In Memoriam: Roy Scheider

I’d like to take a moment here at the ol’ blog to pay tribute to one of my all-time favorite actors, old-school veteran Roy Scheider, who died yesterday afternoon at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock, AK. He was 75.  

Scheider will most likely always be best known for his steady leading man performance as Police Chief Martin Brody in Steven Spielberg’s 1975 blockbuster classic, Jaws. And as terrific a performance as that is, there was so much more to him than just that. For me, Scheider always brought sly humor, cool toughness, and subtle intelligence to all of his performances, as evidenced not only by his work in Jaws, but in a number of other film roles as well: as Gene Hackman’s low-key partner in The French Connection (1971); an American scientist who goes on the galactic journey of a lifetime in 2010 (1984); a blackmailed businessman who takes justice into his own hands in 52 Pick-Up (1986); and a cruel, emotionally abusive patriarch in The Myth of Fingerprints (1997). Even though Scheider eventually came to prominence as an unlikely leading man, he could often make the most of smaller supporting roles, as he did in such films as Klute (1971), Marathon Man (1976), and The Russia House (1990).

For me, though, Scheider’s triumph will always be his performance as Joe Gideon in Bob Fosse’s gloriously messy, imaginative, self-indulgent, and spectacularly entertaining 1979 film, All That Jazz. He brought all of his usual trademarks in portraying Fosse’s alter-ego, a hard-living, chain-smoking, womanizing director-choreographer who knows how to charm his way out of almost any situation. But he learned to sing and dance for the role, and did so in such convincing fashion (he was about 47 when did All That Jazz) that you’d never guess he hadn’t done either before. It’s the kind of performance that makes one re-consider a familiar face in a whole new light. Not surprisingly, this was also Scheider’s personal favorite out of all the roles he’d played.

In an obituary posted on Yahoo! this morning, actor Richard Dreyfuss called Scheider “a knockaround actor [which] to me is a compliment that means a professional that lives the life of a professional actor and doesn’t yell and scream at the fates and does his job and does it as well as he can.” Indeed. Not only did his body of work speak to that, but he was regarded as such by many of his actor colleagues. My father knew Scheider from way back and always had nothing but the very best things to say about him.

In closing, I’d like to direct you to a film clip of the singing-dancing finale of All That Jazz, in which Scheider teams up with none other than Ben Vereen (be forewarned, however, the last several seconds of the clip spoil the very ending of the movie). May it inspire you to check out the rest of this knockaround actor’s outstanding body of work. You will definitely be glad that you did.

(For more on Roy, check out film director William Friedkin’s candid remembrances of him here.)

The Search for Bobby Fischer Ends

The temp job is keeping me busy today, so I’ll have to make this brief.

First, I’ll start with this week’s Random Friday Top 10. I have to admit I’m cheating a little bit: I can’t listen to music here at work, so the Top 10 was culled from my Pandora Quick Mix two nights ago. Here it is:

• “Precious Illusions” - Alanis Morrissette (Under Rug Swept)
• “Air” - Ben Folds (Godzilla soundtrack album)
• “Pisces Apple Lady” - Leon Russell (Leon Russell)
• “Hang Low” - Momus (Ocky Milk)
• “Drown Them Out” - Viva Voce (Get Yr Blood Sucked Out)
• “Severed Head” - Pearl Jam (Pearl Jam)
• “The Morning Sad” - Veruca Salt (Eight Arms to Hold You)
• “Sheep” - Pink Floyd (Echoes: The Best of Pink Floyd)
• “Rinse” - Vanessa Carlton (Be Not Nobody)
• “Slow Like Honey” - Fiona Apple (Tidal)

Elsewhere, there’s word out of Iceland this morning that the sports world has lost one of its most bizarre, elusive, enigmatic, and legendary figures: Bobby Fischer. If the game of chess could boast a maverick outlaw, then Fischer was that guy. A jaw-droppingly non-linear life and career that, to my mind, is ripe for some sort of dramatic or literary rendering. Until that happens, you can rent this movie. It’s a freaking classic.

In Memoriam: The Actor’s Playhouse

I learned today that the Actor’s Playhouse, the 170-seat theatre that sits opposite the former location of the legendary and long-defunct Circle Repertory Company, is going the way of its old across-the-street neighbor. The 62-year-old West Village theatre is closing its doors permanently, according to its operator, Peter Berger. The rent has become too expensive, and there is speculation that the owner of the property, Duell Management, is in negotiations to “to turn it into something other than a theater.”

