PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Critically Acclaimed, Tony Award-Winning LIZA'S AT THE PALACE...
Comes to Public Television After a Sold-Out Broadway Run
"Perhaps unequaled in her ability to hold the stage alone, Minnelli has an emotional gravity (imbued by her classic showbiz lifeline) that – I'm gonna say it – Bette Midler and Cher combined can't equal."
– Review of Las Vegas show by Joe Brown, Las Vegas Sun
BOSTON (Oct. 29, 2009) – The legendary
Liza Minnelli took Broadway by storm in her
unanimously acclaimed New York run of Liza's at the Palace....
which was sold out for five weeks in December 2008. Her spectacular performances earned her
the Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event and a prestigious 2009 Drama
Desk Award. Fans around the world
have been eagerly anticipating news of a television broadcast of this
history-making show and now have the chance to view the long-awaited special on
public television stations nationwide beginning November 27, 2009 (check local
listings).
The television event, also named LIZA'S AT THE PALACE..., was filmed at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on
October 1, 2009 before an invited audience of show business friends,
fans and entertainers from all over the world. The
program features material performed during the New York engagement and captures
many of her greatest hits as well as an affectionate tribute to her godmother,
the late Kay Thompson.
Act one features Minnelli's crowd-pleasing
favorites, including "Cabaret," "Maybe This Time," "Teach Me Tonight" and "My Own Best Friend."
Minnelli's special rendition of the
"Palace Medley," originally sung by her mother at the Palace Theatre in 1951,
stands out as a program highlight. In addition, Minnelli adds a new personal
musical introduction to the fond remembrance of famous vaudevillians.
In the second act, Minnelli honors the legendary Thompson, a
groundbreaking singer-dancer, songwriter, and vocal arranger/coach at the MGM
Studios in the 1940s. Minnelli
recreates Thompson's exciting 1948 nightclub act, which opened at the world
famous Ciro's in Hollywood, and featured the
Williams' Brothers (Bob, Dick, Don and Andy). In this show, the Williams' Brothers are played by Minnelli's quartet of
dynamic singer/dancers – Johnny Rodgers, Cortes Alexander, Jim Caruso and
Tiger Martina. The concert ends with "New York, New York" – Liza's
trademark song, written for her by John Kander and Fred
Ebb in 1977, for the Martin Scorsese film of the same name.
Minnelli was joined on the program by her Broadway co-star and
musical director, pianist, singer and composer Billy Stritch.
The show was again directed by Ron Lewis, the award-winning choreographer and
director. Michael Berkowitz served as the Musical Conductor/drummer.
Now in her fifth decade as an internationally celebrated
entertainer, Minnelli has won every major show business honor including an
Oscar, an Emmy, a Grammy, and four Tony Awards, making her part of a select
group of performers who have won the entertainment industry's top four
achievement awards. Minnelli recently
achieved critical praise playing Lucille Austero, on
the Emmy-winning Arrested Development.
The television program was directed by Matthew Diamond, whose
directing has brought him an Oscar nomination for Dancemaker,
four Emmy Awards, three Director's Guild Awards and the Humanitas
Award. He has directed many music specials as well as a long list of dramatic
programming and is currently the series director for So
You Think You Can Dance.
JoAnn Young, Craig Zadan
and Neil Meron served as executive producers of the
project. Young has written and/or produced more than 50 television specials
including documentaries and musical performances, such as Johnny Mathis
– Wonderful, Wonderful! and Some Enchanted Evening: A
Celebration of Oscar Hammerstein II, a star-filled entertainment
special at City Center in New York City. She wrote two episodes of the Emmy
award-winning six part series, Broadway, The American Musical,
which were nominated for an Emmy and a Writer's Guild Award and won Golden cine
Eagle Awards in 2005.
Zadan and Meron
are the executive producers of the Oscar-winning movie musical Chicago
and the producers of the film musical smash Hairspray. With Minnelli and
Showtime, they "presented" the acclaimed, digitally-restored version
of the Bob Fosse-John Kander-Fred Ebb Emmy winning
television special Liza With
a Z. All totaled, Zadan and Meron's
films and television projects have won six Academy Awards, five Golden Globes,
11 Primetime Emmy Awards, and two Peabody Awards. For television, their movies
have amassed 69 Emmy nominations.
