Previously reported by BroadwayWorld.com and now confirmed by PBS, to celebrate the one year anniversary of Liza Minnelli's Tony Award-winning performance "LIZA'S AT THE PALACE," American Public Television (ATP) will distribute the long awaited Special in December, 2009. Minnelli's unanimously acclaimed Broadway performances were sold out for five weeks in December last year and fans around the world have been eagerly anticipating news of the broadcast.
The television event will be directed by Matthew Diamond and Executive Produced by JoAnn Young, Craig Zadan and Neil Meron. In addition to the Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event, Minnelli received a 2009 Drama Desk Award for her performances at the Palace.
Now in her fifth decade as an internationally celebrated entertainer, she has won every major show business honor including an Oscar, an Emmy, a Grammy, and four Tony Awards, making her part of a select group of performers who have won the entertainment industry's top four achievement awards.
LIZA'S AT THE PALACE will be filmed in the Hollywood Theatre at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on Wednesday, September 30 and Thursday, October 1, 2009. All of the material performed during the New York engagement will be included. The program will capture many of her greatest hits and an affectionate tribute to her godmother, the late Kay Thompson, who was a groundbreaking singer-dancer, songwriter, vocal arranger and musical director/vocal coach at MGM Studios.
She will be joined on the program by her Broadway co-star and musical director, the legendary pianist, singer and composer Billy Stritch. Her quartet of dynamic singer/dancers, Cortes Alexander, Jim Caruso, Johnny Rodgers and Tiger Martina will recreate their roles as the Williams Brothers, which included the brilliant young Andy Williams and his talented siblings. The show will again be directed by Ron Lewis, the award-winning choreographer and director. Musical Conductor/Drummer is Michael Berkowitz, a well-known conductor of pop orchestras all over the world.
"This is an exciting project and we are thrilled to bring it to public television audiences," says Eric Luskin, vice president of APT's Premium Service. "We are very proud to work with a legendary entertainer such as Liza Minnelli, continuing our tradition of distributing top-rated musical productions to public television audiences."
Matthew Diamond's directing has brought him an Oscar nomination for Dancemaker, four Emmy Awards, three Director's Guild Awards and the Humanitas Award. He has directed many music specials as well as a long list of dramatic programming and is currently the series director for So You Think You Can Dance.
JoAnn Young has written and/or produced more than 50 television specials including documentaries and musical performances, such as Johnny Mathis - Wonderful, Wonderful! and Some Enchanted Evening: A Celebration of Oscar Hammerstein II, a star-filled entertainment special at City Center in New York City. She wrote two episodes of the Emmy award-winning six part series, Broadway, The American Musical, which were nominated for an Emmy and a Writer's Guild Award and won Golden cine Eagle Awards in 2005.
Craig Zadan and Neil Meron are the executive producers of the Oscar-winning movie musical Chicago and the producers of the film musical smash Hairspray. With Minnelli and Showtime, they "presented" the acclaimed, digitally-restored version of the Bob Fosse-John Kander-Fred Ebb Emmy winning television special Liza With a Z. All totaled, Zadan and Meron's films and television projects have won six Academy Awards, five Golden Globes, 11 Primetime Emmy Awards, and two Peabody Awards. For television, their movies have amassed 69 Emmy nominations.
