The Hartford Courant, Conn., Frank Rizzo Column: Stamford Arts Center, Out Of Bankruptcy, Starts New Business Model

By Frank Rizzo, The Hartford Courant, Conn.

Oct. 29--The Stamford Center for the Arts has emerged from bankruptcy protection after a year with a new business structure.

Now it's ready to move forward, with one less stage.

But what is that new business model?

"In its simplest form, we are more risk-averse," says Elissa Getto, co-executive director with Jenny Lake.

The arts center will become a booking house and will not be involved in producing. It has also curtailed its other education and outreach programming. The number of bookings at the center's 1,578-seat Palace Theater will be modest, Getto says.

The Rich Forum, formerly a 700-seat theater, is now a television facility where NBC's "The Jerry Springer Show" and other programs are shot.

As the center becomes stabilized, it may begin educational programs in the spring, but only if funding is secured.

The Rich Forum is now leased by NBC for its programming and helps contribute to the Stamford Arts Center's $1.5 million annual operating budget, down from a high of nearly $7 million a few years ago.

Bookings include the Derek Trucks Band, Warren Miller's "Dynasty" and "The Nutcracker" by the Stamford-based Connecticut Ballet.

Georgi James is one busy little girl.

James, who played the precocious young Lily Dale (as well as the widow Claire's daughter Molly and piano student Irma Sue) in "The Orphans' Home Cycle" at Hartford Stage, finished the run in Hartford Saturday and then headed to Florida, where she is in a workshop production of a new musical, "Little Miss Sunshine," based on the 2006 film.

She will play another precocious child, Olive Hoover.

The musical features Craig Bierko, Dick Latessa, Martin Moran and Sherie Rene Scott. The work is being developed as part of the Sundance White Oak Lab in Yulee, Fla.

Music and lyrics are by William Finn, with script and direction by James Lapine. Both also collaborated on "Falsettos," "A New Brain" and "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee."

After the workshop, James will return to "The Orphans' Home Cycle," which begins performances next week off-Broadway at the Signature Theatre Company.

The Florida workshop runs through Nov. 7. Larkin Meehan, James' understudy in "Cycle," will cover for James until she returns a week into previews off-Broadway.

Meehan understudied Scout and appeared as a townsperson in Hartford Stage's "To Kill a Mockingbird" last spring.

Also at the lab is a workshop of a new musical based on Laura Esquivel's 1989 novel, "Like Water for Chocolate," with a script by Quiara Alegria Hudes ("In the Heights"), who was playwright-in-residence last season at Hartford Stage.

Trinity College's "Annual Musical Theater Revue" did some last-minute adjusting last Friday.

Two actors were stricken with the flu. But director Gerald Moshell did some fast editing. The show -- a tribute to women composers and lyricists -- went on with its healthy 11 cast members.

They played in front of one of the honorees, composer Jeanine Tesori, who spent the afternoon with students from the department of music and theater. Students performed songs from "Caroline, Or Change," "Shrek," "Violet," "Mother Courage" and "Twelfth Night." Unfortunately, songs from "Thoroughly Modern Millie" have to be cut because of the ill students. Tesori says she is working with writer Lisa Kron ("2.5 Minute Ride," which played Hartford Stage, and Broadway's "Well") on a musical adaptation of the graphic novel "Fun Home" by Alison Bechnell (author of the comic strip "Dykes To Watch Out For"). The subtitle of the book is "A Family Tragicomic." Joe Mantello will direct.

Though "Shrek" ends its Broadway run in January, Tesori is working on a program that features her music as part of "The American Songbook" series March 5 at New York's Lincoln Center.

She also said scheduling conflicts made her withdraw from writing the music for the Elephant Eye production of a new show, "Beauty Sleeping." (The Bushnell Center for the Performing Arts in Hartford is an investor in Elephant Eye, which also has the upcoming musical "The Addams Family" heading to Broadway.)

Tesori says she is writing an opera for the Met with Tony Kushner, whom she worked with on "Caroline, or Change."

A recording will be made of the music from the production of "Mother Courage," which starred Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline.

Willi Burke and Pearl Rhein are featured in Donald Margulies' "Collected Stories" at Playhouse on Park, 244 Park Road in West Hartford.

Burke's credits include Broadway's "On the 20th Century" and "Fiorello!" and TV's "All My Children" and "Nurse Jackie." Rhein's credits include "Memphis" and "Assume the Position" at La Jolla Playhouse in California.

The play, about an established writer and her ambitious student, runs Nov. 12 to 30, following a discounted preview on Nov. 11. Bargain alert! The preview is $15.

Stevie Zimmerman directs the production, featuring professional actors playing under a guest Equity contract.

Another production of "Collected Stories," starring Linda Lavin, will play Broadway in the spring. Margulies' new play, "Time Stands Still," is in previews off Broadway, opening Nov. 3.

The production replaces the previously announced Edward Albee's "Three Tall Women," which will be presented in a future season.

Information: 860-523-5900, Ext.10, or www.playhouseonpark.org.

We bumped into Tony Walton at the opening Wednesday night of "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" at Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam last week.

The award-winning designer (and director) was all smiles during intermission. He created the original memorable sets for the 1962 production, which starred Zero Mostel, Jack Gilford, John Carradine and David Burns. It was Stephen Sondheim's first musical as composer as well as lyricist. The very funny book was by Burt Shevelove and Larry Gelbart (who died last month).

Walton recalled the problems the show had during its world premiere at the Shubert Theater in New Haven 47 years ago. He remembers an interview that director George Abbott had the morning after the opening there, "saying that he hoped the show could still be saved." Perhaps cutting the songs, he thought.

It was, in no small part to Jerome Robbins, who urged Sondheim to write a new opening number: "Comedy Tonight!" which Robbins staged, along with other directorial assists. "He could make magic out of a simple white handkerchief," says Walton.

Walton has also designed many revivals of the show over the years, as well as the 1966 film version of the musical, directed by Richard Lester, fresh off Lester's triumph in directing the Beatles in "A Hard Day's Night" and "Help!" The film of "Funny Thing," which removed most of the songs, outraged the musical's fans. But don't entirely blame Lester for that, says Walton. It was the film's producer and screenwriter, Melvin Frank.

-- Read Frank Rizzo's blog on theater, the arts and entertainment at www.courant.com/curtain.

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