The full performance DVD of LIZA'S
AT THE PALACE... will be available exclusively to public television viewers, then
released to the general public in mid-February 2010 by MPI Home Video.
The program is a co-production of Jubilee Time Productions, APT,
HDNET and Young Productions, in cooperation with the MGM Grand. APT's Premium Service is a co-production, co-financing and
acquisition fund that provides fund raising specials to member stations, now in
its 21st season. With the financial backing of their public television client
stations, Premium Service has secured many of public television's most
prestigious and highest rated programs.
About American Public Television
American Public
Television (APT) has been a leading distributor of high-quality, top-rated
programming to America's public television stations since 1961. Among its 300
new program titles per year are prominent documentaries, dramatic series,
how-to programs, children's series and classic movies, including Spain...on the
road Again, Rick Steves' Europe, Worldfocus,
Globe Trekker, Simply Ming, America's Test Kitchen From Cook's Illustrated, Lidia's Family Table, P. Allen Smith's Garden Home, Murdoch
Mysteries, Doc Martin, Rosemary and Thyme, Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison, Liza's at the Palace.... and John Denver: The Wildlife
Concert. APT also licenses programs internationally through its APT
Worldwide service. In 2006, APT launched Create™ – the TV
channel featuring the best of public television's lifestyle programming. For
more information about APT's programs and services,
visit APTonline.org.
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SONG LIST
LIZA'S AT THE PALACE....
ACT ONE:
"TEACH ME TONIGHT"
"I AM MY OWN BEST FRIEND"
"MAYBE THIS TIME"
PALACE MEDLEY:
"Shine on Harvest Moon"
"Some of These Days"
"My Man"
"I Don't Care"
"CABARET"
ACT TWO:
"AND THE WORLD GOES 'ROUND"
"HELLO, HELLO"
"JUBILEE TIME"
"LIZA"
"I LOVE A VIOLIN"
ACT THREE:
"Mammy"
"New York, New York."
# # #
BIOGRAPHY
LIZA
MINNELLI
Liza Minnelli is now in her fifth decade as an internationally celebrated
performer. Recently, after a
triumphant 75-city international tour, she brought "Liza's
at the Palace...." to Broadway, which garnered her a 2009 Drama Desk Award and a
Tony Award for Best Special Theatrical Event.
At age 19, Liza
won her first Tony Award for her Broadway debut in Flora, the Red Menace.
She was the youngest artist to win Best Actress in a Musical – a
record she holds to this day.
Minnelli has won two additional Tony Awards: one for her 1974 engagement
at the Winter Garden Theatre, and one for her 1978 performance in The Act. She received a Tony nomination for her role in The Rink and was inducted into the
Theatre Hall of Fame in 2001.
Additional Broadway credits include Chicago
and Minnelli On Minnelli.
Liza won an Academy Award for her legendary performance in the 1972 film Cabaret. Minnelli's other movies include The Sterile Cuckoo (Academy Award and
Golden Globe nominations), New York, New
York (Golden Globe nomination), Arthur
(Golden Globe nomination), Stepping Out,
Tell Me That You Love Me, Junie Moon, and Charlie Bubbles.
Minnelli received the Emmy and
Peabody Awards for her 1972 landmark TV special, "Liza
With a 'Z'." A restored and
re-mastered DVD was released in 2006 by Showtime, which won a Satellite
Award. She subsequently starred in
television specials co-starring legends like Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis, Jr.,
Mikhail Baryshnikov and Goldie Hawn.
Liza recently achieved critical praise playing
Lucille Austero, on the Emmy-winning "Arrested Development."
As a recording artist, Liza has received a Grammy Living Legend Award and four
Gold Record certifications. Hightlights include the albums Liza With a 'Z', Live at the Winter Garden, At Carnegie Hall and Results. Compilations include The
Complete Capitol Collection and The
Complete A&M Recordings.
