
S: Not to mention 500 LED screens, lots of flying, Croatian acrobats, fire jugglers, Russian dancers, and a British West End cast. It became about the kid's magical journeys to ancient Greece, Phaoronic Egypt...
D: We had to look that word up.
S: Qatar during the pearl diving days. The show grew to...
D: Mammoth proportions.
S: Radio City without the Rockettes.

Question:
Were you nervous about the prospect of working in the Middle East?

S: Well, at first we were. I mean you can't live in this world and not know what it going on over there and we were not experienced in traveling to that part of the world.
D: I had to tell my sick mother in Queens that we were doing the show in Paris. She would have been too scared for me if she knew the truth.
S: But when we got to Dubai, we felt totally safe. It felt like being in Las Vegas...
D: But without the gambling. It was so architecturally spectacular and modern and built up.
S: We felt just as safe in Qatar, even when we went swimming in the Persian Gulf!
D: Our nerves about being in the Middle East were nothing compared to putting on this huge show...The show was scary!
S: But the experience was enlightening, hilarious and full of all the comedy and drama of putting on a show in any foreign place.

Question:
What was the experience of prepping for the production in Qatar like? How was it different from working on shows here in NY?

D: First of all there was the language barrier...
S: We had translators. One very memorable translator who is now a character in the show...our Lebanese valley girl, Nazirah. She would translate for us. We never quite knew if what we were saying was really going through.
D: And there was the cultural difference. Bargaining is part of the every day life. But mostly it was about how inexperienced our producers were in putting on a new musical of this size. There were over 100 people on the stage!
S: Everything was bigger there. We had a pre-recorded 70 piece orchestra.
D: We recorded in Bratislava! They also treated the show when it was finished...as finished. They didn't invite us to be part of the rehearsal process, so we couldn't do any rewrites or cuts as we would normally do to make a show better.
S: Once we handed them the script and the orchestra was pre-recorded, that was that. We were like Birdseye. Frozen. Seeing the show on opening night was surreal. We hardly remembered what we had written. And yet, the Emir stood up at the end and cheered.
D: There's nothing like royal applause!

Question:
Were there any customs or cultural changes that you had to get used to while staying in Qatar?

S: We were only in Qatar for less than a week and treated royally. We were fed the best food...
D: Stayed in the best hotels...Same thing in Dubai, which is a totally different country.
S: And culturally, the funny thing is, Arabs and Jews are very similar. They are forbidden to eat ham and shellfish...same as Kosher law. We learned some words and did our best to be polite. We learned you don't sit with the sole of your shoe showing, that's impolite. We learned that your dressed nicely, nothing too revealing...I never went out in my speedo.
D: We were wide-eyed and so were our hosts. They were in awe of our American musical theatre expertise...
S: That's why they hired us. They wanted the best of everything. And the United States (particularly New York) is were you go to get the best new musicals.

Question:
If you had to compare The Road to Qatar! to any other musicals, which would you choose and why?

S: We think The Road to Qatar! is totally unique in that it is totally...
D: Well, almost totally...
S: Yes, almost totally true. And also because it's a 95 minute comic musical. It's both hip and old fashioned...hip because it's so up to date in its subject matter and old fashioned because it's got a bouncy melodic musical comedy score that makes you think of the good old days of musical comedy. When Comden and Green were ruling the street.
D: I think the show is like Showboat.
S: Showboat? Why not Porgy and Bess? It's kind of The Producers meets A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum meets Forbidden Broadway. Irreverent, off the wall...
D: Fun!
S: Fun-ny!
D: My favorite quote about the show is..."Makes the Middle East Funny!"
S: It's what we need right now. Musical comedy heals.

Question:
Besides the writing of a new musical, what else were you able to get from this experience? What did you learn?
D: Well, believe it or not, one of the big reasons I did the show was because I had this romantic notion of bringing peace and love to the other side of the world. To prove that art could perhaps heal the wounds that have separated our cultures. \
S: And in a way, we did do that...I mean we met people that we never would have met, saw places we never would have seen.
D: We learned that people are very different and also very much the same...
S: Our producer was exactly like any other theatrical producer. He wanted to put on a great show...
D: Except with camels!
S: I also learned that you can write a musical in 6 weeks. Who knew? I usually take a year or so. I mean when you are given a task and a list of what has to be part of that...
D: Not to mention when you know there is a check and a production at the end of your task...
S: At first, like anytime you put your fingers on the keyboard and type "scene one", you can't imagine you will ever get to "curtain"...
D: But you can.
S: I also learned to answer all my emails. I mean who knew from one little email would come a huge show in the Middle East and then another show all two short Jews going to the Middle East and writing a musical. Who would have dreamed? Would you?
D: Don't forget the best part. We became collaborators and friends.
S: Of course. We were put together by people from the other side of the world. How did they know we would be so compatible? It's like fate...Kismet.
D: That show was Middle Eastern too.

A Weekend in LA with Buddy

2010-12-07T20:18:00.000-08:00

I spent the weekend in LA at the Four Seasons in Beverly Hills, but it wasn't a spa or relaxation trip. I went out to the coast to interview on video music legend Buddy Bregman. One of Buddy's first professional jobs, his big first orchestration credit was on the 1954 TV musical Anything Goes starring Ethel Merman, Frank Sinatra and Bert Lahr and Sheree North. Buddy's uncle Jule Styne was producer of the show and Leland Hayward was the executive producer. Jule loved nepotism and got his talented nephew the job. He was 24. Now 80 and looking great, I got to talk to Buddy about the show and his subsequent dazzling career (he was A&R man for Verve Records and did all the arrangements on Ella's Cole Porter and Rodgers and Hart songbook albums...Buddy also orchestrated Kay Thompson and the Williams Brothers and recorded with Bing and worked with Garland and Bolger and everyone and his mother.) This will be an extra on the DVD release of Anything Goes which is taken from Ethel Merman's personal kinescope from the collection of yours truly. As a little sidebar I got to audition a potential short Jew for The Road to Qatar! and he was marvelous. Today we did official agent submission auditions and that went very well with a front runner for Nazirah rearing her little head. Thursday we see more actors and do callbacks. This is what I call showbiz...but does it have to be so cold out?

Look Here A New Nazirah!

2010-12-03T20:05:00.000-08:00

Today was a very full Road to Qatar! day starting at 11am with our director, choreographer and designers gathering at David Krane's sumptious apartment so we could go through the script and chart where how the set moves and functions. We then went through to tell what little and big changes David and I made since last year in Dallas. All this was fun and exciting and then later it became clear that I still had some work to do on Nazirah. Ah, poor Nazirah...the lone female in the cast of five...the Lebanese Valley Girl who is an ace translator who becomes Vice president in change of production for the not very competent producer Mr. Mansour...Nazirah who gets a crush on Michael's biceps, despite his sexual orientation. That Nazirah. She is actually the antithesis of what our heroes expect of a Middle Eastern woman. She is not traditional, she is rather Western-ized and modern and although she longs for the glamour of New York penthouses in the sky and London's West End, she eventually takes her new found show biz abilities and produces a musical back in Lebanon. She is finally coming into focus. She is still the ditzy zany young lady with a big bust that tries to appeal to all the men around her, but now she has some growth and fun and so her big number Nazirah's in London is changing to reflect that. She loves being in London because of the shopping, the empowerment, she is taking producing lessons from Cameron MacIntosh. Nazirah's in London and she has a Gold charge card! Harrod's watch out!

Persecuted or Paranoid?

2010-12-01T20:03:00.000-08:00

Let's play a new game...it's called "persecuted or paranoid?"...Today I got an email containing a newletter from an organization that promotes musicals and musical theatres across the country, an organization that does a yearly festival of new musicals of which I am an alumni with two shows being presented by them over the years. So in the newletter I notice that they have a spotlight on an alumni writer of musicals. Wonderful, I think...this could be a good way to self promote. So I write to them and remind them of the great year I have been having (yes, I knocked on wood)...after all it began with a great world premiere of Time after Time in Pittsburgh, went on to 2 very successful and well publicized Miami productions of Rock Odyssey (and a ten year licensing deal!), proceeded to The Night of the Hunter starring Davis Gaine, Julie Johnson and a 24 piece orchestra in Texas, and is climaxing with the announcement of The Road to Qatar! at the York Theatre Off Broadway...so I thought now would be a great time them to feature ME! I swiftly sent out the email and swiftly received the reply that told me that they are discontinuing the spotlight on the musical theatre author series. How timely for me! Persecuted or Paranoid? Hmm...you be the judge.

Why oh why oh why oh...

2010-11-30T20:04:00.001-08:00

Why do we do it? Write musicals. Today I heard that the wonderfully innovative and artfully moving musical by Kander and Ebb and directed by Susan Stroman, The Scottsboro Boys was closing. I saw the show at the Vineyard before it moved to Broadway and was very impressed all around with it. There are some that claim the subject matter is not proper for a musical. These are the same people who claimed Sweeney Todd was also not material to sing about. All this begs the question why write a musical in this day and age when the money producers want shows by established pop or rock writers who haven't a clue what a musical is and probably would laugh if they saw a traditional musical. Be that as it may...why is the question. Why? Because we have to. I have to. What is the lure? Today, after a fruitful and interesting casting meeting with our director, casting director, producers and my collaborator, I went home and got to polish the script and lyrics of The Road to Qatar! Writing a new bridge to Mansour's song, Everything is Bigger in the Middle East to David's music...that's why. That's the fun of it. The work, the joy of knowing that someone will be on stage singing what we wrote. The lyric and music for the old bridge was fine but something nagged at me and I thought, well now's the time, baby. Write something new and better. So I asked David to take the lead and write a short release...he did. I wrote the lyrics, I asked for another syllable, he gave it to me. This is the why. This is the fun.

BUT YOU___ WILL NEVER BE GYPPED
WHEN MA___NSOUR IS IN CHARGE
I'M HONEST, (I'M FROM EGYPT)
WHERE A BOAT'S A BARGE
CAUSE WE'RE LIVING LARGE
YES,
EVERYTHING IS BIGGER IN THE MIDDLE EAST
IF YOU LET MISTER MANSOUR BE YOUR GUIDE etc.

So as I mourn the loss of a wonderful musical on Broadway, of what might be the last new Kander and Ebb show, of the backers who won't ever want to put money into a "serious" musical theatre piece (I can't even think about The Night of the Hunter), I work harder on our five character, one set, musical COMEDY! This is the time for it. And I think I have a great tag line for the promo ads...

Something VERY Funny is going on in the Middle East!

Makes me wanna buy a ticket.

Dog and Camel at Al Hirschfeld's House

2010-11-29T20:19:00.000-08:00

So the Dog and Camel show of The Road to Qatar! went very well, at least from the point of view of performance and reaction. The Al Hirschfeld house was filled with some producers, directors, designers, and theatre lovers who might take an interest in our show. David Krane and I sang our little hearts out and despite this cold that wants to come out (I won't let it) I hit all the high notes and was loud as ever (I went to the Ethel Merman School of Dramatic Arts, majoring in LOUD) and I think a good time was had by all. Time will tell if it translates into more from a financial point of view, but that's not my concern for today. Today my concern was to entertain them with our short version of our show and entertain we did. Onward and up now. And please, God...let this cold just go and find some other writer.

Sunday Dog and Camel Dress...Qatar unlimited

2010-11-28T19:57:00.000-08:00

Althought I am fighting a cold, David Krane and I did our last rehearsal today for our "dog and camel" show of The Road to Qatar! today for our producer, Paul Burchett. This is the first time (besides seeing us do the title song at Barnes and Noble)that he has seen us do our thing. He seemed duly impressed and appreciative. I am sure that the memories of the real show down in Dallas went through his brain as he heard two guys who lived and wrote the story play all the parts for him. This, of course, is how we began getting the material across to people...us doing it. In fact even at our first reading with a cast, I played what was then the role of David (now Jeffrey) while Brad Oscar played me. Odd I know but very enlightening. Now, though, after having had a full production with a great cast, it's even odder (at least to me) to have to go back and sing and act the roles. Still, it's always fun for me to sing really loud and to try to make people laugh. Tomorrow night we hit the townhouse circuit and hope that there will be some lubicated checkbooks. In any case, we will have fun.

Good Time to Blog...Middle Eastern Melody of 2011

2010-11-26T06:55:00.000-08:00

Now that The Road to Qatar! is officially announced and coming to off-Broadway's York Theatre in late January, it might be time to try to chronical this amazing journey from now to whenever. Last year at this time we had just come off of the amazing Lyric Stage (Irving Texas) production of Qatar and were pushing it forward as hard as we could. We had Paul Burchett excited and on board but the where of New York was a big questionmark. When the smoke cleared we realized that going the York (which has produced my musical After the Fair in 1999) was the obvious choice. We had done a reading of the show there (I have done readings at the York of Dodsworth, Grossinger's and other shows over the years) and it seemed the right fit for our 5 character musical COMEDY. And now here we are getting ready to cast the show. On Monday David Krane and I are doing our little (little HA!) "dog and camel show" for 30 people in a fancy townhouse that belonged to Al Hirschfeld and we hope to raise some more dough for this production and also for the future when this production moves to a commercial venue (the York is a not for profit with a limited engagement). Since this show is about our wacky and hiliarous cross cultural experience of writing the first American musical to premiere in the Middle East, it is fitting that David and I sing all the songs and play all the roles for this "backer's" thingie, but sheeh, it's exhausted to do and i wind up in a pool of sweat at the end (My late mother used to say she wasn't coming to see me perform because I sweated too much...I wonder if Louis Armstrong's mother told him that too) and let's face I am not as young as the character I am playing is. I am five years older than we were when we lived the story (but look much younger) and we are casting the roles of "us" 15 years younger than we are at least. The names and ages have been changed to protect the innocent.

I will try to be more bloggy and report how this is all going...meanwhile, get your tickets and visit

http://www.yorktheatre.org/

THREE SHOW DAY

2010-09-01T16:09:00.000-07:00

When you are prolific and have lots of shows and are lucky (luck?!) enough to have productions of those shows you have to learn to juggle. Today I juggled three. Tomorrow rehearsals begin for Rock Odyssey in Miami for the second time this year. What an amazing turn of events. This show was commissioned 7 years ago for the brand new Walden Family Playhouse in Denver, run by Walden Media. The company treated the commission like a film script. I did several treatments, drafts, collaborated with a wonderful composer/lyricist (I only did the book but "guided" the songs) via phone, email and smoke signals and ultimately it was the first of two seasons of original family musicals they presented (I was commissioned to do another called Merlin's Apprentice) and for that one I did only lyrics! So now after the rights reverted to the authors, suddenly Rock Odyssey is a big hit with all the Dade Country 5th Graders! Now they want a ten year deal to do it all over. Ten years! Well, we shall see...Anyway, it's nice to be wanted...now if I can only get them to do Saturday Night at Grossinger's for the Jewish fifth graders...after all, it's Miami!

Patti Patti Oh Patti

2010-08-31T20:47:00.000-07:00

So in the midst of doing all these shows, I am asked again to write the Drama League Tribute...this year it's Patti Lupone. I have never met Patti, but my partner Peter is her travel consultant and his brother Phil is her press agent. It's practically like family! It could be a very exciting evening and I am going to insist she sing at the end. What could be better? Angela went up in the Mame number. Patti needs to sing Don't Cry for Me Argentina! The only problem doing this show is that it will happen literally around my projected Road to Qatar opening and it will be a stephencolejuggling act. Well, last year I was in Pittsburgh birthing Time after Time when I wrote the Angela Lansbury Tribute with one of the best special material lyrics I have ever done. So I should be able to do it!

Stay tuned.

