Why a blog?

Why a blog? Because there weren't enough blogs already, obviously.
I decided to add my voice and see what happens and where this blog takes me.

<------This is a picture of me and friends in ... 'Brel, guess which one is me. Clue: I am the one who burns and peels in the summer. I used this pic to introduce my blog, because it was watching a tape of this production that was the final straw against my resistance to talk about theater. I don't think I ever watched this video, even when I first got it in the early 90s. Wow, I am older and wiser and a better singer. But I have not been involved in theater for many years except for singing concerts with various groups. I need to find a way back....perhaps working with kids, we shall see.

I met all three of the people in this picture when I was doing a production of NINE. I auditioned for Michael who was sitting in the the darkened audience and said, when I finished singing, "you have an absolutely beautiful voice". You've gotta love a director who says such a thing to you in an audition.

The guy with the long Black hair was Leslie McMillen Perez, who played Guido. The pretty woman behind me is Ann Jackson who played his mother. The other tall handsome guy is Jeff Morell, who was not in the show, but was Michael's S.O. and so he would come to rehersals and during the times when Michael would try to stage a "dance" number, when my body just would not go in the right direction, Jeff would make motions for me to follow and mouth directions to me. Jeff, Michael, Bob, Larry, Leslie, Ann, Jonathan...how very lucky I was to audition for that show and how lucky I am to have a record of Leslie, Ann, Jeff and I all singing together in 'Brel.

Later, after Nine had run its course Leslie and Ann got involved in this production of Brel and when they were looking for two other people who could sing, they thought of Jeff and I... at least that's how I think we all ended up working together again.

THE COLOR PURPLE is what's new on Broadway

The Color Purple is the newest show on Broadway I believe. It opened officially a few days ago and has had postive reviews plus GIGANTA publicity thanks to Oprah. Here is their official website.


I have seen some clips, this one is on Broadway.com. The picture above is a picture from TheaterMania.com. I have not seen the show and I have no idea if I woul dlike it better than the brilliant movie version. I expect I would, because live theater is usually better than any movie. But are there images from the movie which that I would miss? Probably, but I will be interested to see over time how the show is recieved by audiences and how long it runs.

You know, I remember when the movie came out and it was fashionable to bash Spielberg as a director. But he did a brilliant job with that movie. I hope that the Broadways production is as good and I wish them many broken legs.

Other good websites for theater info and gossip.

Internet Broadway Database

Talkin' Broadway

BlogwayBaby.com

What the critics are saying according to the official website:

"BLESSED WITH TALENT.
A bright odyssey of survival and triumph with a fairy-tale sense of wonder,'Purple' strikes sparks."
- Ben Brantley, The New York Times

"IT'S FABULOUS!
A SOARING, JOYFUL BROADWAY MUSICAL."
- Richard Corliss, TIME

"VIBRANT & WINNING!
Oprah Winfrey's favorite new musical is blessed by glowing performances from a sisterhood of talent."
- Clive Barnes, New York Post

"PURE HEART!
It celebrates inspiring relationships of faith and love. LaChanze is A MARVEL! A BROADWAY HIT!"
- Elysa Gardner, USA Today

"A sweeping story that's impressively intimate and EXCEPTIONALLY MOVING, with DYNAMITE PERFORMANCES. 'The Color Purple' SINGS TO THE SOUL! A WINNER!"
- Roma Torre, NY1 News

In Honor of a friend for World AIDS Day

Here is a Picture of Michael with some of his best friends. Michael is the one in the back with the solid Green shirt.

Director Ready for His Final Curtain

Miami Herald - Tuesday, December 9, 1997
Paul Brinkley-Rogers, Herald Staff Writer

---

The jalousie windows of Michael McCord's bedroom are open to the world where he was a player, a force in the theater. The late-afternoon shadows are moving in on the lush garden where his dogs are playing.

