WHITE PLAINS CITIZENETREPORTER SETS RECORD VISITS FOR YEAR 7,017,658 VISITS! 2,098,003 VISITORS MADE 6 VISITS A DAY EVERY DAY. 63,330 UNIQUE VISITORS MADE 133,730 VISITS IN DECEMBER. WPCNR AVERAGED 17,284 VISITORS A WEEK, VISITING 31,270 TIMES.

 “BIALEEESCHTOCK AND BLOOOOOOME!” “The Producer-Pros” Robert Amaral (right) as Max Bialystock and Joel Newsome as his accountant sidekick,  Leo Bloom (left) are a team with their own style, chemistry, schtick and timing. Karyn McNay (the blonde always gets the ink on Broadway) as Ulla steals the show.

Observers of the Broadway stage version of The Producers, told your reporter WBT’s staging Thursday evening was as entertaining as the Broadway version with Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick, although Robert Amaral (Max) and Joel Newsome (Leo Bloom) were not Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick. My consultants still thought it was terrific. As Mel Brooks might put it, “You’ll laugh til you plotz”

From the moment the two Usherette cuties, Karen Hyland and Tracy Wholf (in the slick below, in red)  snap you to visual attention in an inviting pas de deux in their spiffy uniform epaulets on Shubert Alley you’re whisked into bygone Broadway.  You listen in on what the critics and opening night audience are saying about Max Bialystock’s latest production,  Funny Boy! 

You’re hooked into the Damon Runyon world of the unscrupulous Broadway hustler. This nifty little number with the two cuties sets the tone as the bustle of a Broadway opening night excitement is stirred up like a glass swizzle stick swishes up a gin gimlet.

Mr. Amaral a comic mix of Jackie Gleason, Jack Lemmon, Jerry Orbach and Zero Mostel wild-eyed lunacy wins your sympathy, as every con-man does, from the first opening and closing night, when Max laments his fate singing The King of Broadway,  with various street ne’er do wells after critics kill his Funny Boy with a chorus of opening nighters singing comments like “we’re in shock, who produced this schlock?” Lyrics to die for throughout!

When Leo Bloom, played by the obsequious Gene Wilder look-alike, Newsome, comes to do Mr. Bialystock’s books, a  double shot of  champagne cocktail with a foamy stein of beer chaser of mirth, mayhem and hysteria raises the roof of the good old WBT.

Amaral and Newsome carry off a fast-talking, gag-every-five-seconds book, mesh with perfect comic timing, emote, overact, and go over the top for a full 2 hours and 45 minutes with 30 minute intermission included. The daffy duo drives this madcap, bratwurst and sausage stuffed, tasteless chaotic hoot of a play with the deadpans, the personalities of the masters Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder who created the roles.

They’re not Zero and Gene or Nathan and Matthew, but they are their own Max and Leo and the chemistry is there. Trust me, you’re gonna love it.

Amaral and Newsome should,  they’re Producer pros. They’ve played the parts on the road across the country. WBT has spared no effort to mount their own Producers as it should be mounted.

The blonde bombshell from the middle west, the iconette Karyn McNay, (also a veteran of The Producers road show) as the Swedish receptionist Ulla, (played by the fluffy Lee Meredith in the original movie), delightfully stops the show. She’s the top — every moment she flaunts, flows, undulates, and struts across the stage — giving us a combination of Marilyn Monroe, Jayne Mansfield, and Madonna as Ulla (lots of Swedish Last names) the hopeful who drops by Max’s office.

Just as Max and Leo do, Ms. McNay stops the train of thought and gets another train started — but does not stop the whip-crackling dialogue! Her Swedish accent is a little thick, but I am not going to quibble! She is worth going off to Rio with– but that would be telling too much. Here she works her wiles on Leo, Mr. Newsome after redirecting Max’s office.

Her precocious, naughty When you Got it Flaunt it when she delivers an audition for Max and Leo, reminiscent of Marilyn Monroe’s My Heart Belongs to Daddy — is a show-topper — in which she encourages all to “show their assets” among other things that gets the house laughing uncontrolably.

The audience  was in a fine mood, thanks to Leo’s deciding to move into the producing business with Max. You know the story, don’t you, pally? Leo, doing Max’s books suggests you could make more money with a flop. Max sees this as his salvation and pleads with Bloom to join him in “We Can do It!”

