'The Showtune Mosh Pit' for June 5th, 2013

THE LATEST IN UNAUTHORIZED GOSSIP AND BUZZ

FROM THE HEART OF CHICAGO'S SHOWTUNE VIDEO BARS,

AND MUSICAL THEATER NEWS FROM CHICAGO TO BROADWAY

by Paul W. Thompson

Overheard last weekend under the showtune

video screens at Sidetrack and The Call:

It was controlled pandemonium at the Park West on Monday night, June 3, 2013, as the Joseph Jefferson Awards committee passed out the awards from their Non-Equity Wing to a capacity crowd. Yours truly was among those on hand as the 40th anniversary of the non-Equity Jeffs was marked by special video tributes, old hands at the podium and the ever-present energy of young talent working its way up the ranks and into the world of the Chicago theater community. The big winner in the showtune categories was the Theo Ubique Cabaret Theatre production of "Smokey Joe's Café," which took home three awards, equaling its winning tradition from January's presentation of the BroadwayWorld Chicago Awards. "Joe" won Jeff in the categories of Production - Revue, Direction of a Musical or Revue (Brenda Didier) and Music Direction (Jeremy Ramey). But which home did the awards go to? The show, which ran last fall at the No Exit Café, transferred to the Royal George Cabaret Theatre this spring, where it's still going strong.

The other big musical winner was the Pride Films And Plays world premiere of "Under A Rainbow Flag," which won not only New Work (for author and composer Leo Schwartz) but Production - Musical as well, a seemingly rare feat. The other musical awards were spread out indeed, with Brigitte Ditmars winning for her choreography of Circle Theatre's "Reefer Madness," Kate Setzer Kamphausen besting her straight play competition to win for her Costume Design of "Sexy Baby" (Hell in A Handbag Productions) and the musical acting awards going to performers in four other shows: Kelli Harrington ("Aspects Of Love," Theo Ubique Cabaret Theatre), Peter Oyloe ("Hank Williams: Lost Highway," Filament Theatre Ensemble), Danni Smith ("See What I Wanna See," Bailiwick Chicago) and Jason Richards ("Avenue Q," NightBlue Performing Arts Company). Harrington is a repeat winner from last year's Jeffs, when she won in the same category for Theo's "The Light In The Piazza." Brava/o to everyone!

Jeff-Awards-Honor-Excellence-in-Chicago-Theatre

Next up in the awards season is New York's biggest theater night, the Tony Awards. And BroadwayWorld Chicago, the Showtune Mosh Pit and Paul W. Thompson Music are teaming up with The Call nightclub, the site of the last three BroadwayWorld Chicago Awards Celebrations, to bring you a Tony Award Viewing Party! No more worrying about what you're going to do on Sunday evening, June the 9th. Come one, come all, to The Call! After you've spent the afternoon at Midsommarfest, the Andersonville neighborhood's annual street festival, just mosey on up to the north end of the strip, to 1547 W. Bryn Mawr, between Clark and Ashland. VJ Michael Hogan will begin playing showtune videos at 4:00, and the Viewing Party begins in earnest at 6:00, with yours truly as host. I've got "Chicago At The Tonys" trivia for you! Bone up now! Prizes and fun, what's not to love? The broadcast from New York is from 7:00-10:00 Central Time, and the party will go on until 11:00 or later. The Call is open until 2:00 am. I plan on seeing you there!

Summer-Parties?-BWW-Chicago-Has-Three-Big-Events-at-The-Call-This-Summer

From Tony to "Tommy," as the following night, June 10th, we will get a return engagement of a one-night only event that went so well, they booked another night! Michael Mahler's band, The Lincoln Squares, Stef Tovar's Route 66 Theatre Company and director Rachel Rockwell mounted the original The Who album, "Tommy," on May 6th at Stage 773. They are all back again for another crack at this seminal achievement in the rock musical, at Martyrs', at Lincoln and Grace, 8:00 pm, $8.

https://www.martyrslive.com/cart

Another one-night-only event has come back, only it's changed its content, its cast and the length of its welcome. I'm talking about "The Second City Guide To The Opera," the collaboration between two of our city's world famous performing arts organizations, The Second City and Lyric Opera Of Chicago, which first teamed up on January 5, 2013. That night's event was a gala, hosted by Renee Fleming and Patrick Stewart, which skewered conventions of the opera world through the talents of sketch comedy writers and opera singers. It was deemed so successful that a month-long run of similar material was booked, now running from May 31-June 30. Audiences sit on the fabled Civic Opera House stage on Wacker Drive, and a cast of eight (six comedians and two singers, though everyone does both) perform in a sketch comedy revue format. It's Joey Bland, Molly Brennan, Lili-Anne Brown, Lauren Curnow, Bernard Holcomb, Beth Melewski, Tim Ryder and Tim Sniffen. I think it's musical theater! Somebody go and tell me....

