Program copy, Joel Rooks, copy & paste for designers producing the program in other than digest format. Go Gi Go Productions Inc. presentsJoel Rooks SAY GOODNIGHT GRACIE LOGO Written by Directed by Portions of the play have been adapted from the reminiscences of George Burns. “Say Goodnight Gracie” is produced with the full approval and cooperation of the George Burns and Gracie Allen Estate. Produced on Broadway by Say Goodnight Gracie LLC Exclusive tour direction by Scott Stander & Associates, 13701 Riverside Drive Suite 201, Sherman Oaks, CA 91423, www.scottstander.com Cast George Burns....................Joel Rooks The show will be performed without an intermission. The original Broadway production of Say Goodnight Gracie opened at the Helen Hayes Theatre on October 10, 2002. It was directed by John Tillinger, and was produced by William Franzblau, Jay Harris, Louise Westergaard, Larry Spellman, Elsa Daspin Haft, Judith Resnick, Anne Gallagher, Libby Adler Mages, Mari Glick Stuart, Martha R. Gasparian, Bruce Lazarus, Lawrence S. Toppall and Jae French. Use of cameras, videotape recorders, audio recorders and/or any other type of recording device during a performance is strictly prohibited. For the enjoyment of the audience, please turn off all cell phones and pagers prior to entering the theater. About Say Goodnight Gracie... “Say Goodnight Gracie” is the hit Broadway play that invites you to spend a hilarious, heart-warming evening in the uplifting company of the world’s favorite and funniest centenarian. George Burns, who spanned one hundred years of American entertainment history, is now miraculously alive and kicking in a stunning tour de force. Say Goodnight Gracie was Broadway’s third longest running solo performance show and was nominated for a 2003 Tony Award for “Best Play” and won the 2003-04 National Broadway Theatre Award for “Best Play.” In Say Goodnight Gracie, we discover George in limbo between this world and the next, unable to join his beloved wife and partner Gracie Allen until he gives the command performance of his lifetime for God. He looks back upon his impoverished, plucky youth on the lower east side of New York… his disastrous but tenacious career in Vaudeville ... the momentous day when he meet a fabulously talented young Irish girl named Grace Ethel Cecile Rosalie Allen … their instant chemistry, with his flawless timing a perfect mate to her dizzy delivery ... his wooing of her, their marriage and their rise to the pinnacles of vaudeville, movies, radio and relevision. Gracie’s demise forced George to start from square one in life and in his career, eventually achieving an equal level of success as a solo raconteur and Academy Award-winning actor, portraying everything from a Sunshine Boy to, Oh, God. Say Goodnight Gracie is a multimedia presentation that also features the skillful vocal talents of actress Didi Conn (“Frenchie” from Grease) as well as evocative music and moving images from George’s long life and good times. The play has been created with the approval and cooperation of the estate of George Burns and Gracie Allen. Its author is multiple Tony Award-winning playwright Rupert Holmes, whose Broadway credits include the Tony Award-winning musical The Mystery Of Edwin Drood and who is also creator and writer of the nostalgic Emmy Award-winning comedy series Remember WENN and currenlty represented on Broadway in the new Kander & Ebb musical Curtains. The Say Good Night Gracie production is hallmarked by a sense of wit, warmth and intimacy. Say Goodnight Gracie is a tender, funny, life-affirming love story ... a personal guided tour through an American century in the company of George Burns, a man who laughingly lived and loved each day for all it had to offer, until he finally went “gently into that good night” to forever reunite with his beloved Gracie. About Joel Rooks Joel has appeared on Broadway in Say Goodnight Gracie, Taller Than A Dwarf and The Tenth Man. His Off-Broadway credits include Iron, Rocket To The Moon, Under The Bed, The Secret Order, Louis Slotin Sonata, Comic Potential, More Stately Mansions, Requiem For A Heavyweight, Richard II, School For Scandal and many others. He has toured in the national companies of The Sisters Rosenweig and Say Goodnight Gracie. His regional theater productions include Once In A Lifetime, Street Scene, God Of Vengeance (Williamstown Theater Festival), The