Lying in his sickbed, the veteran Fort Lauderdale theater director and longtime AIDS activist knows that death is waiting for him -- perhaps jealous of the sheer will he is exerting to stay alive until Christmas Day.

That's the way you keep going, one day at a time, says this man hooked up to an oxygen tank. McCord is bone thin, less than 90 pounds now, his energy sapped by his medical problems. His doctor has told him he could go at any time.

With death that palpable, he says, you get busy. You make your own funeral arrangements, telling everyone not to wear black. You pick the music, but you don't tell your friends what it is, because if you did, it would not be a surprise. With your parish priest, you walk that final mile together in prayer.

"You are living with a little thief," McCord, 42, says of the process of dying. He does not sound exasperated, just knowledgeable.

"Every week, it steals away another part of me. I am continually adjusting. I am continually saying things like, `OK, you can't stand up in the shower any more. What are you going to do? OK, you'll get a shower chair.' "

He's no longer able to walk a great distance. A cane will do. Going out to dinner or the theater is no longer an option. He stays home.

"So you think. You think, `How am I going to be at peace and know that everyone else in my life is at peace?' You make plans. You make arrangements. That's what's neat about dying slowly like this -- you have time to do that. It's not like being shot on the South Florida highways, where you are suddenly snatched away."

Being bedridden, terminal, is not easy for a man who was dance captain for West Side Story on Broadway in 1980, a demanding job that made him responsible for keeping the dancing first-rate. It's not easy for a man who directed critically acclaimed productions of Evita, Li'l Abner and Sweet Charity with the Fort Lauderdale Players. A man who enjoyed steak, vodka and an eight-year relationship with his companion, actor Jeff Marroll, who, last week of all weeks, was told that his mother had died.

The first hint of McCord's lethal illness came Sept. 17, 1987.

That was the day, in Fort Lauderdale, in the middle of rehearsals, when he thought he had the flu but instead was told by his doctor that he had a fungal lung infection.

He was having such a difficult time breathing that the hospital told family members that McCord might not make it through the night.

"They all came to the bed and sat with me," McCord said of this first of several near-death crises brought on by the HIV infection. "They touched me." Perhaps because of that contact, by the next day, he was sitting up and eating.

Told that he had AIDS, his first reaction was not fear. Instead, it was "to keep working, to go on with the show."

As late as July, with his weight dropping to 100 pounds, he was firing up The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas for the Fort Lauderdale Players.

"Dying?" he said. "It's the thing we all have to do, whether it's AIDS, cancer, a heart attack. Hopefully, it's at the end of a long and fruitful life. You can't cheat death. But as my doctor said, it is amazing what the human spirit can do."

Those who counseled, doctored and worked with McCord know what he means.

"People tried to tell him to take it easy," said J.R. Davis, 45, who danced with McCord back in 1980 in New York City and worked with the director in several summer productions in Fort Lauderdale. "He would not. He was driven. He bounced back from near death several times, and in each case, it was the will to live."

McCord's physician, Dr. Frank Tomaka, said: "This man was working 80 hours a week even as late as September. It was a schedule I would have trouble keeping. We'd talk about that schedule, but it was clear it was that which kept him going mentally, emotionally, and when he couldn't keep going, then he was ready to die."

The Rev. John McLaughlin, pastor of Oakland Park's Blessed Sacrament Catholic Church, says he has seen many parishioners succumb to AIDS. "What made Michael special," he said, talking about McCord's decision a year ago to reconnect with the church of his childhood, "was his focus. He's really an inspiration to deal with spiritually."

Link

Below is a picture of Michael and I and the musical director for a show in Cumberland Md, called Somthing's Afoot. Michael Played Flint and he was really good. I knew he was a great director, but he had really terrific timing as an actor too. In addition he did the choreography and had a heck of a lot of fun reminding me how I had two left feet. M is in the blue turtle neck .


This is Michael and our Miss Twead sitting on the top of a Mountain. I am telling you, if you want to have a really wonderful time doing theater, audition for the Cumberland Theater. They hire equity and it is an absolutely beautiful place to live for a couple of weeks or months.