The Second City Guide To The Opera

Not an opera but a comic opera, aka an English operetta, aka the oldest music theater work in English performed regularly by American theater companies--I'm talking about "H. M. S. Pinafore," the 1878 masterpiece by W. S. Gilbert (book and lyrics) and Arthur Sullivan (music), which will run for the next two weekends in Evanston's Cahn Auditorium, courtesy of Light Opera Works (June 8-16). It will be directed and choreographed by the company's artistic director, Rudy Hogenmiller. Hogenmiller's longtime partner, Chicago theater legend James Harms, stars as Sir Joseph Porter, the guy who has a lot of "sisters and cousins and aunts." Big-voiced Michael Cavalieri, who was Count Carl-Magnus in LOW's "A Little Night Music" four summers ago, is back as Captain Corcoran.

Light-Opera-Works-Presents-HMS-PINAFORE-Opening-6-8

Next week will bring us (for one week only) a return of the national tour of "West Side Story," that jazzy Latin dance musical by that most classical of the standard Broadway composers, Leonard Bernstein. The revival direction by the show's late bookwriter, Arthur Laurents, has been recreated for this tour by David Saint, and Jerome Robbins' Tony-winning choreography is recreated once again by Joey McNeely, who danced for Robbins in the Tony-winning "Jerome Robbins' Broadway" back in 1989. Oh, yes! The show's "pretty, witty and bright" lyrics are credited to one Stephen Sondheim. The show will mambo its way into the Oriental Theatre from June 11-16. Maybe it will bring a sizzling summer with it!

http://www.broadwayinchicago.com/westside13

Down the hallway from "Smokey Joe's Café" at the Royal George Theatre is "The Pianist Of Willesden Lane," speaking of classical music in the theater. This one-woman play about music, and so much more, has been extended for a second time, through July 7th. Radio host Mona Golabek ("The Romantic Hours") stars as her own mother, who was evacuated from the war-torn continent to England, losing the rest of her family in the Holocaust. It got great reviews, peeps.

http://www.theatreinchicago.com/the-pianist-of-willesden-lane/6291/

The company that produced "Smokey Joe's Café" (and yes, it's everywhere, peeps!), Theo Ubique Cabaret Theatre, recently announced its 2013-14 season. And it's a fascinating one! It all starts off with Terrence McNally's play "Master Class," which will star the two-time Jeff Award-winning actress Kelli Harrington as Maria Callas, the legendary opera diva (October 11-November 24). Director David Heimann will craft "A Very Merry Madrigal" for the holidays (November 16-December 22), and then the company's second year of "January Cabaret" nights will see a different show each weekend between January 3-26, 2014. In the spring slot of classy musicals set in Europe (following 2012's "The Light In The Piazza" and 2013's "Aspects Of Love"), the company will offer the Tony-winning musical "Passion, directed by Fred Anzevino and musical directed by Jeremy Ramey (March 7-April 27). And one year from now, David Heimann will again helm a new revue, the third summer Theo show in a row with musical direction and arrangements by Aaron Benham. The 2014 entry in that series will be "A Musical Tribute To The Andrews Sisters" (June 13-August 3). Expect Theo Ubique to factor prominently in the next few local awards shows, that's all I'm saying.

Theo-Ubique-Cabaret-Theatre-Announces-2013-14-Season

We also learned about the upcoming season from Bailiwick Chicago, and the aforementioned Aaron Benham will be a busy young man a year from now! In addition to this work on Theo's Andrews Sisters show, he will be the musical director for Bailiwick's production of the rarely seen, Tony-winning musical "Applause," to be directed and choreographed by Christopher Pazdernik (May, June and July of 2014). Bailiwick's production will play in the Richard Christiansen Theater, upstairs at the Victory Gardens Biograph Theater on Lincoln Avenue. And I thought I saw somewhere that Katherine Condit will star as Margo Channing. Can't wait!

bailiwick-chicago-theater-announces-2013-14-season

And lastly, I would like to invite you to my own personal cabaret performance, outdoors on the plaza at St. James Cathedral, just off the Magnificent Mile in Chicago's River North neighborhood, next Thursday, June the 13th. St. James offers a Thursday afternoon series in the summertime called "Music In The Neighborhood," and I'm entry number two. My show is called "This Is Not Over Yet: Paul W. Thompson Sings Broadway Songs Of The Millennial Era (1995-2003)," and it's been a blast to put together. Watch BroadwayWorld Chicago in the next few days for the official announcement of my set list. And I hope to see you there, at 5:30 pm on the 13th! It should be a great rush hour diversion for you showtune fans, and something of a stylistic adventure, too. There was a lot going on at that time! That's why I chose it.... See you then, if not sooner!

http://www.saintjamescathedral.org/music-in-the-neighborhood/

So, between the Tony Award Viewing Party on Sunday and Music In The Neighborhood next Thursday, I may see you a lot! Cause, I'll see you under the video screens on the usual appointed nights: Friday, Sunday, Monday, Wednesday,...won't I?....-PWT

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