Well, dear readers, show was one for the ages. The room was pretty jam-packed, so that was great. We opened with a great Irving Berlin “jump” tune cut from Annie Get Your Gun, called Take It in Your Stride and done to perfection by Ava Madison Gray. Next was Erin Tardibuono singing Much More from The Fantasticks, a beautiful performance. Then came Sadie Reynolds doing the lovely 44 Sunsets from The Little Prince. Sadie is something else – so real and honest and a truly lovely voice. Then it was If Momma Was Married with Emerson and Zo McNeeley and they really socked it home, voices blending perfectly. Next was Daniel Peters making all the moms in the audience happy with Mama, a Rainbow from Minnie’s Boys. Hearts were melted. After that it was Zander Chin doing a song I wrote for a show called Yearbook, which featured songs by quite a few LA writers – the song is called Nerd and Zander really delivered it beautifully.
Next up was Marissa Margolis doing a bang-up version of Journey to the Past from Anastasia. She’s done several Kritzerland shows and she just gets better and better. Then it was a song from my web series Sami called BFF – done here by Elena Bertacchi and Benji Katzke, real life friends. They even did some ography and they did a delicious job and made this writer proud. Then Rae Martinez did a great Frank Mills from Hair, followed by Sophie Peterson doing my song, Annie, which literally brought the house down. Then Ava was back with a cut song from the flop musical Georgy called Toy Balloon. Simple and beautiful.
Next was a song from Doug Haverty and my musical A Carol Christmas, called Spelling Backwards and Sadie was just great, got her laughs, hit it right out of the park. Sophie was back with I’m Not That Girl from Wicked and it was lovely and moving. Then Daniel and Zander did Agony and its reprise from Into the Woods – they were great with a VERY tough song. Elena then did a wonderful Anthony Newley/Leslie Bricusse song from their version of Peter Pan called Once Upon a Bedtime Story – again, very simple, very heartfelt, very beautiful.
Then we had our big six-song medley of TV songs written by Benji’s grandpa, someone you might have heard of named Charles Fox. The medley consisted of Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley, Wonder Woman, Love, American Style, The Love Boat, and Angie. I’m happy to say that I guest-starred on three of the shows in the medley. Charlie did not know we were doing it and he loved it and Benji was great. Then Emerson and Zo did What Is This Feeling? from Wicked – another great job from the girls. After that, it was Aaron Chao doing The Candy Man/Think Positive from Willy Wonka – he almost walked away with the whole show he was so adorable. Rae came back and did Amanda McBroom’s gorgeous song Ship in a Bottle, and she sang it gorgeously. Erin and Talia Doyle did Perfect Strangers from Drood and it’s a really difficult song and they just did great. To wrap things up, Marissa sang You There in the Back Row by Cy Coleman and Barbara Fried and she did an amazing job, and finally we closed the show with Talia Doyle doing my arrangement of Beautiful City and Day by Day from Godspell. Gerald Sternbach was his usual wonderful self on piano. It was an afternoon to remember. Here’s our merry troupe.
Left to right, back row: Gerald Sternback, Marissa Margolis, li’l ol’ me, Benji Katzke, Sophie Petersen, Elena Bertacchi, Doug Haverty, Daniel Peters. Second row, left to right: Aaron Chao, Ava Madison Gray, Sadie Reynolds, Erin Tardibuono, Rae Martinez, Zander Chin. Front row, left to right: Emerson and Zo Mc Neeley.
Here I am with Kay Cole.
Here’s Ava and Sadie.
Here’s Ava.
There’ll be more photos soon. Prior to all that, I got six-and-a-half-hours of sleep, shaved and showered, answered e-mails and then moseyed on over to the club for sound check. About twenty minutes before the show started, I got an e-mail response to my e-mail response where I had to get a bit, how shall we say, tough, it worked, and all is well, and we have the rights to the musical we’ll be doing next March at the Group Rep.
After catching up on stuff and thinking I’d posted when I hadn’t, I sat on my couch in the sweltering eight-two-degree house temperature – unbearable. The A/C is not blowing tepid air, it’s blowing hot air. I’ve written Grant Geissman about it and hopefully he can get someone here tomorrow to figure this out once and for all.
One thing about my show commentary – the young people show audiences are made up of families and relatives and friends who’ve never been to a Kritzerland show. So, they don’t know the running jokes or a lot of the funny theater references – they laugh, but it’s not like our regular audiences and it takes some getting used to. Anyway, it was a good day any way you look at it and I look at it as a good day. Back to the evening, I finished watching the Ennio Morricone documentary. It’s quite good once you get past the first twenty minutes and ultimately, it’s very touching. He was one of the most unique of all film composers and his body of work is astonishing. His Leone scores are masterpieces, each and every one. His thriller scores are great. His prestigious scores are great. He’s wonderful when talking about his music and his collaborators clearly loved him dearly. Well worth your time.
Today, I’ll be up by ten, I’ll go deposit a check, then I’ll go to Gelson’s and get something to eat and bring it home for later. I’ll start choosing songs for the anniversary show, I have some other stuff to catch up on, I’ll continue to hope for a few more modern major miracles, I’m hoping the A/C man will come fix this damn thing so I’m not in a sweat box, and then at some point, I’ll watch, listen, and relax.
The rest of the week is more of the same, I have some meetings and meals, and I want to start meeting with set designers about the March show, which we’ll actually cast in December and rehearsals will start end of January.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, be up by ten, deposit a check, do a Gelson’s run, choose songs, catch up on other stuff, hope for a few more modern major miracles, hope the A/C man comes to fix whatever’s wrong with it, and then I’ll watch, listen, and relax. Today’s topic of discussion: What are your favorite scores of Ennio Morricone? Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, whilst I hit the road to dreamland, happy that Kritzerland 128 was a rousing success.