Why I hope Al Gore is our next President

In 1988 when I was first aware of Al Gore he seemed young, but there was something special about him as a candidate. When he spoke you could tell that he cared about the things he was talking about, that he was knowledgable about his subject and that being knowledgable was also important to him.

Here are the things I know about Gore...

Cross posted at dkos
Cross posted at PoliticalTheaterBlog


He is dedicated to the environment:

There are scientific warnings now of another onrushing catastrophe. We were warned of an imminent attack by Al Qaeda; we didn't respond. We were warned the levees would break in New Orleans; we didn't respond. Now, the scientific community is warning us that the average hurricane will continue to get stronger because of global warming. A scientist at MIT has published a study well before this tragedy showing that since the 1970s, hurricanes in both the Atlantic and the Pacific have increased in duration, and in intensity, by about 50 %. The newscasters told us after Hurricane Katrina went over the southern tip of Florida that there was a particular danger for the Gulf Coast of the hurricanes becoming much stronger because it was passing over unusually warm waters in the gulf. The waters in the gulf have been unusually warm. The oceans generally have been getting warmer. And the pattern is exactly consistent with what scientists have predicted for twenty years. Two thousand scientists, in a hundred countries, engaged in the most elaborate, well organized scientific collaboration in the history of humankind, have produced long-since a consensus that we will face a string of terrible catastrophes unless we act to prepare ourselves and deal with the underlying causes of global warming. [applause] It is important to learn the lessons of what happens when scientific evidence and clear authoritative warnings are ignored in order to induce our leaders not to do it again and not to ignore the scientists again and not to leave us unprotected in the face of those threats that are facing us right now. [applause]
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He is not afraid to criticize Bush or republican policy:

The direction in which our nation is being led is deeply troubling to me -- not only in Iraq but also here at home on economic policy, social policy and environmental policy.

Millions of Americans now share a feeling that something pretty basic has gone wrong in our country and that some important American values are being placed at risk. And they want to set it right.

The way we went to war in Iraq illustrates this larger problem. Normally, we Americans lay the facts on the table, talk through the choices before us and make a decision. But that didn't really happen with this war -- not the way it should have. And as a result, too many of our soldiers are paying the highest price, for the strategic miscalculations, serious misjudgments, and historic mistakes that have put them and our nation in harm's way.

I'm convinced that one of the reasons that we didn't have a better public debate before the Iraq War started is because so many of the impressions that the majority of the country had back then turn out to have been completely wrong. Leaving aside for the moment the question of how these false impressions got into the public's mind, it might be healthy to take a hard look at the ones we now know were wrong and clear the air so that we can better see exactly where we are now and what changes might need to be made.

In any case, what we now know to have been false impressions include the following:

(1) Saddam Hussein was partly responsible for the attack against us on September 11th, 2001, so a good way to respond to that attack would be to invade his country and forcibly remove him from power.

(2) Saddam was working closely with Osama Bin Laden and was actively supporting members of the Al Qaeda terrorist group, giving them weapons and money and bases and training, so launching a war against Iraq would be a good way to stop Al Qaeda from attacking us again.

(3) Saddam was about to give the terrorists poison gas and deadly germs that he had made into weapons which they could use to kill millions of Americans. Therefore common sense alone dictated that we should send our military into Iraq in order to protect our loved ones and ourselves against a grave threat.

(4) Saddam was on the verge of building nuclear bombs and giving them to the terrorists. And since the only thing preventing Saddam from acquiring a nuclear arsenal was access to enriched uranium, once our spies found out that he had bought the enrichment technology he needed and was actively trying to buy uranium from Africa, we had very little time left. Therefore it seemed imperative during last Fall's election campaign to set aside less urgent issues like the economy and instead focus on the congressional resolution approving war against Iraq.