Joel Newsome’s  (Leo’s) dingy offices down on Chambers Street are cleverly created on the stage with a set of cubicles,  (great concept by scene designer Peter Barbieri, Jr.)where Bloom is dominated by a CPA who bridles at “the revolting stench of self esteem” in his accountants. Bloom decides he’s not going to take it any more and sings I Want to be a Producer” in a fine soft shoe. Ahh, the seduction of the great white way! I want to be a producer too.

Great set-up but the first act — an hour and a half of it — that flies by — introduces you to Max’s source of finances…the Little Old Ladies — typified by Hold-me Touch-Me, a “little old lady” whose hilarious lust breaks up the audience in a comic tryst with Max.  I have to tell you Amy Griffin as Hold-me Touch-Me grapples with Max hilariously here as he pleads with her for “the checky.”

The Producers, Max and Leo set off to find the worst play — Springtime for Hitler, A Gay Romp with Adolf and Eva in the Burtesgarden. They go to meet the playwright tending his pigeons  played by Eric Anderson. What a character!  He makes them take the oath of allegiance to der Fuerher but you will see where this is going.

Then it’s off to find the world’s worst director, Roger De Bris where the duo meet a different world. They meet his companion and servant, the utterly divine Carmen Ghia played by John West, whose exits and entrances milk the audience for laughs until they are gasping.  He is too funny in his send-ups. It is illegal for Mr. West to be this funny. Mr. West is the gay man’s gay man. When Roger is finally introduced in drag, he first objects to doing the musical about Hitler, singing Keep It Gay, an admonishment to producers everywhere in selecting a play. Every scene in this play is stand-alone funny in and of itself.

Act One raps up with Max and the Little Old Ladies performing a song and dance routine with walkers ad Max sets about raising the cash with his “backers“ — you have to see how those walkers set a new standard in choreography props — and they all sing Along Came Bialy together. That’s Mr. West as Carmen Ghia on far right, front with Craig Fols as the director, Roger De Bris, with Max and Leo, of course.

After Act One’s assault on sensibilities and all that is politically correct, you need that 30-minute intermission. The energy of this cast is astounding and was rewarded with “bravos” going to intermission. But then it’s Broadway baby.

Act Two takes us to rehearsals and auditions — hilarious in and of themselves — and the playwright the obsessed Nazi adorer, Franz Liebkind wins the part of Hitler. As he arrives for opening night, he breaks his leg and Roger the director assumes the part.

Springtime for Hitler opens in the most outrageously outrageous, funny as Hell scene WBT has ever staged. Chorus girls with beer steins for headgear, draped in sausages and steins, German Eagles for headresses with brown shirted Nazi troopers singing Springtime for Hitler and Germany. Dazzling lighting by Andrew Gmoser makes the scene one you will always remember. It’s offensive. It’s schlock. It’s shock. Beyond tasteless. But hysterical. I defy you not to laugh. It goes on forever with bursting voluptuousness of bratwurst and the foamy head of a beer. I especially like the chorus girls in the little Panzer Tanks. Kudos to the costume guy, Matthew Hemesath.

You are then introduced to Craig Fols (Roger De Bris)  as Der Fuehrer who sings “Heil Myself” with Karyn McKay’s Ms.Ulla strutting herself once more. Fols is “over the roof” hysterical in this bit.

So the play is a hit. The critics love it. But the playwright feels mocked. He goes berserk and attempts to shoot Leo and Max, missing of course which ends Max up in a courtroom when the cops discover two sets of books.

How the muscial meanders its hilarious way to send us into the summer night grinning and satisfied, you cannot beat it. Be warned though — the jokes are dirty. The “F-word” is said. It is a sexy show. It is a show that has won the most Tonys in history. And by the way has grossed $214 Million on the road since 2002.

Highlights — Bob Amaral’s incredible soliloquy Betrayed where he recaps the entire play grousing about how things have turned out. Mr. Newsome’s  Til Him extolling male bonding.

The WBT real life “Producers” Bill Stutler and Bob Funking have assembled a huge cast, a bouncy, comically gifted orchestra and used video screens, multi-level stages and imaginative to their maximum creativity, and allowed veteran Producers-maven David Edwards to direct The Producers Producers. 