This is very sad, considering the rich history of the Actor’s Playhouse. The theatre has been home to many fine and popular productions over the decades, including John Van Druten’s play, I Am A Camera (1956), which served as the inspiration for the musical Cabaret, Fortune and Men’s Eyes (in both 1967 and 1987), Last Summer at Bluefish Cove (1980), the Craig Lucas-conceived Stephen Sondheim revue, Marry Me a Little (1981),  Harvey Fierstein’s Torch Song Trilogy (1982) and Safe Sex (1991), Howard Crabtree’s Whoop-De-Doo (1993), and Naked Boys Singing! (1999). Last summer, the theatre served as a FringeNYC venue, and was home to Gutenberg! The Musical! just earlier this year.

And so it goes that another long-standing contributor to the cultural and artistic landscape of Greenwich Village (and thus, New York City) fades into history.

In Memoriam: Anne Pitoniak & Michael Smuin

Last week saw the passing of two more theatre luminaries, actress Anne Pitoniak and choreographer Michael Smuin. If you’ve never heard of either of them, then read on. You will definitely recognize some of their credits.

Pitoniak created the title role in Marsha Norman’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play, ‘night, Mother, for which she was nominated for a 1983 Tony Award for Best Actress. A second Tony nomination came eleven years later for her performance as Helen Potts in Roundabout Theatre Company’s revival of Picnic by William Inge. Some of her other notable New York appearances included John Pielmeier’s Agnes of God, The Octette Bridge Club, Amy’s View by David Hare (opposite Judi Dench), Dance of Death (with Ian McKellen and Helen Mirren), Pygmalion (1991 OBIE Award), and Horton Foote’s The Last of the Thorntons.

Hers was also a familiar face at Actors Theatre of Louisville, where she played one of her first professional roles in Marsha Norman’s Getting Out. She also appeared in D.L. Coburn’s The Gin Game at ATL, as well as several plays by Jane Martin, including Middle Aged White Guys, Talking With, and Keely and Du.

If you think Pitoniak’s resume is impressive, wait ’till you hear this: she didn’t even take up acting until middle age. She spent most of her life as a wife and a mother before deciding to take acting classes at the Lee Strasberg Theater Institute. Her Broadway debut in ‘night, Mother came at age 61.

Talk about inspirational! To my mind, Pitoniak always exemplified the can-do power of positive thinking. Or, as Shakespeare famously put it, “Thinking makes it so.”

Michael Smuin was a Broadway choreographer who won the 1987 Tony Award for Best Choreography for Lincoln Center’s wonderful revival of Anything Goes. He began his career as a dancer, appearing in the original Broadway cast of Little Me (choreographed by none other than Bob Fosse). During the 1970s, he was a principal dancer and resident choreographer for American Ballet Theatre here in New York.

For the rest of his career, Smuin split his time between ballet and The Great White Way. He directed and choreographed the Duke Ellington revue, Sophisticated Ladies (starring Gregory Hines and Hinton Battle), as well as the notorious Shogun, The Musical. He also served as the co-artistic director of the San Francisco Ballet during the 1980s, and formed his own Bay Area dance company, Smuin Ballet, in 1995.

On a momentarily personal note, I was fortunate enough to have seen Lincoln Center’s revival of Anything Goes, and it was terrific. The tickets were a Christmas gift for my grandmother, who was a lifelong dance teacher and aficianado: I treated her. She knew Smuin’s work very well, and was simply overjoyed by the production and his work on it. Seeing that show with her is one of my favorite memories of her and I, and I am eternally grateful to Mr. Smuin for his part in that.

In Memoriam: Lynn Michaels & Kitty Carlisle Hart

I’m a little late getting around to this, but I’d like to take a moment to mark the passing last week of two great ladies of the theatre: Lynn Michaels and Kitty Carlisle Hart. I didn’t know much about either of them before last week, but it turns out there was plenty to know.

Michaels was a key figure in the original indie theater movement back in the 1950s. Her debut as a producer was Bertolt Brecht’s The Private Life of the Master Race, adapted by Eric Bentley, which went on to receive of the very first OBIE Awards from the Village Voice. From there, she opened and ran the St. Marks Playhouse, which presented such works as The Blacks by Jean Genet, Deep are the Roots, and Leroi Jones’ The Slave/The Toilet. And, starting in 1969, the venue become the home of the then newly-formed Negro Ensemble Company for nine seasons.