(5) Our GI's would be welcomed with open arms by cheering Iraqis who would help them quickly establish public safety, free markets and Representative Democracy, so there wouldn't be that much risk that US soldiers would get bogged down in a guerrilla war.

(6) Even though the rest of the world was mostly opposed to the war, they would quickly fall in line after we won and then contribute lots of money and soldiers to help out, so there wouldn't be that much risk that US taxpayers would get stuck with a huge bill.

Now, of course, everybody knows that every single one of these impressions was just dead wrong.

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He is a man of faith but a real one who believes that we should value diversity and strengthen all families:

Two reviews of his and Tipper's book JOINED AT THE HEART :

From Publishers Weekly:

"For us, as for most Americans," write the former vice-president and his wife, "family is our bedrock, and we believe the strength of the American family is the nation's bedrock." But the American family has changed substantially in the last half century and so have the cultural and economic conditions under which it exists. The families the Gores have encountered in a decade of research reflect these changes: one couple has children from the husband's three different relationships, a gay white couple adopts two black children, a single mother struggles with poverty. The couple add stories from their own marriage and consult with historians, sociologists, psychologists and educators, giving the American family the same comprehensive treatment Al's Earth in the Balance gave the environment. Al and Tipper examine subjects as diverse as the increased divorce rate, the parent-teen gap, dual-income households and the health problems associated with sleep deprivation. They divide the book into themes, including love, communication, work, play and community, and show how these factors influence one another, taking a holistic approach to the underlying problems affecting today's families. Yet although they declare America should "provide every possible support to those most important to us," they make very few firm recommendations on government policy; those reading with an eye toward identifying planks in another Gore presidential campaign will have their work cut out for them. "

Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal:

"Coauthoring this very readable work, the Gores affirm their respect and support for culturally and structurally variant American families, loving individuals committed to each other's welfare. Based on personal experiences and interviews with others in traditional and nontraditional relationships, the authors offer a sampling of caring individuals struggling to balance family, work, play, and community to support one another, adults and children, together with the future of this country. The Gores relate these families' experiences to the environments in which they live, offering a critique of the social programs needed to support successful family life: affordable shelter, reliable and competent child care, pre- and post-school time supervised activities, employee family-leave provisions, well-run community facilities, and services for all age levels. They argue that it is increasingly critical to maintain and grow our country's various sources of "social capital," to understand and support families, the too often unacknowledged vital units of our American society. This convincing, multiresourced work is recommended for public and academic library purchase. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 7/02; also released this November is The Spirit of the Family, a photography book edited by the Gores.-Ed.]-Suzanne W. Wood, formerly with SUNY Coll. of Technology at Alfre."

--Suzanne W. Wood, formerly with SUNY Coll. of Technology at Alfred
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Yes while he is a brilliant policy wonk he is also very funny:

The veep's playful antics are particularly legendary among staff members. On one flight home after a trip to the former Soviet Union, Gore ambled back through the staff section and came across his national security adviser, Leon Fuerth, fast asleep against a window. Sensing a photo op not to be missed, he sat down beside him and launched into an animated discussion of U.S. policy toward Russia. Gore leaned into him and grew increasingly demonstrative as Fuerth remained slumped down, totally oblivious to the tongue-lashing, the photographer and the circle of giggling staff members who had gathered around. According to his aides, Gore is notorious for such stunts -- and usually makes sure his unsuspecting target receives a copy of the photo.
.......snip......

Presidential adviser Paul Begala called Gore's dry wit "a really rare gift because it deflates egos, it eases tension. In a very deadpan, exaggerated, comic sort of way," Begala said, "he'll make fun of the president or of other big-shots by sort of pretending to be an absolute yes man: 'That's a great idea. We should definitely do that. Why stop there?' It's a kind of humor that requires a deep reservoir of self-confidence, a sense of real familiarity with your colleagues ... and obviously high intellect to be able to turn it around."

