I'M NOT A COMEDIAN...I'M LENNY BRUCE Returns to LA for Encore Run
By: Julie Musbach Jul. 01, 2019
I'M NOT A COMEDIAN...I'M Lenny Bruce ran for nine months Off Broadway and for an unprecedented 110 performances in Los Angeles, receiving enormous critical acclaim and dozens upon dozens of rave reviews. An LA Times's Critic's Choice, and winner of the One Man Solo-Performance of the Year from Digital Journal (2018) this look at the life and battles of the most groundbreaking and impactful comedian of all time, Lenny Bruce, not only draws from his many court battles championing the freedom of speech but also includes many of Bruce's original comedic bits and insights from his own writings, masterfully woven together by the show's creator and star, Ronnie Marmo and expertly directed by Tony Award winning stage actor, film and television star, Joe Mantegna. Now with a burlesque feature by Pearls Daily, the Los Angeles born blockbuster comes home for two special encore performances.
ENCORE PERFORMANCES:
Tickets - $40
Dates: www.lennybruceonstage.com
THEATRE 68 - Located at 5112 Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood, CA. 91601
Please note: the show runs approximately 90 minutes, explores mature themes and includes strong language and nudity.
An undisputed comic legend, Lenny Bruce was one of the greatest artists of the 20thCentury. His life and work have had an impact on poetry, politics, music, film and, of course, comedy. Bruce's tempestuous personal and professional life was marked by great passion and great pain. His unwavering commitment to free speech led to numerous obscenity charges and arrests, fighting all the way to the Supreme Court.
A portion of this show's proceeds will go to the Lenny Bruce Memorial Foundation, a 501 (c)(3) non-profit charity, which provides funds for those who have no insurance or enough money to get treatment for drug and alcohol addiction. For more information visit www.lennybruce.org. All contributions are tax deductible.
RONNIE MARMO has starred in more than 60 feature films and television shows, most recently guest starring on Criminal Minds and Lethal Weapon. He also starred in Ammore E Malavita (Love and Bullets), an Italian musical film which just won the David di Donatello for best picture (the Italian equivalent to an Academy Award). Other credits include Back In The Day (on Netflix now), Deuces Wild, Crocodile Dundee in LA, West Of Brooklyn, Pizza With Bullets, Truck 20's Location, Death Of A Tree, Irish Eyes (aka Vendetta), and Limbo Lounge. He has guest starred in several hit television shows including JAG and The Young And The Restless. He was nominated for Best Supporting Actor by the Indie Soap Awards for his role as Crotch in the series, Adults Only. Ronnie enjoyed a three-year run on ABC's General Hospital as Ronnie Dimestico. On stage, he has starred in more than 40 plays. A few of his favorites include Bill Wilson in Bill W. and Dr. Bob, Silva in Baby Doll, Earl in the Los Angeles Premiere of The Late Henry Moss, Danny in Danny and The Deep Blue Sea, and Satan in The Last Days of Judas Iscariot. Ronnie recently completed the audiobook in which he portrays Lenny Bruce in Lenny's autobiography, How to Talk Dirty and Influence People. The audiobook is on sale now through Hachette publishing. As a director, Marmo has staged over 50 stage productions and produced upwards of 100 in Los Angeles and New York. Ronnie was the Artistic Director and Producer of the critically acclaimed first ever 13 by Shanley Festival, which enjoyed a six-month run. He received the Robert Pastorelli Rising Star Award for achievements as an actor, writer, director, and producer at the 2010 Garden State Film Festival. He continues to serve at the Artistic Director of Theatre 68 (68 Cent Crew Theatre Company) in Los Angeles and New York City.
