Tharon Musser

1925-2009

She was called the "Dean of American Lighting," and for over forty years, her lighting designs transformed Broadway stages. Six years after earning her MFA from Yale, she made her Broadway debut with the original production of a little play called Long Day's Journey Into Night. She quickly established herself as a versatile lighting designer, moving easily between straight plays and musicals, classical works and contemporary pieces. She was the designer of choice for Hal Prince, Michael Bennett, and Neil Simon, designing over 150 productions for those and other artists. Her first Tony came for her work on the landmark musical Follies, where her lights helped blur the past and present among the debris of a decrepit vaudeville theatre. Her design for A Chorus Line also won a Tony, and was the first use of a computerized lighting board, rendering the manual "piano board" obsolete. Her design for A Chorus Line was recreated for the recent Broadway revival. Her third Tony was awarded for the original production of Dreamgirls, in which she contributed to the non-stop, cinematic feel of the show.

Her expertise was on display in a wide variety of styles, including original productions written by Ionesco (The Chairs), Pinter (The Birthday Party). Albee (A Delicate Balance), and Coward (Tonight at 8:30). Her designs graced the original productions of the musicals Flora the Red Menace, Once Upon a Mattress, Applause, Mack and Mabel, The Wiz, 42nd Street, A Little Night Music, and Mame, as well as the first productions of such plays as The Lion in Winter, Same Time Next Year, Whose Life is it Anyway? and Children of a Lesser God. She was at home with revivals of classics such as Peer Gynt, A Touch of the Poet, The Imaginary Invalid, and Candide.

In the mid-1990s, she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's, but continued to work for several more years, delivering her final Broadway design for The Lonesome West in 1999. Musser died this week at the age of 84.

Friday Dance Party: All Aboard for Broadway

Joel Grey turned 77 this week, so how could I not include him in this week's Dance Party? Well, it was either Grey or David Cassidy, who also had a birthday this week. Want to feel old? Former teen idol Cassidy turned (get this) 59 on Sunday. yikes. I decided against dredging up one of those old clips from The Partridge Family, with everybody lip-syncing and Susan Dey pretending to play the synthesizer and Shirley Jones looking wildly out-of-place.

Instead, it's gotta be Joel Grey. I've already written a bit about Grey (a bit?), including seeing him on screen in his career-making role as the Emcee in Cabaret. But I've resisted the temptation to use one of those clips, and instead chosen a little-known one. After Grey's success in Cabaret, he headlined a couple of musicals which were not big hits. His 1975 flop Goodtime Charley attempted to musicalize (get this) the story of Joan of Arc, as seen through the eyes of the dauphin of France who later becomes Charles VII. Maybe this would have made an effective opera, but as a musical comedy, not so much. How could a show recover from an opening number sung by the warrior King Henry V and Queen Isabella of Bavaria? That show must have been a hoot to sit through: I mean, Ann Reinking as Joan of Arc?? Wow.

I actually saw Grey's later disaster, The Grand Tour, about which I have written here.

But years before those mistakes, Grey had a minor hit with his follow-up to Cabaret, George M! He played George M. Cohan, which was a good fit for his singing and dancing skills, but Grey has never been a particularly warm presence onstage, and the show was pretty chilly. (I have to say that I have seen Grey once more onstage, in a summer stock production of 1776, in which he was very effective as John Adams, who was, after all, a chilly fellow himself.) And George M. Cohan was not a particularly nice guy to play; he was an arrogant egomaniac who trashed two marriages and, as a producer, attempted to block the formation of the stage actors union back in the 1920s. (Can you tell I played the sucker? Well, I played him into the ground, back in 1983, and can confirm that tap-dancing is not my strongest suit.) Anyway, in 1970, a truncated version of George M! was broadcast on ABC; unfortunately, there has never been a video of that show released, so the clip below is a bit fuzzy. But it's fun, especially when you notice the actors playing Grey's sister, mother and father. Surely you recognize them, right?

By the way, whoever first loaded this clip onto YouTube obviously had no sense of comic timing. Otherwise he would have included the tag line. After this number, the producer watching the Cohans perform (the guy with the cigar) takes a beat and says, "I'll take the girl."

