Anita Gillette
Me and Mr. B: Anita Gillette Celebrates Irving Berlin
Birdland, NYC, March 26, 2018
Reviewed by Ron Forman for Cabaret Scenes
https://www.bodybuildingestore.com/wp-content/languages/new/cipro.htmljpg” alt=”” width=”212″ height=”212″ /> Anita Gillette
Anita Gillette used her warm and friendly relationship with Irving Berlin as a backdrop for a 90-minute tribute to the man Jerome Kern said “is American music.” She delightfully interspersed funny stories about Berlin with songs that America sang which spanned the more than 50 years he actively wrote. She was his cheerer-upper, often visiting him when he suffered from bouts of depression.
She opened with an energetic medley of “No Strings” and “I Got the Sun in the Morning,” followed by a kinetic “Blue Skies.” Berlin first saw Gillette in All American and then cast her as the daughter in a fictional First Family in the USA in Mr. President, his last Broadway production. 55 years after singing it on stage, she reprised her number from that show, “The Secret Service.” A story about that production’s leading man, Robert Ryan, preceded her dramatically performed “It Gets Lonely in the White House,” his big number.
When Gillette asked Berlin, “What kind of songs do you write?
,” his response was, “Hits.
” And Gillette performed many of them before being joined by trombonist David L. Harris for “Mr. Monotony” that allowed Harris to dazzle with his performance. His slow trombone solo led into Gillette’s performance of “Alexander’s Ragtime Band.” She closed with “Let’s Face the Music and Dance.” Her encore began with a song Berlin wrote during World War II, “It’s a Lovely Day Tomorrow,” which led into a sing-along of “God Bless America.”
