Kander & Ebb Revue

Kander & Ebb Revue

Kander and Ebb were a highly successful songwriting team consisting of composer John Kander (born March 18, 1927) and lyricist Fred Ebb (April 8, 1928 - September 11, 2004). Known primarily for their stage musicals, Kander and Ebb also scored several movies including their most famous song, the theme song from Martin Scorsese's New York, New York. Recorded by many artists, "New York, New York" became a signature song for Frank Sinatra. The team also became associated with two actresses, Liza Minnelli and Chita Rivera, for whom they wrote a considerable amount of material for the stage, concerts and television.

John Kander and Fred Ebb were introduced by their mutual music publisher Tommy Valando in 1962. They first collaborated on an unproduced musical called Golden Gate, which producer-director Harold Prince called "...basically a test to see if the collaboration was any good." They wrote Flora the Red Menace, their first musical to be produced on Broadway, in 1965, in which Liza Minnelli made her Broadway debut. Another early collaboration was the industrial musical General Electric presents Go Fly a Kite written with Walter Marks for General Electric's 5th Electric Executives Conference in Williamsburg, Virginia in 1966.

Kander's and Ebb's greatest acclaim came from the musical Cabaret (1966) and the 1972 film version. The musical, directed by frequent collaborator Harold Prince, was a major success, with a Broadway run of over 1,100 performances. It won a Tony Award as the season's best musical, and its original cast recording won a Grammy Award. The film, directed by Bob Fosse, won eight Academy Awards. The musical Chicago (1975) after an excellent initial run of 936 performances was revived on Broadway in 1996 to become an even greater hit. It has become the longest-running revival in Broadway history, and the 2002 film version was also a great success, including an Oscar nomination for the collaboration. Other Broadway successes included Woman Of The Year (1981), Kiss of the Spider Woman (1992), and, posthumously for Ebb, Curtains (2006).

The final collabroation between the two was The Scottsboro Boys, which played on Broadway for a short time in 2010.

ChicagoChicago is a musical set in Prohibition-era Chicago. The music is by John Kander with lyrics by Fred Ebb and a book by Ebb and Bob Fosse. The story is a satire on corruption in the administration of criminal justice and the concept of the "celebrity criminal". The musical is based on a 1926 play of the same name by reporter Maurine Dallas Watkins about actual criminals and crimes she reported on.The original Broadway production opened June 3, 1975, at the 46th Street Theatre[1] and ran for 936 performances. Bob Fosse choreographed the original production, and his style is strongly identified with the show. Chicago's 1996 Broadway revival holds the record for the longest-running musical revival on Broadway, not counting the revue Oh! Calcutta!, and is Broadway's sixth longest-running show.[The musical Chicago is based on a play of the same name by reporter Maurine Dallas Watkins, who was assigned to cover the 1924 trials of murderesses Beulah Annan and Belva Gaertner for the Chicago Tribune.In the late 1920s in Chicago, Illinois, Velma Kelly is a vaudevillian who murdered both her husband and her sister when she found them in bed together. She welcomes the audience to tonight's show ("All That Jazz"). Meanwhile, we hear of chorus girl Roxie Hart's murder of her lover, nightclub regular Fred Casely.

Roxie convinces her husband Amos that the victim was a burglar, and Amos cheerfully takes the blame. Roxie expresses her appreciation of her husband's thick skull ("Funny Honey"). However, when the police mention the deceased's name Amos belatedly puts two and two together. The truth comes out, and Roxie is arrested. She is sent to the women's block in Cook County Jail, inhabited by Velma and other murderesses ("Cell Block Tango"). The block is presided over by the corrupt Matron "Mama" Morton, whose system of mutual aid ("When You're Good to Mama") perfectly suits her clientle. She has helped Velma become the media's top murder-of-the-week and is acting as a booking agent for Velma's big return to vaudeville.

