Laura Benanti was attached last summer to play Alice in a production of YOU CAN'T TAKE IT WITH YOU that was targeted for Broadway in the spring of this year through Manhattan Theatre Club.
I wonder if this is the same one now shepherded by commercial producers? I guess we'll see.
Tonya Pinkins: Then we had a "Lot's Wife" last June that was my personal favorite. I'm still trying to get them to let me sing it at some performance where we get to sing an excerpt that's gone.
Tony Kushner: You can sing it at my funeral.
Have to respectfully disagree with the naysayers. I continue to think the play timeless and perhaps even relevant to the climate today. But it plays so wonderfully with the right folks in it. I still have a bad vhs of the Papermill/Broadway production with Jason Robards, Elizabeth Wilson, George Rose, Colleen Dewhurst (Olga Katrina) and an extraordinary supporting cast. The production always moves me to tears during the family grace scenes. Robards was magic. Many people enjoyed their replacements, which included Eddie Albert and I think Eva Gabor as the countess. I'm delighted it's returning.
Casting ideas?
Not a bad role in it.
"I'm a comedian, but in my spare time, things bother me." Garry Shandling
It's a good choice for a play right now, I think. You can get some great names in it, it's a well known title that people will go to. All in all if done right, it could be a huge hit.
John Benjamin Hickey and Faith Prince as the parents.
Sutton Foster as Essie and Anne Hathaway as Alice.
Jason Alexander as Boris.
If anyone ever tells you that you put too much Parmesan cheese on your pasta, stop talking to them. You don't need that kind of negativity in your life.
Meg Mundy was also memorable as Mrs. Kirby in the Papermill-created revival. But the great, always underappreciated Elizabeth Wilson turned the role of Penny into a comic jewell. (I've seen it rather humorless.) Watch her eyes as she writes her plays.
Harriet Harris as Penny? Andrea Martin as Olga Katrina?
"I'm a comedian, but in my spare time, things bother me." Garry Shandling
Colleen Dewhurst who played the small role of the Countess (?) in Act III said in an interview at the time that it was so nice to take a curtain call and look out into the house and see teeth, as in smiles. She had played tragic roles of O'Neill et al, for so long, she forgot that a comedy would affect the audience differently.
This is a sweetheart of a play when it is done well.
"If my life weren't funny, it would just be true. And that would be unacceptable."
--Carrie Fisher
Dewhurst was magnificent. It's one scene, but she wiped up. And she and Robards have a delicious moment about making the blintzes, their own history with O'Neill remembered by many unavoidably. She played the swinging door to the kitchen for all it's worth. I will make ... BLINTZ!
"I'm a comedian, but in my spare time, things bother me." Garry Shandling
I'm more excited to see another show helmed by Shapiro than I am for the play itself. If it's done well, which I'm sure it will be, it can be very good. The play is a little dusty, but I'm sure Shapiro can make it shine.
Hey, the play certainly has aged better and is more fondly remembered than the musical version (TAF) undoubtedly will be, if it is ever remembered at all.
Rondi Reed as Penny John Mahoney as Grandpa Fran Guinan as Paul Laurie Metcalf as Gay Harrington Al Wilder as Mr. De Pinna Ian Barford as Ed Marianne Mayberry as Essie Estelle Parsons as Olga John Malkovich as Boris Patrick Wilson as Tony Natalie Portman as Alice
I'm spending a year away from NYC roughly May 2010-May 2011. I'm going to hate hearing about all of these wonderful shows opening up that I won't be able to see. A couple of roadtrips to catch up will certainly be in order.