©Theatre.com Oct.28, 2000 De-lovely Dee Hoty is Reno in 5th Avenue's Anything Goes By David-Edward Hughes
Despite word on the rumor mill that Seattle audiences might see Chita Rivera encore her recent turn as Reno Sweeney at The Papermill Playhouse, The 5th Avenue musical theatre company's Anything Goes will top-line Dee Hoty as the singer-evangelist originally essayed by Ethel Merman in 1934, and memorably reinterpreted at Lincoln Center by Patti Lupone in 1987. The 5th Avenue production previews Nov. 26-29, opening Nov. 30. Hoty, fondly remembered as Betty Rogers in the original Broadway cast of The Will Rogers Follies, as well as portraying Miss Mona, and being the saving grace in the ill-fated The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public and appearing in the original cast of Footloose, shares the 5th Avenue stage with a cast of both Broadway and Seattle names. Bronson Pinchot (Putting It Together and Balki on television's "Perfect Strangers") plays Sir Evelyn Oakleigh, and Michael Gruber (recently on Broadway in Swing!) is Billy Crocker, while familiar Seattle talents include Allen Galli as Moonface Martin, Ellen McClain as Mrs. Harcourt and Peter Silbert as Elisha Whitney. David Armstrong, the newly established 5th Avenue artistic director, directs this production. Armstrong directed the December 1999 production of The Secret Garden for 5th Avenue, prior to assuming his artistic director post. Paper Mill Playhouse’s scenic designer Michael Anania’s sets will be seen in the 5th Avenue production, with lighting design by Peter Bracilano and sound design by Beth Berkeley. Anything Goes has proven to rank side by side with Kiss Me, Kate as the most enduring and beloved score of Broadway master Cole Porter, filled with such gems as "You’re The Top," "Blow, Gabriel, Blow" and the title song, and augmented with interpolated hits such as "Friendship" and "It’s De-lovely" from other Porter scores. But Anything Goes was almost a very different show. Long before the musical of Titanic, the original book of Anything Goes by Guy Bolton and P.G. Wodehouse was to have dealt with shipwrecked castaways, but when a luxury liner called The Morro Castle sank during the show's pre-production phase, it was hurriedly re-written by Howard Lindsay and Russell Crouse, into a daffy shipboard romance. main Anything Goes 2000 page

©Theatre.com
Oct.28, 2000

De-lovely Dee Hoty is Reno in 5th Avenue's Anything Goes
By David-Edward Hughes

Despite word on the rumor mill that Seattle audiences might see Chita Rivera encore her recent turn as Reno Sweeney at The Papermill Playhouse, The 5th Avenue musical theatre company's Anything Goes will top-line Dee Hoty as the singer-evangelist originally essayed by Ethel Merman in 1934, and memorably reinterpreted at Lincoln Center by Patti Lupone in 1987. The 5th Avenue production previews Nov. 26-29, opening Nov. 30.

Hoty, fondly remembered as Betty Rogers in the original Broadway cast of The Will Rogers Follies, as well as portraying Miss Mona, and being the saving grace in the ill-fated The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public and appearing in the original cast of Footloose, shares the 5th Avenue stage with a cast of both Broadway and Seattle names. Bronson Pinchot (Putting It Together and Balki on television's "Perfect Strangers") plays Sir Evelyn Oakleigh, and Michael Gruber (recently on Broadway in Swing!) is Billy Crocker, while familiar Seattle talents include Allen Galli as Moonface Martin, Ellen McClain as Mrs. Harcourt and Peter Silbert as Elisha Whitney.

David Armstrong, the newly established 5th Avenue artistic director, directs this production. Armstrong directed the December 1999 production of The Secret Garden for 5th Avenue, prior to assuming his artistic director post.

Paper Mill Playhouse’s scenic designer Michael Anania’s sets will be seen in the 5th Avenue production, with lighting design by Peter Bracilano and sound design by Beth Berkeley.

Anything Goes has proven to rank side by side with Kiss Me, Kate as the most enduring and beloved score of Broadway master Cole Porter, filled with such gems as "You’re The Top," "Blow, Gabriel, Blow" and the title song, and augmented with interpolated hits such as "Friendship" and "It’s De-lovely" from other Porter scores.

But Anything Goes was almost a very different show. Long before the musical of Titanic, the original book of Anything Goes by Guy Bolton and P.G. Wodehouse was to have dealt with shipwrecked castaways, but when a luxury liner called The Morro Castle sank during the show's pre-production phase, it was hurriedly re-written by Howard Lindsay and Russell Crouse, into a daffy shipboard romance.

main Anything Goes 2000 page