Review: Jamie deRoy Marks 35 Years of JAMIE DEROY & FRIENDS

On Sunday, November 23rd, Jamie deRoy marked her 35th year hosting the entertaining variety show she created, aptly titled Jamie deRoy & Friends. For this performance (borrowing a word from her signature song), her friends “camped out” at the newly renovated Laurie Beechman Theatre on 42nd Street in New York City. A bit of venue history reveals that Jamie deRoy & Friends has been a chronicle of the great nightclubs of Manhattan. Eda and I are relatively new friends (20 years) but have attended presentations of the show on the stages of Birdland, 54 Below, Feinstein’s at The Regency, Don’t Tell Mama, Friars Club, The Triad, Metropolitan Room, Green Room 42, Caroline’s on Broadway, and the Gerald W. Lynch Theater at John Jay College. Older friends have seen Jamie & her friends at its inception in 1990 at the gone but not forgotten Steve McGraw’s on 72nd Street.

Jamie’s shows have also been aligned with the history of Broadway musical theatre and New York nightlife. I’m sure her archives would reveal a who’s who of Broadway, cabaret, concert and television luminaries of the last 35 years.  The performers who joined Jamie on Sunday will be added to that distinguished list…. Ali Ewoldt, John Forster, Judy Gold, Ann Kittredge and Jak Malone. This show was akin to being in the audience of one of those exceptional Ed Sullivan or Hollywood Palace TV shows back in the day, the only commercials being for the performers' CDs and the Entertainment Community Fund…. The performances by Jamie’s renowned friends were thrilling, and the showbiz stories and humor that filled the room kept an audience of her friends not wanting it to end.

The show was smartly directed by Barry Kleinbort, who has been on board since its beginning, and who is also responsible for those clever parody lyrics that Jamie sings.

Ms. deRoy has had some of the music world’s most gifted pianists serving as her music director over the years and Christopher Denny was the veteran at the keyboard for last night’s presentation, along with Tom Hubbard on bass. As always the evening was a Benefit for The Entertainment Community Fund.

If you do the math, the amount of friends who have attended these shows could fill Carnegie Hall several times over, and who knows?  That just might be the next venue for the always entertaining Jamie deRoy & Friends.

Learn more about Jamie deRoy on her website at www.jamiederoy.com. Find more upcoming shows at the Beechman on their website here. Below, see photos from the November 23 show.