Latest news with #TheMysteryofEdwinDrood
India Today
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- India Today
Dame Cleo Laine, British jazz icon and Grammy winner, dies at 97
Dame Cleo Laine, one of the most celebrated voices in British jazz and the first British jazz artist to be made a dame, has died at the age of Stables, the music venue she co-founded with her late husband, jazz musician Sir John Dankworth, confirmed the news of her death, calling her 'a unique talent who will always be remembered.'advertisementLaine's musical range — spanning from rich contralto to clear soprano — made her instantly recognisable. Her career took her across the Atlantic and across genres, from jazz and classical to musical theatre and avant-garde opera. She performed works by composers such as Kurt Weill and Benjamin Britten, and even portrayed God in Britten's Noye's Fludde. Born Clementina Dinah Campbell in 1927 to a British mother and Jamaican father, Laine's route to fame was set in 1951 when she auditioned for Johnny Dankworth's band, the Dankworth to the Associated Press, she was signed to the band and given a new name Cleo Laine reflecting her distinctive voice. She married Dankworth in 1958. While the couple often worked together, Laine built a thriving solo first appeared on stage in 1958 and soon became well-known across the UK and the US. Laine earned a Tony nomination for The Mystery of Edwin Drood and a Grammy Award for Cleo at Carnegie.- Ends
Express Tribune
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Express Tribune
Cleo Laine, legendary British jazz singer and Tony-nominated actress, dies at 97
Dame Cleo Laine, one of Britain's most celebrated jazz vocalists and a prominent figure in theater, died on Thursday at the age of 97. Her death was confirmed by representatives from The Stables, the Buckinghamshire arts center she co-founded with her husband, composer and saxophonist John Dankworth. No cause of death was disclosed. Widely regarded as the U.K.'s foremost jazz singer, Laine earned international acclaim for her remarkable vocal range and distinctive style. The BBC called her 'the most recognizable British jazz singer in history,' while The Sunday Times once described her as 'quite simply the best singer in the world.' Though her roots were in the U.K., Laine made a significant impact in the U.S. as well. She received a Tony Award nomination in 1986 for her performance as Princess Puffer in Broadway's The Mystery of Edwin Drood and was recognized with multiple Grammy nominations across jazz, pop, and classical categories — a rare achievement. Her only Grammy win came in 1985 for Cleo at Carnegie – The 10th Anniversary Concert. Laine's discography includes collaborations with music legends like Ray Charles, Mel Tormé, James Galway, and the Duke Ellington Orchestra. She also performed alongside Frank Sinatra during a five-night residency at London's Royal Albert Hall in 1992. Beyond music, Laine had a distinguished stage career, performing in both Broadway and West End productions. Her portrayal of Julie in a 1971 London revival of Show Boat ran for hundreds of performances. In 1989, she earned critical praise for her role as the Witch in a touring production of Into the Woods. Born in Southall, Middlesex in 1927, Laine began her career after auditioning for a band led by Dankworth, whom she married in 1958. The couple remained together until his death in 2010. Laine continued performing into her 90s, often appearing onstage with her children Alec and Jacqui, both musicians. Laine was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1979 and remembered as a trailblazer whose influence on British jazz remains unmatched. She is survived by her two children.
Yahoo
31-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
'M*A*S*H' 's Loretta Swit, a Passaic native, has died
"Hot Lips" Houlihan, a one-note role in the original 1970 "M*A*S*H" movie, had evolved into a nuanced, complex, heroic character by the time the beloved TV series reached its 11th season. And that has everything to do with the nuanced, complex, heroic performance of Loretta Swit, the Passaic native who died Friday. Swit, who died of natural causes, was 87. "She sort of set the template for complex women characters who evolved on television," said Ron Simon, head curator of the Paley Center for Media in New York. "She worked with the writers and producers to have the character evolve." Swit, who won two Emmys for her "M*A*S*H" role, was modest about her own contribution. It was the ensemble, and the creative team, who made this landmark, long-running comedy-drama (1972-1983) about a surgical unit trying to maintain its sanity amid the madness of the Korean War, into the beloved thing it was. "It's become a phenomenon," Swit told The Record in 2000. "I think it's all due to the fact that the original people in charge were so pure, so caring, so creative, and brilliant. The producers, from the get-go, from Day One, kept the doors open. They were always talking to us [about the characters]. It was a real communal effort. `M*A*S*H' itself was the star." Swit, born Loretta Jane Szwed in 1937 (her parents Lester and Nellie were of Polish descent), was a cheerleader at Pope Pius XII High School in Passaic, where she graduated in 1955. She attended a secretarial school in Montclair. She began her professional life with a series of high-profile secretary gigs: as assistant to famed gossip columnist Elsa Maxwell, as secretary to the U.N. ambassador to Ghana, and secretary to the American Rocket Society, while also studying dance and acting. In 1961, she made the leap to the professional stage with an off-Broadway production of Ibsen's "An Enemy of the People," and continued to do stage work through the 1970s and beyond — from a touring production of the one-woman show "Shirley