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He is visionary in matters of the environment and technology:

"The project, which would need approval by Congress, is expected to cost between $20 million and $50 million. Gore sees it as an invaluable resource for scientific, educational and weather research.

It would show hurricanes and other threatening weather patterns, forest fires, cloud formations and other phenomena in real time. There are no full-Earth images now available, although existing satellites track regions of the world.

The vice president announced the program Friday at a technology conference at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge.

"As we connect all our classrooms to the Internet, we have the opportunity to bring new education and potential scientific projects as well as global weather observations to millions of American classrooms and living rooms via television and computer," Gore told an audience of academics, industry leaders and politicians."

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He was right about Social Security:

Stance on Social Security reform featuring private accounts: opposes.

"We have the chance to reform Social Security the right way, in a way that preserves its basic guarantees, pays down our debt, keeps our economy strong, and enables us to meet our other great challenges." Gore has detailed a plan to keep Social Security solvent through at least 2050. As President, Gore would use today's budget surpluses to pay down the national debt and use the interest saved from debt reduction to shore up the Social Security Trust Fund. Gore would also raise benefits for widows and eliminate the motherhood penalty that reduces benefits for women who take time off from work to raise their children. Gore supports a guaranteed benefit for Social Security and opposes raising the retirement age. "Social Security isn't supposed to be a system of winners and losers. It's supposed to be a bedrock guarantee of a minimum decent retirement,"

[Source: press release for speech delivered at Fordham University, NY May 16, 2000] more

And he was right about about the war in Iraq:

"I want to talk about the relationship between America's war against terrorism and America's proposed war against Iraq.

Like most Americans, I've been wrestling with the question of what our country needs to do to defend itself from the kind of focused, intense and evil attack that we suffered a year ago September 11th. We ought to assume that the forces that are responsible for that attack are even now attempting to plan another attack against us.

I'm speaking today in an effort to recommend a specific course of action for our country, which I sincerely believe would be better for our country than the policy that is now being pursued by President Bush. Specifically, I am deeply concerned that the course of action that we are presently embarking upon with respect to Iraq has the potential to seriously damage our ability to win the war against terrorism and to weaken our ability to lead the world in this new century.

To begin with, to put first things first, I believe that we ought to be focusing our efforts first and foremost against those who attacked us on September 11th and who have thus far gotten away with it. The vast majority of those who sponsored, planned and implemented the cold-blooded murder of more than 3,000 Americans are still at large, still neither located nor apprehended, much less punished and neutralized. I do not believe that we should allow ourselves to be distracted from this urgent task simply because it is proving to be more difficult and lengthy than was predicted.

Great nations persevere and then prevail. They do not jump from one unfinished task to another. We should remain focused on the war against terrorism.

(APPLAUSE)

And, I believe that we are perfectly capable of staying the course in our war against Osama bin Laden and his terrorist network, while simultaneously taking those steps necessary to build an international coalition to join us in taking on Saddam Hussein in a timely fashion. If you're going after Jesse James, you ought to organize the posse first, especially if you're in the middle of a gunfight with somebody who's out after you.

I don't think we should allow anything to diminish our focus on the necessity for avenging the 3,000 Americans who were murdered and dismantling that network of terrorists that we know were responsible for it. The fact that we don't know where they are should not cause us to focus instead on some other enemy whose location may be easier to identify. We have other enemies . . ."

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I have no idea if Al Gore has any plans to run for President. But I do know that he is the best qualified candidate for the job IMO.


I wanted to include this information on Gore's new position on healtcare. As one of the posters below reminded me, Gore decided that single payer healtcare was the only thing that would save our broken system.

In Surprising Shift, Gore Says He Favors Single-Payer Health Care System WASHINGTON – Noting that 40 million Americans now have no health insurance, Al Gore says he now favors "single-payer" national health coverage, a proposal that would require a massive change in the health insurance system

With single-payer coverage, money to pay for health care – such as insurance premiums and tax dollars – would be collected by a single agency, which would then pay for comprehensive coverage for all citizens.