Great White Hope (Arena Stage), Brightwings (Long Wharf), Astapovo (Yale Rep), Sheer Boredom (George Street Playhouse), The Rainmaker (Clarence Brown Theater), the archbishop’s ceiling, the last night of ballyhoo (Vineyard Playhouse), A Thousand Clowns (Dorset Theater Festival), Three Sisters, Bus Stop, A Streetcar Named Desire (River Arts Rep). Film and TV work includes It Runs In The Family, The Sightseer, On The Run, His & Hers, American Blue Note, Mark Of The Bear, The Gig, Cop Shop, Ed, Law & Order, L&O-Svu, L&O-Criminal Intent, Winchell, The Beat and assorted doctors, lawyers and cops on various daytime dramas. He has taught at the William Esper Studio for many years and is a member of Ensemble Studio Theater, Circle East and The New River Dramatists. Who’s who in “Say Goodnight Gracie” production. Joel Rooks has appeared on Broadway in Say Goodnight Gracie, Taller Than A Dwarf and The Tenth Man. His Off-Broadway credits include Iron, Rocket To The Moon, Under The Bed, The Secret Order, Louis Slotin Sonata, Comic Potential, More Stately Mansions, Requiem For A Heavyweight, Richard II, School For Scandal and many others. He has toured in the national companies of The Sisters Rosenweig and Say Goodnight Gracie. His regional theater productions include Once In A Lifetime, Street Scene, God Of Vengeance (Williamstown Theater Festival), The Great White Hope (Arena Stage), Brightwings (Long Wharf), Astapovo (Yale Rep), Sheer Boredom (George Street Playhouse), The Rainmaker (Clarence Brown Theater), the archbishop’s ceiling, the last night of ballyhoo (Vineyard Playhouse), A Thousand Clowns (Dorset Theater Festival), Three Sisters, Bus Stop, A Streetcar Named Desire (River Arts Rep). Film and TV work includes It Runs In The Family, The Sightseer, On The Run, His & Hers, American Blue Note, Mark Of The Bear, The Gig, Cop Shop, Ed, Law & Order, L&O-Svu, L&O-Criminal Intent, Winchell, The Beat and assorted doctors, lawyers and cops on various daytime dramas. He has taught at the William Esper Studio for many years and is a member of Ensemble Studio Theater, Circle East and The New River Dramatists. About the production of Say Goodnight Gracie. MICHAEL WHITE (DIRECTOR) began a lifelong love affair with the American Theater while still in high school. As a young actor, director, designer and technician, he won numerous awards in statewide theater competitions and earned a scholarship to the prestigious University of Texas Department of Drama. In addition to his work on stage, he wrote and directed his first original play while still a high school junior. By the time he graduated, he was already a veteran of nine Equity productions on the professional stage. After a distinguished collegiate career, Michael returned to the professional theater wherein he served as an actor, director, designer and stage manager in playhouses from coast to coast. Memorable roles include Nick in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, the narrator in Albee’s Ballad of the Sad Cafe, Lago in Othello, and a two-and-a-half year, box-office-record-setting tour of the comedy Hanky Panky. In addition, he stage managed or assistant stage managed over twenty-five Equity shows. After permanently relocating to Southern California, Michael began a career in film and television that has seen his work in such films as Body Double, Best Seller, The Elian Gonzales Story, The New Women and the A Day Without A Mexican. On television, Michael has appeared in Kitchen Confidential, Strong Medicine, L.A. Heat, Murder, She Wrote, Melrose Place, Saved By The Bell, The Bold & The Beautiful and Days of Our Lives to name just a few. Behind the scenes, Michael served as assistant director on the national tour of The Odd Couple (Female Version) starring Barbara Eden and most recently helmed the world premiere of playwright Lizzie Maxwell’s Confessions of a Nice Jewish Girl. After innumerable assignments on stage and in film and TV, he still lists as his all-time favorites the roles of being dad to his amazing daughter, Michelle, and husband to his beloved wife, Jennifer. And today, more than thirty years after Michael first set foot on a professional stage ... the love affair is still going strong. DIDI CONN (Voice of Gracie Allen). Broadway: Lost in Yonkers, Julie Taymor’s The Green Bird and A Christmas Carol. Off-Broadway: The Vagina Monologues, The Primary English Class, Consequences and