Brooklyn's Ryan Repertory Tours SINGING FOR THE BOYS

Brooklyn basEd Ryan Repertory Company, now in its 45th season, and Family Music Centers are proud to present Singing For The Boys. In a "performance that never was but should have been" Al Jolson, Judy Garland and Deanna Durbin come together in 1943 at the Palace Theatre in New York City for a one-night benefit performance to support the overseas war effort and to entertain the troops. Through their signature hit songs and popular songs of the period the audience is taken on a personal journey that reveals what made these three performers truly legendary and what made them so very human, both onstage and backstage. A must see theatrical and musical experience!!!

For tickets visit: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/3040778 or call 718-996-4800.

Barbara Parisi (Conceived and Directed) is Co-founder of the Ryan Repertory Company. Since 1972 she has directed the company in over 160 productions, ranging from musicals to dramas and comedies and has performed in various roles throughout her career as well. From 2009 to the present she has been directing and designing the lighting for Decades Apart-Reflections of Three Gay Men, an original one-man show, written and performed by Rick Pulos, which has been touring throughout the United States. Barbara has a Doctorate in Performance Studies from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts. She is Professor of Communication Studies, Performance Studies, Gender Studies and Theatre at Long Island University, the Brooklyn Campus. She was the editor of the Best American Short Plays series from 2004 to 2010 for Applause Theatre and Cinema Books/Hal Leonard Group Publishing.

Julia Jo Riva (Co-writer) began her career in theater at a young age, working for Jerry Bachrack, a milliner, creating hats for the Civic Light Opera and many other theatrical venues in Los Angeles. Her love of theater continued and she worked many productions at the prestigious Melrose Place Theater. There, she was the costume designer for Small Craft Warnings by Tennessee Williams and Garden of Delights by Fernando Arrabal, among many others. She shifted from theater to film and worked in film production for over 20 years. Her experience in the entertainment industry developed her strong business acumen but her vibrant career came to a screeching halt when a family tragedy forced her into taking over the family music publishing business. Four Jays Music Company was originally founded in 1955 by Julia's grandfather, American composer Harry Warren. She currently manages Warren's catalog of more than 300 published compositions and an additional 600 "trunk songs" which have not yet been released. She is the writer and producer of Introducing Harry Warren: The Tin Pan Alley Years, a personal story based on Harry Warren's life and the memories she has of him. It was performed at the Harry Warren theatre in Brooklyn and at the Sierra Madre Playhouse in Southern California. She also wrote and produced The Songs of Harry Warren, a charming musical revue that played at the famous Walnut Street Theatre (Founded 1809) in Philadelphia. Through this process, Julia reconnected with theater and found a passion for writing, which led her to join the creative team of Singing For The Boys.

Bill Chenoweth (Musical Director) is a musician, musical director and owner of Fatboy Music, his professional music Production Company in Las Vegas. He was born in Baltimore, MD but spent his formative years living and performing in Northern California. Bill currently lives and performs in Las Vegas. He has performed on television for The Tonight Show, St. Jude's Telethon, and Children's Miracle Network Telethon. He has held long-term gigs in Las Vegas at The Fashion Show Mall (11 years), Excalibur (10 years), and The Venetian (17 years). He has worked as an arranger and audio engineer for various productions throughout his career.

Shelley Martin (Deanna Durbin and Co-writer) has a degree in Opera from the New York Conservatory of Music and studied with noted singer and teacher, Marni Nixon. She has performed in countless Musical Theatre productions in New York, Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Some of her favorite roles include Cinderella, Laurie in Oklahoma!, Louisa in the Fantasticks, Ariel in The Little Mermaid and Belle in Beauty and the Beast. Shelley performed at the Venetian Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas as part of The Artisti Del Arte (The opera singers in St. Mark's Square) for four years. She also performed with Lance Devin at the Paris Hotel and Casino with the group, Paris By Night. Shelley and Lance have been singing with Nevada Opera for 17 years and were the opening act for John Rait while performing in Los Angeles.

Denise Rose (Judy Garland and Co-writer) made her professional stage debut at age 15 in the musical Gypsy in her native Minneapolis. From the time she was a teenager, Denise idolized Judy Garland and admits projecting herself onto the screen of those glorious technicolor movies. Primarily, she learned to sing by listening to Judy and singing along. Later on she studied vocal technique with her great voice teacher, the renowned Oksana Bryn. Denise appeared in musicals and plays in the Twin Cities and she was featured as a singer in various bands. She later toured parts of the US and Canada as a stand-up comedienne. While on the road, she met her comedy partner Dean and they performed comedy sketches and songs in shows like The Dean and Denise Variety Hour at theaters, coffeehouses and corporate events. She appeared at the Judy Garland Festival in Grand Rapids, Minnesota, birthplace of the legend, and for the first time performed the songs of her idol in the presence of "Oz" stars and other celebrities, a wonderful event and special memory. After Denise moved to Las Vegas, she found her dream role playing Judy in Liza and Judy Together Again with Suzanne Goulet as Liza. This show has received standing ovations in Las Vegas and in theaters from New York to Los Angeles. Denise is happy to be portraying Judy more than ever now, keeping her extraordinary music alive for audiences of all ages. In May 2014, she premiered her one-woman-show, Songs and Stories of Judy Garland, to great acclaim and received a special Tribute Artist award from the Las Vegas Entertainers Hall of Fame. Denise has continued to receive critical acclaim for her performances as Judy Garland.