Velma is not happy to see Roxie, who is stealing not only her limelight but also her lawyer, Billy Flynn. Roxie tries to convince Amos to pay for Billy Flynn to be her lawyer ("A Tap Dance"). Eagerly awaited by his all-girl clientle, Billy sings his anthem, complete with a chorus of fan dancers to prove his assertion that "All I Care About is Love". Billy takes Roxie's case and re-arranges her story for consumption by sympathetic tabloid columnist Mary Sunshine, who always tries to find "A Little Bit of Good" in everyone. Roxie's press conference turns into a ventriloquist act with Billy dictating a new version of the truth ("We Both Reached for the Gun") while Roxie mouths the words. Roxie becomes the new toast of Chicago as Velma's fame is left in the dust. Velma tries to talk Roxie into recreating the sister act ("I Can't Do It Alone"), but Roxie turns her down, only to find her own headlines replaced by the latest sordid crime of passion. Separately, Roxie and Velma realize there's no one they can count on but themselves ("My Own Best Friend"), and the ever-resourceful Roxie decides that being pregnant in prison would put her back on the front page.

Act 2

Velma again welcomes the audience with the line "Hello, Suckers," another reference to Texas Guinan, who commonly greeted her patrons with the same phrase. She informs the audience of Roxie's continual run of luck ("I Know a Girl") despite Roxie's obvious falsehoods ("Me and My Baby"). A little shy on the arithmetic, Amos proudly claims paternity, and still nobody notices him ("Mr. Cellophane"). Velma tries to show Billy all the tricks she's got planned for her trial ("When Velma Takes The Stand"). With her ego growing, Roxie has a heated argument with Billy, and fires him. She is brought back down to earth when she learns that a fellow inmate has been executed. The trial date arrives, and Billy calms her, telling her if she makes a show of it, she'll be fine ("Razzle Dazzle"), but when he passes all Velma's ideas on to Roxie, down to the rhinestone shoe buckles, Mama and Velma lament the demise of "Class". As promised, Billy gets Roxie her acquittal but, just as the verdict is given, some even more sensational crime pulls the pack of press bloodhounds away, and Roxie's fleeting celebrity life is over. Billy leaves, done with the case. Amos stays with her, glad for his wife, but she then confesses that there isn't really a baby, making Amos finally leave her. Left in the dust, Roxie pulls herself up and extols the joys of life "Nowadays". She teams up with Velma in a new act, in which they dance and perform the "Hot Honey Rag" until they are joined by the entire company for the grand "Finale".

According to Fred Ebb, he wrote the book in a vaudeville style because "the characters were performers. Every musical moment in the show was loosely modeled on someone else: Roxie was Helen Morgan, Velma was Texas Guinan, Billy Flynn was Ted Lewis, Mama Morton was Sophie Tucker." Kander elaborates that the reason the show was called a vaudeville "is because many of the songs we wrote are related to specific performers like those you mentioned, and Eddie Cantor and Bert Williams as well."[CabaretCabaret is a musical with a book by Joe Masteroff, music by John Kander and lyrics by Fred Ebb. The 1966 Broadway production became a hit and spawned a 1972 film as well as numerous subsequent productions.

It is based on John Van Druten's 1951 play I Am a Camera, which in turn was adapted from the novel Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood. Set in 1931 Berlin as the Nazis are rising to power, it focuses on nightlife at the seedy Kit Kat Klub and revolves around the 19-year-old English cabaret performer Sally Bowles and her relationship with the young American writer Cliff Bradshaw.

A sub-plot involves the doomed romance between German boarding house owner Frulein Schneider and her elderly suitor Herr Schultz, a Jewish fruit vendor. Overseeing the action is the Master of Ceremonies at the Kit Kat Klub which serves as a constant metaphor for the tenuous and threatening state of late Weimar Germany throughout the show.The musical ultimately became two separate stories in one, the first a revue centered on the decadence of the seedy Kit Kat Club, the second a story set in the real world in which the club existed.Act One

At the dawn of the 1930s in Berlin, the Nazi party quietly grows stronger. The Kit Kat Klub is a seedy cabaret, a place of decadent celebration set against the backdrop of growing Nazi terror. The Klub's Master of Ceremonies, or Emcee, together with the cabaret girls and waiters, warm up the audience ("Willkommen"). In a train station, Clifford Bradshaw, a young American writer coming to Berlin in the hopes of finding inspiration for his new novel, arrives. He meets Ernst Ludwig, a German who offers Cliff work and recommends a boardinghouse. At the boardinghouse, Frulein Schneider offers Cliff a room for one hundred marks; he can only pay fifty. After a brief debate, she relents and lets Cliff live there for fifty marks. Frulein Schneider observes that she has learned to take whatever life offers ("So What?").