NIGHT OF THE HUNTER IN DALLAS

2010-08-31T16:10:00.001-07:00

Today I booked my flight to Dallas to be at rehearsals for The Night of the Hunter. This is the third fully staged production and the first to used a 24 piece orchestra based on the orchestrations created for the concept CD which starred Ron Raines, Sally Mayes and Dorothy Loudon. It's also the third time I am overseeing a production since the composer, Claibe Richardson passed away. He never got to see it, except when we did a staged workshop at the Vineyard in NYC. He didn't even live to see the first big NYC reading. It's always hard to do a show without him. Not that he was easy, but he was there and it's his gorgeous music I must protect. Doing any show without your collaborator is hard. Re-writing becomes a balancing act. How do I change it and still keep the music the same and adjust words to fit a new vision but not music. It's not the way it should be. But this is a gorgeously dark and rich musical that demands to be seen and so I shall buck up and go to Dallas and make it the best show with a gloriously big (the biggest I have had live...Aspire was recorded with 70 pieces!)orchestra making a joyful noise in a state that Claibe hated. This is for you, Mr. Richardson.

The Years Go By

2010-08-30T20:40:00.000-07:00

I have not written in this blog in years now. So much has happened. 2009 was the world premiere of The Road to Qatar!, 2010 saw the world premiere of Time after Time and a very lucrative production of Rock Odyssey and in October Dallas will see The Night of the Hunter with a full orchestra. Coming soon:The Road to Qatar is to have its NYC Off Bway premiere in Jan. 2011. The writing continues...working on two new shows at once, both originals and both coming along well, but where they will end, who knows: Merman's Apprentice and The Black and White Ball. Also writing a treatment and special material for a great pair of stars...on spec! More on that later when we know what the outcome will be. No books since Charles Strouse. Wish I could get another book deal, but the shows are happening now and maybe, just maybe this week will bring good financial news.

THE WEEK THAT WAS OR WAS IT?

2009-05-15T05:42:00.000-07:00

The last time I was here was the first day of RIPFest. Now we are approaching the film being shot. So let's flashback: When I got hom on Saturday night exhausted and full of information about the cast, the location, the director, the producers, the barebones outline, etc. I started to formulate some lyric ideas in my mind and the words "The wheel goes round and round" began to come to me. This, of course refers to the potter's wheel in the primary location, a pottery studio. So that let me to a short chorus that I envisioned as feeling both contemporary and folk like so that it felt like it had been around forever:
THE WHEEL GOES ROUND AND ROUND
THE POTTER'S WHEEL IS GROUNDED IN THE GROUND
AND YOU THROW THE POT
FROM A BALL OF CLAY
AND THE WHEELHEAD TURNS
AND YOU SIT ALL DAY
AND LISTEN TO THE HUMMING SOUND
OF THE WHEEL GOING ROUND AND ROUND

I changed and refined until I came up with this and that night I slept little and started to find some modular lyrics for the leading character who I named Peter, after my parter.

The next day I started putting it all together, taking the modular lyrics sections and moving them around to make an arc and a solid musical story. Off they went to David Krane, composer extraordinaire, and the set everything brilliantly. I got to hear it on Monday morning, do some work with him and we were thrust into a cold reading situation on Monday night, which, for us, was scary and crazy, but ultimately safe. Tuesday the rehearsing and rewriting began. An actor would learn one piece only to have me come back and rewrite 90 percent of the lyric (including new intentions) the next day. We finally settled on the final form of the 4 minute musical sequence on Wed (it cut some small cuts on Thurs) and I worked more on the script elements. The two short scenes at the beginning and the end. All this of course with directorial input. A movie is different than a stage piece and I need to be short and terse and get my points across fast. After all it's all 6 minutes! Last night (thurs) we did our pre-recording with a valiant and brave cast, most of whom hadn't sung much or recorded at all (exception was our brilliant leading man) but they all did their best and really put it out there and we will make a great soundtrack and they will sound the best they ever have. I trust. I do. These kids are willing themselves to be great and I am proud of them. So here it is the day before the first of two days of shooting. Just okayed some little script changes for the last scene and there we are. What a week!

RIPFEST!!!!

2009-05-09T20:41:00.000-07:00

Today began RipFest. I am one of six writers (3 musical writers and 3 non) chosen to be part of the 10th of these. We are put together with Directors, producers, actors, locations etc. and given 2 days to write a 5-7 minute musical film which gets shot next Sat and Sun. and shown on the 26th! Oy! It's like being shot out of a canon but I am writing lyrics as fast as I can and hoping inspiration will come to me in the AM after a good night's sleep. What a first day!

MARLO REVISITED

2009-04-27T21:38:00.000-07:00

Got a wonderful email from Marlo Thomas. The song was a big hit. She called me BRILLIANT! What could be better?

OLD EMERGED BUT STILL OUTSTANDING

2009-04-27T21:35:00.000-07:00

NEO stands for New Emerging Outstanding...Two years ago David Krane and I were part of that group with the title song from The Road to Qatar sung by Chip Zien and Adam Heller. This year at NEO 5, we were the hosts. I guess that means we have emerged. We still don't get paid but we are now elder statesmen or something. The good news is that we killed. The audience loved us. The songs varied as usual with some good, some mediocre an some downright lousy. The talent was top notch and the show as a whole went very well. We got more compliments as host than when we were song writers, but that's to be expected because we were visable tonight. On stage talent. They reacted and laughed and all that. It was very gratifying and fun. Oh what a couple of hams we are.

Fun.

MARNI IN THE MORNING

2009-04-26T20:25:00.000-07:00

This Sunday morning was spent brunching at the Film Forum where special guest Marni Nixon returned to the scene of our triumph of a few weeks ago. Fun was had by all and then the rest of the day was spent biking in the hot sun. Not literary but still.

Marlo Loved It and Movie News

2009-04-26T20:15:00.001-07:00

Good news on Friday when I delivered the final version of Together lyric for Marlo Thomas. She loved it. Sang it to her other writer from her car and he loved it. The Piano Play loved it. She sang it at the George Street tonight and I can only hope she was a big hit and the audience loved it and gave lots of money (maybe they can do one of MY shows there one day). Today's good news is that I was selected to be one of six writers to be part of this years RIPFest...here's what it is. I am thrilled and excited and get to write a short musical film (collaborating with David Krane!)Nothing like having something to look forward to!

Since 2002, the event known as RIPFEST has provided an outlet for some of New York
City’s brightest filmmaking and theatrical talents, allowing both established and up-andcoming artists to collaborate on professional-quality short films over a 16-day process.RIPFEST is a unique collaborative filmmaking project that allows filmmakers the freedom to do what they do best – just make films.
Teams of professionals who have never before worked together undergo a sixteen-day,
tightly scheduled process, creating original ten-minute films entirely from scratch.
Each core team consists of a Producer, a Writer, a Director, a Choreographer, a DP, an Editor, a Composer and a handful of Actors – all working professionals. From the very first day, this core creative team is given an assignment – to create an original short film under 10 minutes long, using only the actors on their team as principals, and only the two locations secured in advance by the Producer – one interior and one exterior.
The writer begins writing, and 48 hours after their initial meeting, the teams read their screenplays aloud. After another 48 hours of re-writes, they have a few days of preproduction,each team tapping whatever resources they have in order to make the best possible film. And over the next weekend – just seven days after the core team initially met, they are shooting their films. By the end of the 2-day shoot, their film may involve dozens of extras and crew.
In post-production, the Editor and Composer go to work, stitching together the finished film and scoring it over the following week. The entire process culminates in a gala screening of ALL the films downtown – just 16 days after everyone first met.
RIPFEST has a history of attracting top talent looking for a creative challenge, from
Tony-, Emmy- and even Oscar-winning artists to future award-winning filmmakers. Plus
we encourage across other creative disciplines to explore the world of short filmmaking.

THAT GIRL SINGS

2009-04-23T20:00:00.000-07:00

I got an email the other night from Marlo Thomas asking for my help. Over the years I have written several special material songs for her beginning with a tribute to Alan Alda and several ALSAC songs for St. Judes. Now Marlo is starring in the new Arthur Laurents play at the George St. and doing their benefit on Sunday so she wants a funny parody. At first I was under the email impression that it needed to be a tribute to Arthur so I wrote a quick first draft of "Everything's Coming up Arthur"

HE IS FRESH
HE IS NEW
HE'S A YOUNGSTER WHO'LL BE NINETY TWO
YOU MIGHT SAY HE'S NOT SHY
EVERYTHING'S COMING UP ARTHUR

HE IS KNOWN
FOR HIS GRIT
YOU CAN TRY BUT HE WON'T TAKE YOUR SHIT
HE MAKES GROWN DIVAS CRY
EVERYTHING'S COMING UP ARTHUR

IF HE SAID IT
YOU CAN BE SURE THAT IT'S TRUE
HE'LL TAKE CREDIT
ASK HIS OPINION?
YOU'LL GET IT!

HE WOULD SAY
"IT'S A FACT
I'M THE GUY WHO TAUGHT STREISAND TO ACT"
AND SHE JUST MIGHT CONCUR
THAT'S THE WAY THAT THEY WERE
DIRECTOR, WRITER, EVERYTHING YOU DO
MEANS
EVERYTHING'S COMING UP ARTHUR
FOR ME AND FOR YOU

HERE'S MY SERMON
ARTHURS BEEN THRU 'EM ALL
HAROLD CLURMAN
HELL, HE GOT THRU ETHEL MERMAN!

ETC.

Well, it turned out that the event wasn't about Arthur but to raise money for the George St. Theater. So out goes Arthur and in comes a version of Together begging for money in a funny way...

The end goes something like this

SO DON'T BE A SCHMUCK
JUST GIVE US A BUCK
CAUSE WE'RE TAX DEDUCTIBLE TOO
THIS THEATRE'S BRAVE AND FULL OF PLUCK
WHERE ELSE COULD YOU HEAR THAT GIRL SAY FUCK?
TOGETHER WE'RE COUNTING
MAKE OUR COUGHERS COUGH
KEEP OUR NUMBERS MOUNTING
TOGETHER WE'RE COUNTING ON YOU

Still have lots of polishing to do on this and she only needs to sing it on Sunday! Yikes.

The other news of the day is that DK and I were asked to co-host the NEO concert at the York theatre on Monday. We must be the last resort, but hell, we are thrilled to be asked. Two years ago we were the New Emerging whatever and now we are hosting them. That must be a step up.

April Fool

2009-04-18T07:25:00.001-07:00

Wow...it's deep into April and I haven't had that much to report. Been on Grand Jury duty and doing the Road to Qatar rewrites. This culminated yesterday in a very private two person performance (no audience) of the fresh new intermission-less version of the show complete with a great new musical number (Good Things Come in Threes) and many pertinent cuts. The good news is that it timed out great...95 minutes of fun. That's not too long for anyone to sit and enjoy without having to get up and pee. It also seemed to flow really well. It still needs some smoothing and polishing and a few better jokes, but all in all DK and i feel really good about it.

Another Marni Triumph

2009-03-31T21:46:00.001-07:00

Marni Nixon and I did our Merv Griffin thing at the Harvard Club tonight and we were a smash despite the video system being too low in volume and the lack of showmanship from the people there. We killed, she sold books, and we got free dinners. Sing for your supper and you'll get scallops! Marni and I discussed plans to do the show (what show?) in London and I posed a tribute to her TV career (she has Emmys!) at the Paley Center. Wow, our book has certainly been a boon in a way. Will I ever have another ghosting experience this good? Maybe. Maybe Not. I think we should call our two person show Audrey Hepburn Dubbed My Face...The Ghost Strikes Back... Marni Nixon Unmasked...

Good Things Come in Threes

2009-03-31T21:43:00.000-07:00

After Grand Jury duty today I biked over to David Krane's and heard the new song for The Road to Qatar! "Good Thing's Come In Threes" Nine times out of ten David hits the nail on the head when I hand him a lyric...well this was no exception. It was perfect. Better than I could have imagined from my dummy tune. A really fun and funny number that serves its purpose. How lucky am I to have had the Arabs put us together. Our senses of humor click and he has the skills and talent to back it all up musically. Thank you Arabs!

Qatar Revisted

2009-03-29T10:36:00.000-07:00

The rewrites on Qatar are going well. I presented the new lyric Good Things Come in Threes to DK and he liked it! Horray. I can't wait to hear what he comes up with. It's funny and does what it needs to do for the plot. Now I just hope that with all the cutting and shuffling and rewriting (and eliminating the intermission) it's shot enough to warrent elimating the intermission. Can't tell yet.

Dubai Bye Birdie

2009-03-25T15:46:00.001-07:00

Spent last night and today working on rewrites and cuts for The Road to Qatar! Funny how when you cut some stuff you wind up writing a whole new number that helps everything go faster (or seem to) It's been that way writing this new song "Good Things Come in Threes" I hope to have it semi-polished for tomorrow so I can present it to DK, the composer after our lecture/interview early in the AM. We will be talking about his career as a dance music arranger and showing some great vids from the TV Annie and the movie of Chicago. Then back to Dubai and Qatar.

Not so Elder-and not Hostel at all

2009-03-24T13:54:00.000-07:00

Did one of my lectures about writing for the musical theatre for the wonderful Elderhostel group brought to nyc by ExploreNY. It was a smash today. I told about my beginnings, writing special material, Dodsworth, showed video of Hal Linden and Dee Hoty and then segued into the real life Road to Qatar story that had them roaring with laughter. It's more of a standup or one man show than a serious lecture, but ultimately wildly entertaining. I am so proud after each of these. I get to use my writing and performing skills and hone my comic timing. It's a treat!

Time after What?

2009-03-23T20:03:00.000-07:00

Time for me to bitch a bit. Time after Time is having a reading late August and a full fledged production (albeit at a univerity but still...) in the Winter of 2010 and with my collaborator in a different state (literally and figuratively) it makes collaboration sooooo hard. We are in rewrite time and having just done work with my other collaborator on Qatar in the same room, it makes me long for the same opportunity. When this Time after Time work began lo these many years ago we were both in the same state and city but events have separated us and now I find it next to impossible to get the work done. I would NEVER want to start a show this way. But here I am stuck with working across state lines. Phone and emails are not the same as pacing a room and looking at each other's blank faces. But the work has to get done somehow...and so it will. Enough bitching.

Qatar Revisited

2009-03-23T19:32:00.000-07:00

Had a great work session today with DK just back from a holiday. We talked over many great ideas and outlined how to no only make Road to Qatar shorter, but BETTER, which is really the idea. To make it go fast and funny and still not lose any of the elements that make it the show we love. Cutting is one thing but reconceiving and not throwing the baby out with the bathwater...well that's another story altogether. We are cutting a half of one song, 8 bars from another, one whole song, two whole reprises and drastically changing and tightening what was the finale Act I in an attempt to not have an intermission, but more importantly to have a great ride that never stops and is wildly entertaining and fun and enlightening at the same time. Not easy. But the outline is there in our heads and now it just takes the doing. Tomorrow I give one of my famous lectures about...ME...and that included (nay stars) the real life story of The Road to Qatar! so once again by telling the real story I will probably clarify our fictionalized version of it. That is my hope.

SUNDAY AFTERNOON ON THE PHONE

2009-03-22T18:35:00.000-07:00

Just spent almost two hours doing a phone interview for a podcast for Musicalworld. I have already done one long show for them and they played some great stuff from Time after Time, After the Fair and Night of the Hunter. This time I talked about The Road to Qatar (the musical ABOUT writing Aspire in the Middle East), Aspire (the musical we wrote FOR the middle east), Casper starring Chita Rivera (that should be the title no matter who is in it!), and Time after Time also touching on Dodsworth. This will be divided into two shows. To find this on Itunes (and you can listen to my first show or any of the others free of charge go to Itunes and seach for Musicalworld podcast. When the next shows are on I will give more direct links. Meanwhile I am exhausted talking about the past (although I did get to plug my newest show in the making Merman's Apprentice and the upcoming productions of Qatar (fall at Lyric Stage in Irving Texas) and Time after Time (winter at Point Park University in Pittsburgh, PA)both world premieres. Wow!