Drama Prom

The 25th Annual Helen Hayes Awards were held on Monday. It's commonly called the "Drama Prom" or "the city's biggest cast party," but I think of them as the Hayzies. (If you sit there long enough, you get a bit hazy, believe me.) The last time I attended, two years ago, the ceremony swept by in about two hours; this year, the awards stretched well beyond that time, though the show itself, moment by moment, did not seem to drag. The length of the show can be blamed on the handful of ties; five or six awards had to be awarded in duplicate, requiring duplicate acceptance speeches, etc. In addition, the Hayzies have not yet figured out how to manage those particular awards which bring dozens of people onstage at the same time. And this year, in addition to the large casts winning the "best ensemble" awards, all the local artistic directors (about 70 of them) were dragged onstage to be applauded by those of us in the audience who would like to be hired by them. A bit surreal, I think.

As far as the recipients, I really can't complain too much, since I certainly did not see everything that was nominated. It looked like Signature's Les Miz was the big winner (I wrote about seeing the show here), as I believe they won every acting category for which they were nominated except one: Leading Actor in a Musical. That award went, inexplicably, to David Margulies, who gave a charming but forgettable performance in The Happy Time. When the Hayes nominations came out, I lamented that Michael Minarik (above), who played the pivotal role in The Happy Time, was overlooked; from the gents who WERE nominated, I would have liked to see one of the guys from Kiss of the Spider Woman (above) win out. Ah, well...

I was pleased that Arena Stage's Next to Normal won several high-profile awards. None of the nominees from the show were in attendance, as they were all in previews for its Broadway opening on Wednesday (the New York reviews have been raves, and it now looks like Next to Normal is the show to beat at Tony Time...sorry, Billy Elliott...) I loved the show when it was here, though I wrote that I was disappointed when star Alice Ripley did not play the noon matinee I attended. She won a Hayzie, as did the kid playing her son, Aaron Tveit (this guy won the award over sentimental favorite Robert Prosky, who was nominated for The Price, and has since passed away. But Prosky's death had no chance to play a part in the voting: the numerical way in which the awards are determined means that all the scores for The Price, for example, were in place by the time the show closed, and could not be influenced by later occurrences like an actor's death.)

Though I was anxious to get to the afterparty, I still enjoyed the HH Awards Show itself. The musical interludes were nutty parody songs, delivered by a handful of local stalwarts, including that clown Rick Hammerly, who hammed it up effectively.

I suppose the moment which meant the most to me was the appearance of Ann Norton from the Washington Stage Guild, who has faced a mountain of sorrow in the past year, in addition to medical issues, but who strode onstage to present several awards with no hint of her recent history. The HH folks rightly gave Ann the honor of announcing the Best Actor in a Play award, including the reminder that the award will from now on be named in honor of the late Robert Prosky, a long-time DC presence. Ann is a lady (well, she'd call herself a broad) who could have justifiably Given Up about four tragedies ago, but has refused to do so. I'm very proud to call her my friend.


Whether they admit it or not, everybody goes to the HH Awards just to get into the reception afterward, a huge affair with buffet tables full of food and long lines at the open bar. It's great fun to roam the various banquet rooms provided for the event, and bump into folks you haven't seen all year. Of course, in such a huge crowd, there are those you miss, and I was disappointed not to encounter Floyd King, one of the evening's winners and an old buddy from The Shakespeare Theatre Company. Floyd actually took me to the first two HH Awards ceremonies I ever attended back in the 90s; perhaps some tongues wagged about that behind our backs...but then, that's also one of the joys of the Drama Prom: The Dish. It's all in good-natured fun, and never gets in the way of the familial feeling the event always celebrates.





This year I closed the place down, and felt the effects the next day too, but who cares? I own a tuxedo (actually own several, but that's another story) so I might as well break it out once a year:

(Thanks, Clinton, for this proof of the good time had by all.)

Theatre Droppings: Ion, Faithkiller, and One Fee Too Many

As I've previously mentioned, I'm spending several weeks here in DC attending a handful of general auditions at various local theatres. In my downtime, I've been trying to catch up with as much of the local theatrical offerings as I can, but I'm a bit stymied by my budget. In a nutshell, I have none.