Today, Michaels may be most famously remembered for converting an old hat factory into what is now the Ohio Theatre. She was also the founder and artistic director of the Open Space Theatre Experiment, which presented festivals of new work, including James Lapine’s Photograph.

Artistically speaking, Kitty Carlise Hart couldn’t be further away from Michaels, but her devotion to the theatre was just as fervent.

She was a performer whose career spanned every medium. She starred opposite the Marx Brothers in their classic 1935 film, A Night at the Opera. From 1956 to 1967, she was a celebrity panelist on the popular television game show, To Tell the Truth, with other such luminaries of the day as Johnny Carson, Polly Bergen, and Don Ameche.  Her Broadway debut came in 1933, in the operetta, Champagne Sec; her final Broadway appearance came some 50 years later, in the 1983 revival of the Rodgers & Hart musical, On Your Toes. In between, she appeared in several other Broadway productions including the musical White Horse Inn, Agnes DeMille’s production of Benjamin Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia, and Anniversary Waltz, a play directed by Hart’s husband, the legendary writer-director-producer, Moss Hart. She even made her operatic debut at the Metropolitan Opera House, in a 1967 production of Die Fledermaus.

Hart was also a diligent arts philanthropist who served on the New York State Council on the Arts from 1971 to 1996, including 20 years as its chairwoman. Her advocacy for bettering women’s role in society led to her appointment as chairwoman of the Statewide Conference of Women. Later, she served as a special consultant on women’s opportunities to New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller.

In 1988, Hart testified in Albany to a legislative committee investigating complaints that NYSCA had funded gay-oriented projects. Her response? “We fund art. We don’t fund anyone’s point of view.”

In one obituary of Hart’s, I came across a quote that seems to suit both her and Michaels. It came from a 60 Minutes interview with Marie Brenner, author of Great Dames: What I Learned From Older Women, in which she offered her explanation of the term “great dame”: “A great dame is a soldier in high heels…They lived through the depression. They lived through the war. They were tough, intelligent and brassy women.”

‘Nuff said, eh?

In Memoriam: Roscoe Lee Browne

Today I’d like to take a moment to note the passing earlier this week of veteran character actor Roscoe Lee Browne. He died of cancer in Los Angeles on April 11 after a long and distinguished career. If you think you don’t know him, I say that you do. As is often the case with character actors of his stature, people didn’t recognize his name as often as they recognized his face.

Not to mention his voice. His was a rich, mellifluous voice that could be both authoratative and soothing. Once you heard it, you never forgot it.

What’s he got to do with indie theater, you may ask? A lot. Like many of today’s indie theater artists, Browne toiled away at a number of survival jobs - including college professor, and wine company salesman - before turning to acting in 1956. He hit New York just in time for the original indie theater movement of the 1950s and 1960s, appearing in the original New York productions of The Blacks, Tiger, Tiger Burning Bright, and The Ballad of the Sad Café, as well as the New York Shakespeare Festival (known today as The Public Theater) productions of Julius Caesar, King Lear, and Troilus and Cressida. He appeared in Danton’s Death for the Repertory Theatre of Lincoln Center (now known simply as Lincoln Center Theater), and even hoofed it up with Tommy Tune and Twiggy in the Broadway musical, My One and Only.

Browne’s final New York stage appearance came in 1992, in the original Broadway production of Two Trains Running by August Wilson. My mom was fortunate enough to see his performance, and it has stayed with her to this very day.

Like most people of my generation, I was introduced to Browne through his voluminous film and television work. There were the guest spots on numerous television shows: All in the Family, Maude, Soap, Benson, and an Emmy Award-winning guest spot on The Cosby Show. He also worked with Alfred Hitchcock on Topaz, and narrated both Babe movies.

I will always remember Browne most of all for his supporting turn in the 1972 film, The Cowboys, in which he played opposite none other than John Wayne. As Jedediah Nightlinger, the wise, disciplined cook who helps supervise a cattle drive full of inexperienced young school boys, Browne proved to be one of The Duke’s sturdiest and best sidekicks. We won’t see his like again.