Wallis Annenberg Hosts LA Premiere Of Renée Taylor's MY LIFE ON A DIET

The Wallis Annenberg Center for Performing Arts presents the Los Angeles premiere of Renée Taylor's MY LIFE ON A DIET, the award-winning, autobiographical comedy written by Taylor and Joseph Bologna, which opens its 12 performance, limited engagement on Friday, April 5 and continues through Sunday, April 14, 2019, in The Wallis's Bram Goldsmith Theater. Taylor, co-star of "The Nanny" television series and an Academy Award-nominated and Emmy Award-winning writer and actress, looks back on a life full of memorable roles in Hollywood and on Broadway... and just as many fad diets. A self-described "diet junkie" who believed that if she ate like a star, she just might look and live like one, Taylor dishes out juicy anecdotes about - and weight loss tips from - such Hollywood legends as Joan Crawford, Marilyn Monroe and Barbra Streisand. She also serves up entertaining and poignant stories about the late Bologna, her partner in work and life for 52 years. Considered a comedy legend, she tells about her high and lows - on and off the scale - and shows audiences that the ability to laugh gets you through it all.

My Life on a Diet, originally directed by Bologna, made its New York premiere in 2018 with a critically acclaimed, extended run Off-Broadway at the Theatre at St. Clements and has embarked on a national tour. In November of last year, Taylor and My Life on a Diet won the annual United Solo Special Award for her significant contributions to solo theatre during the year.

Critics have described My Life on a Diet as "fascinating, lighthearted, spicy" (New York Times), and as providing "laughs and unexpectedly tender moments" (Newsday). According to the New York Post, "The inimitable Renee Taylor's new show is wonderful... an evening laced with love and laughter."

My Life on a Diet's national tour is presented by the production's producer Julian Schlossberg. Scenic and lighting design is by Harry Feiner, sound is by Christopher Bond, costume is by Pol' Atteu, projections design is by Michael Redman, production manager is Inga McLaughlin and general manager is Richard Martin.

According to Taylor, "A few years ago, I had the pleasure to work with my friend Nora Ephron on her wonderful play, Love, Loss, and What I Wore. I told her that, as a woman who had worn every size from 4 to 18 over the years, my version of the play would be called Love, Loss, and What I Ate. Well, this is that play, but I ended up calling it My Life on a Diet."

"Renée's memorable Hollywood and Broadway credentials in film, television and theater as an actress and writer are sure to touch our audiences," says The Wallis' Artistic Director Paul Crewes.

Tickets, $65, are on sale now and, available at TheWallis.org/Diet. The Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts is located at 9390 N. Santa Monica Blvd, Beverly Hills. To purchase tickets and for more information, please call 310-746-4000 or visit: TheWallis.org/Diet.

Renee Taylor (Performer, Co-Writer) My Life on a Diet is one of 22 plays, four films, and nine TV movies and series that Taylor and Joseph Bologna created together. Taylor and Bologna appeared together on Broadway in their plays Lovers and Other Strangers (1968), It Had to Be You (1981), and If you ever leave me ... I'm going with you! (2001); and Off-Broadway in Bermuda Avenue Triangle (Promenade Theatre, 1997). For film, they received an Academy Award nomination for the 1970 film adaptation of Lovers and Other Strangers. The following year, they co-wrote and co-starred in Made for Each Other (Writers Guild of America Award nomination for Best Comedy). Taylor and Bologna co-directed, co-wrote, and co-starred in the 1989 film adaptation of It Had to Be You, and the 1996 film Love Is All There Is (which introduced a young Angelina Jolie). For television, the couple won Emmy Awards in 1973 for writing "Acts of Love and Other Comedies," and were nominated once again the following year for writing the TV movie "Paradise." They co-directed, co-wrote, and co-starred in the 1984 HBO movie "Bedrooms" (Writers Guild Award). Taylor made her professional stage debut at 15 in a Purim Pageant at Madison Square Garden and earned her Actors Equity card at age 19 for appearing in The Rehearsal at The President Theatre. Her other stage credits include: Nora and Delia Ephron's Love, Loss, and What I Wore; Agatha Sue, I Love You (directed by George Abbott); Luv (directed by Mike Nichols); Elaine May's 1964 improvisational revue The Third Ear; and William Gibson's Dinny and the Witches at the Cherry Lane Theatre. Her many film credits also include: Jerry Lewis' The Errand Boy, Mel Brooks' The Producers, Elaine May's A New Leaf, Neil Simon's Last of the Red Hot Lovers, Lovesick, White Palace, Life During Wartime, Tyler Perry's Temptation: Confessions of a Marriage Counselor, and more recently, The Do-Over and How To Be a Latin Lover. Known for her Emmy nominated role of Sylvia Fine in "The Nanny," Taylor's other notable TV acting credits include "Daddy Dearest" and the groundbreaking HBO sitcom "Dream On" (she had the distinction of appearing on these three television shows simultaneously). More recently she has had recurring roles in "How I Met Your Mother," "Bob's Burgers," and "Happily Divorced," and can currently be seen on Amazon's "Gown and Out in Beverly Hills." In addition winning the United Solo Special Award for Outstanding solo show, Taylor was recently inducted into the Bronx Jewish Hall of Fame's Class of 2018 due to the success of My Life on a Diet. She holds an Honorary Doctorate from Hofstra University.

Joseph Bologna (Co-Writer, Director) was born in Brooklyn, NY, and graduated from Brown University with a degree in art history. Following a tour with the U.S. Marines, Bologna started directing short films and writing special comedy material. He made his Broadway debut as the co-star and co-author of Lovers and Other Strangers, and he made his film debut as the co-star and co-author of Made for Each Other. His other film credits include Cops and Robbers, Mixed Company, The Big Bus, Chapter Two, My Favorite Year, Blame It on Rio, The Woman in Red, Love Is All There Is and Big Daddy. His television credits include the Emmy-winning television special "Acts of Love and Other Comedies" (co-written with Taylor), and the made for TV films "Honor Thy Father"; "Paradise"; "What's New, Catherine Cutis?"; "Torn Between Two Lovers"; and "One Cooks, the Other Doesn't"; among others. An Academy Award nominated and Emmy Award winning playwright and screenwriter, Bologna, with Taylor, his wife and partner of 52 years, collaborated on 22 plays, four film screenplays, and nine TV movies and series.

Julian Schlossberg's (Producer) theatre credits include Bullets Over Broadway, Relatively Speaking, Sly Fox, Fortune's Fool, Terms of Endearment, After the Night and the Music, Adult Entertainment, The Unexpected Man, Tommy Tune, Madame Melville, Taller Than a Dwarf, Beauty Queen of Leenane, Power Plays, If Love Were All, Death Defying Acts, Vita and Virginia, among many others. His film credentials include Widow's Peak, In the Spirit, Bad Girls, No Nukes, Ten From Your Show of Shows. On television, he's produced "Mike Nichols - American Masters" (PBS), "Nichols and May" (PBS), "Elia Kazan: A Director's Journey" (AMC), Claire Bloom's "Shakespeare's Women" (Bravo), "Lives of Lillian Hellman" (PBS). He is currently producing a fourteen hour series, "Witnesses to the 20th Century." Schlossberg worked with Ms. Taylor when he presented It Had to Be You on Broadway in 1981.

Photo Credit: Jeremy Daniel

To post a comment, you must register and login.