Muriel Plakenstein

2009-03-20T15:38:00.001-07:00

By the way, Merman's Apprentice is named Muriel Plakenstein (and yes, she knows she is going to have to change that name!) You can read Part One of the story somewhere earlier in the blog. If anyone wants to see more, I will post it. I am up to page 71! When will it end?

Muriel and Sitcoms and stuff

2009-03-20T11:26:00.000-07:00

Been working a little more on the sitcom premise...waiting to hear from my new collaborator about my new ideas. Also did some work on Merman's Apprentice, the story and Merman's Apprentice, the musical...I sent off the lyric for Muriel's opening number to the composer. I have toyed with it on and off for a while and I hope he likes enough of it to set some so that I can rewrite if necessary. It all takes place on the old Canarsie line coming in under the river to the magical Oz like place: Broadway in 1970. We already have the second song which is Merman's entrance: A Broadway Star with such non-reverential lyrics as

SHE MAY BE OLD AND HER CHINS MAY ALL SAG
MAYBE SHE LOOKS LIKE
A TRUCKER IN DRAG
BUT SHE’S_____
A BROADWAY STAR

MAYBE HER PERFUME REMINDS YOU OF BOOZE
AND SHE MAY USE LANGUAGE
A SAILOR WON’T USE
BUT SHE’S_____
A BROADWAY STAR

this goes on to include Merman making fun of herself as her autograph hounds pick up the pace...

SHE MAY WAKE UP WITH A GRUNT AND A GROW’L
MAYBE HER MAKEUP’S PUT ON WITH A TROW’LL
BUT SHE’S
A BROADWAY STAR

FORGET ALL THE STAGEHANDS SHE HAD TO DISMISS
SO WHAT IF HER CO-STARS RESIGN WHEN THEY KISS
STILL SHE’S
A BROADWAY STAR

the other two songs are Merman's semi-serious number "Taking the Veil"

IT’S LIKE
TAKING THE VEIL
EIGHT SHOWS--YOU SHOW WITHOUT FAIL
NOW MATTER HOW YOU MAY FEEL
YOU SHOW OR THE SHOW
IS A FAILURE

and Muriel's title song "Merman's Apprentice"

WHO'S GONNA BE LEARNING THE ROPES
LIKE HOW TO TAKE STAGE AND THEN MURDER THE DOPES?
AND WHO WILL GET THE SUCKERS TO STAND
WHEN SHE'S THRU?
MERMAN'S APPRENTICE
MERMAN'S APPRENTICE
YES, MERMAN'S APPRENTICE
THAT'S WHO!

I still have to finish the story so I know how the darn thing ends. Off to the gym soon to pump and think

TV or Not TV

2009-03-18T15:36:00.000-07:00

There is no question at all...TV!!! Today I met with a new collaborator and we are going to write a pilot for a sitcom targeted to LOGO. It will be Gay and Broadway (or is that redundant?) so stay tuned!

Funny Girls Minus Two

2009-03-17T20:33:00.000-07:00

Well, Marilyn Michaels is not interested and Mimi Hines needs a lot of money to come and rehearse so Funny Girls bites the dust. NEXT!

Rewrites

2009-03-16T14:42:00.000-07:00

I had trouble falling asleep last night thinking about how to cut The Road to Qatar. I came up with some drastic cuts, changes, etc. but they only make more problems...why is rewriting so hard...actually why is cutting so hard...actually why do I have to cut!!! This morning I had breakfast with Barbara Minkus (Jennie Grossinger herself) and we talked about a nightclub act I conjured up for her and two other semi-stars. Here's the idea

FUNNY GIRLS!

An dynamic evening starring three of the original "funny girls" who played the starring role in the smash hit Jule Styne-Bob Merrill show. Mimi Hines, Marilyn Michaels and Barbara Minkus have each had brilliant and varied careers which converged in the role of Fanny Brice. The show will start with one of the most dynamic overtures ever composed and before the applause can die down our three ladies will each be discovered in a spot singing "I'm the Greatest Star," in a mock competitive way that will kick off the evening of memories and songs not only from the score of Funny Girl (some sung solo, some duet, some trio) but also authentic Fanny Brice songs such as "Second Hand Rose" and "My Man." Each of the funny girls will get to shine in her own inimitable way, but it will be the coming together and banter that will make this a genuinely memorable event. The evening will also be tied together with brand new special material written by awarding winning songwriter Stephen Cole, who also conceived and will direct the evening. From "Don't Rain on My Parade" to "People" this dynamite evening promises to be a tour de force that will make you forget that anyone named Barbra ever played the role.

MARCH MARCHES IN ON THE WEST SIDE OF THE STORY

2009-03-15T17:11:00.000-07:00

Last Monday night I hosted an pre-theatre event for the Paley Media Center (formerly the Museum of Radio and TV) on West Side Story. This is the second time I have done something like this. The first was an evening devoted to Ethel Merman where I interviewed and bantered with Brian Kellow, the author of the latest Ethel Merman bio. I, of course was great friends with Ethel the last two years of her life so I contributed some of my best stories and anecdotes, not to mention some of my rare video and kinescopes to the proceedings. But that's last year. Now, I was asked to interview (very briefly) Alexander Bernstein (Leonard's son), Harvey Evans (a Broadway replacement Jet and one of the film Jets) and Eliot Feld (also a replacement for Baby John and the film Baby John). I started off with a little West Side history and then introduced Bernstein after which we showed the Ed Sullivan 1958 clip of the Cool number. After that I introduced Harvey and Eliot and asked them a few questions. They were marvelous. Lastly, we showed some of Harvey's home movies from the shooting of the movie and summed it all up. Dinner was delicous (we were at Blue Fin across from the Palace Theatre where the show is playing) and then we went off to see the show. This revival is much improved from the tryout in DC but still not the bees knees in my opinion. Still too much Spanish and not enough poetry in the staging or performances. Enough said. It opens next week and I am anxious to read the notices.

MORE FROM PLAYBILL ON LINE

2009-03-15T15:32:00.001-07:00

Brakefield Company Will Produce New Film "Uncredited—The Marni Nixon Story"

By Andrew Gans
02 Mar 2009


Marni Nixon

The Brakefield Company, a new independent film and marketing company, will produce a screen version of Marni Nixon's autobiography, according to Variety.

"Uncredited — The Marni Nixon Story" is the title of the film, which is based on Nixon's book, "I Could Have Sung All Night."

The Nixon film will mark the first project for Brakefield, the company launched by marketing executive Shawna L. Brakefield.

No casting or timetable has been announced for the Nixon film.

Nixon is perhaps best known for dubbing the vocal performances of such film stars as Audrey Hepburn (in "My Fair Lady"), Deborah Kerr (in "The King and I") and Natalie Wood (in "West Side Story"). In "I Could Have Sung All Night" — penned by Nixon with Stephen Cole — she recalls her numerous Hollywood and Broadway experiences, including working with Julie Andrews, Leonard Bernstein, Liberace, Cary Grant, Otto Preminger and Victor Borge.

Marni Nixon was most recently on Broadway in the Tony-winning revival of Nine, and her other Main Stem credits include Follies, James Joyce's The Dead and The Girl in the Pink Tights. She played Aunt Alice in the film "I Think I Do" and Sister Sophia in the motion picture of "The Sound of Music." Nixon was recently seen as Mother Abbess in the Hollywood Bowl's presentation of The Sound of Music.

Nixon was seen earlier this season in the City Center Encores! staging of Music in the Air.

FROM PLAYBILL ON LINE

2009-03-15T15:31:00.001-07:00

Film Forum Presents An Evening with Marni Nixon Feb. 23

By Andrew Gans
23 Feb 2009


Marni Nixon

The Film Forum presents a chat with Marni Nixon — who is perhaps best known for dubbing the vocal performances of such film stars as Audrey Hepburn (in "My Fair Lady"), Deborah Kerr (in "The King and I") and Natalie Wood (in "West Side Story") — Feb. 23 at the downtown Manhattan venue.

Film Forum's Bruce Goldstein and musical theatre writer Stephen Cole, co-author of Nixon's autobiography, will interview the famed singing actress. An Evening with Marni Nixon is scheduled to begin at 7:30 PM.

Marni Nixon was most recently on Broadway in the Tony-winning revival of Nine, and her other Main Stem credits include Follies, James Joyce's The Dead and The Girl in the Pink Tights. She played Aunt Alice in the film "I Think I Do" and Sister Sophia in the motion picture of "The Sound of Music." Nixon was also seen as Mother Abbess in the Hollywood Bowl's presentation of The Sound of Music. Nixon was also recently part of the cast of the City Center Encores! production of Music in the Air.

Admission is $20, $10 for Film Forum members.

Film Forum is located in Manhattan at 209 West Houston Street. For more information call (212) 727-8110 or visit www.filmforum.org.

Where Did February Go?

2009-03-15T15:08:00.000-07:00

February was a whirlwind of activity leaving me with a cold and cough. It all began on February 2 with the Drama League Gala (see the pics) at the fabled Rainbow Room. I enjoyed the evening as all I had to do was get dressed up, drink, eat, schmooze and watch the show I helped to create. The highlights were the opening, a La Cage Aux Folles Medley featuring some of the original Cagelles, Lee Roy Reems, John Weiner and others. The second highlight was the campaign number from The Will Rogers Follies featuring Keith Carradine and many of the original girls. They stagings of both of these were recreated by Cady Huffman (she appeared in both shows) and they were so much fun to watch. Chita was great as usual doing a Can Can medley that my collaborator David Krane arranged at my suggestion. All in all a very successful evening. The next day I had my first of three lectures for a wonderful Elderhostel group visiting New York and learning about theatre. The first was a lecture on post Rodgers and Hammerstein musical theatre, which I decided meant concept musicals. They enjoyed the lecture, but I am sure I could have done better if I had more time and had done the lecture before. The next one was my usual "my life in musical theatre" lecture featuring the "road to qatar" story. I killed. It was almost as if I were doing a one man show or a standup comedy act. They laughed every time I said anything. The jokes and characterization all landed the way one only dreams they will. I followed this immediately with an interview with David Krane concentrating on his dance music career and showing videos from Chicago, Annie etc. This went very well and we are going to repeat it (along with my usual Qatar thing) at the end of March. But it was exhausting. Then came the next big event of the month, An Evening with Marni Nixon at the Film Forum. This turned out to be very successful as well. I interviewed Marni, they showed great clips and even though the evening went longer than I would have expected (and I was starting to get sick...two days before I had totally lost my voice) the audience was enraptured and the head of the Film Forum was ecstatic, saying I did the best job ever hosting an event there! Marni and I signed many books (see pic) and a great time was had by all. The next day I took to my bed and the cold and cough came with a vengeance! Ah well. That same night I also had a song premiere during the David Evans concert at Lincoln Center's Bruno Walter Auditorium. The wonderful Klea Blackhurst sang "Taking the Veil" the first song from Merman's Apprentice to be heard in public. I am told (I couldn't be there because I was at the Film Forum) it went brilliantly and that it was the hit of the evening. I will see it on DVD and I am sure I will agree. Klea of course will make a wonderful Ethel Merman...how could she not?

Oh yes, inbetween all this was the York Theatre reading of The Road to Qatar! which, to my mind, was variable. Not perfectly cast and very under rehearsed, still it went well. As the author I cringed when lines that always get laughs got none...this is not fun. And now, we are faced with the idea of cutting the show down so that we can eliminate an intermission and play it all as a romp in one fell swoop. This is frightening and exciting at the same time. Losing about 20 minutes of material you love is not easy. Well...onward and up I guess.

Now it's March and things have slowed down again. I found out that Time after Time will get first a reading in August (end) and then a full fledged production at Point Park University in Pittsburgh in the winter of 2010. Rewrites!!!!!

An Article appearing on the Web about Monday Night

2009-01-30T08:24:00.000-08:00

Broadway Playwright Stephen Cole Talks About 'A Musical Celebration of Broadway'
January 29, 2009 by
Will Stape
New York City's Drama League Show Features Stars Chita Rivera, Donna Murphy, Keith Carradine & Many More
Live theater lovers in the New York City area must mark their calendar. Save the date for
February 2, 2009, and grab these hot tickets while they last to a very special evening of Broadway theater entertainment. "A Musical Celebration of Broadway" features an unforgettable night of Broadway stage magic.New York City's fabled Rainbow Room will be the place to catch the Drama League's annual A Musical Celebration of Broadway. This yearly star studded gala from the Drama League is a lively festival showcase featuring some of Broadways' biggest and brightest stars, including, Chita Rivera, Donna Murphy, Christine Ebersole, Keith Carradine, Cady Huffman, Cheynne Jackson and Nancy Opel. In honor of the 25th anniversary of The Drama League Directors Project, the event will pay tribute to producers Stewart F. Lane and Bonnie Comley.I caught up with Stephen Cole, the writer of the show, to learn more about the special event. For him, this year's show above all else most symbolizes, "Broadway's fighting spirit. In these tough financial times, the community is coming out to not only honor a great producer, but to raise money for a great theatrical cause, the Drama League's Director's Project. It also symbolizes a busy period for me!"It's not the first time Mr. Cole has written a Drama League benefit, but it's a special first in this regard, "It's the first time I've written a producer tribute. We've done tributes to stars like Liza Minnelli, Chita Rivera, Rosie O'Donnell and composers like Cy Coleman. Having a producer (Stewart Lane & Bonnie Comely) to honor is an interesting forum. It's also the 25th Anniversary of the Director's Project (where the money goes) and we're honoring several of the most successful directors to come out of that program. I'm most excited about a reunion of original cast members from La Cage Aux Folles (starring Lee Roy Reems & original Cagelles) and The Will Rogers Follies (Keith Carradine and girls) to recreate numbers from those great show, which incidentally played at the Palace Theatre which our honoree owns! Personally, I'm excited to be working again with Chita Rivera, who starred in my musical Casper.The evening will be chock full of memorable moments, but Mr. Cole is definitely thrilled about a few specific ones, "I can't wait to be in the room again with Christine Ebersole who is a doll and with whom I have worked several times. I'm also looking forward to Donna Murphy being paired up with Jackie Hoffman to sing the show stopping The Grass is Always Greener from Woman of the Year.Stephen Cole is a veteran of the Drama League benefits, and the importance of the organization still rings strong and true with him, "It's been around forever. I have written about 18 of these benefits. They award the oldest theatrical prize, the distinguished actor award. But most of all, this Director's Project has given the theatre (and continues to) many great directors who should be indebted to them for their careers."Despite the bad economy, Cole makes an honest and reasonable case for buying tickets. "Well, this show is going to be great. For people who can afford to buy seats for the dinner and show (we are talking rich people here), its a great tax write off! They really are contributing to the future of the American Theater."Cole has many fond memories of writing the Drama League shows over the years. His particpation and friendship with the stars has led to some fantastic opportunities.

I have had the pleasure of writing special material songs for many great artists, consequently getting to know and work with them further. People like Marlo Thomas (I write special songs for her to this day and I wrote That Book about That Girl because of our friendship), Tyne Daly, Christine Baranski, Liz Smith, Chita Rivera (it was because of my tribute to her that I cast her in Casper), Rosie O'Donnell and others. It's been a joy to watch the parade of stars do incredible work first at the Pierre Hotel and now at the Rainbow Room. Being the writer of the event, I actually get to sit down and watch the show and like everyone else, I am looking forward to be dazzled on Feb. 2nd by an array of talent who donate their time...talent that you seldom see in one room. Stars that money can't buy! But they will all be there to honor Stewart and Bonnie and to help the Drama League. I will be very proud to be part of it."When looking over Broadway's current crop of shows, Stephen Cole can pick modern highlights, "It's a hard thing to choose my favorites...since so many shows just closed. I really enjoyed In the Heights for it's vitality and heart. I loved August Osage County (saw it 3 times), but the best show would have to be Billy Elliot (I saw it twice in London and twice here). It's got it all. A very powerful book combined with unique staging. It's inspiring, serious, funny, exhilarating. What musical theater should be. Totally theatrical experience."Tickets, priced $900-$2,500 - For more information visit www.dramaleague.org.Proceeds benefit The Drama League - founded in 1916 as "an association of theater professionals and patrons dedicated to encouraging the finest in professional theater and has since then developed into the theater's premiere service organization."

