BWW Blog: Ed Dixon of Casa Manana's OSWALD: THE ACTUAL INTERROGATION - Reunion with Betty Buckley

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Started the day with a TV interview in Dallas. Ben and I were interviewed live on channel 8 at noon, a beautiful studio, and the interviewer was quite versed on the topic and the play, very enjoyable. Then friends of mine arrived at the airport from Oklahoma and California. We all went to a high end steakhouse (it's called Silver Fox... so I originally thought it was a strip club) and had a mini-reunion. Was great to have them at the show and we took a lot of photos and drove them both back to their hotels afterward. A very enjoyable day.

Wednesday, November 13, 2013

Well, I finally crashed. Spent the entire day in bed and it was all I could do to get myself together by show time. As it turned out, many local actors came to the Wednesday night performance and the house was large and lively and responsive. My old friend Wendy Welsh (who starring in a production of my RICHARD CORY at Lyric Stage) came and we had a lovely reunion and since she knew everyone in the cast, a good time was had by all.

Thursday, November 14, 2013

Had another relaxing day. Went for sushi with the marvelous Montgomery Sutton... who knew that there was such great sushi in Texas? We went to Shinjuku Station for the second time and it is first rate sushi by anyone's standards. Earlier in the week I went to Blue Sushi with the delightful Anthony Fortino and it is also excellent, but not as excellent as Shinjuku. The show went marvelously although I dropped a small line and Ben covered for me. He did it so beautifully that I thought it was his error until he set me straight. Nice to have people on stage with you who totally have your back. James McQuillen, a terrific local musical director came to the show and we chatted afterward. (He did the orchestrations for my WHODUNIT... THE MUSICAL and it was great to see him.) I just heard that Betty Buckley is coming to the show tomorrow and that just thrills the pants off me.

Friday, November 15, 2013

Spent the day sightseeing with Zak Reynolds, one of the young singers who perform The Battle Hymn of the Republic during the salute to JFK at the end of the play. Spent a similar day with Anthony Fortino, another of those singers, the other day... they are both moving to NYC soon and I foresee bright futures for them both. Then came the show which went really beautifully with a very attentive audience. In the house were Steve Hobbs, who I went to high school with in Oklahoma and Steve Riley who worked with me at Casa in my debut season in 1969... wow, the memories. As a side note, there was an accident on the main road leading to work and I had to take a detour... got terribly lost and arrived one minute after half hour call. I am always a half hour early to this call, so being late made me hysterical. Was very glad when I finally calmed down and got on with the play.

Saturday, November 16, 2013

An uneventful day and then our penultimate show. There was a big responsive crowd and Betty Buckley was in attendance. Was so great to see her afterward and she was extremely gracious. She took many photos with me and the cast, and Betty insisted that we go into the concourse and have our picture taken in front of the YOUR OWN THING poster, which is the show in which we first met. It was really quite incredible to be there with Betty in the place where we got our start so many years ago. Many more old friends at the stage door and then the end to a very lovely day.

Backstage with darling Betty Buckley.

Betty and I in front of our YOUR OWN THING poster from 1970.

With Zak Reynolds at the Ft. Worth Botanical Gardens.

The cast of OSWALD with my book.

One of the final moments of OSWALD shot by Curtis Brown.

One of my favorite photos of OSWALD, also shot by Curtis Brown

At Blue Sushi with Anthony Fortino.

With Ben Williams at the stage door.