Valentine" to the 1985 Broadway production of "The Mystery of Edwin Drood" by Rupert Holmes. "Loretta Swit was in real life every bit as warm, caring and sly as her 'M*A*S*H' persona," said Holmes, known for his numerous theater pieces (including one, "Thumbs," for Bergen County Players) not to mention his immortal "Escape (The Piña Colada Song)." "I was privileged to know her when she took over from Dame Cleo Laine in my Broadway musical 'The Mystery of Edwin Drood,' " Holmes said. "In that show, the audience voted on whodunit at each performance, and the biggest problem Loretta presented for us was that everyone adored her and no one could imagine her as a killer." Swit also did movies ("Freebie and the Bean," 1974; "S.O.B.," 1981) and lots and lots of television: "Mission: Impossible," "Gunsmoke," "The Love Boat." But it was her role on "M*A*S*H" that made her, not just a favorite with TV viewers, but also a game-changer in the realm of situation comedy. Characters in sitcoms don't evolve. That is — or was — the point. Lucy is always wacky. Dennis is always a menace. Oscar is always sloppy, and Felix is always neat. That's the situation. Hence, "situation comedy." But "M*A*S*H," with its 11-year run, couldn't be static. Alan Alda, Mike Farrell, Jamie Farr, Harry Morgan, Gary Burghoff, had to develop. "If you're portraying a character for 11 seasons, the character has to have an arc," said Steven Gorelick, former executive director of the New Jersey Motion Picture and Television Commission. "Otherwise, you don't have 11 seasons." And the "M*A*S*H" regular who evolved most was the character, played by Swit, who was originally called "Hot Lips" Houlihan. By the end of the show, she was "Margaret." "She took that role and made it her own," Gorelick said. In the original movie (where she was played by Sally Kellerman) and in the early TV episodes, "Hot Lips" is there to be the butt of jokes. She's the embodiment of stuffy officialdom — and most of the jokes involve the randy surgeons of the M*A*S*H unit knocking her off her pedestal, usually in crudely sexual ways. That's where Swit's character started. But that is not where it ended up. The burgeoning women's movement of the 1970s had something to do with that. But so did Swit. "Starting from that male-viewed stereotype, she becomes more complex," Simon said. One symptom of this: the gradual fading of the "Hot Lips" as a character name. "They stopped calling her that," Simon said. "It just didn't fit. She was head nurse, she had major responsibility, she was the most important woman in the M*A*S*H division." The character, in turn, became the template for other competent women who started to be seen on TV: "Cagney and Lacey" (Swit was originally slated to appear in it), "Murphy Brown." Happily, Swit's work will live on. Because "M*A*S*H" will live on. "I'm heartbroken to learn of her departure," Holmes said. "But I am comforted that the range of her wonderful work lives on in virtually every episode of one of television's legendary series." This article originally appeared on Loretta Swit of 'M*A*S*H,' and Passaic NJ native, dies
Chicago Tribune
20-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Review: ‘Clue' at the CIBC Theatre hasn't much of one
Clue, or Cluedo in the country of its birth, is one of the best board games of all time. Colonel Mustard, Mrs. Peacock and Professor Plum have been brandishing their candlesticks, lead piping and other lethal weapons since the late 1940s. That's when a British chap named Anthony Ernest Pratt rightly figured there would be demand for a whodunnit parlor distraction that took its cue from the popular, contemporaneous murder-mystery novels by the likes of Agatha Christie. Especially once Hasbro took over the game from Parker Brothers, Clue became a brand ripe for licensable extension. There's been a movie, a TV show, retro and spinoff games and even a live musical, which I remember seeing in Chicago in the mid-1990s. It's not a happy memory. The touring show currently at the CIBC Theater is a newish, non-musical live adaptation credited to Sandy Ruskin that dates back to 2017, and hews relatively closely to the screenplay for Jonathan Lynn's 1985 movie. Turning a board game with multiple possible outcomes (murderer, weapon, location) into a dramatic entertainment requires some work, of course, and frankly, I've seen far more structurally adventurous murder-mysteries: 'The Mystery of Edwin Drood' being one. 'Clue' is set in 1954 amid the rise of McCarthyism. It does not involve the audience in its decision trees, nor is it a particularly tense kind of suspenseful. In essence, you are buying a murder-mystery slapstick farce more akin to Tom Stoppard's 'The Real Inspector Hound,' or 'The Play That Goes Wrong,' although both of those titles are far smarter and funnier. Detective mysteries remain popular, whether Scandinavian noir or 'Only Murders in the Building.' I hold no animosity for the genre, which got me through the pandemic. I just don't think this particular show is especially exciting when it comes to detecting. 'Clue' was a way to brand the show, of course, but I'd rather see something more original. And truthful. And mysterious. You do get a bunch of skilled character actors enjoying themselves and camping it up in the period setting. There is a certain escapist sense of fun in the building. Some of the physical comedy, especially a falling chandelier, has its yuks. A few one-liners land. And John Shartzer, who plays Mr. Green, has some inspired shtick. The thing certainly clips along like everyone is worried about catching the last train home: it clocks in at just one hour and 20 minutes, which was more than enough for me. Chris Jones is a Tribune critic. cjones5@ When: Through March 2 Where: CIBC Theatre, 18 W. Monroe St. Running time: 1 hour, 20 minutes
