Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies
New Port Richey's Angel Cabaret Theatre has announced its 2004-2005 season, and there's been a major change in the programming.
Every Friday starting May 21, owner Jimmy Ferraro is turning the Angel from a dinner theater into a comedy supper club. Comedians from "Giggles" Comedy Clubs will be on stage at 8:30 p.m. after dinner is served at 7 p.m.
It's a daring departure from the dinner theater formula, but the decision was made only after a couple of nights of Giggles' shows turned into sold-out successes.
Because of the food service, the Angel, unlike most comedy clubs, won't allow smoking. This could be a big draw for non-smokers who love comedians. On the other hand, it might chase away people who like a cigarette with their drinks and laughs.
Dinner and comedy show are $19.95, plus tax and tip.
The Angel will continue to have theatrical-type shows that run Saturdays and Sundays anywhere from one to six weeks, as well as one-day holiday specials ($35.50, plus tax and tip).
Some of the shows are familiar, some are originals and some are unknowns making their area debuts:
May 29-July 3: Forever Plaid
July 17-Aug. 15: Barefoot in the Park
Aug. 21-29: Marriage Is Murder, audience interactive show
Sept. 11-Oct. 10: Steppin' Out, a tribute to Irving Berlin
Oct. 23-Nov. 21: Too Big to Be a Waitress, a one-character musical comedy
Dec. 3-25: A Christmas Cabaret
Jan. 15-Feb. 20, 2005: This Joint is JUMPIN'! musical revue
March 5-April 10, 2005: Lend Me a Tenor, a comedy
April 16-24, 2005: Murder on the High C's, an audience interactive show
April 30-June 5, 2005: Mamaleh!, a musical.
Besides those shows, Ferraro has scheduled Fiesta Italiana on Oct. 11; The Blonde Songbook on Nov. 25 (two shows); New Year's Eve Extravaganza on Dec. 31 ($69); The Krista Marie Show on March 27; and Rodi Alexander as Barbra Streisand on May 8, 2005.
Congratulations to the three young ladies who won the Richey Suncoast Theatre's first scholarships to study the performing arts.
Honor students Star Dawn Verosic and Jennifer Lori Perez of Hudson High School and Cynthia Lewnes of Mitchell High School each got $500 for their college costs.
Richey Suncoast board president Charlie Skelton came up with the idea of the scholarships. He and theater-backer Chip Wichmanowski, executive director of the Pasco Education Foundation, put together a high school talent show to raise the money to fund them.
"This is just the beginning," Skelton said of the awards.
Stage West Community Playhouse has a nifty new benefit on its Web site: TicketLeap.
It's a way to buy tickets on line for individual shows at just about the same price you'd pay at the window or over the phone.
You can even choose online the seats you want. If you don't like the selection of, say, a Friday, jump to Saturday or Sunday or a week later, and maybe those seats will be open.
Stage West is discounting the ticket price $2 to make up for the service charge TicketLeap imposes.
Right now, the only tickets online are for I Hate Hamlet, which plays May 6-23.
"We'll have season tickets online by mid-summer," said Andrea Gleason, Stage West's treasurer.
The recent show, Jekyll & Hyde, sold 140 tickets online, she said, most of them from Clearwater and St. Petersburg. The purchase saved the ticket buyers a long distance telephone call, so it was well worth it.
To purchase online, go to www.stagewest.net/ and click on the green TicketLeap on the left side of the page.
If you don't know how to get to Stage West itself, click on the "map' icon, and it will give you a easily-followed map to the theater.
It was a room full of red hats and purple dresses - 340 of them, to be precise - when local chapters of the Red Hat Society from Pasco, Hernando and Pinellas counties gathered at Spartan Manor in New Port Richey this week.
The Society is for women over 50 who have decided to "nurture their eccentricities" as they get older, thus the flamboyant purple and red outfits. The Society just registered its 20,000th chapter, the Just Duckies in Willow, Calif. Other chapters are in Canada, Europe and Australia.
Honored guest was Linda Murphy, the Vice Mum of the original Red Hat Society, which was founded in 1998 by Exalted Queen Mother Sue Ellen Cooper.
Also honored was the Times' own columnist, Carolyn Hopkins, who has covered the Red Hatters and others for more than 31 years for this newspaper, but is retiring on April 16.
Sure enough; Carolyn was crowned with her own Red Hat, one that goes well with her little BMW convertible.
Got a note from hometown boy (New Port Richey hometown, that is) Michael Ursua, who was in Lakeland this week conducting the orchestra for the 50th anniversary national tour of the musical Singin' in the Rain.
Ursua got his start in theater years ago at Richey Suncoast Theatre, but he makes his home in New York City now, where he sings, dances and directs NYC stage shows between national tours.
Theatre buffs will remember Ursua as the Production Tenor in the 1997 tour of the Singin' in the Rain that played Ruth Eckerd Hall. His solo number, Beautiful Girl, was a hit with audiences everywhere that tour went.
Local audiences saw Ursua as Charlie Davenport in Annie Get Your Gun a year ago at the Show Palace Dinner Theatre. He and his sister Shanna and her husband Chris Sell co-directed and choreographed Crazy for You there in January 2002, when Michael played Bela, the theatrical czar. He directed Oliver! at the Show Palace last summer before heading back to the big city.
Singin' in the Rain has a couple more dates in Florida, then does a 10-state swing before winding up in New York late this month.