BEHIND THE SCENES OF A TONY CAMPAIGN

The Tony Awards might seem totally inscrutable to the majority of you living outside Broadway. You might well wonder, "What really makes a winner?"—especially when even a Tony voter writes, "voting for the Tonys is a dangerously haphazard affair."

At least this year you have the rare opportunity to peek behind the scenes of a major Tony campaign. Who is it but Cubby Bernstein—the James Carville of the show business set—putting the "camp" in campaign on behalf of the long-running musical Xanadu?

Click here for the whole video exposé, complete with footage of Nathan Lane, Patti LuPone, Cynthia Nixon, Duncan Sheik, and Julie White, among many other luminaries of the Great White Way. These videos have turned Broadway on its head, with the more recent episodes being especially revealing.

And your own Tony predictions are welcome here—by 6pm EST.



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MERV GRIFFIN (1925-2007)

Here talk-show host Merv Griffin talks with Patti LuPone while Madeline Kahn sits on the sidelines, quite possibly disapproving.



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ENCORES: GYPSY

The Encores! series extends its winning streak with its summer production of Gypsy, which runs through July 29. Could it be more finely tuned, as suggested in Ben Brantley's dour-toned New York Times review? Sure, I think it could...but it's still very good in many ways. And I think Brantley is unfair to Patti Lupone's intriguing and intelligent take on the character of domineering Momma Rose.

One of the show's highlights comes in a kind of throwaway transitional scene that shows Momma Rose adding young boys to her troupe while traipsing over to California. Her pouncing posture is funny, a little scary, and very representative of her character. Later in the first act Lupone and Boyd Gaines (as Herbie) offer a great little duet that climaxes with the two singing as they practically tumble to the floor. It's a great routine for the two stage veterans.

In the second act there are at least three big numbers. The reliable routine in which strippers teach the basics to the future Gypsy Rose Lee is entertaining, but there's magic in the sequence showing her blossom in the trade. On the surface it might not come across as very demanding for an actor, but Benanti's performance is so polished (and her makeup and costuming so flattering) that it suddenly made the vast City Center seem very, very intimate and offered a strong case that the kind of "striptease" touted by Gypsy Rose Lee can still be erotic even in today's more jaded and openly sexualized world. (I think an adult actually escorted a child out of the theater during the episode.) And then there's the big—really big—number, "Rose's Turn," which Lupone performs with high drama without turning it into a maudlin, cringe-inducing psychodrama.

Once again Encores! offers a full orchestra with a rich and lively sound that (even with problematic violin intonation in early passages) cannot be equaled by today's small, electronically enhanced pit ensembles. And the reliably hardcore Encores! theater crowd is an attraction in itself, delighted to be entertained and very demonstrative to boot.

I do have a complaint about the venue. Due to budgetary concerns, I've been getting nosebleed seats for a while, but for Gypsy I accidentally wound up with tickets in the center of the rear mezzanine, which has to rank as one of the worst seating sections in all of New York City. The rake is too flat, which means that many heads can block views of the action. A friend and I craned this way and that to get good vantage points, but before the second act he migrated to seats in a less crowded section to one side of the rear mezzanine. I joined him there after the woman behind me pleaded for me to stop my swaying. I am pretty sure that the rake can be improved, so I think that City Center should fix it promptly and, in the meantime, find a way to label and price the seats as "obstructed" or something like that.

Here's Gypsy Rose Lee in Stage Door Canteen (which also featured original Momma Rose Ethel Merman). And is that William Burroughs at the very end?



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And here's writer Arthur Laurents on the musical and the "real" Gypsy Rose Lee.



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ENCORES! GYPSY CASTING

As previously noted, Patti LuPone is to star in the Encores! Gypsy. Now there's more casting news: "Friend of Tony" Boyd Gaines will play Herbie, Laura Benanti will play Louise, and Tony Yazbeck--who played a newsboy in the Tyne Daly Gypsy--will play Tulsa.

Here's Laura Benanti singing Maria...to Andrea McArdle's Annie-ta! Heh.



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