John Sannuto (Al Jolson, Co-writer) has worked as an actor, singer and dancer, as well as a director and choreographer in a variety of performance genres over the past forty-three years and spent many of those years with Ryan Repertory Company. He first performed as Al Jolson in 1983 and continued doing his one-man Jolson show, Jolie:You Ain't Heard Nothin' Yet, produced by Ryan Rep. through the 1990s. In 2005, he performed once again as Jolson in Jolson: A Vaudeville, an original musical written by James Racheff and Ted Kociolek. John is happy to be revisiting the spirit and life of Jolson, twelve years later now, in this new production with Ryan Repertory Company. His most recent credits include, Emperor Hadrian in Antinous by Amelia Arenas, Harry Warren in Introducing Harry Warren: The Tin Pan Alley Years by Julia Riva, Madame de Montreuil in Yukio Mishima's Madame De Sade, and director, choreographer and performer in Eileen Fischer's Waiting for Pessoa at the 2013 New York International Fringe Festival. John is an Associate Professor of Theatre and Speech and the Theatre Program Coordinator at Long Island University´s Brooklyn Campus and an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Speech and Theatre at New York City College of Technology.

Lance Devin (Emcee/Buddy) is an actor, singer and the author of 14 books and stories. His appearances have taken him from the Metropolitan Opera to Broadway as well as five years on the small screen in the long running soap opera General Hospital. He currently performs with the world-renowned group, The Three Waiters, and with the Nevada Opera Theater in Las Vegas.

Ruth Pe Palileo (Production Manager) is honored to collaborate again with Ryan Repertory Company. Ruth directs for Current Theatrics, Las Vegas, play-writes for Pintig Cultural Group, Chicago; and serves on SDC Journal's Peer Review Board. She has a Ph.D. in Theatre and Performance from Trinity College, Dublin. Ruth most recently worked on Ryan Rep's Vegas production of Decades Apart-Reflections of Three Gay Men in 2016. Her latest show recreated a Medieval Feast for the St. Thomas Aquinas Center (Vegas, January 2017). Other directing credits include an adaptation of The Anubis Gates (London 2014), Fairy Tales by Neil Gaiman (Chicago, 2012), Ionesco's The Chairs (Best Production of 2011, Las Vegas Citylife) and The Passion of Christ (which was nominated for a 2010 Jerusalem Award in Dublin, Ireland).

Basil Horn (Draperies and Assistant Technical Director) was born and raised in Moscow. He moved to the United States in 2001 to pursue acting and singing. In 2007, he joined the Ryan Repertory Company as a set decorator and videographer. A year later, he had his U.S. debut in Ryan Rep's benefit concert The Songs of Harry Warren. He went on to sing and play in multiple shows including Introducing Harry Warren: the Tin Pan Alley Years and as Charlotte in Yukio Mishima's Madame De Sade at LIU Brooklyn. In 2011 he was sound designer and media artist for Antinous at the First Floor Theater, La Mama. In spring 2012, Basil had the great opportunity to work on Fires In The Mirror, where he portrayed a woman, a community leader, and a young man. He continues to work in film and television and is featured in the short film "5 Minutes" by Wilson M'Biavanga, which won Honorary Mention at the 2013 Los Angeles Movie Awards in the NYLA International Film Festival. In 2013, Basil performed in the existential play Waiting For Pessoa at the New York International Fringe Festival. His most recent role was as Sorn in Stupid F**king Bird. In May 2017 he graduated from LIU Brooklyn with a BFA in Jazz Music.

Rick Pulos (Media Designer and Assistant Technical Director) is a published playwright, theatre producer, artist, performer and educator and has performed all over the United States in venues such as the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, the Tilles Center for the Performing Arts and Highways Performance Space. He studied theatre and film at Yale University and attended the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California where he studied with various experimental and commercial artists and directors. His show Decades Apart-Reflections of Three Gay Men Decades, which has been performed over 30 times across the country, most recently played at Yale University. For more information: www.decadesapart.org.

The Ryan Repertory Company (Co-producer) was founded in 1972 and is named after Irene Ryan, most famous for her role as Granny in television's long-running The Beverly Hillbillies. She was a leading performer in theatre, film and television and her name remains synonymous with quality work in every aspect of entertainmenT. Ryan Rep is a center for the development of new and original theatrical events. The company's home is the Harry Warren Theatre in Brooklyn, New York, named in honor of the great American composer, the first major songwriter to write primarily for film. Warren was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Song eleven times and won three Oscars for composing the songs "Lullaby of Broadway," "You'll Never Know" and "On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe." He wrote the music for the first blockbuster film musical, 42nd Street, choreographed by Busby Berkeley, with whom he would collaborate on many musical films. For more information contact Barbara Parisi, Executive Director, at (718) 996-4800.

Family Music Centers (Co-producer) is one of the top and most experienced music dealers in Nevada. We offer a full line of pianos, guitars, drums, sheet music and band and orchestra instruments. We provide band rentals to major schools throughout the area. Our Music Academy trains hundreds of students each week. But what separates us from everyone else is our name, Family Music Centers.When you shop with us, that's how we treat you, like family. Music is very individual. We know that what YOU want to play is different from anyone else. That's why we listen carefully. Then, we help you every step of the way to reach your goals. So join the family... and let's help you enjoy playing music for the rest of your life. www.familymusic.com

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