As Cliff visits the Kit Kat Klub, the Emcee introduces a British singer, Sally Bowles, who performs a racy, flirtatious number ("Don't Tell Mama"). Afterward, she asks Cliff to recite poetry for her; he recites "Casey at the Bat". Cliff offers to take Sally home, but she says that her boyfriend Max, the club's owner, is too jealous. Sally then performs her final number at the Kit Kat Club aided by the female ensemble ("Mein Herr"). The cabaret ensemble then performs a song and dance, calling each other on inter-table phones and inviting each other for dances and drinks ("The Telephone Song").

The next day, Cliff has just finished giving Ernst an English lesson when Sally arrives. Max has fired her and thrown her out, and now she has no place to live, and so she asks him if she can live in his room. At first he resists, but she convinces him (and Frulein Schneider) to take her in ("Perfectly Marvelous"). The Emcee and two female companions sing a song ("Two Ladies") that comments on Cliff and Sally's unusual living conditions. Herr Schultz, an elderly Jewish fruit-shop owner who lives in her boardinghouse, has given Frulein Schneider a pineapple as a gift ("It Couldn't Please Me More"). However, in the Kit Kat Klub, a young waiter begins singing a patriotic anthem to the Fatherland ("Tomorrow Belongs to Me") a cappella, with others joining him, including the Emcee.

Months later, Cliff and Sally are still living together and have fallen in love. Cliff knows that he is in a "dream," but he enjoys living with Sally too much to come to his senses ("Why Should I Wake Up?"). Sally reveals that she is pregnant, but she does not know the father and reluctantly decides to get an abortion. Cliff reminds her that it could be his child, and seems to convince her to have the baby. Ernst then enters and offers Cliff a jobpicking up a suitcase in Paris and delivering it to his "client" in Berlineasy money. The Emcee comments on this ("Sitting Pretty", or, in later versions, "Money").

Meanwhile, Frulein Schneider has caught one of her boarders, Frulein Kost, bringing sailors into her room. Frulein Schneider forbids her from doing it again, but Frulein Kost threatens to leave. She also mentions that she has seen Frulein Schneider with Herr Schultz in her room. Herr Schultz saves Frulein Schneider's reputation by telling Frulein Kost that he and Frulein Schneider are to be married in three weeks. After Kost leaves, Frulein Schneider thanks Herr Schultz for lying to Kost. Schultz, however, says that he was serious, and proposes to Frulein Schneider ("Married").

At Frulein Schneider and Herr Schultz's engagement party, Cliff arrives and delivers the suitcase to Ernst. A "tipsy" Herr Schultz sings "Meeskite" (Meeskite, he explains, is Yiddish for ugly or funny-looking) a song with a moral ("Anyone responsible for loveliness, large or small/Is not a meeskite at all"). Afterward, looking for revenge on Frulein Schneider, Frulein Kost tells Ernst, who now sports a Nazi armband, that Schultz is a Jew. Ernst warns Frulein Schneider that marrying a Jew may not be wise. Frulein Kost and company reprise "Tomorrow Belongs to Me", this time with even more overtly disturbing Nazi overtones, as Cliff, Sally, Frulein Schneider, Herr Schultz and the Emcee look on.

Act Two

The cabaret girls, along with the Emcee in drag, perform a kick line routine which eventually becomes a goose-step. Frulein Schneider expresses her concerns about her union to Herr Schultz, who assures her that everything will be all right ("Married" (Reprise)), but they are interrupted by the crash of a brick being thrown through the window of Herr Schultz's fruit shop. Frulein Schneider is afraid that the gesture might represent malicious intent, but Schultz tries to reassure her that it is just children making trouble.

Back at the Kit Kat Klub, the Emcee performs a song-and-dance routine with a girl in a gorilla suit about how their love has been met with universal disapproval ("If You Could See Her"). Encouraging the audience to be more open-minded, he defends his ape-woman, concluding with, "if you could see her through my eyes... she's not a Meeskite at all." (Originally, it was "She wouldn't look Jewish at all," which, while meant to be anti-anti-Semitic, sounded so anti-Semitic that it was changed.) Frulein Schneider then goes to Cliff and Sally's room and returns their engagement present, explaining that her marriage has been called off. When Cliff protests, saying that she can't just give up this way, she asks him what other choice she has ("What Would You Do?").

