09/11/03
"Richard Rodgers: An Enchanted Evening," which was filmed in May 2002 at London's Theatre Royal, Haymarket, features stage stars Judi Dench, Ruthie Henshall, Maureen Lipman, Lesley Garrett and Kim Criswell. Directed by Simon Callow, the 80-minute recording includes such Rodgers classics as "Sixteen Going on Seventeen," performed by Dench, and "My Funny Valentine," sung by Henshall, as well as "Some Enchanted Evening," "Johnny One-Note," "Getting to Know You," "I Have Confidence, " "To Keep My Love Alive," "If I Loved You," "You'll Never Walk Alone," "Oklahoma!" and more.
During his lifetime, Richard Rodgers penned over 900 songs. His partnerships with Lorenz Hart and later with Oscar Hammerstein II produced some of the most successful musicals in Broadway history. His works with Hart included On Your Toes, Babes in Arms, I Married an Angel, The Boys from Syracuse, Pal Joey and By Jupiter, and the Rodgers-Hammerstein collaboration spawned Oklahoma!, Carousel, South Pacific, The King and I, Flower Drum Song and The Sound of Music.
Amazon.com is currently accepting pre-orders for the Image Entertainment DVD, which will be available beginning Nov. 18.
RUTHIE HENSHALL, KIM CRISWELL, JUDI DENCH AND MORE SALUTE RICHARD RODGERS ON UPCOMING DVD
An all-star salute to late composer Richard Rodgers will be available on DVD in November.
-Andrew Gans of playbill.com
Ruthie's back playing Velma Kelly in CHICAGO THE MUSICAL
HENSHALL has appeared on Broadway in Chicago, Putting It Together and Miss Saigon. She has been nominated for four Olivier Awards (for Crazy For You, She Loves Me, Chicago and Peggy Sue Got Married) and won the Best Actress in a Musical Award for She Loves Me. Henshall, who is currently performing concerts throughout the United Kingdom, is signed with EMI Records and recently released an album, Pilgrim. She was expected to return to the Great White Way this spring in the Burt Bacharach and Hal David revue The Look of Love, but has now pulled out of the project.
Howar played Michael opposite Henshall's Peggy Sue in Peggy Sue Got Married. He won the Edmonton Civic Award for Outstanding Achievement in Dance in 1990. His theatrical credits include Anything That Moves, Outrageous, Les Miserables (U.S. national tour) and The Who's Tommy (Canadian national tour).
-Broadway.com The pixie star led a cast of topnotch professionals—RUTHIE HENSHALL, Michael Mulheren, Paige Price, and Keith Byron Kirk—in an hour-long revue of Broadway song and dance, a kickoff to the New York Loves America tour which will hit fourteen other U.S. cities, concluding Feb. 2 in Denver. The musical revue, organized under the auspices of the League of American Theatres and Producers, was billed as "a thank you" for the support which the country had lent to New York City in the aftermath of the World Trade Center attacks. And if in the process, publicity could be generated to lift sagging advance ticket sales on Broadway and promote New York City tourism, all the better.
Before Duncan launched into "All That Jazz" against a backdrop of pleasure craft moving in and out of the marina, League president Jed Bernstein welcomed a crowd of about 500, describing Miami as "the sixth borough," and noting that the troupe was making their first stop here, in the Sunshine State, because if "it had been Minnesota, the cast would have quit."
Turning to more somber business, he presented the heads of Miami's police and fire departments with two firemen helmets, signed by the surviving members of the decimated "Broadway firehouse," Ladder 4, Engine 54—a ceremony which will be repeated in each city on the tour. The brigade's motto, said Bernstein, was "Never Missed a Performance"—a cue to bring on Duncan and the troupers who launched into spirited numbers from long-running Broadway hits, such as Michael Mulheren on "Mr. Cellophane" from Chicago, as well as those from upcoming shows, like Price's rendition of "I'm Just a Who Cain't Say No" from Oklahoma! Keith Byron Kirk knocked it out of the park with "I Dreamed a Dream" from Les Miz. But the BIGGEST OVATIONS were reserved for HENSHALL'S BELTING of "Cabaret" and for the trio of Duncan, Paige and HENSHALL on "Dancin' Queen", introduced "….as a song from Mamma Mia!, the Italian name of the British hit featuring the music of the Swedish Rock group, ABBA, now in America."
Happily drinking in the show in the audience were Ira and Ruth Gordon, a middle-aged Miami couple who said that they were planning a trip to New York in March. After the Broadway quintet concluded with a song from "Rent", Ruth Gordon ("not the actress, she , but me, I'm alive") confessed that she and her husband were "Broadway addicts" and had been drawn to Bayside by a mention of the free musical revue in the local paper.
"We love Sandy Duncan and I think this show was just terrific," she said. "It'll bring the nation closer to New York and to Broadway." Sitting next to her was Selma Godwin, an elderly tourist from Alabama who had never been to Broadway but was now thinking about it. "I hear it's very expensive," she said. "But I don't think about that quite as much as I used to [before September 11th]. "
Such responses could help bring New York tourism back to previous levels, said Christyne Nicholas, president of NYC and Company, who was present at the kick-off and whose civic organization helped to underwrite the tour. "We're down about ten percent but that's bouncing back from having been down sixteen percent," she said optimistically. "Grassroots events like this can help both in the near future and long term."