Gore, the 2000 Democratic presidential nominee and a potential candidate in 2004, offered his views in response to a question at a synagogue in New York during a tour promoting his book "Joined at the Heart," written with his wife, Tipper.

"I was planning to wait and make a major speech on this and I probably should, but I'll just answer your question candidly," Gore told the moderator.

Gore's comments Wednesday night were first reported by ABC News' Internet political report "The Note" and were confirmed by Gore spokesman Jano Cabrera, who said any details would come in a future speech on health care.

"I think we've reached a point where the entire health care system is in impending crisis," Gore said. "I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that we should begin drafting a single-payer national health insurance plan."

Depending on the details, calling for a single-payer plan could be a very dramatic step for Gore. During the 2000 primary campaign, Gore attacked Democratic rival Bill Bradley's central proposal – universal health care – calling it too expensive and not expansive enough to help poor people afford full coverage.

Another potential Democratic candidate for president, Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, pushed for health care for all Americans in a speech Thursday night to an education group in Washington. He wants to expand coverage under Medicare and Medicaid to cover people who don't have insurance.

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Missing Ed

I went to my sister's house for ThanksGiving. While there we watched Chorus Line on DVD. My sister's S.O., Ray had discovered that his principal (he is a teacher) conducted the show on broadway for many years, so he wanted to see what it was all about. And also because Ray is now exploring musical theater, just as he spent some years learning about Opera.

So anyway, we watched the movie and I was pointing out who was who and what they had done. I pointed out Nicole Fosse and tried to explain who Bob Fosse was...lol, so strange to me that anyone would not know. I also mentioned that Terrence Mann of the magnificent baritone voice and stage presence, had been in Les Miz etc... and was a theater legend of sorts. Ray was impressed that someone who played such bad guys could also make "Larry" so likeable in the movie.



So I went on line at their house to see what else Mann had done, it had been years since I had really paid attention to the theater in NY. I had forgotten that he was in Assassins, a show I had done in Ft Lauderdale. I couldn't remember what part he had played and I HAD THE CD and had listened to it many times. My guess was that he played Czolgosz and I was right.

After talking theater for a good part of the day, I went home and started looking around at links on Al Gore's internets. I was looking for information on the revival of Assassins and read a bit about Sondheim, who is someone I admire very much and whoes music I had just sung a week before at a concert.
From there I started googling old friends in Ft Lauderdale and decided to see if I could find my friend Ed Dellicarpini who had directed Assassins and who was one of a handful of people from Florida I really missed.

I found out I was way too late. Ed died of AIDS two years ago. I am so sad and so disapointed in myself for not following through a few years ago when I was feeling like I should call him. I know it sounds (reads) weird, but I am a tiny bit psychic or maybe just intuitive. I should have listened to the little voice in my head that told me "call Ed, you want to speak to Ed because you miss him so much".

The last time I saw Ed was at the memorial service of my friend Michael (in 1997) who I blogged about a few days ago. Michael and I had a falling out several years before he died and we never really made it up. He had been my best friend, soul mate (his words) and mentor for years, but when it was time for me to leave the nest neither one of us handled it well. We had several screaming angry fights and after I left florida (I had been divorced from my husband and "divorced" from my best friend and mentor and I couldn't stand to be there anymore, amoung other reasons.) and Michael never forgave me, at least not that I knew.

So I just cut everyone off, because I didn't think I mattered and I didn't want to be tempted to move back there. I knew that there were several people who could make me want to move back and Ed was one of them. It had only been a year since I moved away. So even though was said to each other "let's keep in touch", we did not.

I first met Ed when I was doing a production of Baby at Broward Community College. He was a student there but older than some of the other people in the cast, some where between their college age and my age of about 33 or 34. Ed was one of those people who had been wounded by something or someone and put on a cynical shell to protect himself. He was funny as hell and his humor tended to run to imitations of PeeWee Herman and scathing comments about other people.