Edwards  the director, played Bialystock and Bloom in the First National Tour. He brings a sure, deft hand for timing, choregraphy and nuance that paces the madcap show that sprawls and ripples like a too tight dress on a buxom blonde — it’s overflowing, cleavage the works —  too much to take in all at once, yet  comprehensive, dramatic, and spectacularly schmaltzy and schnappsy to this box office sure-thing.

Hats off to the orchestra behind the scenes   under the baton of Leo Carusone — maniacal, frantic, Chaplinesque music…underplaying the singers splendidly.   Sound was slick throughout. Best set: the evocative perspective view out of Max’s office with the theatre marquees.

So you go see it twice, baby. And, did I mention you get dinner included in the price of your ticket? What a steal!

If you have not seen The Producers on Broadway, or have seen it, or not  seen the movie call for tickets now. But go see it again, and you won’t care about today’s economy.

You’ll also wish someone would produce a full-length musical Springtime for Hitler.

We also need a musical now about “The Developers.” I have plenty of material, Mr. Bialystock! Read this book!

My consultants, the Broadway experts say it is the best show WBT has ever done. Call the box office before it’s too late, 914-592-2222 or the WBT website box office, www.broadwaytheatre.com.

Seen on Press Night:

The dynamic former morning information and entertainment team on WFAS Radio encountered each other. The newsman who brought Westchester up to date, Peter Katz, (now appearing weekly on White Plains Week, left, and the morning man, Bob E. Lloyd who for decades read those school closings, and got Westchester off and working Monday through Friday. Mr. Lloyd came in especially for Press Night. It was good to see him again. It was good to see Mr. Katz, too, Westchester’s most distinguished and accurate news analyst.

Here you have Mr. Eddings quoting Paul Wood, the Mayor’s Executive Officer to wit, “The question is, what do you get for $1.2 million? Can you build 17 units for that?”

White Plains B.C. –1950s. B.C. (Before Cappelli) Dead in 2001, shunned by big time developers and property owners. (WPCNR Collection)

White Plains 2008 A.C. (After Cappelli)  4 towers, 1 hotel, 1 four level shopping center, built in 7 years

(WPCNR Photo)

And later in the same report, Louis Cappelli is quoted as saying, “How can you build affordable housing for $450,000 a unit?” in his lament that the city designated the 240 Main Street building as a high rise increased his cost and made the project unaffordable.

The interesting thing is, last Friday, the Common Council agreed to a deal that pays LCOR $50.5 Million in real taxpayer dollars (abated taxes) (over 24 years) to build 107 affordable units, which works out to $472,000 a unit. So the city itself is paying $472,000 a unit for one affordable housing unit at least in the LCOR deal. This is being reported as only about a $27 Million tax abatement, but by the city’s own figures sheet they list it as a $50.5 Million tax abatement which are the real tax dollars.

Now the City Hall WPCNR Monitoring Service noted this in the first edition of the article, and Paul Wood diplomatically called and said that $27 Million is the real value of today’s dollars of the abatement, it is costing LCOR, he says $221,000 a unit to build in today’s dollars. Mr. Wood says  the city is giving LCOR a “subsidy” to build the affordable units, paying them back in cheaper dollars, $50.5 Million of them. He says the net value of those $50.5 Million is $27 Million. Nevertheless, no matter what the inflation-eroded value of the $50 million, 500th dollar you are still giving $50.5 Million dollars away. At the time that  the $50 million, five-hundredth dollar is deducted from LCOR’s tax in 2032, that is a whole real dollar in 2032.

Now, of course there is a way out of this. As has been  reported on my weekly television show, White Plains Week, for at least three years now, the 240 Main Street spot is too valuable a piece of real estate to sully with affordable housing. But if the building were made higher, providing more units I believe any developer would be happy to build there.

Perhaps if the Council allowed Cappelli Enterprises to increase the height of the building say to 65 stories, enabling the firm to build a building that could pay for itself and be a true high rise which could be marketed for satisfying profit, maybe, maybe Cappelli Enterprises might consider building it and even adding to the affordable housing inventory beyond the 17 units.

