Thursday, September 17, 2009

AS SEEN ON TV: ED SULLIVAN

Thanks to my good friend NYMarkie, I got to see "Bye Bye Birdie" on Broadway Wednesday night at the newly refurbished Henry Miller's Theater, with a pre-show event at the MonteNapo restaurant in the New York Times Building.

One of the "double pleasure" highlights for this classic TV fan was hearing Will Jordan once again impersonate TV's greatest impresario, Ed Sullivan. Will Jordan has played the role in the movies - "Down With Love", "I Wanna Hold Your Hand", "The Doors", "The Buddy Holly Story" and "Mr. Saturday Night". On TV, he's played Sullivan for such talk show hosts as Mike Douglas, Merv Griffin, Johnny Carson, and even on 'The Ed Sullivan Show' as well. He was in the 1990's version of "Bye Bye Birdie" for Toobworld, which starred Jason Alexander, Vanessa Williams, Tyne Daly, and George Wendt. There's one showcase of Will Jordan as Ed Sullivan out there in the world of online TV, but unfortunately YouTube won't allow it to be embedded. (But I'll have it up very soon!)
ED SULLIVAN
AS SEEN IN:
"Tell Her About It"
[music video by Billy Joel]

AS PLAYED BY:
Will Jordan
OH! The show? The music is timeless, the book horribly dated. Gina Gershon was fantastic as Rose, and Bill Irwin may be too tightly wound up but still very funny as Mr. MacAfee. (Funny how most of us know that name so well nowadays!) As for John Stamos, he acquitted himself well, but how can anyone really stack up against a legend like Dick Van Dyke?

BCnU!

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