HELLO AGAIN!
The Songs of Allan Sherman
WHO’S WHO?
LINDEN WADDELL
Linden Waddell (Creator/Actor) returns to the boards after taking a 20-year hiatus to raise her two children, both now recent UC Berkeley graduates – proud mom!
Linden created “Hello Again! The Songs of Allan Sherman” because she loves to sing and to make people laugh. Linden had wanted to act and sing ever since performing a character role at age 4 (Jack’s Mother in Jack and the Beanstalk, at camp). While growing up in Downey, California, Linden performed in dozens of shows with the Downey Children’s Theatre, Civic Light Opera, Teen Theatre, and Marionette Theatres. During these formative years, Linden’s family would play Allan Sherman and Stan Freberg comedy albums on the record player. After college, Linden continued performing in musicals and operas and became a professional actress and singer. She stepped away from ‘the biz’ to be a devoted mom and upon returning to her career, wanted to do a passion project. Remembering the comedy of Allan Sherman, and appreciating that no one created better parodies than he (and that he used songs from the Great American Songbook and Broadway show tunes – material that Linden knew and loved) - she created a show honoring Allan Sherman’s genius with parody lyrics.
Linden enjoyed researching Sherman’s 250+ parodies and selecting numbers for the show - songs that resonated with her and would entertain today’s audience.
She read Sherman’s autobiography, ‘A Gift of Laughter,’ his biography ‘Overweight Sensation–the Life and Comedy of Allan Sherman’ by Mark Cohen, and sought out content and material about Sherman on the Internet. She crafted the show and tried her own hand at parody, creating the show’s opening number ‘Parody Tonight’ based upon Sondheim’s ‘Comedy Tonight’ from A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. The number introduces us to Sherman, provides a zeitgeist snapshot of his rise to fame and lets us know what we’re in for during the performance. Linden learned: it’s not easy writing parody lyrics! She then hired friend and musical cohort Marjorie Poe and well-known local director Janet Miller, creating a mighty triumvirate. She started performances in her living room for friends, just as Sherman performed his initial offerings. Since then, lucky audiences around Southern California have been treated to Allan Sherman’s gifted lyrics. Linden is thrilled that critics and audiences rave about ‘Hello Again! The Songs of Allan Sherman,’ that they are reminded of Sherman’s brilliant comedy, and seek out his creative parodies anew. Highlights of Linden’s performances include bringing joy to Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, and especially when Allan Sherman’s son, Robert, attended her performance – on Father’s Day – and loved the show.
MARJORIE POE
Marjorie Poe (Musical Director / Accompanist / Arranger) is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music and has taught music at several schools and colleges. Ms. Poe served as an award-winning musical director for dozens of Equity waiver theatre productions in LA and spent a handful of years on tour with Broadway road companies (Cats, Wizard of Oz, Sunset Boulevard and Meet Me in St. Louis). She has worked with Debbie Reynolds, Robert Morse, Debby Boone, Mary Jo Catlett, Jo Anne Worley, Mickey Rooney, Pat Boone and an assorted mix of large animals, as she was also an arranger/keyboardist with Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus, traveling with the "Greatest Show on Earth." She composed an original score for the West Coast premiere of The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby produced at the LACC Theatre Academy, and is a noted arranger and orchestrator.
JANET MILLER
Janet Miller (Director/Choreographer) Janet Miller is a producer, director, choreographer and educator. She is a recipient of the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Joel Hirschhorn Award for Career Achievement in Musical Theater. Her original choreography has been showcased Off-Broadway at the Westside Theatre in The Marvelous Wonderettes. She received a Lucille Lortel Award nomination for Outstanding Choreographer for this production. Janet garnered an Ovation nomination for her work on TMW, a Garland, a LADCC Award, and was part of the team that won the Ovation for Best Intimate Musical. Ms. Miller was thrilled to choreograph the European Premiere of TMW for Teatro Franco Parenti in Milan, Italy. Janet has staged her award-winning step touch extensively throughout the US.
Good People Theater Company is celebrating their six-year anniversary and Janet serves as Producing Artistic Director. GPTCo has seven productions under their belt, A Man of No Importance, Barrymore (2x) The Fantasticks, Closer Than Ever, Marry Me A Little, and The Toxic Avenger. The shows have been well received in Los Angeles by both critics and spectators. AMONI and Barrymore were both Ovation Recommended, and Barrymore received an Ovation nomination for Best Actor.
Ms. Miller has worked as director and/or choreographer on both coasts on such shows as Side By Side By Sondheim, South Pacific, Guys and Dolls, Kiss Me Kate, Jesus Christ Superstar, Anything Goes, Baby, Annie Get Your Gun, Dames At Sea, Charlie Brown, Urinetown, Bat Boy, The Odd Couple, The Nerd, The Crucible, The Man Who Came To Dinner, The Rimers of Eldritch, Crimes of the Heart, and Taming of the Shrew to name a few. JM holds a B.A. in musical theatre from CSU Northridge, an M.A. in Theatre Arts and Dance and an M.F.A. in TV, Film & Theater from CSU Los Angeles. She is the chair of theatre at College of the Desert. Ms. Miller is a proud member of SDC. www.janetmiller.net www.goodpeopletheaterco.org.
ALLAN SHERMAN
Allan Sherman (Lyrics) b. November 30, 1924 - d. November 20, 1973 was an American comedy writer and television producer who became famous as a song parodist, recording artist, and performer in the early 1960's. To give some context, at the release of Sherman’s first Warner Bros.’ album My Son, the Folk Singer, any record album was considered a ‘hit’ if it sold around 10,000 copies during its popularity. My Son, the Folk Singer – through radio play and word of mouth – sold 65,000 copies in its first week and a half million albums in its first month, becoming, at that time, the fastest-selling record album in history, eventually selling over 1.5 million copies. Sherman was an overnight sensation. More albums quickly followed, and his biggest hit single was "Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh," the Grammy Award-winning, internationally-recognized comic novelty song in which a boy describes his summer camp experiences to the tune of Ponchielli's "Dance of the Hours,” from Sherman’s album My Son, the Nut. Sherman shot to fame with three (3) Billboard 200 No. 1 albums in a row (more than 50 years passed before there was another #1 album in the comedy category - Weird Al Yankovic’s 2014 Mandatory Fun).
At the height of Sherman’s success, he performed his parodies at Carnegie Hall, the Hollywood Bowl, headlined in Las Vegas, sang on TV variety shows, and guest-hosted The Tonight Show for a week. He recorded many more albums, wrote novels and an autobiography entitled A Gift of Laughter, and penned the book and lyrics for an original Broadway musical, The Fig Leaves Are Falling (1969).