—By Patrick Pacheco of playbill.com
06/23/03
RUTHIE'S BACK IN CHICAGO AND HOTTER THAN EVER!
07/31/02
HENSHALL & PEGGY SUE CO-STAR EXPECTING CHILD!
RUTHIE HENSHALLL and Tim Howar, who were co-stars in London's short-lived musical Peggy Sue Got Married, are expecting their first child. The Olivier Award-winning actress is due to give birth this winter.
02/02/02
BROADWAY THANKS AMERICA: THE NY LOVES AMERICA TOUR KICKS OFF IN MIAMI
You could tell who were the New Yorkers Jan. 19 amid the colorfully dressed throngs at Miami's Bayside Marketplace, an airy shopping complex along the sun-drenched harborfront of Biscayne Bay. They were the ones in black, sweating chic-ly in the eighty-degree noonday heat—including Sandy Duncan in jeans, studded belt and sheer blouse over a maillot.
01/18/02
RUTHIE HENSHALL NOMINATED FOR AN OLIVIER AWARD FOR PEGGY SUE!!!
Click Here For Olivier info!
12/17/01
ZIEGFELD FOLLIES CD REVIEW
The most stunning spot is "Words without Music," a stormy torch song. RUTHIE HENSHALL sings it in a smoke-tinged voice, and she is absolutely marvelous. She has made a couple of Broadway visits since this stint ?most visibly in Stephen Sondheim's Putting It Together ?but we have yet to see her tear up the stage like she did at Encores....
FOR FULL ARTICLE CLICK HERE!
-Info from dresscircle.co.uk
KAREN ZIEMBA, RUTHIE HENSHALL and STEPHANIE POPE, who have all portrayed merry esses in the Chicago revival, sang and danced a score by Ira Gershwin (lyrics) and Vernon Duke (music) and performed sketches by Gershwin and David Freedman when the period revue was revived by Encores! at City Center in 1999. The recording was made shortly after, and the ladies are all heard on the disc. Mark Waldrop adapted and directed the presentation, using the score and elements of the lavish revue of 1936.
HENSHALL played roles created by Gertrude Niesen, POPE was in roles created by Josephine Baker and ZIEMBA played one of a specialty trio (including Bob and Jim Walton) and was seen in sketches.
Director-adaptor Waldrop's cast for Ziegfeld, a little known show to contemporary audiences, also included Christine Ebersole (in roles created by Eve Arden), Howard McGillin (in roles created by Rodney McLennan), MARY TESTA (in roles created by Fannie Brice, including Baby Snooks), Peter Scolari (in roles created by Bob Hope), Stanley Bojarski and Kevin Chamberlin (as the sketch comics) and Jock Soto, Jenifer Ringer and Jonathan Sharp as the ballet soloists. Rob Fisher is musical director.
Ziegfeld Follies marked the first time in six seasons that Encores! attempted to recreate a classic American musical revue. Although the impresario's name was attached to the show, another in a series of lavish entertainments meant to "glorify the American ," Florenz Ziegfeld died in 1932. The 1936 edition was produced by Ziegfeld's widow, Billie Burke Ziegfeld (who played Glinda in "The Wizard of Oz" film in 1939). Original orchestrations by Hans Spialek, Robert Russell Bennett, Conrad Sallinger and Don Walker are being used.
Ziegfeld Follies of 1936 featured music by Duke and lyrics and sketches by Gershwin and David Freedman (a popular revue writer of the day) and served up a song that had a life beyond the show: "I Can't Get Started." The haunting musical number, "Words Without Music," is also known to American music fans, and is heard here.
In the original, sets and costumes were by Vincente Minnelli and Raoul Pene du Bois. It marked the Broadway debut of ballet choreographer George Balanchine (his On Your Toes was also in 1936); and the "modern" dances were by Robert Alton. For the concert revival, Thommie Walsh was choreographer and Christopher Wheeldon was ballet choreographer. The disc preserves the little-known ballet music.
The company also included Timothy Breese, Stephen Campanella, Tony Capone, Nat Chandler, Dottie Earle, Angelo Fraboni, Jennifer Frankel, Will Gartshore, Aldrin Gonzalez, Peter Gregus, Jeffrey Hankinson, Jack Hayes, Amy Heggins, Chris Hoch, Pamela Jordan, Damon Kirsche, Aixa M. Rosario Medina, Wes Pope, Tamlyn Brooke Shusterman, Eric van Hoven, Rocker Verastique, Wendy Waring, Joseph Webster, Deborah Yates.
The 17-track CD includes a 36-page booklet, which has the complete lyrics to the songs, two historical essays and photos taken by Ira's brother, George Gershwin.
The popular Encores! series at City Center in New York City revisits neglected or seldom-revived musical theatre scores and scripts in a conceptual concert form, often with big-name stage talent. The current Broadway revival of Chicago began as an Encores! presentation.