Donna and Jackie Together Again for the First Time

2009-01-27T14:50:00.000-08:00

Met today with Donna Murphy and Jackie Hoffman to read through the lines I wrote leading into The Grass is Always Greener and they couldn't have been lovelier. They made the lines their own and changed words to suit them and made it seem totally natural. This is what I love about great pros. Now to finish the rest of the script and be done with it! Chita tomorrow.

One Week to the Drama League!

2009-01-26T15:03:00.001-08:00

Well, it's one week away and I am still writing the script for the Drama League Gala...of course, things change by the hour. No Tony from West Side Story (good thing I didn't write his introduction!)...the hardest part of today's work was trying to smoothly introduce The Grass is Always Greener from Woman of the Year. Donna Murphy and Jackie Hoffman will sing it but the trick is to set the song up so that we get the references. It's about a celebrity and a housewife and how each thinks the other's life is wonderful. But Donna and Jackie are both actresses, so I am making things up...who knows if it will work. Maybe it's just better to say this song was about this and here we are playing these roles for you and doing the number. Stop being so clever? No! I will never stop trying. Still I haven't sent the script to anyone yet. Not sure, not sure...ah, the trouble with indecision.

Drama League Follies

2009-01-24T09:43:00.001-08:00

Oh yes, you finally write the sketch for the opening of the show and the actors you need aren't available so the brilliant work you finally did is in the trash! Nice!

The Casting Game and other Follies

2009-01-24T09:40:00.000-08:00

You think you might have a cast for your reading and suddenly your email comes in and the guy you really wanted to play Jeffrey in The Road to Qatar! can't make his schedule work out. So you go to the next choice and pray you haven't waited too long and that he doesn't have another committment...you get a Mansour and he has a one day conflict, so you say, "don't worry about that day, sure we can work around you and who needs a whole 29 hours to put on a show anyway?" Ugh!

And Marni Makes...Great!

2009-01-22T20:22:00.000-08:00

Tonight I went to see Marni Nixon in her nightclub act at the Metropolitan Room...well it really was a trio act called Menage featuring Sarah Rice (30 years after creating Johanna in Sweeney Todd on Broadway). Although I tend to stay away from cabaret these days (most cause of the prices!) I really had a great time. Marni is singing beautifully and even though she seems to be reaching for lyrics it actually comes across as sponteneity, as if she is making them up as she goes along...most of the time this works well. Brava Marni. Tomorrow I go to the Film Forum offices and have a meeting about her tribute. No one deserves it more.

Voices from the Past

2009-01-22T09:40:00.000-08:00

Today the phone rang and it was Julia Hansen calling from Aspen. I have known Julia for many years, as she was the president of the Drama League and 25 years ago created the Director's Project and for many of those years helped to produce the Gala that I wrote scripts and special material for. This year I am doing what I think is my 18th or so Gala and we are doing a tribute to the 25th Anniversary...it seems Julia is flying in for the event and has been asked to speak. I think that's dandy. The Gala is not selling tickets this year (900 bucks!) like it used to and the Rainbow Room might go out of business before we even get our performers in there...still we march on. Further good news today (was that good?) comes from the casting front...we heard back from Val Fagan, with whom I worked (I have a vague memory) 15 or so years ago on Dodsworth...she might be the answer to our Nazirah prayers for The Road to Qatar...maybe, just maybe we can get this reading cast and go on to the important stuff. Stay tuned.

Still Casting!

2009-01-21T21:23:00.000-08:00

Okay, today was better. We met a wonderful actor who gave us what we needed for the role of Jeffrey in his audition. He is younger than the actual character but I was so convinced by his humor, acting and singing that I knew I wanted him to be in our reading. We called and wrote but haven't heard back yet, but fingers are firmly crossed. I also did some of the writing I have been neglecting, including stuff for the Drama League Gala and most of the very short screenplay I am doing as a favor for a favorite producer. I hope I am not too late. I want to finish it in the morning and email it off and get it off my desk. This is the best part of writing...having written.

CASTING A LINE?

2009-01-20T16:57:00.000-08:00

When did it happen? When did writing a musical mean you needed to do everything else? Like casting for a reading? I have been doing this a long long time and I can remember when casting for a reading was simpler (wasn't everything?). Maybe that's because there weren't so many readings instead of productions. Maybe now every actor is sick to death of making 100 dollars for 29 hours of learning a new show (oh to write a play where music doesn't have to be learned) and putting it on its feet in front of an audience who expects it to be as good as if rehearsed for weeks. And readings frequently are as good. But oh the agony.

MONDAY EVENING WITH MARNI AND STEPHEN

2009-01-18T09:32:00.000-08:00

FEBRUARY 23 MON
An Evening with Marni Nixon
Question: what do these three great movie musical roles have in common? Deborah Kerr’s Anna in The King and I, Natalie Wood’s Maria in West Side Story, and Audrey Hepburn’s Eliza in My Fair Lady. Answer: the glorious singing voice of Marni Nixon, who dubbed the vocals for each of these musically-demanding parts and, despite the absence of screen credit, soon became famous as “the ghostess with the mostest,”as Time dubbed her. But, on top of those three legendary roles, she also dubbed the singing voices of Margaret O’Brien (twice — once in Hindi!) and Jeanne Crain, hummed for Janet Leigh, and even touched up the high notes for Marilyn Monroe. (She also sang on screen as Sister Sophia in The Sound of Music). But Marni’s life as a “ghost” is only a small part of an extraordinary career that stretches back to her L.A. childhood. A favorite on the concert and opera stages, she has worked side by side with such legendsas Igor Stravinsky, Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland, Pierre Boulez, Charles Ives, and Arnold Schoenberg (not to mention Victor Borge, Liberace, and Lawrence Welk!), while maintaining a parallel career on the musical stage. In recent years, Marni has appeared on Broadway in James Joyce’s The Dead, Follies, and Nine and has long been a much sought-after vocal teacher. Tonight, Marni Nixon will appear in person for an onstage interview with Film Forum’s Bruce Goldstein and award-winning musical theater writer Stephen Cole, co-author (or “ghost writer”) of Marni’s frank autobiography, I Could Have Sung All Night, which will be available for sale at Film Forum.
Admission: $20, $10 for Film Forum members. 7:30

MERMAN'S APPRENTICE PART I

2009-01-17T14:17:00.001-08:00

Below is part one of Merman's Apprentice. I started writing it as a joke because I had written a show called Merlin's Apprentice and thought Merman was more of a magician...then I got hooked on the characters and story. Now she will be a musical...enjoy!

2009-01-17T13:15:00.000-08:00

MERMAN’S APPRENTICE
By Stephen Cole
Part 1

Muriel Plakenstein had run away from home at last.
The Double L train had been her escape for a long time now, but this time the trip from Canarsie to Manhattan would be permanent. While most twelve year olds were safe in school, Muriel was deciding whether to change trains at Union Square or at Eighth Avenue. Muriel was not like most twelve year olds. It’s like everyone said about her, “she’s older than her years.” And Muriel wanted to be a Broadway Star. She could sing. Boy, could she sing! And she was loud too! She could imitate anyone on any of her cast albums. One day she was Carol Channing hitting the lowest of bass notes in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” and the next she was John Raitt hitting the highest of highs in at the end of “Soliloquy” in “Carousel” (the Lincoln Center version from the RCA record club her mother belonged to). Muriel didn’t care if she sang the men’s songs or the women’s, as long as it was a musical.
Her little friends hadn’t always understood Muriel. This was 1970 and not one of her little chums even knew what a “My Fair Lady” was. Muriel was different. From the time she saw her first “Wizard of Oz” on TV she knew. And when her dad brought home the cast album of “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” (one of his co-workers bought it by mistake, thinking Marilyn Monroe was in it…now what was THAT about?) she was totally hooked and cried, wheedled and begged for the money each week to buy a new record. When she was eight or nine, she even cut school and took three busses to find a rare copy of “What Makes Sammy Run?” with Steve Lawrence. Muriel was determined one day to BE Steve Lawrence. Or Carol Channing. Or even Bernice Massey.
Oddly enough, among all the cast albums was a soundtrack. For those of you who don’t distinguish between the two (and most record stores are guilty of this horror) Soundtracks are only the tracks from the MOVIE versions of the great shows. These were distained by Muriel, as she knew that most of the voices in the movie versions of shows were dubbed anyway. She could see their lips moving one way and hear the voices singing another. Muriel was shrewd. But there it was, buried in a closet, the soundtrack of “Gypsy.” Muriel liked it a lot although she didn’t know who was singing for whom. To her ear sometimes the women singing most of the songs sounded good and sometimes she didn’t. She tried to compare her voice on that record with her voice on another recently acquired recording of her Broadway Musical, “Wonderful Town”, but didn’t have two record players to play them side by side, so the experiment went untested.
One day she turned on the radio and heard one of those songs from her record of “Gypsy.” But it wasn’t the voice she was used to. It was something unbelievable. Like a trumpet call with the clearest words shooting out at her and an emotional charge the likes of which Muriel never had heard before. The announcer announced that this was the Original Broadway Cast of “Gypsy” starring the great Ethel Merman. Ethel Merman!
Muriel had seen her on TV a couple of times. On reruns of “The Lucy Show” or “That Girl.” (She would watch these in the mornings on the occasions she played sick and got out of school.) But Muriel had never heard her sing like this. The next time Muriel’s father took her on one of their Thursday jaunts to the Green Acres shopping center on Long Island, Muriel begged, pleaded and wheedled five dollars out of him and bought the record. When she got home she played it through the huge stereo headphones that covered half of her head. Muriel was hooked. Forget about Channing, Lawrence (Steve not Gertrude) or Raitt. She just HAD to be Ethel Merman.
And on that sunny June day in 1970, Muriel Plakenstein (she would have to change that!) watched as the stops in Brooklyn gave way to the darkness of the tunnel that connected the old world with the new one. And as the old train clanked and sputtered along underground, she dreamed.
In her knapsack were two-dozen reel-to-reel tapes that she had made of her favorite albums. She couldn’t very well take the records themselves nor, unfortunately could she bring the enormous reel-to-reel tape deck that her father had bought her for her twelfth birthday. She would send for them later. When she was settled in her new and glamorous apartment. Just having the tapes with her made her feel better.
The fact that Muriel had only 8 dollars and 49 cents on her didn’t deter her at all. Soon she would be the world’s first twelve-year-old Broadway Star and the money would come rolling in. But she would have to be frugal for the few days it might take to make it big.
Now, don’t imagine that Muriel didn’t know what she was doing. Muriel had her copies of Show Business and Backstage. These newspapers had all the listings of what was auditioning, who was interviewing…the works. Muriel was not some little amateur. Hadn’t she wowed them last summer at the bungalow colony in the Catskills when she sang the entire Bench Scene from “Carousel” by herself? Without any accompaniment, thank you very much! And when she did her encore of the reprise of “Show Business” from her newly bought LP of “Annie Get Your Gun” (the Lincoln Center version) didn’t everyone cheer? Of course they did! A little Merman they called her. Muriel was so happy then. And now she was about to embark on the rest of her life.
After changing trains at 8th Avenue, she got off at 42nd Street. Muriel finally emerged into the light of 44th and 8th (her father had shown her how to sit in the front of the train so that you came out two blocks higher than the stop). As she came out of the subway the marquees of 44th Street hit her right where she lived. But the one right in front of her eyes was one that had been there for what seemed like her whole life: “Hello, Dolly!”
“Hello, Dolly!” was like an old friend to Muriel. It was the first show her father took her to see. She had been seven years old. 1965. It was the year her mother died and Muriel’s dad was really trying to be both a mom and a dad. And he wasn’t even really that good at either. But every Saturday he dutifully took Muriel into the city and they went to Radio City and saw the movie and the show. The Rockettes bored Muriel and she thought the shows were so stupid. The movies were usually fun and Doris Day seemed to star in all of them.
One December Saturday afternoon, though, the movie at Radio City looked boring and the on stage attraction was the Nativity! Or the Navity as Muriel called it. Well Moe Plakenstein wasn’t about to expose his little girl to that! “Jesus Christ! No way!” So they wandered the streets for a while and before long found themselves on 44th Street in front of the St. James Theatre where the marquee announced Ginger Rogers in “Hello, Dolly!”
Muriel: “Why don’t we see that movie?”
Dad: “That’s not a movie. It’s a show.”
Muriel: (Begging, pleading and wheedling) “Well, why can’t we see it? I want to see it! Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeease!”
Dad: “Let’s see what the prices are.”
Well, it seemed that for three dollars (which was Muriel’s father paid for movies most of the time) you could sit way upstairs and so Muriel’s dad grudgingly bought them two tickets and began the climb up the flights and flights of stairs to the last balcony (there were two or three) of the theatre. They were given little magazines that were called Playbills and Muriel held on to hers like it was gold. She held it so tightly that to this day there is a tear where her thumb and forefinger grabbed it. And when the lights went down and the orchestra played, she knew she was home.
And now all these many years later, here she was outside that very same theatre that started it all for her. Except that this time Ginger Rogers’ name was gone. Emblazoned over the Hello and the Dolly this time was Ethel and Merman. Oh my God! There it was!
Muriel had never even dared to hope to see Ethel Merman in a Broadway Show. Hadn’t she heard with her own ears and seen with her own eyes when Ethel Merman was on Johnny Carson? Didn’t she hear her proclaim, “No… No more Broadway. Now it’s time for just me. Now it’s time for Ethel?” Or some such thing. But here was her name in red and white. Muriel’s heart beat faster and faster as she pulled out her money from her pocket to count it for the twentieth time today.
Maybe Muriel could buy a ticket and see Ethel. This very day. But no. Today was Thursday and there were only matinees on Wednesday, Saturday and sometimes Sunday.
And Muriel supposed that ticket prices must have gone up since those early days. They might even cost four or five dollars now.
And Muriel needed to conserve her resources. A girl had to eat didn’t she? And just then Muriel’s stomach started to rumble. Muriel was hungry. It was almost noon. But before Muriel could even begin to think about where she might get some lunch, she heard the voice.
“Don’t be an asshole, Russell. We’re going to Sardi’s and that’s the end of that!
Muriel had been looking down on the ground when she heard the voice. When she looked up there in the living and fire-breathing flesh was Ethel Merman. Most of Muriel’s friend’s wouldn’t know this woman with the big red hair from their mother’s hairdresser, but Muriel was not like the others. Muriel knew that Ethel Merman was the First Lady of the American Musical Theatre. Muriel had looked her up at the Canarsie branch of the Brooklyn Public Library. She had been in so many Broadway Musicals that Muriel had to memorize them.
GIRL CRAZY GEORGE WHITE SCANDALS TAKE A CHANCE ANYTHING GOES RED HOT AND BLUE STARS IN YOUR EYES DUBARRY WAS A LADY PANAMA HATTIE SOMETHING FOR THE BOYS ANNIE GET YOUR GUN CALL ME MADAM GYPSY …the names ran through her mind every night as she drifted off to sleep. She had memorized them like other kids memorized their multiplication tables. Muriel knew what was important. There was one that Muriel kept forgetting though. But the library never said anything about “Hello, Dolly!” And yet there was her name and here she was!
And out of the mouth of Muriel’s dream come true came, “Move your ass, Russell. I’m not eating alone!” Muriel didn’t know who Russell was, but she saw him cower, nod and move his ass as Merman stormed down the street toward Sardi’s. Muriel followed behind them at a respectful distance. As they approached the restaurant a slightly crazy and disheveled looking man jumped out from a doorway and pushed an autograph book in front of the great star’s face. She automatically whacked it with her right arm and sent the autograph book flying into a puddle in the gutter. Those clarion tones proclaimed:
“No autographs! Get the fuck out of my way!”
Muriel’s mouth fell open. Not since her father broke his arm falling down the stairs after slipping on the foldout slipcover of “I Had A Ball” (which Muriel found in a flea market in Paramus, New Jersey for one dollar, thank you very much!) did Muriel hear such language.
Muriel was astounded! Muriel was astonished!
Muriel was thrilled!
“Wow!” said the little girl.
“What did you say?” said the big loud voice. Muriel turned around thinking that it must be someone else she was shouting at. But no, Merman was talking to Muriel.
“I said ‘wow!’” “That’s what I thought you said.” “Are you really her?” Muriel asked with the kind of innocence that only she possessed (at least on 44th St. in front of Sardi’s!)
“This kid’s cute, Russell. She kind of reminds me of…never mind.”
To Muriel “Russell” seemed very tall. Muriel found out later that Russell was one of Ethel’s friends and, although he was too old for the part, was appearing with her in her new production of “Hello, Dolly!” For now, he was just this amazingly tall and handsome man who wearing horn rimmed glasses like her Dad wore before he got the contact lenses. Russell also seemed kind.
“Let’s take her to lunch,” bellowed Russell in a voice that sounded a bit like Merman’s. Muriel wondered if they were related, but before she could even form that question in her mind, the great Merman had said, “Sure why not come on kid you look hungry Vincent you look wonderful great haircut how’s the wife table for three!”
And in a flash Muriel was sitting at a red banquet at the best table with a view in the best room of the best restaurant Broadway had ever known.
Ethel: “So what’s your name?”
Muriel: “Muriel Plakenstein.”
Ethel: “You’re gonna have to change that!”
Muriel: “That’s what I told my Dad.”
The waiter brought three large menus to the table but Ethel shooed them away. “Bring us the Actor’s Menu,” she bellowed at the waiter. After the waiter was out of earshot (was that possible?) Ethel continued. “Just because you star in a show doesn’t mean that you’re made of money or that you should waste it. Vincent has a perfectly good menu with lower prices that’s made for starving actors.” Muriel never knew that. Muriel was learning.
The actual eating of the lunch was a blur to Muriel as she was too busy listening to Ethel and Russell talking. Muriel would be able to remember nothing of the cuisine, but every word that was uttered was emblazoned in her memory forever. Once in a while Ethel would ask Muriel her opinion on something and Muriel would answer to the best of her ability. Ethel always smiled and nodded as if Muriel really knew. Muriel wasn’t nervous at all and seemed to be in her element.
Finally, desert was discussed. Ethel was astounded that Muriel just wasn’t keen on anything desert-wise.
“You don’t want ice cream,” Ethel blared. “You don’t want chocolate cake! What the fuck DO you want?”
“I want to be a Broadway Star,” replied Muriel, with a smile that could melt the already melted butter that the waiter took away.
And before Ethel and Russ could register a reaction, Muriel launched into a clear, clean and shockingly accurate imitation of Ethel Merman in “Call Me Madam”:
“You don’t need analyzing, it is not so surprising that you feel very strange but nice!”
“Wow, Ethel,” exclaimed Russell, “she sounds just like you. But young!”
As Ethel and Russ (for this is what Muriel was asked to call them from now on) exited the restaurant into the blinding sunlight of 44th Street, Muriel was sad. It’s not that she wasn’t happy and grateful for the delicious lunch or excited about meeting her idol and Russ. It was that she now realized that it was over. Why do wonderful things go so fast and end so soon and school seems to take forever? Muriel had pondered this question before. But never outside of Sardis on the way to dropping Ethel and Russ off at the stage door of “Hello, Dolly!”
Muriel was silent as they walked up the street. Ethel and Russell were muttering under their breath, but because of Ethel’s loud voice, Muriel heard a few scattered phrases:
“Who the hell cares what they think? Merrick won’t be there!”
“Who cares about the stage manager?”
“Taking an earring at Lamstons is NOT stealing, for God’s sake!”
“Then it’s settled!”
Muriel’s ears perked up most at the line about taking something not really meaning you were a thief. Muriel had kind of taken things too. Well, not exactly taken…all right she had switched a couple of price tags on records so that she could get two (or three) instead of one. When her father asked she would tell him there was a big sale at Sam Goody’s. The truth of it was that Muriel had found a roll of 69 cent stickers on the floor of the store one day and has been using them ever since to keep her record collection up to date. So Ethel and Muriel had stuff in common. Neat and a half! While Muriel pondered this, she didn’t realize that the other parts of the whispered (and shouted) conversation would change her life forever.
There they were: the two tall ones and Muriel in the alley and right in front of the stage door of the St. James Theatre. Muriel put her hand out to shake theirs and say goodbye, but no one took it. Ethel just said, “come on kid, you’re coming to rehearsal with me!”
Muriel couldn’t believe her ears, but she knew that if she obeyed the clarion tones she was going to be in for the time of her life.