Cliff tells Sally that he is taking her back to his home in America so that they can raise their baby together. Sally protests, declaring how wonderful their life in Berlin is, and Cliff sharply tells her to "wake up" and take notice of the growing unrest around them; Sally retorts that politics have nothing to do with them or their affairs. Following their heated argument, Sally returns to the club. Cliff is accosted by Ernst who has another delivery job for him. Cliff tries to brush him off, but when Ernst asks if Cliff's attitude towards him is because of "that Jew at the party", Cliff attacks him only to be badly beaten up by Ernst and his Nazi bodyguards and dragged out of the club. The Emcee introduces Sally, who enters to perform again, singing that "life is a cabaret, old chum" ("Cabaret"). As Sally finishes the song, she breaks down in tears.

The next morning, the bruised Cliff is packing, when Herr Schultz, who tells Cliff that he is moving to another boardinghouse, visits him but he is confident that the bad times will soon pass. He understands the German people, he says, because he is a German, too. When Sally returns, she reveals that she has had an abortion; Cliff slaps her. Cliff still hopes that she will join him, but Sally says that she has "always hated Paris" and hopes that when Cliff finally writes his novel, he will dedicate it to her. Cliff leaves, heartbroken.

On the train to Paris, Cliff begins to write his novel, reflecting on his experiences: "There was a cabaret, and there was a master of ceremonies... and there was a city called Berlin, in a country called Germany...and it was the end of the world." ("Willkommen" Reprise). In the Kit Kat Klub, the Emcee once again welcomes us (in the 1998 revival, he strips off his overcoat to reveal a concentration camp prisoner's uniform marked with a yellow Star of David and a pink triangle). The cabaret ensemble reprises "Willkommen", but it is now harsh and violent as the Emcee sings, "Auf Wiedersehen bienttgood night!"

Curtains (2008)

Curtains is a musical with a book by Rupert Holmes, lyrics by Fred Ebb, and music by John Kander, with additional lyrics by Kander and Holmes.

Based on the original book and concept by Peter Stone, the musical is a send-up of backstage murder mystery plots, set in 1959 Boston, Massachusetts and follows the fallout when the supremely untalented star of Robbin' Hood of the Old West is murdered during her opening night curtain call. It is up to a police detective who moonlights as a musical theater fan to save the show, solve the case, and maybe even find love before the show reopens, without getting killed himself.

Act I

It is 1959 at the Colonial Theatre in Boston, where a new musical called "Robbin' Hood!", a western version of Robin Hood, is reaching its conclusion ("Wide Open Spaces"). Madame Marian, played by faded film star diva Jessica Cranshaw, looks on as Rob Hood wins the sharp-shooting contest and proposes to Miss Nancy, the schoolmarm. The cast then sings the finale of the show, during which it is clear that Jessica can neither sing, dance, nor act. She takes her bow and, after receiving two bouquets, collapses behind the curtain.

Later that night, Carmen Bernstein, a hard-bitten lady co-producer, divorced songwriting team Aaron Fox and Georgia Hendricks, and the show's financial backer, Oscar Shapiro, read the reviews, most of which are terrible, especially the Boston Globe's, which is the review they needed; the only good review comes from the Cambridge Patriot. No one believes that anyone would be heartless enough to become a critic ("What Kind of Man"). The show's flamboyant British director, Christopher Belling, arrives, saying that he had an epiphany after walking into a church. Just then, stage manager Johnny tells Carmen that there's a phone call for her. Carmen suspects that it's her philandering husband Sidney. Meanwhile, Georgia and Aaron get into an argument about why Georgia joined the show. Aaron claims that she only wanted to rekindle a romance with choreographer Bobby, the actor playing Robbin Hood and Georgia's ex-boyfriend. Everyone is pessimistic, but Belling asks Georgia to sing Madame Marian's opening number. She does so spectacularly, and it is clear that she is thinking about her failed marriage with Aaron. Aaron begins to sing with her, but Bobby cuts him off ("Thinking of Him").

