Gathering pays homage to a friend of the arts

By LENNIE BENNETT

© St. Petersburg Times,
published June 13, 2001

Payback is a word usually associated with negative reciprocity, so seeing an example of payback for someone's good deeds is a happy occasion. Such was the case Sunday as about 40 friends gathered for a homage to Brian Reale.

Brian first came on my radar screen about 10 years ago, before I began working for the St. Petersburg Times and was still involved as a volunteer in the community. He became a board member of several arts organizations, including American Stage Theatre Company (while John Berglund and Victoria Holloway were in charge) and was introduced to me as "a decorator."

Brian was and is so much more. If you admire the look of the theater's lobby, with its Lance Rodgers-painted ceiling, the charm of the brick courtyard or the beauty of interior and exterior details, such as the graceful curves of the door handles and the whimsy of the grillwork over the windows, you can thank Brian. He continues to lend his talent and wonderful eye to American Stage and many other arts groups for free. His quiet support of artists and generous gestures on behalf of his friends are locally legendary.

He supports his philanthropic habit with a successful interior design business that takes him all over the world. If you read the glossy shelter magazines, you have seen his work featured.

One of the main party organizers was Bob Devin Jones, also a busy chap these days. He is a director so he, like Brian, has led a peripatetic life, traveling around as new productions call. Though he soon heads off to South Carolina to direct two plays for a Shakespeare festival in Charleston, he said he will be staying in town more since he will bring his one-man show, Uncle Bends -- A Home-Cooked Negro Narrative, to American Stage in March.

Jones also is collaborating with the production company that brought us Webb's City, The Musical, writing a new show about the Manhattan Casino and 22nd Street S, which he would like to see debuted at the old casino, now boarded up and for sale.

Other party organizers were Al May, just back from a trip to France, Lester Wolfe, Sandra Gadsden, Mary Evertz, Fred Wilcox, Jim Howell, Mary Ann Taranto and David Ellis. They kept decorations to an elegant minimum in the Polywog Room at the Sunset Ballroom, with black tablecloths, sea-green napkins and orchids -- very Brian.

Friends able to come were Dr. John Lindstrom and Marilyn Mathis; American Stage board president Marion Ballard and Bill Ballard; artist Dodie O'Keefe, who always wears dramatic jewelry, this time a jewel-studded silver dragonfly; Dorothy Webb and Clint Paige; Ed. Cassidy and Charlie Landrum; Tinker McKee; Cary Bond Thomas; Astrid Ellis; Louise King; Bill and Hazel Hough; Ken Mitchell, artistic director of American Stage; and Lee Lowry, its managing director.

I forgot to report this fun fact from the St. Anthony's Triathlon several weeks ago: Bill Hough and two friends placed first in their division, the Grand Master Corporate Male Relay. "We also placed last," said Hough, a cyclist, "since we were the only people in that category."

Tony Taranto is another enormously talented person, a music professor and pianist whose original compositions have been performed at Carnegie Hall. For the party, he was good-naturedly over-qualified, playing background music for us while we dined on chicken (and very good chicken, by the way, stuffed with cheese and spinach and covered with a light raisin sauce.)

Sharon Scott, who appeared in From the Mississippi Delta last season at American Stage, drove up from Sarasota after she finished a matinee performance of How to Succeed In Business. She arrived in time to serenade us with several songs including I'm Still Here from the Stephen Sondheim musical Follies, which Brian had seen recently during one of his frequent jaunts to New York City.

He maintains an office in Manhattan and his decision to live in St. Petersburg, where few people could afford for him to design so much as a lampshade, has always mystified me. But Brian said he moved here from Miami because he wanted to live in a "shoulder" town -- one accessible to big cities but not big itself.

I am glad our "shoulder" suits Brian because he certainly suits us.

The Women's Chamber of Commerce of the Greater Gulf Beaches elected new officers. They are: Ruth Szemer, president; Nancy Stubbs and Danny Hunsinger, vice presidents; Jerry Guardia, recording secretary; Barbara Candelero, corresponding secretary; Nan Edmiston, treasurer; and Loretta Sandt, director at large. Directors are Joan Bendix, Dorothy Reda, Phyllis Heater, Claire Ippolito, Bobbie Burnstein and Mary Gutilla.

Keep those dates coming for the 2001-2002 On the Town Social Calendar. It will be a pull-out section in Neighborhood Times published in late August, with social events listed from September through June. Please send information about your event to Lennie Bennett, St. Petersburg Times, P.O. Box 1121, St. Petersburg, FL 33710. Or e-mail lennie@sptimes.com. Be specific about the contents; I delete any e-mail of uncertain provenance. Please do not leave a telephone message with information.

Looking ahead

June 21

MID-DAY BUSINESS AND PROFESSIONAL WOMEN'S LUNCH: Featured speaker is Lois Frankel, state legislator, children's advocate and possible candidate for governor. The local chapter of this national organization for women will meet at Soho Gallery, 21st Street and Central Avenue, at noon. $12. 892-4694.

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