But I was willing to toss a ten-spot into the till to see scrappy Taffety Punk's new play, The Faithkiller. It looks like an ambitious undertaking, considering the Punks have so little money and the performance space is so tiny, but my buddy Marcus Kyd, who directed the piece, pulls out all the stops anyway. There is even a play-within-the-play, or more accurately, a TV Series-within-the-play, and Marcus took the bull by the horns and actually filmed several scenes. These are the moments when the budgetary restraints seem particularly noticeable, but the cast is up to the challenge of this time-jumping work. In particular, Michael John Casey makes an impression in two smallish roles, as does Theo Hadjimichael as the latest victim of Hollywood-style ethnic cleansing. It was unclear to me from the program whether this is a world premiere, but even if it isn't, the playwright could clip a bit from the proceedings and perhaps sharpen his point.

I was able to catch a much bigger-budgeted show across town at The Shakespeare Theatre Company, which sells the last row of their balcony at the Harman Center for 20 bucks (sadly, they make no such discount at their other home, the Lansburg, which is why I was unable to see their recent production of Dog in the Manger). Ethan McSweeney directed a new adaptation of the Greek tragedy Ion, and it was kind of a hoot. The show was a delight whenever the chorus of women took focus; in Ethan's version, they were a gaggle of giggling tourist gals.

In fact, the whole show had a light-hearted quality to it, and Ethan was able to make the appearances of the gods fun, too (I find I usually lose interest whenever the gods make appearances in Greek tragedies). Aubrey Deeker opens the play with a Puckish performance as Hermes, sliding down from the heavens on a red scarf, while Colleen Delaney delivers the obligatory deus ex machina moment at the show's conclusion with a wry sense of humor.

Keeping to the constraints of my currently limited funds, I tried to catch one more show this week. I was excited to see (thanks, Facebook) that Fords Theatre was offering an Internet discount to its production of The Civil War, about which I have been curious. It's only the second show in the theatre since an expansive redesign (and since the replacement of Fords' infamous cane chairs, which could give the audience rickets), and the production boasts some folks I'd really like to see. My grad school co-hort Elliot Dash is in the cast, and I bet he is providing more proof of the adage that my friends are always the best things in their shows. (Here he is with Frank Wildhorn, who wrote the piece).

In addition to Ell, the show boasts some of the best local musical talent around. I would enjoy seeing Stephen Gregory Smith and Chris Sizemore, who are only acquaintances of mine, but always put on a good show.

Anyway, Fords was offering tickets for 25 bucks if you ordered online, and if you were attending the show in April. I immediately clicked the link, which sent me to Ticketmaster's site. Here is when the service charges started to mount up. (I am frankly astonished that Fords, a major LORT company here in town, is still using Ticketmaster, which has recently been in court on charges of fraud regarding a Springsteen tour. Fords certainly has the resources to provide their own online ticketing.) After choosing a pretty swell seat to see The Civil War, I was assigned an additional $4.95 "service fee" plus a one dollar "facilities fee." This "facilities fee" really rankles me; it's been around for years, and several of the larger theatres in DC tack it on to every ticket sold(Arena Stage is notorious for it). It is obligatory, but is not technically part of the ticket price, so does not have to show up on the books as box office income, and thus does not have to be included in any union negotiations regarding box office profits (actors' minimum salaries are determined by a theatre's potential box office income).

OK, so now this 25 dollar ticket is over 30 bucks. It's still a big discount from the regular price for a musical in DC. But just as I was typing in my credit card number to pay for my ticket, an additional "processing fee" popped up. What exactly is the difference between a "Processing Fee" and a "Service fee," and why do you need both?? This added an additional 3 dollars to my ticket, and I snapped. Sorry, Fords, you went one fee too far. I was willing to pay 30 bucks to see your show, but not 33, only because it is clear you are trying to gouge your audience, as well as hide certain profits from the labor unions. It's not like you are employing dozens of people to man your box office, answering phones and selling tickets; the whole damn system is AUTOMATED, but you still want NINE additional dollars for each ticket sold online.

