By Brian Scott Lipton . . .
As Bette Midler sang 50 years ago (yes, 50 years ago), you’ve got to have friends. And few people in New York City have more – and more talented – friends than producer Jamie deRoy! Once again, she gathered a group of these delightful folks — superb performers, one and all — to entertain us at her latest Jamie deRoy & Friends show, held on July 11 as part of the Broadway at Birdland series as a benefit for the Entertainment Community Fund (the newly rechristened name of The Actors Fund). A good time – no, a great time – was had by all, both on and off the stage.
What’s always so exciting about one of deRoy’s variety shows is that you’ll usually be introduced performers that you haven’t seen before as well as get a chance to watch an old favorite or two, and this outing with no exception.
Highlighting the latter category was the irrepressibly hilarious Robert Klein, who has lost none of his comic timing (or idiosyncratic singing voice) at age 80. His many stories, including ones involving former film co-stars such as Joan Rivers and Jennifer Tilly, were side-splittingly funny. He also still plays a mean harmonica, and he can still move audiences while performing the touching ballad “Falling” (by Marvin Hamlisch and Carole Bayer Sager), which he introduced in the 1979 Broadway musical They’re Playing Our Song.
Another welcome “old friend” was singer-songwriter Julie Gold, whose authenticity and sincerity are always on display. Naturally, she performed her Grammy Award-winning hit “From a Distance” (made famous by, yep, Bette Midler) as well as the clever “Genius Bar,” an ode to the hazards of modern technology as well as the pleasures of such old-fashioned devices as the transistor radio and VCR. It was a song that the Birdland crowd could definitely relate to.
DeRoy’s three other guests were likely less familiar to the crowd, but no less wonderful: the virtuosic classical-jazz violinist Daisy Jopling; the sultry songstress Lianne Marie Dobbs, who wowed the crowd with her renditions of “Witchcraft” (Cy Coleman/Carolyn Leigh) and “What Did I Have That I Don’t Have” (Burton Lane/Alan Jay Lerner); and the booming-voiced, charismatic Ben Jones, who dazzled with a pair of unusual “break-up” songs: “You’ll Be Back” from Hamilton (Lin-Manuel Miranda) and the bitterer-than-lemons “I Wanna Be Around” (Johnny Mercer and Sadie Vimmerstedt).
As for deRoy, she was – as ever – the consummate hostess, effusively praising her guests and her musical accompanists (pianist Ron Abel and bassist Steve Doyle), sharing hysterical if heartfelt personal anecdotes with the audience, and delighting everyone with her opening and closing songs: an updated version of Murray Grand’s delicious “I’m Too Old to Die Young” and her now-signature number, David Buskin’s ultra-witty “Jews Don’t Camp.”
So, the next time Jamie deRoy offers you the chance to meet her friends – she will return to Birdland in October – make sure you take her up on her offer.
Photos: Maryann Lopinto