More Saturday Stuff

2009-01-17T13:02:00.000-08:00

So I did a great hour and half phone interview about my career...well only part of it. Talked about Night of the Hunter and After the Fair...for a podcast to come from Ohio. Was fun talking about me...no shit! Got emails from Jason Graae about his possible participation in the upcoming reading of Qatar...he is in LA of course, so I am not counting my chickens, but he would be great as me (aka Michael) so more fingers are crossed...how many fingers can I cross here? Casting a reading is hell and I hope next time to get a casting director. I hate hate hate it. I realize after looking through this whole blog that it's literally almost two years since I began it. Of course I took off half of that not writing it, but still...lots of changes and lots of stuff the same. New shows? Show Choir (not the title but there is none yet...I'm not the book writer) with Todd Ellison...slow in coming but we have three songs. Merman's Apprentice with David Evans (two songs almost written...story still be written by me...as a matter of fact, I think I shall publish the story in segments here so stay tuned...maybe it will help me finish it...it's been years in the making but fun), new ideas are coming but slowly...wrote a 20 minute dance oriented musical utilizing two songs David Krane and I wrote...called Everybody Dreams...well that's sorta the update...see you soon.

REALLY back from the dead!

2009-01-17T10:45:00.000-08:00

So, it's been literally forever since I updated this thing. What have I been doing for the last year or so? Hmmm...the projects continue. The Road to Qatar! had another reading last spring...very successful...and now we are preparing for reading number 3 on Nov. 19, 2009 (did one in 2007, 2008) at the York Theatre...this time though we are armed with the knowledge that there will be a full production in October 2009 at the Lyric Stage in Dallas. This is where my musical After the Fair premiered and won 5 Dallas Theatre Awards including Best New Play or Musical...it sits on my mantal all dusty and shiny (I must dust!). I am thrilled that Qatar will see a real stage and after that will come to NYC for another run in November. What else? February will be a busy month...besides Qatar reading, on Feb. 2 I am the writer for what seems like my millionth (18th I think) Drama League Benefit...this year a tribute to producer and Palace Theatre owner Stewart Lane (and his lovely wife Bonnie). Some of the stars lined up are Keith Carradine, Donna Murphy, Chita Rivera, Christine Ebersole...the usual suspects...not sure if Liza will make it, but I sure hope so. Then on Feb. 23rd, I get to co-host and interview Marni Nixon at the Film Forum's tribute evening to her. That's really exciting. Of course, who better than I? The Ghost's Ghost! But I am thrilled to be asked and I love working with Marni. Speaking of ghosting...I ghosted (without credit) Mr. Charles Strouse's memoir Put on a Happy Face...got great reviews, too bad my name is not on the cover...oh well...it's money, right? Right! Time after Time is back on track...working on doing another reading and maybe getting a production at Point Park University where Jeff Saver the composer is teaching now. Fingers crossed for us! Who knows, next fall might be jam packed. Last fall (have I really not updated this in so long?) we did a great reading at Northwestern University as part of the American Musical Theatre Project (that was fall of 07) and learned a lot...mostly how good the show was...Recently had a great meeting with a potential director so we might be making some significant changes and working toward a reading of the show...Meanwhile, my website has a new address...http://www.stephencolewriter.com/ and as I am doing this blog again, I intend to update the site as well...I have done a few new things in the past few years! Thanks for reading this whoever you are.

Back from the Dead!

2008-08-07T21:16:00.000-07:00

Oh My God! It's been forever and a day since I updated this blog. I hereby vow (but don't hold me to it) to do better and fill in the blanks of over a year.

Time after Ohio

2007-03-31T20:13:00.000-07:00

Spend two days in Ohio (one night with Jeff Saver and the other in a Motel in Pittsburgh) and did some work on Time after Time after a 17 month hiatius. I know that the time spent on the show with Jeff did him good and there is no doubt that time away from the show gave me a perspective and a freedom to work on what was not up to par and to still love what is. I think we had some good talks and that we can make the show a lot better. It was a good trip...sad, exhilarating, sad, depressing, uplifting...Came back and recorded a couple of songs from Qatar to submit for the York Theater's NEO concert. Will submit two from that show and one from Time after Time. Nothing exciting moneywise has come up for SNAG and that's distressing, but not shocking. Right now Qatar is my best front burner bet. It's new, it's hip, it's really good and it's new. Did I mention it's new?

Why oh Why oh Why oh?

2007-03-27T21:10:00.000-07:00

Why am I going to Ohio? Well, it's where Jeff Saver is and we are going to spend two whole days reviving our work on Time after Time. I am going to remind Jeff what is great about it and what we can make better. He is going to come back to composing in a small but important way. Even if he doesn't actually write music this week it will remind him who he is and that his life is important. His art and his collaboration with me. I am nervous about it, but I will surely have a good time. Also had lunch today with Thomas Z. Shepard, famous record producer and very nice man. We are talking about me possibly working on his book with him. Another ghost is born? Perhaps. He has had a great career and I think a great title would be Off the Record by Thomas Z. Shepard with Stephen Cole (same type please). More to come.

Blame It On My Youth

2007-03-26T17:55:00.000-07:00

While I was out walking today I started to sing the beautiful Oscar Levant song Blame It On My Youth (Edward Heyman lyric) and before I knew it I realized that this could be the title of the play (musical? play? memoir?) I have been toying with. In fact using the song at the top of the show might be my way in. Maybe by using a real song that mean something ironic as a title and a device is my way into this play. Treating a play the way I treat a musical might get me into it. It's a memory play for sure and the lyric has a certain irony.

IF I EXPECTED LOVE WHEN FIRST WE KISSED
BLAME IT ON MY YOUTH,
IF ONLY JUST FOR YOU I DID EXIST
BLAME IT ON MY YOUTH
I BELIEVED IN EVERYTHING
LIKE A CHILD OF THREE
YOU MEANT MORE THAN ANYTHING
ALL THE WORLD TO ME

Already it feels right. A way to talk about the first kiss and how naive a 16 year old boy (no matter how sophisticated he thinks he is) can be. How this 40 year old woman wove a web of magic and romance and pulled him into it.

IF YOU WERE ONE MY MIND BOTH NIGHT AND DAY
BLAME IT ON MY YOUTH
IF I FORGOT TO EAT AND SLEEP AND PRAY
BLAME IT ON MY YOUTH

This boy gave up everything for this woman, for the chance to be adult, to be cared for, to be nurtured and understood.

AND IF I CRIED A LITTLE BIT
WHEN FIRST I LEARNED THE TRUTH

And eventually truth came crashing around his ears. The truth of obsessive love. Of adult emotions that he was not ready for. Of a love so intense he had no way of dealing with it. Neither did she for that matter, except to do all the wrong things.

DON'T BLAME IT ON MY HEART
BLAME IT ON MY YOUTH

But what could SHE blame it on? Her heart, her needs, her narcissistic need for the boy.

There IS something here. To intersperse her singing with his recollection and then let play with time. How I would love to keep this a two character piece, but for some reason I have already added another actor in this first scene. Well, it could all change tomorrow.

Speaking of tomorrow...Having lunch with Thomas Z. Shepard about the possibility of working on a book with him. Could be good. I will report back.

The Love of an Older Woman

2007-03-24T17:41:00.000-07:00

I think because I am so excited and happy with The Road to Qatar! I am looking for another project. For some reason I feel that having gone to the well of reality and my life once and come up with gold, maybe I could do it again. The older woman in my life keeps coming back to haunt me. She yells "write me, write me!" as if she were the chorus in the opening number of Colette which closed on the road. She is gone now and maybe it's time to come to terms with the interesting story of a 16 year old boy and a woman twice his age who fell in love with his talent and then him and rushed him into her bed despite his natural proclivities and then betrayed him out of love, jealousy and passion. And the boy forgave her and they remained friends until her death. There IS a story here...Probably not a musical, but maybe my first play? I don't know yet, but something is pushing me to tell this story. It's connected to all the older women in my life. They all see something in me and either go too far or not far enough. This first one was very important. Wow, she would sure be shocked and possibly thrilled to become a part of my work. Can't wait to see where my brain takes me.

Never Look a Gift Arab in the Mouth

2007-03-22T20:33:00.000-07:00

This afternoon David Krane and I sang the score of the Road to Qatar! for a potential director and it went very well. We were great. It's not easy playing all five parts, but the very fact of having to do three different Middle Eastern character voices at least distinguishes them from the two main character, which are easy as they are based on us! The potential director loved it all and now we shall see what we shall see...next step is probably to do this same dog and camel show for producers who might give us a reading. Maybe we will figure out a way to do a cut version...act I only perhaps. This time we did all the musical segments which is a lot! But in any case today went as well as it could and I am happy and tired.

Superfluous Duets

2007-03-21T13:13:00.000-07:00

It's amazing how you can (or I can) actually feel what the structural problems of a show are by just singing thru the score. I felt really good last night singing The Road to Qatar, but I just knew that one reprise of the title song was just one too many. Original the song was in the spot where the reprise was last night, but in the total rewrite the song wound up being the second song in the show instead of the 11 o'clock number. It works much better there, but the delightful and delicious counter melody did not work at the top of the show, as it was specifically a lyric for the later part of the show. I thought I could have my cake and eat it by keeping the countermelody as a surprise for the reprise, but it turns out that I just didn't want to hear that number in that spot...it stopped the action for something great musically, but not great dramatically...So I decided today to just lift it out and see how it read...of course it read better without the reprise. So a wonderful countermelody bites the dust (for now...you never know) but a better show grows from the ashes.

