By Eileen Lee and Craig Bobby Young
Hey Breeps:
Our weekly British breakfast club at Cecconi’s in West Hollywood seems to be getting bigger and bigger, I counted over 60 guests on Tuesday. And it’s so nice to see people table-hopping, laughing, eating a good breakfast and reading the British Weekly, of course. I overheard conversations about film-making, songwriting and ‘did you see our Darren Darnborough on the telly last night?’ People helping each other and sharing information. I was even at it myself picking the British producer Julia Verdin’s brains about festival submitting. Now Marc Cleary and I have finished our film “Pepper” we needed some help in our strategy. And Julia is a ‘festival darling’ and shared her tips of wisdom with us, which hopefully will help us along the way. – I’ll let you know which festivals we get into. (Fingers crossed!)
Speaking of brains – Eileen and I went to the Hollywood premiere of “The Wizard Of Oz” at the Pantages Theatre, Hollywood. The new musical adaptation of “The Wizard of Oz” by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Jeremy Sams (who also directs), have added a few new songs -I’m not too sure about them – but I think being spoilt with such memorable songs as “Somewhere over the Rainbow”, “We’re off to see the Wizard” and ”Ding dong the Witch is Dead”overshadowed the new numbers- What a spectacular!! This is a must see for all ages – okay not newborns (I never will understand why people take their screaming babies to the theatre, aren’t there enough babysitters in so-cal?) Those of us oldies who can reminisce and for the new generation too – the show featured great set design mixed with stunning projected visuals of swirling tornados and superb sound design, which took me right back to my youth where the land of make believe was alive and well – and the lead Danielle Wade (who won the role on a British reality show called (duh) Over the Rainbow) is perfectly cast. It felt like it really was Judy Garland up there.
The show is running at the Pantages Theatre through October 6th. Located at Hollywood and Vine (6233 Hollywood Boulevard) and designed by architect B. Marcus Priteca, it was the last theater built by the vaudeville impresario Alexander Pantages. The palatial Art Deco theater opened on June 4, 1930 and to this day remains one of LA’s most magnificent theatres.
We can lead a very charmed life here in Hollywood and we are very blessed to experience so many wonderful things – like going to award shows. My good friend Herb Ankrom, Brits in LA member and two-time Emmy winner himself (for producing ABC’s Extreme Makeover: Home Edition). And it was true Hollywood – no yellow brick road but this scarecrow definitely wasn’t in on a council estate in Clifton, Nottingham anymore! This road was red and more stars than you can shake a stick at – Michael Douglas, Clare Danes, Matt Damon, Ryan Seacrest, the list goes on and on! The show was amazing with performances by our own Elton John and Carrie Underwood along with the host Neil Patrick Harris’s song-and-dance numbers. We had a blast. Anyway that’s enough showbiz talk…I’ll leave that up to our expert Sean Borg across the way (;-)
We also celebrated Variety’s ‘Ten to Watch’ list and the Los Angeles debut of the new British Airways airbus that landed for the first time at LAX this week. We sipped cocktails and learned more about this amazing jet with Brits in LA key members – our newly launched discount and events membership. If you are interested in joining us you can shoot us an email at britsinla@gmail.com.
We always have great events coming up and we look forward to meeting some of you there. Don’t be shy!
Cheers,
Craig
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