Third Coast Creatives

For decades, Cole Porter was the toast of Broadway.   With successful shows such as Kiss Me Kate , Anything Goes , and Silk Stockings along with constant flow of hit songs cascading off his keyboard, just having Porter’s name on the marquis was a producer’s dream.   At the urging of producers Cy Feuer and Ernest Martin, Porter agreed to pen the score for a show set in Montmartre in the 1890s.   Written towards the end of his career, Can-Can was Porter’s “poke-in-the-eye” to the censors he felt were holding Broadway back.   With its latest production in its Porchlight Revisits series, Porchlight Music Theatre brings Can-Can , Porter’s irreverent homage to the wicked revelry of Montmartre to Chicago’s Gold Coast’s Ruth Page Center for the Arts for three high kicking performances.   Beginning its fifth year, this special series provides an opportunity for music theatre aficionados to experience musicals that opened on Broadway, but are no longer frequentl...

 Although The Blues Brothers movie was released over 38 years ago, it has remained a cult classic throughout the world.  In an online poll conducted by The State Journal-Register, Illinois Bicentennial Committee, and Abraham Lincoln Library and Museum as part of the Illinois Bicentennial celebration, voters chose The Blues Brothers  as the top movie in Illinois history.  Despite opening to mixed reviews, the film has grossed over $115 million worldwide.  Here are some fun facts about this cult classic. ·          The original draft of the screenplay written by Dan Aykroyd was 324 pages, which was three times longer than the standard screenplay.   To soften the impact, Aykroyd made a joke of the thick script and had it bound with the cover of the Los Angles Yellow Pages directory when he turned it into producer Robert K. Weiss.   Director John Landis was given the task of editing the script into a usab...

Reading the pages of Jessica Hopper’s latest book, Night Moves , (University of Texas Press) I found myself reliving my younger days as a creative living and hustling on the streets of Chicago.   As a free lancer working in theater, dance, movies, and anything else I could find, I identified with Hopper’s journey to define her creative self while struggling to make ends meet.   In hindsight, being broke had its benefits.   Being forced to traverse the City by foot or public transportation, Chicago opened up in ways I could never experience being cooped up in a Honda. Through Night Moves, I rediscovered those somewhat faded memories of good times and bad.   The book is a compilation of vignettes of Hopper’s exploration of the City between 2004 to 2008.   It revisits when Hopper fell in love with Chicago, block by block, on a bicycle.   More than that,  Night Moves is a snapshot of Chicago that no longer exists as Hopper and I knew it. A Ch...

Sequins, taffeta, and jeweled tiaras filled the Chicago Improv…and that was just in the audience.   On stage Laura Osnes (Cinderella on Broadway), Susan Egan (original Belle in Beauty and the Beast) and Courtney Reed (original Jasmine in Disney’s Aladdin) were joined by Music Director/Fairy Godfairy Benjamin Rauhala to host a Broadway Princess Party.   Through two sold-out performances, these talented artists performed the most beloved ‘Princess songs’ of stage and screen, reminiscing about their favorite fairy tales and most cherished characters. The Broadway Princess Party is the brainchild of New York-based music director Rauhala and two-time Tony nominee Osnes.   Returning home from a visit to Disneyworld, Rauhala thought, wouldn’t it be fun to have a Broadway Princess Party?   What about a show composed of songs made famous by all those princesses, a show complete with some gossip and banter about what it would it was actually like to play these charac...

For the past six years I have had the pleasure to write for Halfstack Magazine, the last several as Entertainment Editor. Jen, Halfstack's Founder/Editor, allowed me a wide portfolio to cover most things indie.  I interviewed musicians, authors, dancers, designers, and creatives of all sorts.  I had the pleasure to write about Sara Bareilles joining Broadway's first all female creative team to create the music for Waitress and her dream to be part of the Broadway community.  When Kristin Bell grabbed her not so voluntary pianist friend to sing songs from Frozen to people trapped in a shelter during a Florida hurricane, I shared how she was upstaged by a dancing policeman. Sundance's Liz Manashil and I spent literally hours on the phone discussing indie movies and sharing stories about projects past.  The years I spent writing for Halfstack (as well as guest hosting the magazine's podcast) were truly rewarding.  Not only did I get a chance to meet some amazi...