Melanie
Stace and Her Sirens of the Silver Screen
Melanie
Stace and Her Sirens of the Silver Screen
Melanie
Stace is appearing at Feinstein’s in New York City on June 3rd and 4th
and again in September on the 16th and 17th, and the
British actress and singer who now makes her home in New York City, is unveiling
her new show Sirens Of The Silver Screen,
which brings back to life the music and films made famous by people such as,
Doris Day, Ruth Etta, Rosemary Clooney, Betty Hutton, Bette Midler, Michelle
Pfeiffer, Liza Minnelli, Judy Garland, Barbra Streisand and Marilyn Monroe.
“In my shows, I have always had a movie section and I
started to develop a fascination for people like Rosemary Clooney and more
modern ones and older ones. I would always come back to particular songs by
particular ladies, who were stars of our silver screen, but they were also
singers. They were the sirens and the ones who really tugged at your
heartstrings, singing about love (both) lost and found and singing about pain,
joy, heartbreak and sorrow. You name it and they sung about it. They were almost
all completely beautiful and they were almost all incredible actors and mostly
dancers, so there was a classic triple threat. Ever since I was a little girl, I
have been fascinated by them. It
sort of got bigger and bigger and bigger, as I paid tribute to them in my shows.
My musical director Doug Oberhamer has the most amazing collection of DVDs and
movies. When I go and work with him in his studio, we are singing and writing
music together, as we are rehearsing our show, but I can’t help it, because
these amazing movies are all around me. Last year when I was performing at the
Metropolitan Room, I thought wouldn’t it be great if I did a more theme driven
show and I thought that I would like to do the
Sirens Of The Silver Screen. I sat
down and thought about who they were going to be. That is such a difficult
task,” says Ms. Stace.
“I wanted to be focused on the silver screen sirens, but
I am not impersonating them. I am not going to stand up there and sing boo, boop
e doo a la Marilyn Monroe. It is a love letter to them and the amazing input and
amazing influence that they have given to us. Some of the songs are well known
and some of them not so well known, because I don’t want to appear contrived and
they have all sung them so much better. I always wanted to find my own angle and
it is always the songs that fit for me. It is Melanie up there. It is not me
impersonating somebody else. I don’t think that you can base the show on that
and I wouldn’t be interested to do that,” she says.
There is a brief departure from the stars of the silver
screen, “We go off on a couple of tangents as well, because I throw in a couple
of wildcards. I have to, because it’s my show, right? (she says cheekily and
laughs). I do a little tribute to an amazing Italian Pop singer named Mina (Anna
Maria Quaini) and if there is anybody who should have been a siren of the
silver screen it is her. She was really the bad girl of seventies Italian Pop.
I love to sing in English and Italian and I have always done it in my
shows. I thought she is not a siren of the silver screen, so how can I work this
out? I found out that she had done some movies and a series of commercials, so
they are going to have to give me that one (she says slyly). I am going to do
(her song) “Never, Never, Never,” in both Italian and English. I am going to
sing it half and half. It is really a lovely song.
Mina is now producing some songs for
some talented young artists. She became
huge in the seventies and still in the eighties when I was working there,” she
says.
Melanie Stace is an accomplished stage actress, who also performed on BBC’s
The Royal Variety of Performance as
well as co-hosting the popular The
Generation Game, both of which appeared on television in the U.K.
She has also spent seven years in the role of Madame ZinZanni in the
production of Teatro ZinZanni, a wildly popular dinner theater come Cirque du
Soleil, with performances in Seattle and San Francisco. The Central character in
the storyline, which is presented in a circular tent, is Madame ZinZanni, whom
over the years has been portrayed by Joan Baez, Lilane Montevecchi, Maria
Muldaur, Sally Kellerman and Ann Wilson (of the rock band Heart). Four years ago
Melanie Stace was invited to join the cast of
Palazzo a similar production
performed in a spiegel tent. The first year with the theater company
Palazzo, Ms. Stace performed in
Munich, Germany and in subsequent years, Amsterdam (The Netherlands), Vienna
(Austria) and in 2011 she performed for five months in Rotterdam (The
Netherlands). Ms. Stace therefore gets an opportunity to thoroughly enjoy and
merge two of her loves, acting and singing, while performing the songs for
Sirens Of The Silver Screen.
“This year they want me to go back to Germany. It is a
five course gourmet dinner with candles on the table and a beautiful spiegel
tent from the 1930s, all red velvet and everything.
It is a story and I am Madame Palazzo really, but they don’t call it
that. I am the Queen of the Ball and it is a hundred years party,” Ms. Stace
explains.
Our conversation returns to
Sirens Of The Silver Screen and Ms.
Stace says, “With each of the choices I came back to the people who poured so
much of themselves into what they were doing. Through their songs they were
communicating with us, so they could make us laugh or cry. When Marilyn Monroe
sings “I’m Through With Love,” from Some Like It Hot, it is just an incredible
piece of cinema. That is what my show is about in a nutshell.”
With what seems to be a favorite phrase of hers, Ms.
Stace describes another “amazing piece of cinema,” with “Rosemary Clooney is the
absolute siren of the silver screen, when she is standing there in
White Christmas singing the song
“Love You Didn’t Do Right By Me.” She is so composed. I think she was very
underrated and she had her own television show (1956), but you don’t hear people
talk about her like they do other people. I
wanted to find out about her and I wanted to promote her. It is such a joy for
me in my work to find out more about these people. They are in my head when I am
doing their songs. It is very much me singing them, but it is thanks to them,
because they are the inspiration.”
Melanie Stace is performing at
Feinstein’s at Loews Regency on Sunday June 3rd
and Monday June 4th at 8 pm.
Ms. Stace will be accompanied by Greg Chudzik on bass, David Anthony on
drums and guitarist Tony Romano. You can also visit the
Melanie Stace website for more information.
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