the Lesson. Regional credits: Danny and the Deep Blue Sea (LA premiere), Division Street, Birdbath, Room Service, It Had to Be You, Anything Goes, Enter Laughing and six years in the acting company of the Sundance Playwright’s Lab. Films: starring roles in You Light Up My Life, Grease and Grease II, and she is the executive producer of the Paramount/ABC television movie “We’ll Always Be Together!” Other films include The Magic Show, Raggedy Ann and Andy, Almost Summer, Thomas and the Magic Railroad and the title role in the Oscar-winning short Violet. Television: a series regular in Danny Thomas’s “The Practice,” “Benson” and “Shining Time Stations” (PBS). She lives with her husband, composer David Shire, and their son Daniel, in Hudson Valley. GEORGE BURNS was an Academy Award-winning actor, comedian, dancer, singer and best-selling author. He began his career around the turn of the century performing in a barbershop quartet (when it was all the rage), and then moved on to vaudeville. One-reel shorts, then feature films followed. He graduated to a top-rated radio show for 17 years, a top-rated television show for another eight years, and, finally, over the last 30 years of his life he played Las Vegas. Meanwhile he released record albums, appeared in top-grossing movies (winning an Oscar for “The Sunshine Boys”), television specials and still enjoyed a good cigar, a habit he picked up in 1910 when he was a teenager. He was born on January 20, 1896; a time when sound recording was a new medium and records consisted of wax cylinders played on wound up gramophones. When Burns was about three months old, Thomas Edison publicly unveiled his first projected film program in a Manhattan theater, launching a great industry that would grow to shape the history of the 20th century. Most people did not have telephones and Henry Ford’s horseless carriage called the “Quadricycle” was still a novelty item. Rocket ships and space shuttles were nothing more than a glimmer in the imagination of Jules Verne, and the frontier days of the American west were still fresh in people’s minds. In 1922, George had been working in an act with Billy Lorraine as “Burns and Lorraine,” when after about a year, Billy decided to move on, leaving George without a partner. Enter Gracie Allen. This time, the pairing was to last—not just onstage, but off as well—for the next 42 years. They worked their way up as George continued to perfect his writing skills behind the scenes, and onstage played the straight man to Gracie’s dizzy character with her “illogical logic.” It may seem surprising, but in the beginning of their partnership, George and Gracie’s roles were actually reversed, with Gracie playing the straight character and George having the funny lines. By the mid-1930s, the energetic young couple was ready to start a family, so they adopted a baby girl, Sandy and a baby boy, Ronnie. About this time, the family moved into a permanent home in Beverly Hills, where the children grew up and where George resided until his death. “The Burns and Allen Show” remained one of the top radio shows during its nearly 20-year run with 45 million listeners tuning in each week. By 1950 George felt they were ready for the new medium of television. The show transferred well, and for the next eight years on CBS, Burns and Allen entertained audiences with plotlines revolving around home life, neighbors, and even vaudeville routines. At the age of 68, the second half of his show business career had only just begun. To take away some of the pain of losing his beloved Gracie, George threw himself into his work. George decided to move into production and among other projects, developed the enormously popular “Mr. Ed” television series as well as “No Time For Sergeants.” George continued to play the nightclub circuit, made guest appearances on TV and spoke at college campuses. T hen, in 1975 at age 79 and less than a year after having triple bypass surgery, George rekindled another career. Over the course of the next two decades, George appeared in eight more films, including perhaps his most popular role as the title character in the top-grossing “Oh, God” (1977). George’s busy schedule continued until at the age of 98, until he had a serious fall in his bathtub. However, as George kept telling everyone, he planned to stay in show business “until I’m the only one left!” In January 1996 he celebrated his 