Thalia Follies: At Last - An Election!
The New York Times was just one of the many fans of this show, a sketch-and-song tribute to the painfully slow democratic process called electioneering. See video of the show.
With comedy icon Jane Curtin anchoring an all-star cast, Thalia Follies: At Last - An Election! sold out its run at Symphony Space then played to a packed house at the Mahaiwe Theatre in Great Barrington, Massachusetts in the weeks leading up to the Big Vote.
Leenya Rideout, a good friend and amazingly talented singer/songwriter/musician, got Gregory into this mess.
She called as the days approached and told him the illustrious artistic director Isaiah Sheffer was looking for a funny guy to round out the cast for a new and improved election-year version of the Follies.
Gregory ended up writing the lyrics and Leenya the tune for the song that opened the show, "How Do We Make Fun of Obama?" Gregory also had the great honor of writing and performing in a sketch with Jane Curtin, where he played a nervous voter and she played an electronic voting machine with a hidden agenda.
In an interview with Jane, she describes the process they went through to cull the hours of material they started with in the writers' room on day one. Gregory counts this truly collaborative creation as one of the high points of his artistic life.
photos by Patrick Daly
Gregory Jones
