TALK OF THE TOWN (Dorothy Parker, origin of The New Yorker Magazine)

[nomdeplume]

Posted: 11/4/05 at 3:10pm

There is a fun new musical playing in a dining room at the Algonquin Hotel on West 44th Street here in Manhattan. Having seen some boring small-scale musicals of late, I thought I might be in for a dull pastiche of songs with some lame dialogue... Wow, was that off the mark!

The Talk of the Town is tons of fun with smart dialogue and enjoyable songs, even some fun choreography from "Movement Consultant" Mercedes Ellington who tosses in the occaisional tango with relish. This show is a thinking person's delight! I wish it would transfer to a much bigger venue so more people would become aware of it and see it. It offers the kind of class act that makes me proud to be a New Yorker and that I could cheerily drag every friend and visitor to see.

The writers Dorothy Parker and her literary friends used to form the luncheon "Round Table" intelligentsi-artsia at the Algonquin Hotel and later combined forces, forming The New Yorker magazine we still know today. Can't wait until my mother comes to town to take her to it, as she's read The New Yorker devotedly for decades.

Witty, bity, lots of fun. How these actors delight in establishing full-bodied characters from the literati: Dorothy Parker (Kristin Maloney), Robert Benchley (Chris Weikel), Alexander Woollcott (Rob Seitelman), Robert Sherwood (Adam MacDonald), Edana Ferber (Donna Coney Island), Marc Connelly (Stephen Wilde) and George S. Kaufman (Jeffrey Biering).

And lest you think this is just light witty fluff, wait until you reach the songs "Through a Writer's Eyes", "The Man I Might Have Been" and Dorothy Parker's "The Faces That We Wear." They will punch so deep down into your consciousness they will get you thinking about your own role and goals in life!

The service is kind, the food yummy, with a $40 prix fixe dinner or you can have drinks instead. Show tickets are $60. Husband and wife Ginny Redington and Tom Dawes are the writer team. They were in attendance the night I saw the show and when we learned that, we all cheered "Author!" for them. They shyly and sweetly said that was a first. But I'll bet it's not the last!

-------------------------
See also Michael Dale's BWW review of November 19, 2004 when it was at The Bank Street Theatre:

https://www.broadwayworld.com/viewcolumn.cfm?colid=1634

and

https://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/theater/story/339878p-290226c.html










Updated On: 4/18/06 at 03:10 PM

[nomdeplume]

Posted: 11/21/05 at 2:13pm

This show plays only Sunday and Monday evenings.

Catch it if you can!

[nomdeplume]

Posted: 4/18/06 at 9:39pm

Thank heavens this deserving show got an article:

http://www.backstage.com/bso/news_reviews/nyc/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002346022

[Harpo]

Posted: 4/18/06 at 10:12pm

Oh my, how timely for me. I just started reading The Portable Dorothy Parker. The Round Table always fascinated me and I stayed at the Aloqonquin for a few days last year. Not the greatest hotel stay I've had, but eh, doesn't matter. Sounds like a great evening, I'll try to catch the show. Thanks for sharing this.

[nomdeplume]

Posted: 4/29/06 at 1:17am

Nice article on The New Yorker magazine:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4951402.stm

[Ourtime992]

Posted: 4/29/06 at 2:13am

Sounds interesting. I had the idea (I'm sure I was far from the first) of writing a musical or play about the Algonquin Roundtable several years ago but never did anything with it.