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Many Broadway shows cancel Sept. 11 performances

The events of Sept. 11 led Broadway producers to cancel performances of their shows for that evening. On this year's first anniversary of the terrorist attacks, many of those same productions, as well as some new ones, will voluntarily go dark.

Because the date falls on a Wednesday, that will mean matinees as well as evening shows will be eliminated.

Many of the Broadway shows will schedule performances on another day to make up for the lost show. In addition, several off-Broadway shows will be dark on Sept. 11.

Press spokesman Chris Boneau, whose firm Boneau/Bryan-Brown represents the Disney shows (Aida, Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King), as well as Frankie and Johnny, Cabaret, Urinetown, 42nd Street and Mamma Mia!, said: "All of them are doing it out of respect. From the Disney standpoint, the move is in anticipation of memorials and events that will likely happen on that day."

Another reason fueling producers' decision to shut their doors on Sept. 11 may be the fact that few tickets are reportedly being sold for performances on that date.

Other shows taking the day off are Les Miserables, The Phantom of the Opera, Rent and Into the Woods.

Lombardo crooner dies at 89

Kenny Gardner, the light-voiced, cheerfully smooth tenor who for almost 30 years was the featured crooner with Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians, died Friday (July 26, 2002) in Manhasset, N.Y. He was 89 and lived in Plandome, N.Y.

The cause of death was a heart attack soon after an appendectomy, said his niece, Gina Lombardo Cudahy.

For more than 50 years, millions in hotels and ballrooms danced cheek to cheek to the Lombardo sound, usually in a bright and regular two-step rhythm. More than 100-million Lombardo recordings were sold. Lombardo's New Year's Eve broadcasts, first on radio and later on television, and always from some luxurious hotel, made the group a national institution. Its theme song was Auld Lang Syne.

Mr. Gardner retired from the band in 1978, soon after Lombardo died. The band still plays on under the direction of Al Pierson.

Mr. Gardner's wife died in 1999. He left no immediate survivors.

Man charged with cheating on British 'Millionaire'

A British army officer who won $1.56-million on the TV quiz show Who Wants to be a Millionaire was charged Wednesday with deception and conspiracy by police investigating claims he cheated on the program.

Maj. Charles Ingram, 38, was charged by Scotland Yard detectives and released on bail until a court hearing Wednesday.

His wife, 38-year-old Diana Ingram, and Tecwen Whittock, a 52-year-old college teacher from Cardiff in Wales, also were charged.

All three face one charge of obtaining a reward by deception and one of conspiring to do so.

Charles Ingram, from Wiltshire county in western England, won the show's top prize in September, but the episode was never broadcast and Ingram's check was withheld because of suspicions that he had cheated.

On 'American Idol' ...

Ryan Starr, 19, of Sunland, Calif., was eliminated by viewer vote from American Idol on Wednesday night, leaving six contestants in the contest that bills itself as the search for America's next pop music star. The top two finishers get recording contracts.

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