Behind Every Story

2007-03-21T08:16:00.000-07:00

For those of you who might have missed these articles by the great Peter Filicia. Here is the true story that inspired the musical work in progress I keep talking about here...The Road to Qatar! This will give you some background on what an amazing tale it is.
Something To Aspire To
By: Peter Filichia

"We want you to write musical. How much?" That was the cryptic e-mail that bookwriter-lyricist Stephen Cole received last February. It was followed by an instruction to call a number in -- of all places -- Dubai. Cole assumed it was "just one of those e-mails," but he wrote back, saying he wouldn't call Dubai and that the sender would just have to call him. "A second later," Cole says, "the phone rang and a broken-English voice asked if I'd write a musical for the Emir of Qatar."
Although Cole has written musicals produced regionally (Casper) and off-Broadway (After the Fair), he hasn't yet reached Broadway, so he was surprised to be summoned. The Dubainians told him that his website had gotten them interested in him. So, would he write an original musical? Says Cole, "I'd read how rich this country was, so I told my agent to ask for a lot of money. They came back with an offer of only a work-for-hire contract but with enough money to make me say, 'Take it!' " But Cole would have to accept their choice of composer. "I suggested ones I'd worked with, but they nixed them all," he relates. "None, you see, had a website. They told me David Krane would compose, and while I'd only barely met him, I knew I'd be dealing with someone who knew musicals."
Indeed, Krane -- who was equally stunned when he got his e-mail from Dubai -- has been writing Broadway dance music and/or arrangements since Carmelina in 1979. "Even though I haven't written a musical for Broadway," he says, "they were sold when they saw on my website that I worked on the Chicago movie." (Moral of the story, writers: Get a good website!) "They didn't offer enough money for a Rolls-Royce, but enough for a mini one," says Krane. "So I said yes."
Fine. But now he and Cole were told they had to deliver the show in eight weeks. The collaborators asked "What's the show about?" and were told they'd learn more after they flew to Dubai. After a 14-hour business-class flight, they met their producers. The first surprise was that the musical would be performed in English "because most of the audience would be foreign dignitaries," says Krane. "And the Emir spoke English, too."
Artistic director Nasser Abdullah Abdul Reda told them that the show would deal with a boy whose father would not let him go to a sports academy. Says Krane, "The show would open Qatar's newest sports arena -- the world's largest soccer stadium -- at the Aspire Sports Academy." Cole decided that he had his title: Aspire. "I was told, though," he says, "that the show had to include such Qatarian icons as the sea, ancient Greece, ancient Qatar, a pearl diving expedition and -- oh, yes -- Carl Lewis, the Olympic runner, and Zinedine Zidane, a French soccer star. I came to the conclusion that they had to be included because the Emir hoped they'd actually show up for the premiere. What's worse, I was expected to have an outline by the end of that first day! They even had set designers there from England, so they could get started working from my outline." (Those designers would eventually quit.)
By the second day, Cole had decided that the show's theme should be what one needed besides strength to be a good sportsman. "So," he says, "I landed on a sultan's son who goes on a tantrum in his room and learns a lesson when a star comes to life. The producers wanted a narrator, but I sold them on the star being personified as a Bette Midler-type. She teaches the boy wisdom, compassion, and courage. The Wizard of Oz always works," Cole adds with a knowing smile. Krane was able to hire crackerjack orchestrator Larry Blank and a music copyist. Cole and Krane then flew to Doha -- Qatar's capital -- to see the still-under-construction stadium, in which the show would premiere on November 19. "Then they took us on a wild SUV ride through the pitch black desert at what had to be 100 miles an hour," says Krane. "We arrived in an encampment where there was a belly dancer, and then we went on camel rides. We felt like we were in The Road to Morocco."

They got their advance. Krane also got a tape of Qatarian folk tunes, some of which would have to be assimilated into the show. ("People would expect to hear them," he was told.) Then Krane and Cole returned home to write, although the contract now said six weeks, not eight. The shortened time frame particularly worried Cole because he'd been working on Marni Nixon's memoir -- fetchingly titled Audrey Hepburn Dubbed My Face -- and it was soon due at the publishers. But Krane and Cole proved the adage that work takes as long as the time you have to do it. They finished Aspire, including the dance music and underscoring, in five weeks.
In July, they went to London to perform it for their producers. "Luckily," says Krane, "Stephen has a fabulous voice. He's the love child of Stephen Douglass and Ethel Merman." Be that as it may, once Cole finished singing and Krane ceased playing, the stone-faced Arabs didn't applaud. Says Cole, "Though I'd spent 90 minutes singing my heart out, I decided that the check's clearing was my applause."
Actually, Reda and his people were thinking where the collaborators had erred culturally. For example, it turned out that one of the Qatarian folk tunes used by Krane can only be played at Ramadan. Out it went. But the show got a green light. This meant that Krane quickly had to go to Bratislava, of all places, to oversee the pre-recording of the music by a a 70 piece-orchestra. "I had put in a chime but was told to take it out because it sounded so much like the bell that tells Muslims it's time to pray," he says.
Krane and Cole were astonished when they were told that they "wouldn't be needed" at casting sessions or rehearsals. They returned to America and waited until they were summoned to Qatar. We'll learn of that trip in my next column.
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[To contact Peter Filichia directly, e-mail him at pfilichia@theatermania.com]
http://www.theatermania.com/content/news.cfm/story/7577

Peter Filichia's Diary Feb 1, 2006

We Open in Doha
By: Peter Filichia

When we last left bookwriter-lyricist Stephen Cole and composer David Krane, they'd been commissioned to write an original musical for the Emir of Qatar. As I related on Monday, they were given six weeks to do it and miraculously accomplished the task in five. Their show, Aspire, was to open a new soccer stadium in Doha, Qatar's capital, on November 19, 2005.
Much has been made of Elton John not being on the scene to work on his musicals. Well, much to the surprise of Cole and Krane, they weren't weren't invited to stay in Qatar for casting or rehearsals. But they were summoned to the Middle Eastern country two days before the opening, so they could watch the final rehearsals on Friday and Saturday. What they saw was a bit of chaos. An LED screen on which projections were to be shown didn't work. (It had been shipped to Quatar at a cost of $95,000!) At each of the final rehearsals, the show never progressed past the third number. So Aspire, with its 175-member cast, would have to open without a full run-through or even a tech rehearsal.
Opening night! It's opening night! It's those Americans' latest show; will it flop or will it go? Before Krane and Cole started dressing for the occasion, they were told that they should take curtain calls, but they wondered, "What if the audience doesn't like it?" The show's stakes had been raised, for what had been conceived as a one-night-only performance had turned into a one-week run. Krane and Cole wondered if there'd be enough interest in Aspire for it to play out the week. Granted, the Emir was charging no admission for his subjects to see the show, but maybe it would be such a disaster no one would want to attend.
As the clock reached show time, something else was missing: The Emir. "Of course," says Krane, "we couldn't start before he got there." The collaborators killed time by chatting with the French and Korean ambassadors. They also scanned the crowd for Carl Lewis and Zinedine Zidane, the sports stars whom they were told to reference in their show. They weren't in attendance, as had been assumed; but Mark Spitz, another former Olympic champion, was.
Finally, a full hour late, in walked the corpulent Emir with his trophy wife. They took front row seats, and it was Magic Time. "It really was," says Cole. "I'd expected abstract sets, but oh, were these realistic. They'd been made in China and were bigger than you'd ever dream. The inside of tombs! King Tut's palace! Three enormous ships! And the cast! There were fire eaters, Croatian acrobats, Russian dancers, and jugglers who juggled things the size of houses. Funny, whenever we asked about the budget, they never told us what it was. They'd always say, 'Less than you think.' But this show sure looked expensive to us. It was like Jumbo, but bigger."

To their delight, the authors saw that the show itself worked. They sat back and enjoyed their tale of Mansour, the son of a Sultan. Since the death of the lad's mother, the Sultan won't let his 12-year-old leave the palace. Mansour is spoiled by his father's lackeys. When they say, "Your wish is our command," he snarkily decides, "I want that star in the sky to come down." Of course, they can't do that, but a Star does come down -- think Bette Midler -- to tell him off for being such a brat. Then she says, "Close your eyes and wish." Soon, Mansour is crossing the sea. He arrives in Greece, where he meets Odysseus, Achilles, Ajax, Agamemnon -- and a Cyclops, whom the Greeks want to kill. Mansour asks them to spare the monster and invites him to dinner. The charmed Cyclops says that he could never eat them now that they're all friends. The Greeks learn, "A man can win a battle by using his heart."
Mansour then takes off on a flying carpet, arrives in Egypt, and meets a nine-year-old named Tut who's been thrust, not unlike Chulalongkorn in The King and I, onto the throne after his father dies. The boy king is scared and runs away, which thrills General Horemheb and henchman Ay, who expect to take over Egypt. The country's laws demand a 30-day waiting period before power changes hands; Mansour spends the time encouraging Tut to reclaim the throne and planning a ruse to quash the villains. It works, and Tut is forever grateful. Mansour then meets the aforementioned Olympic champ Carl Lewis and soccer legend Zinedine Zidane, both of whom encourage him to take a camel ride. He winds up in 1920, where a pearl diving expedition is about to take place.
Then came a showstopper -- "though not the kind you'd want," says Cole. "Right then and there was a sword dance, and then 25 minutes of Arabian music with nothing happening dramatically. We just had to sit and wait it out." (The Emir's emissaries had insisted on all this, and Cole and Krane couldn't fight City Hall, so to speak.) Eventually, the story resumed with Mansour meeting Saad, a 15-year-old who gets stuck in a small underwater crevice. Only the diminutive Mansour can get into the space to help release him. In doing so, he helps Saad to become a man.
Once the Sultan sees how Mansour has matured, he allows him to leave the palace and become a man. But Krane and Cole didn't see the end of the show. They had to get ready for their curtain calls and, considering that the stadium was so large, they needed 10 minutes to go from their seats to the backstage area. When they bowed, the Emir stood up and cheered -- and, needless to say, so did everyone else. David Krane and Stephen Cole felt just like Mansour, whose name is Arabic for "victorious."
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[To contact Peter Filichia directly, e-mail him at pfilichia@theatermania.com]

Tuesday Night in Qatar!

2007-03-20T21:12:00.000-07:00

What a roller coaster a career in the theatre can be! Last night I was riding high after doing the backer's audition of Saturday Night at Grossinger's. The only fly in the ointment seemed to be that my agent didn't show up. This got me upset to say the least. Just when you need an agent to be schmoozing it up, you are alone. Then the shit hit the fan this AM via email that my agent was no longer my agent. Now, this has been coming for a while, at least via my ignored intuition. After all, communication has been at a bare minimal since...before December! Other big events were either not attended or attended half way (and by that I mean leaving after an hour of a hugely successful performance of one of my shows). This was getting to be unacceptable and to give the agent its due, the agent agreed that I was being neglected and deserved better. Still, this did not take the sting out of the realization that I have to move on and find someone new, especially since I chose this one over my last one and burned a bridge that remains burned to this day. Sad. But you go on...and tonight David Krane and I performed (or rather let three people watch a rehearsal of) our score for The Road to Qatar! And that went really well. I am very confident about 80 percent of what we have and that's pretty damned good for draft number two. We are rehearsing again tomorrow and performing for a director on Thurs. Not sure if this director is right for the piece but then the reaction will tell me a lot. I know we have a hilariously amazing small show here, based totally on truth, for whatever that means...what's important is the story and the characters and it really works. So far. I am proud proud proud of Qatar! Stay tuned for the director's reactions.

Monday Night at Grossinger's

2007-03-19T20:53:00.000-07:00

The question is this: is a backer's audition successful unless you know if you got backing? Well, we did a great presentation in a great living room for a very nice crowd who seemed to really appreciate what we did. I sang and acted well. The others were their marvelous selves. Everyone seemed enthusiastic, but I guess I won't know the money situation until I know it. I am thoroughly exhausted in any case. And if I am tired, can you just imagine the two wonderful leads who too the red eye from LA last night and tomorrow morning at 445am will be on the road to Kennedy? Highlights were having Larry Silverton, Doris's widower, there. Larry is a great guy and Doris was one of the Co-creators (Rita Lakin, the other, was there as well) and has gone to the big blintz stand in the sky. I am in hopes that Larry who is well off to say the least will help us get this production off the ground. But those are slim hopes. You don't get rich by putting money into shows. Even shows that your wife created and loved to death. Literally. But we shall see. He had tears in his eyes and seemed to really love it all. So did many others. It was certainly hard though to get the comic elements in a living room. The stand up schtick works best with lights and a bigger audience. But Barry Pearl did a valiant and brilliant job. I felt good singing the counterpoint duet with Lynne Halliday. Old home week for us. We worked together as director (me) and performer over 20 years ago and now we were singing a song together. What fun! Well, here's hoping this all adds up to some bucks and that we can really do the show this summer or early fall at the York. Thank you Barbara Minkus, Barry Pearl, Lynne Halliday, David Armstrong, Matthew Ward and everyone at the York. With that I say goodnight and goodluck....zzzzz

A Busy Monday Expected

2007-03-18T18:04:00.000-07:00

Barbara Minkus and Barry Pearl arrive early in the AM. Barbara will go to rest at her daughter's apt. and Barry will catch some winks at my place. At noon we all gather at Matt Ward's studio and plow thru the presentation, putting the pieces together and blending the West Coast rehearsals with the East Coast...ain't we fancy? Then at 5pm we will convene at Bobby Cramer's apt. and run thru the presentation, timing it. Fingers crossed it's about 50 mins. 6:30 the guest arrive, drink and eat and at 7pm promptly we start our presentation which has to end at 7:55 so that Matt Ward can get in a car and be driven to Forbidden Broadway where he goes on at 8:15! Show biz!!!!!!!!!

Notes on a Saturday Night

2007-03-17T08:53:00.000-07:00

This is the most writing I have done all week...the people at the York asked me to write a short (ha!) history of Grossinger's...this is the result.

Author's Note by Stephen Cole

When Claibe Richardson and I first started working together we didn't have a project, so we just wrote some songs to get to know each other. During this time, Claibe would play me some Jewish sounding musical numbers from a show he had been working on for some time with Ronny Graham, Rita Lakin and Doris Silverton. This show was then simply entitled Grossinger's. I would politely listen and we would go on to our work which eventually turned out to be the beginnings of our musical adaptation of The Night of the Hunter. One day, early in our process on that serious and very ambitious project, Claibe asked me to read the latest draft of the big fat Broadway bound musical (it was being written for Lainie Kazan and Karen Morrow!). It seems that Ronny Graham had come up against a brick wall. So I read it. Well, they had strayed far away from the story of Jennie and the Catskills and Ronny had written a bizarre Mel Brooks-ian treatment that defied description. He had also realized how far he strayed, threw his hands in the air dramatically and said he had had enough of Jennie, the Catskills and the show. Ronny was very dramatic! In this script, though, I saw the kernal of a story...what they had started with, the story of Jennie and her indomitable will and how, she, as woman ahead of her time, had built an empire in upstate New York. A haven for the Jews. Having spent many a childhood summer in those very Catskill mountains, I knew who she was. I knew the territory. I was Jewish! (Oddly enough neither Ronny nor Claibe were!) I knew I could write this show. If I could start all over. Claibe and I put Night of the Hunter aside (for a while we wrote both at the same time...The River Jesus playing comfortably in the background while we wrote songs about blintzes) and wrote a whole new first draft, with new plots, new songs, revised lyrics, everything. And the first place we brought it to was the York Theatre, who gave us the most wonderful reading directed by Larry Arrick starring Tovah Feldshuh as Jennie. This was still the big Broadway version of the show and it was a smash for one night only. The York was turning people away at the elevator. People (including columnist Peter Filicia who wrote about it) were standing on stage with the actors and seated in the aisles. The laughter and fun was permeating the air along with the imaginary smell of Jennie's famous rye bread. From the York we took the show to Ft. Worth, Texas. Of course! There we cast Ruta Lee and Gavin MacLeod and the "goyish" version of Grossinger's ran for over a month at the huge Casa Manana. Somehow, even in Texas, the Jews found us. And you know what? They weren't all Jews. They just loved the show. After that, there were options, and promises and suddenly it was very difficult to get such a huge show off the ground. So when a small theatre on Long Island (after doing the four character After the Fair, originally produced by the York, not so incidentally) asked to do Grossinger's I told Claibe that he wouldn't be getting that big orchestra he dreamed about, but maybe a small trio. He countered with, "why don't we make the whole show smaller?" I thought he was nuts. Jennie's huge epic saga small? Then I got the idea of the Grossinger family telling us the story as part of one of their famous Saturday Night shows. The big stars are late and Jennie in her infinite egotism and brilliance saves the day and tells the story of how she made it all happen. Along the way, her family teaches her a lesson or two about herself. Wow! A whole new book happened, more song changes and a reading out on Long Island with Claibe and me singing the score (including the last song he would write ironically entitled "Dead on Her Feet"...for sadly, Claibe did his final Grossinger rewrite and departed for heaven before the production could take place). The production on Long Island happened (starring my good friend FD) and it was attended by my good friend Jim Morgan of the York, who gave me some great artistic advice and filed the show under "the future" in his head. I took the advice, did another rewrite and the show was produced in its 6 character version at Theatre West in LA, where it proved a critical and popular hit, running for four months...In LA time that's years! It starred Barbara Minkus and Barry Pearl and they made the show so much their own that when a new production was mounted last Winter in Ft. Lauderdale, it was inevitable that they once again play their roles. And now, "the future" has finally arrive and Saturday Night at Grossinger's is coming home to roast at the York Theatre once again. What a full circle! Janet Hayes Walker, who was there at that fabled first reading would be so surprised and thrilled. Ronny, who died in 1999 would be in shock! Claibe, who sat on the board of the York for years, would be delighted. As for me, well, it's like Jennie and the entire Grossinger family sings in the opening and closing of the show..."Welcome Home!"