So it looks like The Civil War will have to be fought without my attendance. I'm sorry to miss the show, but I have a hunch I know how it turns out. Those Yankees always win.

Friday Dance Party: Happy Easter!

Well, there can be only one possible choice for this week's dance party, right?

Easter Parade!

Everybody knows it's one the those classic movie musicals which everybody loves. I'm sure I would love it too, if I could ever sit through the thing. I admitted quite a while ago in these pages that I had only seen two Judy Garland movies from start to finish: The Wizard of Oz, and Judgement at Nuremberg. Since that first confession, I have seen one more: A Star is Born.



But you can catch enough of Easter Parade on Youtube to see that it's a stylish musical with plenty of swell numbers. And with stars like Garland, Fred Astaire, and Ann Miller, there are many musical treats from which to choose an Easter-themed Dance Party. (And Peter Lawford looks all suave and debonair... I wonder if he sings in the movie...)









So many possibilities from Easter Parade, it's been hard to pick just one! So watch this:

I guess there are TWO Easter movies out there...

Jack Wrangler

1946-2009

One of the few adult film stars to achieve general celebrity, Wrangler's unabashed homosexuality and his masculine self-confidence made him an icon of the early gay liberation movement. He was born into a Hollywood family (his father was producer/director Robert Stillman, his mother was a dancer in Busby Berkeley musicals) and he made his professional debut as a child on the Sunday morning program The Faith of Our Children, a religious drama series of the early 1950s starring Eleanor Powell (go here for Powell's Dance Party in these pages). He studied theatre at Northwestern University, considered at the time to be the top drama school in the country, and performed a few bit parts in The Mod Squad and Medical Center under his real name, John Stillman. He worked as a bartender and go-go boy in West Hollywood before joining the adult film world (he took his porn name from the label of his work shirt), and eventually achieved cult status. In the 80s, he crossed over into heterosexual pornography, but publicly maintained his homosexuality (he claimed his first sexual experience with a woman was onscreen).

Wrangler's celebrity might have remained in the gay subculture if not for his startling relationship with aging pop singer Margaret Whiting. The singer, whose hits included "That Old Black Magic" and "Moonlight in Vermont," was 22 years older than Wrangler, and their unusual pairing kept them in the limelight for decades. Though he never claimed to be straight, Wrangler said that he and Whiting saw things the same way, "comically, professionally, and romantically," and they eventually married. (Go here for my obit for Whiting.)

Anyone who saw a Wrangler film knew he was never padding his pants, though he may have padded his resume a bit. He certainly appeared in Robert Patrick's early stage classic T-Shirts, and he claimed to have appeared in Doric Wilson's gay play Forever After; the playwright himself disputes that claim. He has also said Wilson wrote A Perfect Relationship with him in mind. (Wilson replied, "I never even jacked off with him in mind.")

Wrangler moved out of the adult film industry soon after meeting Whiting, and began a career producing musical theatre and cabaret. He co-produced several revues celebrating the music of Johnny Mercer starring his wife, who was one of Mercer's favorite singers.

Since the 80s, Wrangler and Whiting have remained visible parts of the Manhattan theatre scene, and have been active in HIV/AIDS charities. Here they are with female impersonator Charles Pierce:

Wrangler: Anatomy of an Icon, a full-length (no pun intended) documentary about Jack's life and career, was released last year.

Jack Wrangler died from complications of emphysema and lung cancer this week at the age of 62.

'sNewz

...an occasional series mentioning current events which lately held my interest...

As the economy continues its free-fall, 3M, the company responsible for Scotch Tape and Post-Its, has joined the growing ranks of companies laying off hundreds and hundreds of workers. The employees in the Paris branch, however, did not take the pink slips lightly. They kidnapped their boss and held him hostage for days, attempting to force 3M to increase severance packages. The astonishing aspect of this story is this: apparently, this kind of thing is not all that unusual in France. Executives are often "non-violently detained" as hostages during labor disputes. As a member of several labor unions myself, I applaud this negotiating tool.