Liza, her mother, Judy Garland, and her father, Vincente
Minnelli, are the only family in Hollywood history to have all received an
Academy Award.
DVD Liner Notes
Michael Feinstein about Liza
Minnelli
It is not by Divine Providence that Liza
Minnelli has been a superstar for several decades. Stardom does not occur
by accident, lucky break or proper alignment of the stars. It comes from
hard work and the honing of one's craft that takes years of behind-the-scenes
work that is not, or should not, be evident or known to the public.
Staying power and the ability to evolve with the times is a particular talent
of Liza's, as she is never content to rest on her
laurels or take anything for granted. LIZA'S
AT THE PALACE.... is simple proof of that fact.
Liza has said that she will never write an
autobiography. She has been offered eye-twirling amounts of money to tell
her story and has blithely refused because, as she put it, "my
autobiography is in my songs." She never sings anything that does
not resonate deeply and tell part of her story. The lyric is of paramount
importance because she is an actress who acts in song and character. She
has a complex scenario in mind with every thirty-two bar journey and knows how
to make the hair on your arm stand up in response to her art. When she
was very young, her father Vincent Minnelli took her to small clubs to hear
singers who sang with an intimacy that she later learned to emulate on the
concert stage. Her mother Judy Garland taught her much, of course, but it
was the combined influences of her larger family circle of friends that tells
the whole story. Yes, she was born to a show business life of privilege
and comfort, but what she took away from it was the understanding of how to
make others feel better about their own lives by expressing the inexpressible
through music and entertainment.
In her formative years, Liza was shuttled back and
forth from place to place and always had a record player in tow, along with
discs of the classic singers of standards. She also listened to the pop
hits of the times and learned how to interpret feelings, innately sensing the
hope underneath the craziness of the world. Today, she is the last of a
beloved and special kind of talent that was once the accepted norm of show
business, who could command the stage in a solo capacity and transport
listeners. Sinatra, Sammy, Peggy, Clooney, Louis and Ella are gone, but Liza is blessedly here. In this time of instantaneous
change and passing fancies she remains stalwart and inspiring.
Liza's newest show is her most autobiographical, and
what you see on the stage and hear in this recording was an intense labor of
love. All of her friends have commented that they have never seen her
work so hard and tirelessly. Sure, she is happy to sing your
favorites. She won't ever cheat an audience out of what they came to
hear. But in
LIZA'S AT THE PALACE.... she salutes her
family and friends and evokes the ghosts of
the past in a startlingly fresh and unexpected way. Especially
when it comes to her godmother, Kay Thompson.
Kay Thompson was the most unique and dazzling of show business visionaries - an
author, composer, actress, lyricist, arranger, monologist, pianist, artist,
designer and
anything else that you can think of. Kay touched the lives of so
many people in so many different ways. Donna Karan said that she wouldn't have had a career without Kay, and Judy Garland counted
on Kay as her musical advisor and arbiter of all things tasteful. Liza grew up knowing Kay not only as her mother's best
friend but as a lady who created a nightclub act that changed the genre
forever. She stretched the conventions of what was done in a showroom,
and turned everything upside down through her sheer brilliance. She
worked with the Williams Brothers (including Andy) as her back-up group and
suspended the microphones from the ceiling so that they wouldn't get in the way
of her uber-choreography. She was a force of
nature that shook up show business like an earthquake and left a euphoric
feeling with everyone who saw her perform. "Kay did the greatest
nightclub act in history," is the phrase that instantly emanates from the
mouths of all of her surviving witnesses. But it was ephemeral and never
preserved for posterity. Her humor, wit, heart, hysteria, joy and sorrow
were never to be experienced again. Happily, her goddaughter decided to
bring it all back for the benefit of those unfortunates who never saw or even
heard of Kay, properly sensing that there was no better time than now to
revisit and reintroduce the glory of real talent, hard work and true
stardom. Superstardom. But isn't that what Liza has always been about?
# # #