I think, if I remember, that Ed came along in the Gillen Brey package. Gillen is one of those people who decided we were going to be friends and that was that. Where I am reserved with people, Gillen is a big puppy who comes up and jumps all over you demanding love. She and Ed were best friends, they thought with one brain and directed Assassins together.

So Ed came along with Gillen and over time he and I formed a mutual affection that suited both of our reserved natures. We once went to Metro Zoo in Miami to take pictures, as we were both camera nerds. That was a really wonderful day and the day Ed introduced me the Secret Garden cast CD. I listened to it for several years and I still do from time to time. I believe it is Lucy Simon's finest work, one of the most beautiful scores for a musical ever. Lilly's Eyes, nuff said.

Several years after I got to know Ed and Gillen and Diane Woodle, Diane, Gillen and I were riding in a car and talking about how Ed needed to get tested, considering how often he left our company to "go walk amongst his people". I forget exactly who confronted him, but he didn't want to know and said he would not get tested. He reconsided at some point and indeed we found out he was HIV positive sometime in the mid 1990s. Of course we were all sad, but at the time Michael had been living with full blown AIDS for almost 10 years. But we forgot that Michael was drivin by the need to stick around and run everyone's life (to our advantage more than not. He really cared that everyone be doing well before he died). We didn't think about friends who died after a few short years. Now the standard would be that everyone would live for at least 10 years. After all Michael had been diagnosed in 1987 when the drugs and treatments were almost non existant.

So I thought Ed would be around for a lot longer and it was a selfish idea that the world would accomodate me. In the end I hear that Ed shut a lot of friends out, except Mickey and as Kevin said, "good for Mickey" for refusing to be shut out.

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Here are some pics of Ed and various other friends. This one below is Ed as Booth and Kevin Bogan as Charles Guiteau. I can't come up with the name of the guy playing Czolgosz, but it will come to me or I will find a program later.




Ed and Val greeting some kids who want to meet Dorothy.



This is Ed in Candide, you can guess the character I think.



Ed getting made up for Sweeney Todd, my first production with The Fort Lauderdale Players and the show that introduced me to Ed and to Kevin who's talent and beautful voice I immediately admired.




Ed and Sam decided that there should be at least one pregnant women in Sweeny so they stuffed my costume and the director decided to go along with the idea. I ended up with Sam and Ed on stage most of the time and they were brutal with the attempts to make me laugh. Staying in character was a challenge. After one performance a woman walked up to me and said how angry she was that the director would allow a pregnant woman to move the house. She was very relieved to find out that I was just good at acting pregnant, not actually "with child".

As usual I couldn't make a serious face for the picture. I had to mug instead. As you can see our "back story" was that Ed was my older abusive husband. Being in this production is one of my favorite memories even though my only claim to fame was singing in the letter quintet.



Our trip to the Zoo.



Love you, Miss you Ed.

Want to hear some great music?

I'll bet you have never heard this music before. It is the music of the Eastern European Orthodox church.
You may recognize Rachmaninoff and Tchiakovsky, but I'll bet you never heard Bortniansky, Gretchininoff, Vedel, Beresovsky or Archangelsky.

This group singing is the Ekumen Choral from Olyphant Pa. The day we sang this music all the soloists were sick with bad chest colds and throat infections. Someone had shared a nice virus the week before apparently. So we were not at our best, but still the music is so beautiful it is worth the download if you have never heard it before.

You will discover that we sing a capella and in eastern church slavonic with either a Russian or Ukrainian pronunciation depending on the composer and our audience.

The other thing you might notice is that the mic was too close to me and my voice carries. Generally we have a more blended sound.

We sing in NYC at the Ukrainian Festival every couple of years. The festival is held in lower Manhattan and it is worth going to for the art and jewelry along with the slavic food you will not generally find outside of the Slavic community.

http://www.coloradofullcircle.com/cheswick/ <------ This is a site where the files are hosted.