I think a 70-story building marking a renewed interest of Cappelli Enterprises in White Plains would be a grand solution to a situation that the Common Council created themselves anyway. Cappelli Enterprises was ready to build the units. They would not let him. They wanted Ginsburg Development to build them.

(Such is the credibility of WPCNR, and the thousands that believe and rely on WPCNR for the news that is true, I regret the concern, alarm and panic expressed by a caller, that I was advocating a 70-story building on the 240 Main site. I was exaggerating to make a point, satirizing if you will. )

The council said no, they felt the city should be open to other developers and relied on another developer to build Cappelli Enterprise affordable commitment. It did not work out. Now, Cappelli Enterprises is being victimized by the Council’s own naivete.

WPCNR placed a call to Cappelli Enterprise public relations firm, Thompson & Bender, to see if an overture to build a higher, tonier 240 Main Street 50 stories, 65 stories — the sky’s the limit– was perhaps on their leader’s mind, and whether that opportunity might solve the hand-wringing over the affordable housing.

Makes sense to me,

However, why should the council turn down $1.2 Million from Cappelli Enterprises? Take the money and run. At least, we know Cappelli Enterprises is good for it, and Cappelli Enterprises has no trouble getting a bankroll, unlike some developers recently.

At least we know that when Cappelli Enterprises speaks, people,  big time hoteliers, and markets listen, and the voice of Cappelli moves markets, even the world’s leading luxury hotel listened to him.

Mr. Cappelli has given us City Center, the world’s premier hotel, Ritz-Carlton, and has actually paid us around $8 Million a year in tax payments for the last 8 years  not to mention the the ancillary sales tax effects. 

I cannot see consistency from the Common Council in their positions.

Take the money and run, Council. Or kiss and make up with Cappelli Enterprises and forget this high rise designation nonsense. No way an 8-story building is a high rise. Come on.

But 70-stories — that’s a high rise.

That would make sense to an Ultra-Developer, but I am not advocating 70 stories, take it easy out there, people.

A profitable one at that that will be poised for the boom and bring back the only developer who has ever really helped the city to survive when all else are hemorraging red ink  — fast.

Mr. Eddings also in a rare coup — a speak-to with Donald Trump — reports Mr. Trump is considering partnering with Mr. Cappelli elsewhere in the county. How about “Twin Trumps” in White Plains? With the right height anything’s possible, right? With the economies of other cities in the county tanking, where would you build if you were an Ultra-Developer?

It is not Cappelli Enterprises fault that the city mismanages its assets, buys open space for millions, never fights a certiorari bandit, and overspends on its school system.

Yet last week, the Common Council gave to LCOR exclusive development rights to city property on Bank Street on a project that has not even been designed yet — while a year ago they denied the same sphere of favored developer status to Cappeli Enterprises on the Station Square project — saying they wanted other developers to have a chance.

Where is the consistency? Station Square was great. The LCOR project is an aesthetic mystery at this time — a bad idea.

Why can’t the Council negotiate a better 240 Main Street project and kiss and make up with the developer who created the rennaisance?

Are we going to keep the Super Developer developing for White Plains, or really say “good bye?”

You’re going to need him the next four years. 

Garment said the Planning Board had no problem with the city granting access to water through the city system, or granting access to the Scarsdale site through the Ethical Culture Society property driveway. These two conditions, previously vigorously opposed by the city, had long been a road block to the project since former Planning Commissioner Mike Graessle and Department of Public Works Commissioner Joseph Nicoletti had strongly voiced opposition to the project six years ago.

Asked if Renamba LLC had changed the project in some way that alleviated the concerns the city had expressed six years ago, Garment said “that I don’t know. Basically this was the feeling of the members of the Planning Board, the members right now. We had access to the approvals made in Scarsdale approving this. We had the feeling this was not a question of appropriateness, but there wasn’t much we could do about it other than imposing significant conditions (upon any approval).”

The matter now comes before the Zoning Board of Appeals September 3. There was no public hearing at the Planning Board on the project after the representatives from Renamba made the presentation last night.

Renamba in order to gain access to the Scarsdale site off Saxon Woods Road, has agreed to pay The Ethical Culture Society of Westchester $400,000 for an easement, and $25,000 a year for the first ten years of use of the Society driveway.