Belling then announces his plan: they are going to replace Jessica. Niki, the schoolmarm and Jessica's understudy, steps forward and says she would feel terrible taking over, but Belling goes on to say that he is actually casting Georgia as Madame Marian. Bambi, a dancer, steps forward and says that Niki should get the role, but Belling sees right through her: Bambi is Niki's understudy, meaning if Niki got the lead, she'd get to play Miss Nancy. Georgia is cast, in spite of Aaron's disapproval.

Carmen then enters and tells the ensemble that it was the hospital that had called. Jessica Cranshaw is dead. The cast performs a mock funeral, and it is clear that no one is sorry to see their leading lady gone ("The Woman's Dead"). Lt. Frank Cioffi of the Boston Police Department arrives to announce that he had seen the show and loved it (except for Cranshaw), and then reveals that Jessica Cranshaw was murdered.

Cioffi tells Belling to finish up what he was doing with the cast, who do not want to go on with the show. Carmen unsuccessfully tries to convince them that "the show must go on", and various members of the ensemble stand up to her, including Bambi, who is actually named Elaine and is Carmen's daughter. Cioffi, an amateur performer himself, enthusiastically helps her bolster the morale of the cast, and convinces them to do the show ("Show People"). However, since Cranshaw was poisoned in the last minutes of the show and never left the stage thereafter, Cioffi believes that she must have been murdered by a member of the company. Also believing that the perpetrator is still in the building, Cioffi sequesters it. Sidney Bernstein arrives from New York, and Cioffi begins to suspect him, although Sidney claims to have been with a certain woman whose name he refuses to give.

Cioffi is left alone with the winsome Niki, who is now covering for Georgia. The lieutenant is struck by Niki's charm and confides in her about his investigation and his lonely life, as he is married to his job ("Coffee Shop Nights"). She seems to return his affection, so he hopes she is not the murderer. The next day, Georgia attempts to learn to dance, but is failing miserably despite Bobby's belief in her. Cioffi arrives and soon meets Daryl Grady, the critic who wrote the terrible review for the Boston Globe, only praising the choreography and Niki's performance. Carmen and Sidney ask him to re-review the show with its new lead, and he decides that he'll re-review the show, tomorrow. They reluctantly agree before Niki tries to thank Daryl for his kind words. He tells her that he doesn't associate with the artists he reviews, and after having an argument with Cioffi about his previous review of "Robbin' Hood", leaves.

Belling works to re-stage a difficult production number, featuring Niki, Georgia and Bambi, and Cioffi suggests that the song needs to be rewritten ("In The Same Boat #1"). Cioffi is left alone with Aaron, who shows Cioffi that composing a song is difficult. After he lets it slip that he misses something, Aaron confesses that he still loves his ex-wife ("I Miss the Music"). Any doubt that Georgia can carry the show is removed by the dress rehearsal of the big saloon hall number ("Thataway!"). Cioffi then comes on and tells the cast that he has figured out that Sidney has been blackmailing every member of the show into working for him. While the cast is relieved that they no longer need to be blackmailed, Cioffi reminds them they're still suspects and that they should continue with the show. Tragedy soon strikes again as the curtain is rung down, as Sidney Bernstein is simultaneously rung up, with the curtain rope tied around his neck.

Act II

Sasha, the conductor, turns to the audience to reveal that the hanging was fatal ("The Man is Dead"). A makeshift dormitory has been set up on the stage of the still-sequestered Colonial Theatre. Each member of the company suspects the others in the middle of the night ("He Did It"). Cioffi returns from the coroner's office, but he focuses on whether the show will be ready for its re-opening. When a death threat for Sidney is found, stating he will die unless he closes the show, Oscar reveals Sidney died for nothing as he was going to comply. He even gave Oscar back the last check he made out. Carmen takes it back, saying she is going to keep the show open. Aaron previews his new version of "In the Same Boat" featuring Bobby and two cast members Randy and Harv but Cioffi is not yet satisfied with the product and has other advice for the show's creators ("In The Same Boat # 2").

Bambi asks that a pas de deux be added for herself and Bobby. Carmen agrees, but she is no stage mother: her duty is to the box office ("Its a Business"). Grady then comes in and tells everyone that he's taking interviews from the cast in the Green Room. Bambi does well at the rehearsal of the re-staged square dance number ("Kansasland"). Just then, however, a shot rings out from offstage, and Bobby is wounded in the arm, although Cioffi soon figures out that Carmen was actually the target. Niki comes forward with the gun, and the company immediately jumps to the conclusion that she is guilty ("She Did It" (Reprise)). She says that she innocently found the gun backstage and hands it over, albeit after she accidentally pulls the trigger and almost hits Cioffi.