?By Kenneth Jones of playbill.com The musical has been pulled by its producers as takings have plunged, despite
the excellent reviews the musical, starring West End favourite Ruthie Henshall,
earned when it opened Aug. 20.
The show, which was to have run until March 2002 will now close on Saturday,
Oct.
The early closure, despite a promising start, perhaps confirms the Shaftesbury
Theatre's reputation as an 'unlucky' theatre. Apart from the American show Rent
(based on Puccin's La Bohème), the theatre's record for long runs has not been
good in recent years ?this despite its ability to attract interesting shows.
This reputation for bad luck used to haunt the Piccadilly Theatre, but in recent
years ?indeed, since Elaine Paige's success in Piaf in 1993 ?the latter has
managed to shrug off the curse, hosting shows like Shockheaded Peter,
Matthew Bourne's Swan Lake and, currently, Noises Off.
For information on Peggy Sue call the Shaftesbury Theatre Box Office: 020
7379 5399.
-by Paul Webb Theatrenow.com
RUTHlE HENSHALL will play Peggy Sue, who faints at a high school reunion and wakes up in 1960, thereby
getting the chance to change the course of her life. Her co-star, Andrew Kennedy, plays Peggy Sue’s
near-do-well husband, Charlie.
12/06/01
RUTHIE HENSHALL TO JOIN VAGINA MONOLOGUES
Musical actress Ruthie Henshall will join former MASH star Loretta Swit in The Monologues at the Arts Theatre from December 17.
Henshall's most recent stage appearance was in the title role of Peggy Sue Got Married which closed after a disappointingly short run this summer.
The third member of the cast will be Michelle Gomez who appeared in Sleep With Me at the National Theatre, and in the film Soft Touch. Each will play a four week stint.
To buy tickets call the London Theatre Club on 020 7907 7030
11/19/01
ZIEGFELD FOLLIES OF 1936, SEEN IN 1999 ENCORES! CONCERT, NOW ON CD!!
The 1999 Encores! concert cast album of Ziegfeld Follies of 1936 is FINALLY on store shelves from Decca Broadway after languishing in the vaults.
10/01/01
WEST END'S SHATESBURY DIVORCES MUSICAL PEGGY SUE
OCT. 13
Peggy Sue Got Married has been forced to close, due to the downturn in West
End business.
9/13/01
FANS GET TO MEET RUTHIE HENSHALL!
If you live in London, then you will be fortunate enough to have the chance to meet the "REIGNING QUEEN" Musical Theatre, Ruthie Henshall, Saturday Sept 29 at
the Dress Circle Shop in London's Covent Garden.
The Diva will be meeting fans and signing copies of her new album, Pilgrim.
So go and meet the star of Peggy Sue..., Chicago, Les Miserables, She Loves Me, Putting It Together, and Crazy
For You to name a few at:
Dress Circle
57-59
Monmouth Street
Upper St Martin's Lane
London
WC2 9DG
(Nearest tubes Leicester Square and Covent Garden)
-info from www.dresscircle.co.uk
8/27/01
AMAZING CD NEWS! RUTHIE HENSHALL'S NEW SOLO ALBUM, PILGRIM NOW AVAILABLE!!!
Just in stock is the most eagerly awaited release of the month so far - Pilgrim, by RUTHIE HENSHALL - the Queen of Modern Musical Theatre.
Released to co-incide with the opening of Peggy Sue got Married at the Shaftesbury Theatre, Pilgrim is full of Ruthie's very personal song choices, making it an electric, but magical and mellow CD.
You can read more, and place an order at dresscircle.co.uk
Pilgrim, Ruthie Henshall: CD, 2001, ?3.99
SONGS:
1. Songbird,
2. After The Rain,
3. Never Again,
4. Chasing The Clouds,
5. When Two Worlds Drift Apart,
6. If You Believe,
7. Wet,
8. Hushabye Mountain,
9. Live To Tell,
10. The Man With The Child In His Eyes,
11. This Time Around,
12. Maybe I'm Wrong,
13. Ordinary Miracles,
14. Pilgrim.
8/20/01
RUTHIE HENSHALL STARS IN LONDON'S PEGGY SUE GOT MARRIED!
At the Shaftesbury Theatre, London WC2 The world
premiere of the new musical Peggy Sue Got Married, based on the time-travelling 1986 film
starring Nicholas Cage and Kathleen Turner, will be at the Shaftesbury Theatre on August 20.
HENSHALL'S last West End appearance was as Roxie Hart in Chicago, while Kennedy has appeared in
Annie, Miss Saigon, Grease and The Rocky Horror Show.
Lyrics and book are by Arlene Sarner and Jerry Leichtling, who wrote the screenplay for the film,
while the music is by Bob Gaudio, a former member of the The Four Seasons, who composed
music for films including The Jazz Singer, Goodfellas and Dirty Dancing.
This development means that The Philadelphia Story, which was set to open at the Shaftesbury
Theatre in June, will now be postponed. No alternative theatre or date for the opening has been
announced.