Winter Watch

2007-03-16T15:02:00.000-07:00

From 70 to snow, sleet and ice. Welcome to March. Today was so ugly out that I hardly got out the door. Still fighting a remnant of Monday's stomach thing. Doing some small edits and cuts for Monday's Grossinger thing. Not enough money is coming but all we need is one big one. One fish. Maybe Piano Bar will benefit from Grossinger's on Monday. Hate to be cryptic, but it could happen. Stay tuned.

The Singing Jew

2007-03-14T19:32:00.000-07:00

Woke up this morning to rehearse with the lovely Lynne Halliday and the lovelier Matt Ward for monday's backer's thingie of SNAG (Saturday Night at Grossinger's) and felt a little like a relapse was upon me. But then the phone rang and Matt postponed the rehearsal for an hour and that was okay with me. At noon we rehearsed and I sang my little heart out for two hours. The adrenaline must have kicked in as I did feel better after singing. The second part of the day was taken up with watching the footage from Piano Bar with my co-director and producer of that hilarious project. It was scary to see at first but then I really got into how funny it was and how amazing the audience reaction was. No sweetening needed here. They were screaming at everything. Why this show isn't running every night is beyond my comprehension. But Joe is working as hard as he can and I am sure we will get a good run out of it someday soon. Tomorrow the singing Jew continues as I rehearse The Road to Qatar! for a presentation next thursday. I guess all those singing lessons are coming in handy...not! The older I get the more I know how to just belt it out and let the chips fall where they may. The ghost of Merman possessed me and I'm off to the races. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Between Murders

2007-03-13T11:24:00.000-07:00

The story goes that Libby Holman, the great torch singer, who stood trial and was acquitted of murdering her husband Smith Reynolds (she was pregnant with his child...shades of Chicago!), was backstage at some show when Tallulah Bankhead introduced her..."this is my friend Libby Holman...she's between murders now." That's how I feel sometimes. If you equate shows with murder. Last week I was just recovering from the Kander and Ebb ( the sad news is that there is no video, but there are many great still photos and I hope to post them one of these days) and now I am getting ready for Monday night's backer's audition of Saturday Night at Grossinger's as well as a private audition of the score of The Road to Qatar for a potential director. All next week, meaning I put on my singing and acting cap and let the writer stand aside. The week after that back to writing as I go visit Jeff Saver in Ohio and get back to revising Time after Time. In between all this I got the famous stomach virus that has been going around and yesterday was not pretty...it made me miss the Pittsburgh CLO reunion, but perhaps I didn't really want to go to that anyway. I am feeling better today and need to get back to work. No more between murders.

Blightline

2007-03-11T14:44:00.000-07:00

Well...Marni gets booked on Nightline on Friday night and it's a great piece except for one small detail...not one fucking mention of the book! The book sits there in full view on Henry Higgin's couch right between Marni Nixon and Cynthia McFadden and no one mentions it exists. National exposure down the drain. And to add a cherry on the sundae, McFadden gets the facts wrong..."so Marni, you sang all of Audrey Hepburn's songs and she got an Oscar nomination...do you think that was right?" Marni, flustered, said she thought that was fine. But Audrey was denied a nomination literally because of all the brouhaha over the exposure of Marni's voice coming from her lips...Julie Andrews being denied the role didn't help matters either. All Cynthia had to do what look at the book on the divan! Or even mention it. Arrrrrrrrrgh! Serenity now...serenity now...

Time after Grossinger's

2007-03-09T15:07:00.000-08:00

Last night after American Idol (my good friend FD wants me to do a parody show called American Ethel, in which all the contestants have to imitate Merman singing all these contemporary pop songs...he swears it can be fixed and I can win, but I am leery), I finally got to editing and writing the script for the upcoming backer's audition of Saturday Night at Grossinger's. It was a very good thing to do, not just because I really HAVE to do it, but because having to write concise narration for scenes that we are not playing made me make sense of the end of the show in a way that didn't make enough sense in the real playing script. This has led me to think about how I might rewrite it and say what I really want to say. The ending is tough. It's fake in a way to have Jennie come to the realization that her family should come first. The real Jennie Grossinger was a business woman and a star first. The family came last. But I want to say more than what it says. I want her father to make her realize that she somehow needs to incorporate her family, her marriage and her children in her career. To be more fulfilled. It's hard. But I feel like saying what I want to say in narration might bring me closer to what I want to say in the show itself and that I might be on to something more interesting. Today I printed the script for Time after Time and did a little rewrite on the very opening of the show. Sending it off to a director who expressed great interest and loves the songs on the CD. And the good news is that Jeff wants me to come out to Ohio for a few days and work on the show. That's great for him that he feels he can work at all after what he has been through. But work is the great cure-all and he needs to write music. The book is in suprisingly good shape and reads very well. I don't really know what I want to do to it, but I know I want every song to be as good as the very best ones are. There are a few that are not there yet. And I want John to have better material (John being Jack the Ripper) HG and Amy have the best stuff now. Picked up the pics from Monday night's big Kander and Ebb Evening and they are fabulous. I will try to post the group shot on here for anyone who is reading this to see.

My Fair Marni

2007-03-07T21:15:00.000-08:00

Went to the 10am dress rehearsal of My Fair Lady at Avery Fisher. It was surprisingly well done...well directed by Jim Brennan, well cast...two very strong leads...took Harry Arends who really appreciated it. Unfortunately we didn't get to see Marni Nixon afterwards. She had to do publicity. I wanted her to autograph the two books Harry bought (I already autographed them, but she would make them worth more!) I am so glad I met Harry. It's rare that I connect with a colleague this well...He is smart and nice and I hope we can work together more in the future. The film stuff we have done together is so rewarding. Unlike live theatre, it's there to see again. Otherwise I relaxed today. Tomorrow I have to get back to the gym and write the script for the Grossinger backer's audition on the 19th.

Tuesday Afternoon at Grossinger's

2007-03-06T20:26:00.000-08:00

So, after waking up feeling like I had been hit by a truck...a truck named Kander and Ebb...we all gathered (we being Barbara Minkus, Lynne Halliday...formerly Lynne Kolber...David Armstrong and Matthew Ward) to go thru the songs we are going to perform on Mar. 16th as a backer's audition for Saturday Night at Grossinger's. Minkus of course knows her stuff, but Lynne has never heard it and as for me, I may have written this and sung it forever, but I have never really sung backup or played Paul who has a new song I adore, but hey this is hard shit! I might have to actually learn the song which is a counterpoint song. I can't just get by on my good looks and loud Merman notes. That's for the star to do. Minkus goes back to LA to rehearse with Barry Pearl and Lynne and I will rehearse again next Weds with Matt...then they return to NYC the day of the evening and we rehearse a little and do it...hoping to raise 250 thousand dollars in 45 mins. Stranger things have happened. Stay tuned.

A Triumph!

2007-03-05T21:32:00.000-08:00

What a day! I know that putting together all star tribute benefits is gruelling and that it all comes together (or not) on the day of the performance when the sound, lights, and performers all come in and do their thing during the day of the show and then show up and do the show without ever having run it through. It's vaudeville at its scariest. Today was the first time I was totally in charge as producer, director and writer of the event and for the most part it went well. There were sound issues in the hall but we solved them eventually by calling in pros (thank you Barbara Minkus) and the evening's event went extremely well. The video montage was spectacular and the talent was beyond reproach with Marin Mazzie killing with Ring them Bells, Karen Ziemba moving me with Love and Only Love, Deb Monk doing her thing with Everybody's Girl. Barbara Cook was the highlight just mesmerizing with Among My Yesterdays from the Happy Time. Liza was valiant and courageous and did her three number, but a cold held the high notes in check. Still she is a trouper and a half and she was THERE! A big big star. Kander was moved and loved it all I think. It was a triumph. The birthday cake at the end...everything. I was proud of me and now may I please collapse? No. Tomorrow I have to rehearse Saturday Night at Grossingers. Well, back to reality and my own shows.

The Day Before Kander and Ebb

2007-03-04T15:36:00.000-08:00

Well, tomorrow is the big Kander and Ebb Tribute and I am nervous. Everything is going fine, but the strange lack of control I feel and the enormous burden of being all alone on this is leading me right to valium closet. There will be sound and light checks in the afternoon...some people are not coming in, but Liza IS. What a pro! I finished the script for Sheldon Harnick early last evening after having seen the matinee of Curtains! I am so glad I got to see the show so that I could hear the song that David Hyde Pierce is going to sing tomorrow night before tomorrow night. It's a charm song and I placed it slightly differently after hearing the gentleness of it. It's very sweet but not a drop dead show stopper. So I switched it in the program with Everybody's Girl sung by the great Deb Monk. That we know is a show stopper. So how did I like Curtains? I liked it, but am still formulating my feelings. As someone close to the show said, it's not art...although there is an art to not being art as well. There are some good songs and all the performances are top notch. I can't wait to see how the critics deal with it. The audience certainly had a good time. I did too, but I think the first fifteen minutes needs trimming and I wish there were a killer opening number. The show really starts when the detective shows up. He is the star. David Hyde Pierce. I also wish it were a more emotional show in some way. I really miss the big emotional grandeur of John Kander's Rink, Spider Woman and Visit scores. But this is an out and out musical comedy and the choices were made. It's interesting comparing it to my own Road to Qatar! I don't have much emotion in that either. It's an out and out musical comedy. Would I like my own show if I paid to see it? Good question. But content dictates form and both shows content dictated musical comedy approaches and not a lot of emotion. How did The Drowsy Chaperone do it? I was in tears at the end. They pulled off the big trick. Funny funny funny and then wham...tears. I think that's why it's a great success. Well, the next time I write here will be a report of tomorrow at the Morgan. Fingers crossed, legs broken, mirrors covered...no, not that...I'm not sitting shiva! Wish me luck anyone who is reading this!

PS on Kander and Ebb

2007-03-01T14:51:00.000-08:00

I have dedicated Monday's evening to Daniel McDonald and Memby...

A Kander and Ebb and Qatar Week

2007-03-01T14:44:00.000-08:00

Well, most of this week has been spent producing the Kander and Ebb Tribute coming up on Monday evening. Everything is moving along, getting sound checks together with the stars, figuring out the order of the evening, even writing the intros that Sheldon Harnick will read. Then it all comes together on Monday. Scary! I still have my big stars...Liza is still singing three songs, Barbara Cook is still on board...all the Curtains guys! It's exciting and scary. Doing this on my own is odd...producing (not really directing, but conceiving) and writing. But I can do it and it will be a great success...Also heard the rest of the changes for Road to Qatar and now it's time for David and me to rehearse the score so we can present it well. This new draft seems good to me, but we will not know till we do another reading. Comedy is hard. Next week, after Kander and Ebb is done, on to Grossinger's and rehearsing the backer's audition.

A Weekend Among Friends

2007-02-25T08:16:00.000-08:00

Just back from Memby's viewing and funeral service in Ohio. I was lucky to get out of Pittsburgh this morning with the freezing rain conditions. Jet Blue cancelled the flight and with the help of my private, personal and very handsome travel agent, I booked on American and got in. I was overwhelmed by the numbers of people (hundreds) who lined up to view Memby's close casket and console Jeff and her incredibly large and warm family. I think all of Youngstown was there. She was so loved. The funeral the next day was SRO as well and beautifully handled with music and prayer and speech and celebration for her life. The most amazing part of this trip was meeting so many of Jeff Saver's friends from childhood and high school. They took me into their group and made me feel a part of them. They all knew our work and of course Jeff has spoken of me, but to meet them was akin to meeting his family back in 1995 when they all came to see Dodsworth at Casa Manana in Ft. Worth Texas. His whole immediate family was there (including his late parents) and they took me into their tribe and we sang them freshly minted songs from the score and cried together from the beauty of it. It's an occasion I never will forget. My family was not there. But it wasn't just that I was jealous of his closeness but that for the first time I saw that such families exist. And this weekend I saw how longlasting friendships can nurture and heal as well...Jeff is very special and has surrounded himself with special people. I am proud to part of the circle. It's going to be very hard for him now to come back to his life, but I am in hopes that Time after Time will come back to life and we will get to work again. Meanwhile I want to have Jeff a tune for the lyric I wrote about Kander and Ebb and present it to John Kander for his 80th birthday. This would be therapeutic for Jeff I think. I hope so anyway. May I just say this goodbye to Memby who was a wonderful wife to Jeff and a great mother to Mariela and Rosalia. They are her legacy.

A Lyrical Thought

2007-02-22T21:43:00.000-08:00

I have been thinking about the new lyric I tossed off (David said I wrote it faster than the title song for Aspire, which I know took me ten minutes or as long as it took to type it) the other day and which David says is an Arabic soft shoe...In the shower I was thinking about the larger implications of the lyric...the song basically says...One More Payment, One More Check, Give 'Em What they Want, or make 'em think that you do. It's about placating them and that its ok if they say we stink as long as we get what WE want, which is the money. Does this have political implications as well? Is this just what countries do? Make nice with certain Arab nations to get what they want...ie. the oil (incidentally the title of the Opening number of the show). Is this whole insane story of two short Jews writing a musical in the Middle East and enduring zany Arabs who have power over them a parable for what the US is going thru? Or is it just the true story? I always thought that this show was bigger than what it seems and suddenly this hit me. This song is very interesting and important...as David says. But what am I really saying?

Write or Wrong?

2007-02-22T21:34:00.000-08:00

Why does a theatre writer have to be a producer as well? Spend the afternoon meeting with the not for profit theatre that Saturday Night at Grossinger's planning our backer's audition for March 19th. How I would love to just say "see you there!" But it's a) not in my makeup and b) not possible in this day and age to just be a writer and hope that others will take your show on to success...was it ever? Either way, I am heavily involved in the planning and execution of said backer's audition including trying to get the right money people in the room. In the end, would I have it any other way? No. But I am stressed with the Kander and Ebb coming up (Liza is going to sing three songs...I am thrilled!) and having to hop a plane in the morning for Pittsburgh to get to Youngstown for Memby's funeral. I want to go of course and don't at the same time. Doesn't everyone feel that way about funerals? Meanwhile work goes on for Road to Qatar and David is very excited about the new music he has written and that makes me happy. I will hear it after Ohio and when I am back in nyc. Can't wait to report.

Charlotte Rae Day

2007-02-21T19:12:00.000-08:00

Went to Barnes and Noble to see Charlotte Rae and she drew a huge crowd. She did a whole nightclub act and was really marvelous. 80 years old and can still do it. Her comedy is right on and she still has a lot of voice left. She is shorter than my mother and that's saying a lot. My mother is so short she can walk under a coffee table in high heels and a picture hat. Charlotte is shorter. But she did take my mind off my up and down sadness today. I would love to be Charlotte's ghost and help her write her autobiography...I will try to push that.

Sad day

2007-02-21T12:50:00.000-08:00

Sad to report that Memby Saver has passed away. I have been guarded about talking about it, but it's been well over a year since Memby was diagnosed with colon cancer and it's been a long and valiant battle. She was in much pain and this morning she was finally taken out of it. I have known and collaborated with Jeff Saver since the early 90s and have known Memby since he met her and she has been a great booster of our work and a wonderful wife and mother. She had many great talents of her own. I will never forget going to see her perform as a Salsa singer at a club in New York. This modest thin girl turned into the sexpot of all time on the stage as she undulated and entertained in a way that I have never seen. It was a total theatrical transformation and was astounding. I will miss her. I will miss complaining about Jeff to her and knowing that she not only understood him, but was rooting for us to be wildly successful with our shows. We will be and she will know it.

