On the Town With Aubrey Reuben
Where All the Stars Shine Brightly!
April 27, 2013
Jean Shafiroff and Mayor Bloomberg at the
Jewish Board of Family and Children's Services (JBFCS) 2013
Spring Benefit at the Plaza Hotel. Fifth Ave. & Central Park
South. Wednesday night. 04-24-13
Laila Robins and Robert
Cuccioli announced the Outer Critics
Circle nominations at the New York Friars Club. Pippin led
the list with eleven nominations, Kinky
Boots with nine and Golden
Boy and The
Nance with six. Individual nominees for plays
included Nathan
Lane for outstanding actor, Cicely
Tyson outstanding actress, and for musicals Billy
Porter and Laura Osnes. They were good selections.
Equally good were the selections announced by Michael
Urie and Patina
Miller of the 2013 Drama League Nominees at Sardi's.
The Distinguished Achievement in Musical Theatre goes
to Bernadette
Peters and the Founders Award for Excellence in
Directing goes to Jerry
Mitchell. The 79th Annual Drama League Awards will
be held at the Marriott Marquis on May 17. I can hardly
wait
On Broadway, Macbeth, by William
Shakespeare, is a one man show by Alan
Cumming, playing all the characters of the tragedy
for ninety-minutes. It takes place in a hospital for the
criminally insane with the actor as a patient. We have
no idea why he is there or what he has done.
The Testament of
Mary, by Colm
Torbin, features a remarkable, fearless performance
by Fiona Shaw,
as the mother of Jesus Christ.
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She smokes, drinks alcohol, takes off her clothes for full
frontal nudity as she jumps into water, constantly throws
objects, tables, chairs, a ladder to the ground, and never stops
talking for ninety minutes about her son, his crucifixion, the
raising of Lazarus and his followers.
The Trip to Bountiful,
by Horton Foote, is
the story of a old lady making a secret trip back to the home
where she was born. Cicely
Tyson gives one of the finest performances of the season in
this sweet, sentimental tale that takes place in Texas in 1953.
The entire cast is wonderful and support the luminous Tyson,
whose eyes shine so brightly in her wondrous portrayal of a
senior citizen restored to life on this magical theatrical trip.
I'll Eat You Last: A Chat
With Sue Mengers, by John
Logan, is a one woman monologue about a once powerful
Hollywood agent, imitated by Bette
Midler. She reminisces about her life in a foul-mouthed
manner, where we are forced to listen to vulgar words throughout
her 90-minute rampage against celebrities she hates while
smoking in one hand, taking marijuana in another, and drinking
alcohol. It is obvious from this performance, directed by Joe
Mantello, that she was a very unpleasant woman, whose major
pleasure in life was malicious gossip.
The revival of Pippin,
book by Roger O. Hirson,
music and lyrics by Stephen
Schwartz, at the Music Box Theatre, has been redesigned as if
one is at the circus. The stage is like a tent, and is filled with
acrobats, trapezes, poles and more. The cast is very
good, especially Andrea
Martin, who stops the show with her one song No
Time at All, performed on a trapeze upside down. It is
remarkable. Diane Paulus has
directed an energetic production, that leaves the spectator
breathless.
Off-Broadway, Here Lies Love,
concept and lyrics by David
Byrne, music by Byrne and Fatboy
Slim, is one of the most inventive, imaginative musicals of the
season. It tells the story of Imelda
Marcos (a magnificent Ruthie
Ann Miles) from small town beauty queen to wife of the President
of the Philippines. It is created as if one is in a discoteque,
where the audience stands and moves to the rhythmic music.
The New York City Opera has returned to City Center, its original
home. Welcome back. We have missed you. La
Perichole, by Jacques
Offenbach, is a souffle of an operetta. The story of a street
singer and her lover in an updated modern Peru is silly, and
director Christopher Alden has
emphasized all these elements, with the excellent chorus smoking,
drinking, and acting sexy. It's harmless, painless and,
occasionally, good fun. The orchestra played the melodious music
wonderfully, under the baton of Emmanuel
Plasson. The singers, Kevin
Burdette as the Viceroy, Marie
Lenormand in the title role and Phillippe
Talbot as her lover, contributed to the merriment, and sang and
acted well. It is good to have the company back where it belongs.
As always, the 27th Easter
Bonnet Competition is delightful. It is full of pleasant,
original song and dance numbers performed by the casts of various
shows on Broadway and Off-Broadway. Cyndi
Lauper, Harvey Fierstein and Tom
Hanks presented the awards, and Cady
Huffman, Deborah Cox and Paul
Libin were among the judges.
Ambassador John L. Loeb, Jr. and
Para-Olymic Gold Medalists Nick
Springer were two of the Honorary Chairs at Give
Kids A Shot! National Meningitis Association Gala 2013 at the
New York Athletic Club. It was a festive affair.
The Jewish Board of Family
and Children's Services (JBFCS) 2013 Spring Benefit was a
delightful affair at the Plaza Hotel. The honorees were Seymour
R. Askin, Jerold D. Jacobsen and Jean
Shafiroff. Mayor Michael
R. Bloomberg addressed
the guests at the cocktail reception and Melissa
Russo, WNBC News Anchor, was the Master of Ceremonies at the
dinner.
MoMA presented How Green Was
My Valley, by John Ford,
USA, 1941, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture against
tremendous competition. It is a glorious film, with an outstanding
cast. Roddy McDowall
steals the film, but Walter
Pigeon as a minister, Maureen
O'Hara, Donald Crisp (who won the Oscar as Best Actor) and Sara
Allgood as members of a Welsh mining family at the turn of the
twentieth century, all contribute to the success of this powerful
film. MoMA also presented To
Be or Not To Be, by Ernst
Lubitsch, USA, 1942, with the beautiful, talented Carole
Lombard and Jack Benny in
the leading roles. The film takes place in Poland at the beginning
of the German occupation during World War II. It is a heavy handed
satire, in which a group of actors deceive the Nazis and save the
Polish underground.
Post Tenebras Lux, by Carlos
Reygadas, Mexico/France/Germany/The Netherlands, 2012, is about
a young Mexican family moving to the countryside. Although the
director won the Best Director prize at the 2012 Cannes Film
Festival, it is hard to realize why. It is an incoherent,
pretentious, self-indulgent film. The director dotes on his own two
children, and we are forced to observe them constantly playing,
eating, talking and even sleeping. There is an obsession with sodomy
between the man and his wife, and even simulated sex scenes in a
singers' bathhouse with some of the most repulsive male and female
naked bodies ever seen on film. There is also a lot of drinking,
drug taking and violence.
04-24-13
(L-R)
Cady
Huffman.
Paul
Libin.
Deborah
Cox
were
judges
at
the
27th
Easter
Bonnet
Competition
at
the
Minskoff
Theatre.
200
West
45th
St
Tuesday
afternoon
04-23-13 |