Here’s a little trivia about the Live from the West Side: Women of Broadway series. Patti LuPone, who opened the series on October 24th, starred in the 2008 revival of Gypsy with Laura Benanti. Both LuPone and Benanti won Tony Awards for their performances.
Benanti, who headlines this Saturday, appeared in the 2002 revival of Into the Woods with Vanessa Williams. Both received Tony Award nominations for their performances. Williams will close out the series on December 5th.
Benanti has, of course, starred in more than just these two shows on Broadway. She made her Broadway debut in the 1998 revival of The Sound of Music. She received her first Tony Award nomination for her performance in 1999’s Swing. After Into the Woods she appeared in the 2003 revival of Nine with Chita Rivera and Antonio Banderas. The Wedding Singer followed in 2006.
After Gypsy she appeared in the play In the Next Room. Tony nominated performances in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown* and the absolutely delightful 2016 revival of She Loves Me followed. She next appeared in Steve Martin’s Meteor Shower in 2017 before living out her dream of appearing as Eliza Doolittle in the 2018 revival of My Fair Lady.
Ever the under-achiever, Benanti has appeared regularly as Melania Trump on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. She has released In Constant Search of the Right Kind of Attention in 2013. Her most recent album is the eponymous Laura Benanti which was just released on October 23rd.
I could go on and discuss her book, the #SunshineSongs project and her many film and television projects. All of this is just one way to make perfectly clear that with a new album and such a vast career, her only challenge in performing on Saturday will be narrowing down what to perform.
Whatever she chooses, I can assure you this will be an amazing concert.
I’ve had the privilege of seeing her in many of her Broadway roles (and cannot describe how wonderful she was in My Fair Lady). I’ve also seen her perform in concert. Fans of Broadway musicals and great singing will want to see this show.
This whole series, Live from the West Side, was created to raise money for both the performers and for a number of regional theaters around the country. In Southern California that venue is Segerstrom Center in Costa Mesa.
The complete list is: Boise State University, Broward Center, Cleveland Playhouse Square, Dallas Summer Musicals, Denver Center, Fox Theatre, Hennepin Theater Trust, Marcus Center, Northlight Theatre, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Overture Center, Paper Mill Playhouse, Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, RiverCenter, Segerstrom Center, Shea’s Performing Arts Center, Straz Center, Tennessee Performing Arts Center, The 5th Avenue Theater, Theatre Under the Stars, University of North Carolina School of the Arts, and Texas Performing Arts.
Tickets are $30 for the performance.
*Before trivia purists get after me, LuPone also appeared in Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown giving them another shared credit.
Photo of Laura Benanti by Rod Spicer/Courtesy Segerstrom Center