Legal Woes Won’t Affect Starlight’s ‘La Mancha’

Starlight Musical Theatre is using the same director (Albert Marre), the same set, the same lighting design and much of the same supporting cast as the 25th anniversary Broadway-bound revival of “Man of La Mancha.”

But, if Dale Wasserman, who wrote the script for the musical, files suit to stop the anniversary production, as he’s threatening, it will not affect Starlight’s show.

That’s because Starlight’s production, which opens Oct. 10 at the San Diego Civic Theatre, is an independent one--not technically part of the national tour scheduled to open Nov. 7 in Chicago and travel to, among other places, Los Angeles (Nov. 26-Dec. 22 and Costa Mesa (Dec. 24-Jan 5).

Wasserman wants to stop the tour because he objects to producer Mitch Leigh (who also happens to be the show’s composer) remounting the same production with the same designs and the same director: Marre, who’s been overseeing companies of “La Mancha” since 1965. Wasserman has criticized Leigh as a “re-producer” rather than a producer. Leigh, who has threatened to file a countersuit, has described himself as being of the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” philosophy.

The Starlight production should give observers a pretty good idea of what Leigh and Marre have in mind for Broadway. Leigh and Marre will be here, in part, for a chance to “try it out . . . before going to Broadway. This will give Marre an idea of how things will work,” a Starlight spokeswoman said.

The Broadway-bound production is to star Raul Julia and Grammy-winning pop singer Sheena Easton in her stage debut. At Starlight, the headliners are Joan Diener, the original Aldonza on Broadway (she is also the director’s wife), and David Holliday, a Broaday veteran who has played the part many times before. Both have just appeared in “Man of La Mancha” in Zurich. The muleteers, half of whom date back to the original “La Mancha,” will be the same.

Wasserman is alone in his battle. Composer-producer Leigh has the support of lyricist Joe Darion for the show. But Wasserman, who holds separate copyrights for his book of the musical, could succeed in squashing Leigh’s “Man of La Mancha.” In that case, the Starlight production could be the closest thing to what would have been the Broadway anniversary show.

“Two Trains Running,” August Wilson’s play that had its California premiere at the Old Globe Theatre last March, will open on Broadway on April 13 at the Walter Kerr Theatre. But it will open without Ed Hall, who, as Holloway, was the garrulous old man who had seen it all and still believed in hope and possibility.

Hall died of cancer July 30 in Providence, R.I. He was 60.

In an interview shortly before “Two Trains Running” opened here, Hall talked about how close the part was to him.

“What August (the playwright) does is fit the part to the actor. Holloway is a man who has lived his life, worked hard all his life, been through all the experiences that the others are living through and tries to give advice. Each night there’s a point in this play where it picks up with something I’m doing in my life. It comes out of experiences in my life. It’s so natural for me to sit there and say these words.”

The part in “Two Trains Running” that really got to Hall was the speech he gave about the importance of believing in oneself. Hall believed in himself. Even in the 1950s, when American theater producers cast white actors almost exclusively, he believed that he, an African American, would get parts. And despite being brushed off by directors who wouldn’t even bother to audition him, he got some great parts.

He was in the original Broadway production of “A Raisin in the Sun,” directed by Lloyd Richards in 1959. He became an active member of the Trinity Repertory Company in 1967, playing everything from Oberon to a rock singer in more than 20 years there. He went to Broadway with the cast of Wilson’s “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone” in 1988; the playwright himself said Hall should have been nominated for a Tony for his work as Bynum Walker (“He marked Bynum with his own warmth and humanness,” Wilson said). But Hall was overlooked.

Most recently he performed in the TV “Separate but Equal,” and played several roles at the Old Globe Theatre, including an acclaimed performance as Hoke opposite Sada Thompson in “Driving Miss Daisy” in 1989.

Hall also believed he was going to lick the cancer and go to Broadway with the cast of “Two Trains Running.” But that he couldn’t do.

With Hall gone, Richards, who directed the play, has said the part is being “rethought.” Benjamin Mordecai, managing director of Yale Repertory Theatre, where the play debuted, said the company will be ready to announce a replacement soon. Mordecai also said the play as a whole will show “substantial changes. . . . August keeps working on it, he cuts and focuses it all the time.”

Mordecai said Wilson is also working on a new play that will debut at the Yale Rep with Richards, Wilson’s longtime director, again at the helm. He also expects to put together a group of theaters, including the Old Globe, to present the new play as Wilson continues to work on it.

PROGRAM NOTES: Forever breaking records, “Forever Plaid” just became the first Old Globe production to gross more than $1 million. Tickets have been selling at a rate of 575 a day, and only scattered singles are left for the first three weeks of its return run of Nov. 1-Dec. 1, a spokeswoman said. The fourth week is a third sold, which makes it look likely that the show’s four singers will be crooning Christmas songs in extensions through December. The Old Globe production of the show at the Pasadena Playhouse is also doing well: As of Tuesday, it had sold 75% of its tickets for the entire run, opening tomorrow. . . .

“Breaking Legs,” which had its world premiere at the Old Globe in 1989, is persevering off-Broadway despite disparaging reviews. It’s been running for six months, and every three weeks the Globe gets a check, according to a spokeswoman for the theater.

CRITIC’S CHOICE: ‘BIG BUTT GIRLS’ AT SUSHI

Rhodessa Jones returns to Sushi Performance Gallery with her deeply moving one-woman show about women in prison, “Big Butt Girls, Hard-Headed Women” tonight for a two-week run. Drawing on her own experiences working with women in prison, Jones turns the inherent drama of her stories into a healing experience. What contributes to the power of her performance is her refusal to distance herself from these women. She shares moments that are deeply personal--including a letter from her own nephew who is now in prison. Free tickets for youths ages 4 to 18 are available tonight when an adult purchases a half-price ticket at the Times Arts Tix booth in Horton Plaza. Performances are at 8 p.m. Thursday-Saturday and at 10 p.m. Saturday, through Sept. 21.