Did you hear they are planning a new Three Stooges movie? It's not a biography of the comedy team, but an actual film starring the Three Stooges, recast with current movie stars. Get a load of this dream team:

Apparently, Benicio Del Toro will be playing the VERBOSE one. Does anybody think this is a good idea? I am not, repeat NOT, a fan of the Three Stooges, whose comedy consisted of whacking each other over the head and making stupid noises. They were no Marx Brothers, that's for sure. Still, this casting seems...um...odd. Of course, the casting of Steve Martin to play Inspector Clouseau sounded right, and look how that turned out...

I'm not sure what to think here: Broadway giants Stephen Sondheim and Andrew Lloyd Webber (did you know they have the same birthday?) are both considering adapting well-known films into musicals. Sondheim's done this before, turning Swedish film Smiles of a Summer Night into A Little Night Music; this time, he's chosen Groundhog Day. Really? Groundhog Day? Well, if it's Sondheim, there must be something in the original piece that's, you know, original. I confess I've never seen it. I don't think I've ever seen a Bill Murray movie all the way through, except Tootsie. Is Groundhog Day the one with the Baby Ruth candy bar floating in the swimming pool? Wait, maybe that's Caddyshack...

(Can't leave this topic without a quick kudo to the late Lois Kibbee, pictured above, who was one of the grande dames of daytime drama, but who will forever be remembered for this reaction to that wayward candy bar...)

Lloyd Webber has chosen a more iconic film to screw up. Even as his Phantom of the Opera sequel, The Phantom Goes to Coney Island, seems to be heading down the tracks directly toward us, he has picked up the rights to, get this, The Wizard of Oz. There have been a dozen or more different stage treatments of that flick, including attempts to simply put the movie onstage. But Webber thinks they have all been bunk. He believes the film must be restructured to more adequately fulfill the requirements of a stage musical. It has no opening number, for example (I guess we should look forward to a big hootenanny with the Gale farmhands), or big numbers for the Wizard or the Witch. Webber plans to keep several of the film's Harold Arlen classics, and rewrite the rest. There are rumors that the role of Dorothy will be cast via a reality show (the Brits have used that technique for West End revivals of Sound of Music and Joseph's Dreamcoat, and Broadway saw its own version when the leads for the recent Grease were cast in a reality show format). There are even rumors that one of the judges for this one will be Liza Minnelli.

What, Lorna Luft refused to participate? I think I'm melting.

Hey, this guy passed away last week:

TOM BRADEN

1917-2009
Don't recognize him? He started his career as a CIA agent, but then morphed into a journalist, a failed politician (he lost a bid for California Lieutenant Governor in 1966), and, as the first co-host of Crossfire opposite Pat Buchanan, is credited with creating the now-common routine of pairing a liberal and a conservative on a talk show and letting them scream at each other.

Still don't recognize him? You probably know him better as this guy:

Braden's syndicated newspaper column regarding his home life, which became a memoir, was sold to television in the 70s and became Eight is Enough. At age 92, he had led a full life, but perhaps he was pushed over the edge at the news that former teen idol and Eight is Enough star Willie Aames went so broke he held a garage sale in Kansas City last month.

I've got some sympathy for Aames, who was a fairly big star in his heyday (he was also a regular on Charles in Charge). He has apparently struggled with substance abuse, and after his wife of 22 years threw him out of the house, he attempted suicide. Perhaps he's trying his best to get his act together (the fact that there was a film crew on hand to film the garage sale tells us he knows a little something about publicity).

But here's a guy for whom I am having trouble feeling much sympathy. Redmond O'Neal was busted over the weekend, yet again, for felony drug possession. He's been in rehab a dozen times, and I am deeply sorry that his mother, Farrah Fawcett, is apparently losing her battle with cancer. At this moment, with his mother back in the hospital, you would think the family's energy should all be focused there. But Redmond is a guy whose brother Griffin was once arrested for chaining him to the banister to keep him from leaving the house to buy drugs. And of course, sister Tatum's struggles with addiction are well-known, as are those of patriarch Ryan. So maybe there is something to that theory that there is an "addiction gene." But is there one for simple stupidity? Redmond (who admittedly has one of the perkier mugshots of the O'Neal clan) was arrested for heroin possession on Sunday, as he was going INTO the LA County Jail to visit an inmate.

Really, how stupid do you have to be, to walk into a police station carrying heroin?