Joe Mantegna was awarded the Tony and Joseph Jefferson Award for his acclaimed performance as Richard Roma in David Mamet's Pulitzer Prize-winning play Glengarry Glen Ross. Some of Joe's film and television highlights include House of Games, Searching for Bobby Fisher, Godfather III, his Emmy and Golden Globe-nominated role of Dean Martin in The Ratpack, his Emmy-nominated role of Pipi Delana in The Last Don, and the voice of Fat Tony on The Simpsons. For two seasons Joe starred with Mary Steenburgen and Amber Tamblyn in the critically acclaimed CBS drama Joan of Arcadia, which won the 2004 People Choice Award for best new drama and picked up three Emmy nominations. In 2008 Joe reprised his Emmy-nominated role of Lou Manahan opposite Debra Messing in the USA Network series The Starter Wife. Joe has also lent his voice to the Disney/Pixar film CARS2 and continues his 23-year run as Fat Tony on The Simpsons. In April of 2011 Joe received a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Joe lends much of his free time to a number of philanthropic endeavors. In May of 2012 Joe was appointed the National Spokesperson for The U.S. Army Museum to lead the fundraising campaign to build the long-planned National Museum of the United States Army. He's also an ambassador for the Gary Sinise Foundation, which builds homes for wounded veterans. His passions also include working with various autism-related charities as well as being a long-time supporter of the Barbara Sinatra Center for Abused Children. In 2014 Joe received the Lifetime Achievement award from the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce for his dedication to the community and craft of acting. Currently Joe stars as FBI Special Agent David Rossi in season thirteen of the hit CBS Drama Criminal Minds and continues his hosting and producing duties for six seasons on Gun Stories for the Outdoor Channel. His newest collaboration is Hollywood Weapons: Fact or Fiction? Joe resides in Los Angeles with his wife of 40 years, Arlene, and their two daughters, Mia and Gia.
Lenny Bruce (October 13, 1925-August 3, 1966) was a stand-up comic and social satirist whose career spanned the 1950s and mid 60s. He was introduced to show business after leaving the army in 1945, serving as a master of ceremonies at the nightclub where his mother, Sally Marr, an entertainer herself, worked. Inspired, he began participating in amateur nights at various nightclubs in New York and New Jersey where he performed impressions, parodies and one-liners. He soon developed a style marked by blue humor punctuated with obscenity and, as he gained notoriety, material focusing on criticism of the social, political and legal establishments, organized religion, moralistic attitude toward sex and drugs and other controversial subjects. In 1947, he changed his name from Leonard Alfred Schneider to Lenny Bruce. Lenny Bruce gave his first professional performances shortly after the end of World War II, though it was not until his appearance on the TV show Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts in 1948 that his career began to grow. After playing New York's Borscht Belt, the natural progression for comics of the day, he married a stripper named Honey Harlow in 1951, moving to California, where he broke from comedic norms and experimented with his material and technique in the strip clubs and burlesque houses of LA. In a 1959 televised appearance on the wildly popular Steve Allen Show, he was introduced as "the most shocking comedian of our time." As Lenny Bruce's popularity grew, so did his legal troubles, with his increasing prominence and choice to take on societal norms through humor bringing intense police and judicial scrutiny. In 1961, he played to packed houses at Carnegie Hall, a turning point in his career. Numerous arrests and convictions based on obscenity statutes would soon begin to follow him across the country. As his performances continued to raise issues that tested the legal system's capacity to deal with social change, he was blacklisted from appearing in a growing number of clubs that feared repercussions. Public authorities increasingly denounced his performances as dirty and sick and courts across the US tried him for obscenity. He was still, however, held in wide esteem by the artists and intellectuals of his day, not only for saying what he was saying but for fighting for his right to say it. Over the span of his career, Bruce recorded more than 30 albums of his stand-up routines and live performances, and his autobiography, How to Talk Dirty and Influence People was a national best seller. Although plagued by controversy and overcome by addiction at the end of his life, Lenny Bruce is now looked upon as a groundbreaker, a visionary. Seen as both a crusader and martyr, a saint and sinner, the predecessor for so much of what we recognize today as satire through his relentless challenging of the perceptions and purpose of comedy and a revolutionary for the path he paved for entertainers and individuals alike regarding the freedom of speech.
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