100th birthday, and then quietly passed into entertainment history on March 9, 1996. Although they weren’t an overnight sensation, Burns and Allen received a lot of bookings, many as a “disappointment act,” to replace another act that for some reason had cancelled at the last minute. Still, they worked their way up as George continued to perfect his writing skills behind the scenes, and onstage played the straight man to Gracie’s dizzy character with her “illogical logic.” One classic example of Gracie’s on-stage persona occurred when she was asked by an interviewer about her childhood, “Were you the oldest one in the family?” . . . . “No, no,” Gracie quickly replied, “My mother and father were much older ! “ It may seem surprising, but in the beginning of their partnership, George and Gracie’s roles were actually reversed, with Gracie playing the straight character and George having the funny lines. However, it was soon apparent that Gracie was actually getting more laughs with her stylish delivery of the straight lines than George was with his comic responses. He decided to switch their roles, and Burns and Allen began their upward climb. In 1925, their first big break came when they were booked to play the Orpheum circuit for a total of 16 weeks. They were married on January 7, 1926, in Cleveland, Ohio, by a justice of the peace. Shortly after their marriage, Burns and Allen broke in their new act, the now famous “Lamb Chops.” It was an immediate hit, and they were soon signed to a five-year contract on the Keith-Orpheum circuit and played to huge crowds all across the country. On the personal side, by the mid-1930s, the energetic young couple were ready to start a family, and in 1934 they adopted a baby boy, Ronnie. About this time, the Burnses also moved into a permanent home in Beverly Hills, where the children grew up and where George and Gracie resided for the rest of their lives. “The Burns and Allen Show” remained one of the top radio shows during its nearly 20-year run with 45 million listeners tuning in each week. By 1950 George felt they were ready for the new medium of television. The show transferred well, and for the next eight years on CBS, Burns and Allen entertained audiences with plotlines revolving around home life, neighbors, and even vaudeville routines. Gracie retired from show business in 1958, while George went on to pursue an independent career. In August of 1964, Gracie Allen died of a heart attack in Los Angeles. The New York Drama Desk bestowed identical honors upon Holmes and his creation. The Mystery Writers of America gave his Broadway comedy-thriller Accomplice their coveted Edgar Award – the second time he’s received this honor. His tour de force for actor Stacy Keach, Solitary Confinement, set a box-office record at the Kennedy Center and was seen on Broadway at the Nederlander Theatre. His book for the musical adaptation of Paddy Chayefsky’s Marty, with score by Charles Strouse and Lee Adams, recently broke all box office records at the Huntington Theatre in Boston and will be seen in Toronto in 2004 prior to Broadway. Holmes also created and wrote the critically acclaimed, Emmy Award-winning television series Remember WENN, set within the golden age of radio. His first novel, Where the Truth Lies, from Random House, is already into its second edition and is available in both hardcover and audiobook. For more about all the above, be sure to visit www.RupertHolmes.com. GO GI GO PRODUCTIONS’ (Producer) first project was Ethel Merman’s Broadway, which played internationally and is scheduled for London and Toronto openings and its 100th birthday celebration on Broadway in 2008. GO GI GO was a co-producer of Bermuda Avenue Triangle with Renée Taylor, Joe Bologna and Lainie Kazan, and produced a special engagement of Love Letters, which reunited Barbara Eden and Larry Hagman for the first time on stage. Currently, Love Letters is on a national tour with Barbara Eden and Hal Linden as the stars. Recent productions include the 30th anniversary tour of Plaza Suite starring Lee Meriwether, Milton Berle’s 90th Birthday Celebration tour, The Odd Couple: The Female Version with Barbara Eden and Rita McKenzie, and If You Ever Leave Me…I’m Going With You! starring Renée Taylor and Joe Bologna at the Apollo Theater in Chicago which was followed by its Broadway engagement.
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