Reprise! Broadway's Best has announced its "4th Annual Celebration of Reprise!," a gala benefit evening which will include a cocktail reception, silent auction, sit-down dinner and a performance of Gerard Alessandrini's Forbidden Broadway, directed by and starring Jason Alexander. Forbidden Broadway will perform one night only, Sunday, April 2 with the evening beginning at 5:30pm at the Skirball Cultural Center's Ahmanson Ballroom (2701 N. Sepulveda Blvd. in Los Angeles).
Forbidden Broadway will also star Susanne Blakeslee, Stan Chandler and Kristine Zbornik, with musical direction by
Brad Ellis.
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Forbidden Broadway was first seen at Palsson's Supper Club on New York's Upper West Side in January1982. Since then the formula has been the same: take the most familiar and popular numbers from Broadway shows, add wickedly hilarious lyrics by creator
Gerard Alessandrini and spot-on impressions by talented performers, and put the audience in stitches. It has become New York's longest running musical comedy revue and has won Drama Desk, Obie and Outer Critics Circle Awards.
Forbidden Broadway provides an informal and very funny history of the American musical theatre and it has remained one of the funniest evenings on or Off-Broadway," according to press notes.
Alexander (who appeared in the Reprise! production of Promises, Promises) won a 1989 Tony for Best Actor in a Musical for taking on various roles in Jerome Robbins' Broadway--among them, Fiddler on the Roof's Tevye and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum's Pseudolus. The actor, who starred as Max Bialystock in the Los Angeles company of The Producers, also appeared on Broadway in Accomplice, Neil Simon's Broadway Bound, The Rink and the original production of Merrily We Roll Along. Best known to TV audiences for his work as George Costanza on "Seinfeld," his other TV and film credits include "Duckman," Pretty Woman, Love! Valour! Compassion!, Shallow Hal and the TV musical versions of "Cinderella" and "Bye Bye, Birdie."
Cocktails and silent auction begin at 5:30pm; sit-down dinner at 6:30pm; and the performance at 8:00pm. Tables of 10 are $2,750 and $3,750. Single ticket prices are $275.00 and $375.00 and are tax-deductible. For tickets, call the Reprise! offices at 310-319-1111 or visit
www.reprise.org.