Voice from the Past

2007-02-20T21:35:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I heard a voice from the past on my answering machine. The greeting began "Hello, Genius of the Universe!" I knew that hyperbole could only belong to David Bell, my collaborator and delightful partner in crime on Casper the Musical. I had called David's cell phone last week as a favor to Jeff who found out that David was now teaching (heading the dept?) at Northwestern U and Jeff wanted an intro. I was so happy to call David who, as it turns out was in Paris doing a show, which is why it took him a week to get back to me. His message was long, effusive, complimentary and dear...everything that David Bell is. He mentioned my shows (both with Jeff) Dodsworth and Time after Time, especially the later. I assume he got the CD we made of the live concert that featured those two shows sung by Judy Blazer, Liz Callaway, Christian Borle and Walter Charles. David seemed very interested in helping us get Time after Time on and that would be just dandy for so many reasons, not least of all the fact that the long term option was uncerimoniously dropped recently and that to have the prospect of a production would be so good for the show and even better for Jeff. I hope it can happen. I hope to talk to my voice from the past and get working with him again. He also mentioned me coming to Northwestern to do some master classes...wouldn't that be a kick! I have a lot to teach and would love to do that.

Give 'Em What They Want

2007-02-20T21:07:00.000-08:00

Working through all the new and revised Road to Qatar material inspired me to come home and write another new lyric where a reprise was not quite cutting it. I thought it was good but when your composer questions you and you don't have the right answers, you start to realize perhaps you could come up with something better. So instead of the reprise that underscored the scene, this new lyrics "Give Em What They Want" doesn't just comment on the scene but helps to propel it as one character tells the other to make the Arabs happy even though they are giving tons of notes. Cause it's all about getting that final payment. I think it's going to be a great new addition to the score. Hurry up David and write the music.

Afternoon Delight

2007-02-20T16:04:00.000-08:00

Had a lovely lunch with the delightful Susan Jacks. Susan has played Gypsy in all of our Piano Bar incarnations and has always more than killed with her brilliant 15 minutes (she's brilliant and so am I)She makes the audience laugh and feel great and I adore working with her. Hope we get to do it again real soon. Afterwards I went to hear most of the musical changes for Road to Qatar! David did a wonderful and incredibly speedy job, rewriting, recomposing, writing new stuff, stitching, hemming, everything that was prescribed and needed. He got up to the new audition sequence and we figured out a better way for it to happen and so he is redoing some of what he already redid. This is a very important moment and needs to be a kind of mini showstopper I think. It's all based on the song Behind Every Story, which was the opening number of Aspire. There will be five counter melodies and they will all come together in a musical tour de force if we are lucky. Behind Every Story was the first song that we wrote when the commission for Aspire came through. It was a lyric I had worked on way before Aspire and then redid as soon as I realized it would work as an opening number for that show. I can recall hearing the tune for the first time and realizing that I was a very lucky boy to have been arbitrarily paired up with Mr. Krane. He was able to capture everything in that first song. The Qatarian folk themes, the grandeur of the song, the telling of the story. Now we are taking the basic song and building on it. Can't wait to see how it works out. Other news of the day is that Liza is almost definate for the Kander and Ebb. This is amazing...I dare not even hope too hard. She is the finale I needed and of course she should be there but getting a major A list star is a coup for me and for the Morgan Library. The line up is now Karen Ziemba, Deb Monk, David Hyde Pierce, Cady Huffman, Jason Danieley, Marin Mazzie, Barbara Cook, Liza with Sheldon Harnick as host! Wow!

Post Script for a Saturday Night

2007-02-17T21:00:00.000-08:00

Jeff called and it's only a matter of days not weeks, he said. Unfair is the word...

Another Saturday Night of Winter

2007-02-17T19:10:00.000-08:00

Finally let Act II of Road to Qatar go and sent it off to David Krane. I am very pleased with it on paper and have even changed all the names from Stephen and David to Michael and Jeffrey...why? A good friend asked me why change the names...well...I just had a feeling that I would be freer to do what needed to be done with the story if I wasn't tied to the real names. Then if it's not totally true, it's the story of Michael and Jeffrey, not Stephen and David. Actually it has become truer, if more dramatized. I also wanted to have as little to do with Title of Show, which not only used the author's names, but had the authors play themselves. Their story if not our story, but another show about musical theatre writers has got to not be like theirs...and then there's Guttenberg...wonder how that is doing or even how it IS. To me it sounds exactly like the very funny but strangely unsuccessful show of a few years ago called The Big Bang (authors played themselves in that too...I am happily retired from playing me in a fictional piece...I have enough trouble playing me in real life. Anyway, I will miss rewriting Qatar, but I have a funny feeling I will be doing so again...and soon. No news from Jeff and I am worried of course. I was oddly affected and saddened by the passing of Daniel MacDonald and I think I was thinking more about Jeff and Memby. I am so very worried.

Friday Night Wrap-up

2007-02-16T17:08:00.000-08:00

Well, I really had hoped to write in this blog every day (although who the hell is reading it, I don't know...anyone out there?), but it seems that every few days is more likely. The backer's audition for Saturday Night at Grossinger's is all falling together. It will be on Mar. 19th and both Barbara Minkus and Barry Pearl, the stars of the LA and Florida casts will be flying themselves in to perform in an elegant living room that has been donated by a very generous friend (she is also donating the coffee, cakes and booze, wow!) Matthew Ward, my collaborator on After the Fair, Casper, Merlin's Apprentice and the recent Drama League Gala will play for us and we hope to actually get some checkbooks open. This show could be so good for the York and for all of us, if marketed correctly. Bring in the Jews please. My Jews. My people who know the Catskills and are still alive enough to buy tickets. It will happen. Still working on the act II rewrite of Road to Qatar! David has done all his revisionary work on Act I and waiting for the rest. It's getting there. Polish, polish, polish...Had a meeting this AM with Ned Ginzberg about Kiss Me Guido and the rights etc. It will take some more time to get that sorted out and I hope that I really want to do it. The lack of phyical proximity between the songwriters (us) and the book writer (in LA) makes me very nervous, and his inexperience in crafting a musical theatre libretto, which I am so good at. Well, my biggest fear is that I will wind up writing half the book (or structuring it) and getting no credit or money for it. I have to sort that out in my mind. The Kander and Ebb is coming together, but so far no Liza...hmm...thinking of either having Sheldon sing Meeskite (if he will) or getting Ruthie Henshall and the boys to do All that Jazz. If I do that I have to change the video and I don't know if he has edited yet. I will write to Harry and find out and then make a decision (if she is even available and we can get the boys...maybe too much trouble) so the juggling of projects continues.

Tuesday Night with Stephen Cole

2007-02-13T16:34:00.000-08:00

Been busy with the continuation of Road to Qatar rewrites. Act I emailed to David Krane and today he read it and LOOOOVED it. Horray. He laughed out loud. I am excited. Act II is done but I am not happy enough to email more than half of it yet. The transition to Qatar (the last 1/4 of the Act) is not right yet and by moving the title song to Act I, I am denied the 11 o'clock number and even though I am reprising it with a new counter melody, I am not as excited about it. How to solve? Hmmm...not sure yet. Kander and Ebb continues as well. Things are falling into place musically and the only person I haven't heard from is Liza. I am concerned about certain budget items as we might have to shell out more for one of the accompanists than one would like, but the person being accompanied is worth it. Hope that works out. Had a meeting with the York people about Saturday Night at Grossinger's and it went well enough. We still have to raise a lot of money and are planning a backer's audition in March. After talking to David Armstrong today, it was agreed that it would be best to have not only Barbara Minkus do Jennie but to also have Barry Pearl come to NYC and do Sheldon's numbers and schtick for us. This will help raise more money than me doing the songs...brilliant as I am. I am not him. He is him. And David was so sweet in saying I was just too young and cute. I think he is a great director already. Barry and Barbara are both willing to come on their one buck. They know this is a great opportunity and that they will get to do the show in NYC and these are great roles for them as has been proven in LA and Florida. Now we just have to pin down dates and places...What a schmear! Onward and up as I say. We shall see what we shall see as Lucia says.

SATURDAY NIGHT

2007-02-10T19:28:00.000-08:00

Continued working on the rewrite of Qatar. Well into Act II now and I think I have fixed the audition sequence and made it slide into Bratislava, which I had skipped in the first draft. The work is fun and I am having a good time as long as I am writing away. The Kander and Ebb saga continues. Jeff will not be coming in to play or rehearse the show after all...something I have known would happen. So I need to make sure everything is covered musically. Charlotte Rae called again today and she is still unsure about doing the evening, even though she really wants to. It's all about staying an extra week in cold, freezing NYC. Who can blame her? If she does it, it would be great. If not, we will still have enough of a show for 45mins...I am sure we will have too much in fact. Took Granny to dinner tonight for his 70th. The food was great and we laughed a lot. Came back and watched Carol Channing's 1956 Person to Person. Granny fell asleep...like old times. Channing was interesting then. Almost human (not that I don't like her as a caricature...I do.) and watching her with her then football player husband and 2 year old child is odd...no wig, not much affectation. Just a person. I like her better as a character. More work tomorrow on Qatar and talk to David Krane...oh yes, it's time to change the lead characters' names from David and Stephen to Neil and Michael...They are not us anymore but people in a show. Frees us up I think...it's all still true, but hyper-true. And we have changed our names to protect...well us.

The Best of Days, the Worst of Days

2007-02-08T22:05:00.000-08:00

Did some very good work on Qatar today...not as much as the last couple of days, but sketched lyrics for each character that would counterpoint with Behind Every Story in the audition sequence...each character would sing their inner thoughts as the lyricist is singing the opening number of the show within a show to them. The Egyptian producer would sing about not understanding one word but that doesnt matter as long as he OWNS ever word. The Qatarian Movie star would sing about this year it's a musical and next year a movie starring me, without the songs of course, making him the Middle Eastern Tom Cruise. Nazirah, who has a crush on the American lyricist would fantasize about being married to him and moving to New York, finally leaving the Middle East behind. The composer at the piano would be singing about how they all seem rapt and loving his music (that is until he hears a stray snore coming from the producer). I think even the lyricist singing will have his inner thoughts revealed...he will realize that no one is listening to anything he is singing and that it's horrible to be performing in the window of a piano store just two blocks from the 2005 London Tube bombing. This could work. Saw Follies at Encores tonight. I knew I was letting myself in for a disappointment. I am now one of those people who say "but I saw the original!" Well, I did. And everytime (including the very exciting Philharmonic concert in the 80s) I see another Follies I cannot get the original out of my head and it will never be as good and that's that. Returned home to phone message and then two phone calls from my collaborator Jeff and his wife is not well at all. It is getting more obvious that he will not be coming to NYC to work on the Kander and Ebb (on a happier note, spoke to Charlotte Rae today and she MIGHT stay in NYC and do the show and sing YES from 70 Girls). Tomorrow we shall find out who will be playing the piano and musical directing the evening. It all makes me very nervous and there is too much on my shoulders here, but it's the way it is. Let's see what tomorrow brings.

Catching Up is Hard to Do

2007-02-07T13:23:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, after going to bed late (Rainbow Room see below) I woke up early (for me)...thank you Jet Lag! But I need all the waking time I can get. I gave one of my lectures for the Elderhostle groups I adore. I have given many of these now over the years. They are about, well, me! It's about my career as a writer in the musical theatre, but recently I have taken to including my writing of books as well. I usually cue up several videos and talk about how I have written musicals since I was 15 and show clips of my work. Lately though I have been telling the amazing but true story of how David Krane and I wrote Aspire as the first commissioned American musical to be presented in the Middle East. This story always goes over brilliantly and now that we have actually written (still writing) a musical called The Road to Qatar! The story has a great punch line and is a big hit. The upside of doing these lectures is always that the people are so marvelous. These elders are far from hostile. They come from all over the country to enjoy theatre and learn something about the inner workings. And they appreciate every word I give them. The laughs are great. I love performing and I come away with more than they do. Yesterday was no exception. I came away with a very clear understanding of what is great about the story and I was inspired to really get down to finishing my rewrite of the first 20 or so pages of the show. So now I have new and reshaped material to send to David and he can get to work on recomposing (as opposed to DEcomposing, which one of my other collaborators is doing, but that's another story, never mind). I am excited again about the show and the truth of the matter is, the real fun lies in the writing. The rest is just the rest. Today I had a meeting at the Morgan Library about the Kander and Ebb evening and made some strides in the producing end. Got a sound and light guy and asked my friend Elliot to stage manage it for me. Still need some more talent, but it will come. Who knew I would have to produce this? Well, produce, direct and write...that's now my label. Onward and up! Taking a first class ride as we hit the road to Qatar!

After the Rainbow Room

2007-02-05T21:40:00.000-08:00

It's early Tuesday morning and the Drama League Show went very well. If it had been a first preview, we would know what to cut and prune and tomorrow it would be a much better show, but all in all, it went better than I expected. The videos went without a hitch and the material I wrote was clever and fast, even if there was a little too much of it. Dreamgirls started the night off with a bang and then my special material for Joanna Gleason and Jim Dale went very well. The Way You Look Tonight was lovely and the dance was stylish and Astaire-ish. The next two numbers were just okay and it took a while to recover. Heather MacRae following the wonderful post war musical film video montage brought the show up again...although in a ballady soft way. What we needed was a big dance there but we had several slow numbers in a row. The Tarzan number with film went over well and the flop medley did pretty good too, Brinberg is good, wish we could have made him funnier tho...if I had been here I might have helped with that. The other Flop medley people were great troupers...loved them. Rita Moreno was surprisingly good singing I Never Has Seen Snow. Much better voice than I suspected. I boldly approached her about writing a book with her. She was sweet but non-committally offputting. I will pursue it tho. All that Jazz went over very well and Ruthie Henshall certainly gives her all. I should ask her to be in the Kander and Ebb...the video was good at the end too. Spring Awakening was nice but not the Finale I wished it was. The evening was too long and boy did I have to pee! Still, in all better than the last one I wrote and saw (didn't see last year's) and Jim Dale and Joanna really gave their all. Dear people. Of course I came home and got blue immediately...from the high to the low...that's part of a theatre writer's life. And so the sun sets over the Rainbow Room and tomorrow I do my elderhostle lecture and they will surely revitalize me. On to Kander and Ebb...on to Qatar...on to on to on to...and to sleep...zzzz

Over the Rainbow Room

2007-02-05T16:08:00.000-08:00

It's been a few days since I have been able to write here. Last time I blogged I was on my way to London. The whole trip was heaven. From the business class seats on BA to the suite at the Berkeley (not Barclay) Hotel to the two brilliant shows (Billy Elliot...better the second time and Frost/Nixon) we saw and the two magnificent meals (one at the Boxwood Cafe and the other at the famous Ivy in the West End where Noel and Gertie dined after Private Lives). We also walked our feet off, taking no subways (the weather was great) and walking all the way up to the top of the dome at St. Paul's. Saw Granny for dinner at his place (He is coming over here today for a month and his 70th birthday) and all in all had too short but a wonderful trip. Today I returned to the freezing cold New York weather and climbed (in an elevator, thank you very much) all the way up to the 65th Floor at Rockefeller Center to the fabulous Rainbow Room to attend the rehearsal for tonight's Drama League Gala. There was some interesting and aggravating drama, but everything was resolved and now I am dressed to kill and ready to see what the hell we wrought. I think it's going to be a lovely evening and I going to be spending it with a dear friend who just became a grandmother but doesn't look it in the least. Dinner, show and glamour. And whatever I wrote will be said and sung and all will be well. I will report on the truth of that statement in my next post. Now, it's over the rainbow room for me.