PAUL IACONO SINGS ELAINE STRITCH… SINGS ELTON JOHN is Coming to The Green Room 42
The performance will take place on Saturday, May 3 at 9:30 PM.
By: Chloe Rabinowitz Apr. 09, 2025
THE GREEN ROOM 42 will present the return of Paul Iacono, best known as star of G.B.F., Fame, and MTV’s “The Hard Times of RJ Berger,” in the world premiere of The Stritch Is Back: Paul Iacono Sings Elaine Stritch... Sings Elton John on Saturday, May 3 at 9:30 PM. Written and performed by Paul Iacono and directed by Ben Rimalower, the show recreates wildly personal and painfully hilarious moments shared with Elaine from Carnegie Hall to Hollywood, accompanied onstage by music director Drew Wutke, with music consulting and additional arrangements by Peter Saxe. A livestream option is available for $20.
As mentioned in the 2013 documentary, Elaine Stritch: Shoot Me, the octogenarian diva’s aborted final project was to be a cabaret of Elton John songs. The Stritch Is Back: Paul Iacono Sings Elaine Stritch... Sings Elton John imagines how that might have been, in a brassy evening of excess and exposé. Actor and writer Paul Iacono recreates his misadventures with mentor and muse Elaine Stritch, set to the music and lyrics of Elton John and Bernie Taupin. From an awe-struck child in the world of Broadway to an adult creative navigating the challenges of show business, join Paul for a larger-than-life journey through the highs, lows, and lessons learned from his relationship with his indomitable stage-godmother, Elaine Stritch.
Paul Iacono
(Writer / Performer) is a graduate of Manhattan’s Professional Performing Arts High School, Iacono is best known for portraying the title character on MTV’s “The Hard Times of RJ Berger.” Paul was first featured on “The Rosie O’Donnell Show” at age eight, after she discovered his unique talents for impersonating Frank Sinatra and Ethel Merman. Favorite stage credits include Mercury Fur (The New Group), Bridget Everett’s Rock Bottom (Joe’s Pub), Noël Coward’s Sail Away with Elaine Stritch (Carnegie Hall), and John Guare’s Landscape of the Body, with Lili Taylor and Sherie Rene Scott (Signature Theatre). Favorite film credits include MGM’s remake of Fame, Darren Stein’s G.B.F., and Dating My Mother with Kathy Najimy. Iacono's play Prince/Elizabeth premiered at The Teatro LATEA Theater co-starring Sofia Black D’Elia and Peter Vack, The Last Great Dame (loosely inspired by his relationship with Elaine Stritch) at Jane Friedman’s HOWL! Happening Gallery, and High Priest, the Andy Warhol Silver Factory epic, at La MaMa Experiments Play Reading Series. His cabaret “Where’s The F*cking Kid?” premiered at 54 Below, with “Psychedelic Hedonism” following at Joe’s Pub (New York Magazine “Critic’s Pick”), followed by “Psychedelic Playhouse,” and most recently “Paul Iacono, Unfiltered,” both at The Green Room 42. He was named one of Out 100’s most influential after coming out in Michael Musto’s Village Voice column in 2011. Iacono has six other projects in development, including his downtown cult-favorite, Gotham Rogues: The Unauthorized Batman Parody Musical, which will have its first full presentation this September at Joe’s Pub. Instagram: @PsychedelicHedonism
Ben Rimalower
(Director) is the author and star of the long-running solo plays Patti Issues (New York Times “Critic’s Pick,” MAC and Bistro Awards) and Bad with Money, available everywhere as a double audiobook, as well as producer and host of Broadway Podcast Network’s “Giants in the Sky: How Sondheim and Lapine Went Into the Woods.” He writes the theater column in Metrosource Magazine and has been a frequent contributor to Vulture, Playbill, Out, Decider, and Huff Post. Ben directed Snoopy! (starring Tony winners Sutton Foster and Christian Borle), the Off-Broadway plays Joy and The Fabulous Life of a Size Zero(starring Gillian Jacobs and Anna Chlumsky), and a slew of solo shows, most notably conceiving and directing Leslie Kritzer Is Patti LuPone at Les Mouches and subsequently producing Ghostlight Records’ Patti LuPone at Les Mouches. He is recognizable around the world for his four seasons on Bravo’s “The Real Housewives of New York City” as the writer-director of LuAnn de Lesseps’s record-breaking cross-country cabaret sensation, Countess and Friends. He also co-wrote de Lesseps’s single, “Feelin’ Jovani.” Ben serves as the Director of Programming for The Green Room 42.
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