News on your favorite shows, specials & more!

Joan Rivers Makes Bass Hall Debut 11/2

By: Oct. 25, 2011
Enter Your Email to Unlock This Article

Plus, get the best of BroadwayWorld delivered to your inbox, and unlimited access to our editorial content across the globe.




Existing user? Just click login.

Performing Arts Fort Worth is set to present An Evening with Joan Rivers at Bass Performance Hall on Wednesday, November 2, 2011, at 7:30 p.m. Tickets start at $27.50, and are on sale NOW!

Joan Rivers is a force of nature and one of the hardest-working celebrities in the world. An entertainment legend of unparalleled accomplishment and talent, she's an internationally renowned comedienne, Emmy-winning television talk show host, Tony-nominated actress, best-selling author, playwright, screenwriter, motion picture director, columnist, lecturer, syndicated radio host, jewelry designer and cosmetic company entrepreneur, red carpet fashion laureate, businesswoman - and most importantly, a proud mother and grandmother.

Rivers has enjoyed an illustrious career that has spanned more than four decades in the entertainment industry, and as her recent accomplishments reveal, she's as robust and hard-working as ever. Recently Rivers returned to E! Entertainment Television to host the network's popular franchise Fashion Police, covering red carpet style for the annual awards season, as well as hosting E!'s popular Fashion Police weekly series. From hot new trends to red carpet risks, Rivers takes viewers through a complete recap of the week's celebrity fashion, ultimately deciding who sizzled and who fizzled. In 2011, she became the GoDaddy girl for GoDaddy.com. The commercial premiered during Super Bowl XLll to thousands of viewers nationwide. Her highly anticipated and critically acclaimed documentary, Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work premiered in theaters nationwide in 2010 and is now available on DVD. Rivers also appears regularly in Las Vegas at the Venetian Showroom.

After a successful first season, Rivers once again has taken over the reality TV circuit with Joan and Melissa: Joan Knows Best?, a WEtv's series in which the famous mother/daughter duo welcome cameras into their homes. Season two premieres January 2012.

In 2009, Rivers starred in NBC's hit reality series The Celebrity Apprentice. She also celebrated the publication of two best-selling books: Men Are Stupid and They Like Big Boobs: A Woman's Guide to Beauty Through Plastic Surgery and Murder at the Academy Awards: A Red Carpet Murder Mystery, both published by Simon & Schuster. She received a Daytime Emmy nomination for her portrayal of Bubbe in PBS' award-winning animated children's series Arthur; gave life to the character, Dot Matrix in the animated series, Spaceballs in 2008; played an eccentric aunt in two seasons of IFC's popular mockumentary series Z Rock; and wowed audiences at The Udderbelly in London with her comedy show "Unplugged and Uncensored."

Also in 2009, the iconic funny woman was roasted and honored in The Comedy Central Roast of Joan Rivers. That year also marked the debut of her TV Land reality show, How'd You Get So Rich?, which took a candid look at the extravagant lifestyles of fabulously rich entrepreneurs and innovators. The show ran for two seasons.

Joan Rivers is a true pioneer: she created her own brand of irreverent, unconventional comedy and forged her remarkable rise to stardom in the entertainment world. Enduring humiliation and deprivation for nearly a decade playing tawdry clubs, Borscht Belt hotels, and Greenwich Village cabarets ("I was insanely persistent," she says), her career skyrocketed in 1968 when she appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson. Within three years she was hosting That Show with Joan Rivers, one of the first syndicated daytime shows. Her own The Late Show Starring Joan Rivers helped launch the Fox Network in 1986. In 1989, she returned to daytime television with The Joan Rivers Show, winning an Emmy Award for Outstanding Talk Show Host and her own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Rivers' unique gifts of humor, compassion and tenacity have enabled her to triumph over personal tragedy and attain extraordinary professional success. In 1990, she launched the Joan Rivers Classics Collection of fashion jewelry, apparel and accessories on QVC. The collection became an instant bestseller, and she was honored with an ACE Award from the Accessories Council in 1997. The collection continues to be enormously successful, earning close to one billion dollars in sales to date. A preeminent connoisseur of fine art, antiques, and vintage jewelry, Rivers keeps her finger on the pulse of all the latest trends and is widely considered America's most visible, accessible, and authoritative fashion spokesperson.

One of the most naturally style-savvy women on the planet, Rivers consistently appears on Best Dressed lists around the world. Along with her daughter Melissa, she hosted E!'s live red-carpet events from 1996-2004. From 2004-2007, they continued their "must-see" red-carpet coverage of the Emmys and other awards ceremonies for the TV Guide Channel, garnering the highest ratings ever for the channel.

While continuing to headline at prestigious concert venues worldwide, Rivers is always working on new projects. In April 2002, she brought her critically acclaimed Edinburgh Fringe Festival one-woman show, Broke and Alone, to London's Theatre Royal Haymarket, where she received rave reviews and the theater's first standing ovation in 14 years. The show enjoyed equally enthusiastic critical and audience response at the State Theatres in Sydney and Melbourne. Subsequent performances, including two one-week runs at the Canon Theatre in Los Angeles, all garnered "hottest ticket in town" status.

Constantly in motion, Rivers continues to work effortlessly and serves as a board member on behalf of God's Love We Deliver, The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention and the National Osteoporosis Foundation. She also dedicates her time to Guide Dogs for the Blind, among others.

By 2003, Joan was once again dazzling audiences as a headliner in Las Vegas. In October of 2004, she returned to the U.K. for her first national concert tour. The Glasgow International Comedy Festival followed in March of 2005, but the U.K. was clamoring for more, so she returned to England for her second major tour in two years. In the spring of 2006, the greatly sought-after comedienne returned to Australia for sold-out shows in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, and Canberra.

In August 2007, Joan launched The Joan Rivers Theatre Project, a play-in-progress workshop, which she co-wrote and starred in, for a limited engagement at the Magic Theatre in San Francisco. Six months later, the show opened to rave reviews at the Geffen Playhouse in Los Angeles as "Joan Rivers: A Work in Progress by a Life in Progress," enjoying sold out performances for its entire six-week run. This was followed by a sold out run in August 2008 at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival preceding a successful three-week run at London's Leicester Square theatre.

From her signature question "Can we talk?" (A Federal trademark) to her red-carpet mantra "Who are you wearing?," the woman who asks the questions gets the answers America - and the world - wants to hear.

Joan Rivers embodies class, confidence, and chutzpah in all the right proportions, and her accomplishments are extraordinary. Her most joyous triumph is being grandmother to Melissa's son, Cooper (Edgar Cooper Endicott), who was born on December 1, 2000.

To charge tickets by phone, call (817) 212-4280 in Fort Worth; 1-877-212-4280 (toll free) outside Fort Worth; or order online at www.basshall.com. Tickets are also available at the Bass Performance Hall ticket office at 525 Commerce Street. Ticket office hours: Monday through Friday 10:00 a.m. - 6:00 p.m. and Saturday 10:00 a.m. - 4:00 p.m. For group sales, please call 817-212-4318.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride/WM Photos



Comments

To post a comment, you must register and login.

Join Team BroadwayWorld

Are you an avid theatergoer? We're looking for people like you to share your thoughts and insights with our readers. Team BroadwayWorld members get access to shows to review, conduct interviews with artists, and the opportunity to meet and network with fellow theatre lovers and arts workers.



Videos