Actually, Joe isn’t a bastard at all — far from it.
I just thought that would be a catchy title for a post.
In truth, Joe is an amazing writer, terrifically funny, human and humane, a soft-spoken sports book of knowledge and an all-round very decent kind of fella.
Along with Jimmy Roberts, Joe wrote “I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change.” A catchy title in and of itself and also a musical that will probably run Off Broadway until the year 2525.
Maybe longer.
Joe also wrote, along with Jimmy Roberts, the Off-Broadway musical “The Thing About Men,” which was called “Men” when it made its world premiere at Tim and Buck Busfield’s B Street Theatre in Sacramento several years ago. I had the great fortune to play the lead character, Tom Ambrose — a role I still believe is one of the great men’s roles in American musicals.
Seriously.
Tom Ambrose gets to sing and ride a bike, wear a gorilla mask, boxing gloves and a robe, play the ukelele, scheme, scream and plot and ultimately twist the audience into a direction they didn’t expect. And he makes people laugh the entire time.
The run was sold out and we got standing ovations every night. True.
I hate having to give a standing ovation, but I sure don’t mind getting one.
Just call me “The Happy Hypocrite.”
Anyway, Joe is a chronic re-writer and a massive “cutter.” He would apologize profusely at giving me rewrites, new pages, new dialogue to learn during the week of opening (and a couple shows after that) — but I was glad to do it because a) Joe is an inspiration and b) He was making the show better. Nothin’ wrong with making a show better.
So where was I going with this?
Oh yeah. I had to turn down the East Coast run of “Men” because my daughter Julia Rose had just been born and it’s very difficult feeding a family on $15 a day while performing in small houses in New Jersey and Florida. And, in the interest of full disclosure, I was told I was the second choice for the East Coast tour because a super talented Broadway actor suddenly couldn’t get out of his contract to do Joe and Jimmy’s show. So, it was, “Uh, Bill, can you leave L.A. in three days and come rehearse with us?” In truth, that didn’t bum me out, that was just business, but I still had to turn it down.
Nathalie and I sent Joe a birth announcement. Jimmy, too.
Flash forward seven years.
Julia Rose has turned seven.
Joe has written at least a play a week and a musical a month including the open and closed (sadly enough) Broadway Elvis musical “All Shook Up.”
And now the regional theatres are getting ahold of the rights and this breakdown just came out:
Breakdown for
ALL SHOOK UP (Combined EPA/ECC Singers)
Musical Theatre
WestLong Beach, CA
LOA ref WCLO
NATALIE HALLER (20’s- 30): a mechanic. A small town girl who dreams of more. Lusts after Chad. Dresses up as ‘Ed’ to get closer. LEAD
CHAD (25-35): a great-lookin’, motorcycling, guitar-playing, leather-jacketed roustabout. The “Elvis” character. LEAD
JIM HALLER (mid 40’s-50’s): Natalie’s widowed father. Middle-aged and messy, he still
longs for his wife. SUPPORTING
Last part of the story…
Yes, my wife Nathalie is 20 years younger.
We’ll be turning 80 together this November/December.
You’re invited.
Especially you, Joe DiPietro!
(and even if all of this is a super strange coincidence, I’m still gonna stick to my story!)