Just finished reading Patti LuPone's autobiography...- Page 3

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:11pm

She also was well-received in my all-time favorite TV movie LBJ: The Early Years right around the time the Into the Woods negotiations might have been taking place.

[AC126748]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:13pm

Ah, I thought it was three. Either way, it ran far longer than it was ever scheduled to run, and I think we can thank Frank Rich's love letter to Patti LuPone for that.

[ChenoKahn]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:19pm

But you can't deny Bernadette was fairly well known to the public while Patti was only known in the theatre world

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:24pm

I can. I knew who Patti was when I was a teenager in North Carolina back in 1979.

You might be able to say Bernadette was better known to the population at large, but Patti really made a splash with "Evita," and that translated to magazines articles, as well as appearances on Merv Griffin and the like.

In any event, had she taken the part, I'm sure Patti would have been the biggest name in the cast by far.

[AC126748]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:25pm

Bernadette was definitely known outside of the theatre world--no one is denying that. Patti may have been primarily a "theatre star" then, but she was one who was known to a much wider audience (not unlike, say, Audra McDonald before she did PRIVATE PRACTICE).

[CarlosAlberto]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:29pm

Bernadette had been around for a lot longer than LuPone and was virtually a household name by 1986. LuPone had made her mark in musical theater and anyone with an invested interest in theater knew who Patti LuPone was but she was not a household name and her television series "Life Goes On" didn't hit the airwaves until 1989.

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:30pm

Yeah, I'd say Bernadette was better known; just contesting that Patti was known only in theater circles.

[AC126748]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:30pm

That's something most people who post here can't/don't realize, Reg. There was a time when someone like Patti LuPone could achieve national success and recognition while working almost exclusively in theatre for ten years, as Patti did. They were booked on talk shows. They were written about in magazines. Alexis Smith was on the cover on TIME, for Pete's sake. Randy Graff was on The Tonight Show when LES MIS was first mounted. People who lived in the NY metro area went to the theatre regularly.

[BrodyFosse123]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:33pm

30 years later and the majority of people STILL remember Patti LuPone for EVITA, regardless of what else she may have done in her career.

My sister, who isn't an avid theater fan nor follows anything Broadway-related, knows Patti LuPone's name from EVITA.

That speaks for itself on the impact she made on pop culture back in the early 1980's with EVITA.

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:36pm

AC, I was actually just thinking about that and wondering if perhaps Patti was the last one to achieve that.

I recently saw some glamour shots she did for some fashion mag right after "Evita," and I was thinking that not only could I not imagine that happening now, I can't recall the last time it happened.

I'm not claiming any historical accuracy here; just my memory. But I feel like that might have been the last time someone made a big splash on Broadway and because, to some extent, a national celebrity. Maybe because it was 1979, and the 80s brought us all the megamusicals, where the show was the star?

Just thinking out loud . . .

[ChenoKahn]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:40pm

Sorry, yes she was known outside of the theatre circle just not to the level of Bernadette. I really should have worded that better.

[AC126748]

Posted: 8/1/11 at 5:40pm

The only person to come up in the last 15 years who might come anywhere close is Audra. I'd say a huge part of that also has to do with Rosie O'Donnell prominently featuring Broadway performers on her show. But really, before PRIVATE PRACTICE, she'd done very few movies (really, not much aside from WIT) and one failed TV show (MISTER STERLING, a midseason replacement that starred Josh Brolin before he staged his comeback). Yet people I know who know nothing of theatre knew who Audra was.

It's nowhere close to what Patti was able to achieve, but it's pretty interesting when you look at it.