BROADWAY'S ARTHUR LAURENTS CHATS WITH JOURNALIST CHARLES KAISER
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
6:00PM - 8:30PM
COMING SOON FROM LAURENTS: BI-LINGUAL "WEST SIDE STORY"...
AND "MAINLY ON DIRECTING 'GYPSY' AND OTHER MUSICALS"...
OCT. 15 DEBATE ALERT! You won't want to miss a word of Laurents/Kaiser on Wednesday. What's more, you won't have to! The highly quotable Arthur Laurents goes on promptly at 7:30 p.m. with 60 minutes of Broadway tales you'll dine out on for weeks. At 8:30 p.m. you're on your way home to the 9 p.m. presidential debate. RSVP now! (Nice but not necessary -- you're welcome to just show up at the Center.)
Broadway legend Arthur Laurents (above left) just celebrated his 91st birthday by completing the book Mainly on Directing Gypsy and Other Musicals, which Knopf will publish next spring; the buzz for it is already extraordinary.
Now Laurents is about to start rehearsals on his brand-new, bilingual version of West Side Story, opening on Broadway March 19. What can you expect?
Well, here's how Times theater critic Ben Brantley describes Laurents' direction of the current Gypsy with Patti Lupone: "This latest incarnation of 'Gypsy' lets you see right down to the naked core of characters so hungry for attention that it warps them.... There is no separation at all between song and character, which is what happens in those uncommon moments when musicals reach upward to achieve their ideal reasons to be. This 'Gypsy' spends much of its time in such intoxicating air." Click here to read the full review of 'Gypsy'.
Charles Kaiser (above right) writes a blog called Full Court Press for radaronline.com. The author of The Gay Metropolis and 1968 In America, Kaiser is a former reporter for The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal and a former press critic for Newsweek. He is finishing a book about the French Resistance called The Cost of Courage.
Location: Manhattan's LGBT Community Center, 208 West 13th Street, just west of 7th Avenue.
Networking and Socializing: Doors open at 6pm; beverage bargains. Program at 7:30pm sharp, followed by audience Q&A.
Admission: Nonmembers $10; OP Members just $5.