As Cioffi works on solving the case, he tells Aaron, Georgia, and Bobby that Sidney had nothing on them and yet they were still working for very little money. Georgia then quotes a death threat which Cioffi hadn't read out loud. Cioffi is about to arrest her when Aaron attempts to takes the blame for her, reviving their romance. The couple reunite ("Thinking of Him/I Miss the Music" (Reprise)). After Aaron leaves it is revealed that it was all an act, and that Bobby had only been pretending to be Georgia's boyfriend so that she could see if she could stir anything in them. She leaves, and Bobby confesses that he does love Georgia, and that he would do anything for her, even commit murder.

Niki laments how love makes people feel bad, but Cioffi begins flirting with her and reminisces about the first time he saw her on stage, and how he thought that he could be her perfect partner; in an elaborate fantasy sequence, he becomes just that ("A Tough Act to Follow"). But he realizes that she has a secret. He had found out that cast members would use certain people to get higher reviews. He also tells Niki that some cast members were using certain people to get higher ratings, and in Sidney's book where he had coded memos for the casts' blackmails, there was an O next to her name. Stage manager Johnny knows the secret, but won't tell the detective what it is. He is shot and killed before he can reveal any more. He tears out a page from his notebook saying "Drop in planet Earth".

Cioffi takes Niki and Belling up to the theater's flyspace high above the stage. He announces that he's solved the mystery. Left alone, he is hit with a sandbag and is sent tumbling down. He narrowly escapes death by clutching onto a setpiece, which lowers him to safety. When on the ground, he exclaims that he has solved it...he knows how to best stage "In the Same Boat". Putting together all of the versions, the cast is able to sing an incredible number ("In The Same Boat- Complete")

Cioffi then announces that he and Niki are engaged, and asks the cast to re-stage the bows, when Jessica was murdered, and they notice that Georgia is only being offered one bouquet, not two. Cioffi figures out that the murderer hid a pellet gun with a poison capsule inside a bouquet, disguised as an usher, and killed Jessica. Bobby suddenly comes on stage with a bloody head and collapses, and everyone realizes that the masked Rob Hood standing on stage is a fake.

Cioffi then announces that the O and the "Drop in planet earth" both represented a globe. The Boston Globe. He finally solves the case: the murderer is the critic, Daryl Grady. So Grady takes of the mask, and reveals that he is in love with Niki and did not want her to move away to New York, so he decided he would do anything to stop the show. Grady takes Niki hostage, threatening to kill her so that Cioffi can't marry her, he tells Cioffi to give his gun, but when Grady tries to shoot Cioffi he realizies that the gun has no bullets inside,and he is foiled when Cioffi takes another gun from his jacket,and Carmen pulls the trapdoor on him.

After everyone returns backstage to prepare for the reopening, Cioffi privately confronts Carmen: She killed Sidney. Carmen has been secretly acting on behalf of Bambi while pretending to be unsupportive so Bambi would have to work to get ahead rather than rely on nepotism. She wants her daughter Bambi to move on to Broadway, but Sidney was going to close the show. Cioffi agrees to give her until after the show's Broadway opening to turn herself in, and tells her that, with the right lawyer, she could easily be acquitted of what is surely justifiable homicide. Carmen tells Cioffi that he's one of them ("Show People" (Reprise)) Belling comes on and tells them that with Bobby's injury, he may not be ready for the performance.

Finally, the show reopens. Georgia is now Madame Marian, and Cioffi has replaced Bobby as Rob Hood, and "A Tough Act to Follow" has become the new finale of the show.

Flora The Red MenanceFlora the Red Menace is a musical with a book by George Abbott and Robert Russell, music by John Kander, and lyrics by Fred Ebb. The musical starred Liza Minnelli in the title role in her Broadway debut, for which she won a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical. This was the first collaboration between Kander and Ebb, who later wrote Broadway and Hollywood hits such as Cabaret and Chicago.Headstrong wannabe fashion designer Flora Mezaros (Liza Minnelli) is a member of an artists' co-operative of bohemian types - dancers, musicians, designers - struggling to find work during the Great Depression. Hoping to find a job which pays at least $15 a week, she is hired by the head of a large department store at $30.

She falls in love with Harry Toukarian (Bob Dishy), another struggling designer, who attempts to convert Flora to his Communist ideals. Even though it compromises her job in an organisation which does not recognise the new unions she seeks to hold down both job and relationship. Complicating matters is a predatory Communist matriarch, Comrade Charlotte, (Cathryn Damon) who wants Harry for herself, a secretary with designs on her boss, and Kenny and Maggie, a jazz dancing duo with their sights on greater things.

In the end, however, Flora finds herself torn between two vastly different ideals, and has to sacrifice one or the other for true happiness.

In the Vineyard Theatre revival, the story is told as though in a presentation by the Federal Theatre Project, part of the WPA established by President Roosevelt (voiced by Art Carney). A company of actors played all the roles, with obvious props and scenery, not trying to hide the 'amateur' look and feel of the show.

Kiss of the Spiderwoman

Kiss of the Spider Woman is a musical with music by John Kander and Fred Ebb, with the book by Terrence McNally. It is based on the Manuel Puig novel El Beso de la Mujer Araa. The musical had runs in the West End (1992) and Broadway (1993) and won the 1993 Tony Award for Best Musical.Luis Alberto Molina, a gay window dresser, is in a prison in a Latin American country, serving his third year of an eight-year-sentence for corrupting a minor. He lives in a fantasy world to flee the prison life, the torture, fear and humiliation. His fantasies turn mostly around movies, particularly around a vampy diva, Aurora. He loves her in all roles, but one scares him: This role is the spider woman, who kills with her kiss.

One day, a new man is brought in his cell: Valentin Arregui Paz, a Marxist revolutionary, already in a bad state of health after torture. Molina cares for him and tells him of Aurora. But Valentin can't stand Molina and his theatrical fantasies and draws a line on the floor to stop Molina from coming nearer to him. Molina, however, continues talking, mostly to block out the cries of the tortured prisoners, about Aurora and his mother. Valentin at last tells Molina that he is in love with a girl named Marta.

Again, Valentin is tortured, again Molina has to care for him afterwards. In his fantasies, Aurora is next to him, helping him do so.

The prison director announces to Molina that his mother is very ill and that Molina will be allowed to see her. Condition: He must tell the name of Valentin's girlfriend.

Molina tells Valentin about his love: A waiter named Gabriel. Only a short while afterwards, Molina gets hallucinations and cramps after knowingly eating poisoned food intended for Valentin. He is brought to the hospital ward, talking to Aurora and his mother. As Molina is brought back, Valentin starts suffering from the same symptoms, also from poisoned food. Molina is afraid that Valentin will be given substances that might make him talk and so protects Valentin from being taken to the hospital. As Molina nurses him, Valentin asks him to tell him about his movies.

Molina is happy to do so; Valentin also shares his fantasies and hopes with Molina. Molina is allowed a short while at the telephone with his mother, back he announces to Valentin that he's going to be freed for his good behaviour the next day. Valentin begs him to do a few telephone calls for him, Molina at first refuses, but Valentin knows how to persuade his cell mate...

Molina is brought back the next day, heavily injured. He has been caught in the telephone call, but refuses to tell whom he has phoned. The warden draws his pistol, threatening to shoot him, if he doesn't tell. Molina confesses his love to Valentin and is shot. Aurora bends over him and gives her deadly kiss.

And the World Goes Round

And the World Goes 'Round is a musical revue showcasing the songs of John Kander and Fred Ebb. The revue takes its title from a tune the songwriting team wrote for Liza Minnelli to sing in the film New York, New YorkThe show consists of an eclectic collection of love songs, torch songs, and acerbicly witty comic numbers. It was conceived by director Scott Ellis, choreographer Susan Stroman, and librettist David Thompson, who collaborated on such Kander and Ebb shows as Steel Pier and the 1996 revival of Chicago.

With scenic and technical embellishments added and the title simplified to The World Goes 'Round, the revised edition included mostly upbeat, unfamiliar songs from the team's lesser musicals: The Happy Time, The Rink, The Act, Flora the Red Menace, and what was then a work-in-progress, Kiss of the Spider Woman.[2]