Lucky Stiff
June 5-21, 2009

About Creators Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty

Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty are considered among the foremost theatrical songwriting team of their generation. They are winners of Broadway's triple crown: Tony Award, Drama Desk Award and Outer Critics Circle Award, as well as two Grammy nominations, for their score of the hit Broadway musical Ragtime. They received two Academy Award nominations and two Golden Globe nominations for the songs and score of Twentieth Century Fox's animated feature film, Anastasia (Gold Record and Number One Song) They are co-creators of the beloved Broadway musical Once On This Island (eight Tony Award nominations and the London Olivier Award for Best Musical). Their musical, Seussical, based on the works of Dr. Seuss, received Grammy and Drama Desk nominations and is one of the most frequently performed show in America.

Their credits include: My Favorite Year, A Man of No Importance, (2003 Outer Critics Circle Award, Best Musical); Dessa Rose (winner of the 2005 Audelco Award for Best Musical, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle nominations); Lucky Stiff (Helen Hayes Award, Best Musical); Chita Rivera: The Dancer's Life and The Glorious Ones (five Drama Desk nominations including Best Musical).

Individually, Ms. Ahrens is the lyricist and co-book writer for A Christmas Carol, which ran for ten years at Madison Square Garden. For her work as a lyricist, composer and producer, Ms. Ahrens has received the Emmy Award . She is a mainstay writer and singer for the renowned animated series Schoolhouse Rock. Her short stories and essays have been published nationally, and she was nominated for the Best American Essays and Pushcart Anthologies.

As a composer Mr. Flaherty's concert pieces have premiered at the Hollywood Bowl and Boston's Symphony Hall. He has received commissions from the Guggenheim Museum, Carnegie Hall and Symphony Space, among others. He wrote the incidental music for Neil Simon's Proposals on Broadway. Most recently, he wrote the musical score for Loving Repeating: A Musical of Gertrude Stein, which premiered at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago where it was awarded the Joseph Jefferson Award for Best New Musical. He also has several other film scores to his credit.

Ahrens and Flaherty's songs have been performed and recorded by a vast and diverse array of artists, from Aretha Franklin, Aaliyah, Deana Carter, Donny Osmond and Johnny Mathis to Brian Stokes Mitchell, Audra McDonald, Renee Fleming and Bryn Terfel. A print anthology of their music, The Ahrens & Flaherty Songbook, is available from Alfred Publishing.

They serve on the governing body of the Dramatists Guild of America and are members of ASCAP, NARAS, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. They are also proud to co-chair the Dramatists Guild Fellows Program for emerging playwrights and musical theater writers.

Breaking News: The critically acclaimed revival of the epic musical Ragtime recently playing at the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts may be heading to the Great White Way. The Washington Post reports that negotiations are currently underway to bring the award-winning musical to Broadway. Marcia Milgram Dodge directs and choreographs.

Production History

Lucky Stiff was the first collaboration for the musical theater team of Lynn Ahrens (book and lyrics) and Stephen Flaherty (music). The show is based on the 1983 novel The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo by the late British satirist Michael Butterworth. It was performed for a limited engagement at Playwrights Horizons off-Broadway in 1988, and won the Richard Rodgers Award for that year.

A 1994 studio cast recording included Judy Blazer as Annabel, Jason Graae as Vinnie, Debbie Shapiro Gravitte as Dominique, Paul Kandel as Anthony, Pappas as Harry, Testa as Rita, Barbara Rosenblatt as the Landlady, Bruce Winant as the Boarder, and Patrick Quinn as the Monte Carlo Emcee.

In 1994, the musical had its British debut at the Theater Royal in Lincoln in the English midlands, and in 1997 it had a West End production, starring Frances Ruffelle, Paul Baker, Tracie Bennett, and directed by Steven Dexter.

It was revived for five performances as part of the York Theatre's Musicals in Mufti series in 2003, with several of the other original Playwrights Horizons cast members, as well as Malcolm Gets as Harry and Janet Metz as Annabel.

Lucky Stiff, book and lyrics by Lynn Ahrens; music by Stephen Flaherty; directed by Thommie Walsh; Presented by Playwrights Horizons, 416 West 42nd Street, Andre Bishop, artistic director; Paul S. Daniels, executive director. With: Stephen Stout, Barbara Rosenblat, Patty Holley, Michael McCarty, Frank Zagottis, Michael McCarty, Ron Faber, Stuart Zagnit, Mary Testa, Paul Kandel, Julie White and Patty Holley.

What The New York Times Said

Review/Theater; 'Lucky Stiff,' a Musical From a Crime Novel
By Frank Rich, April 27, 1988

'Lucky Stiff,' a farcical adaptation of a crime novel by Michael Butterworth, offers no metaphors, no portentous themes, no melancholy relationships. It does have $6 million in stolen loot, a henpecked optometrist, a plethora of offstage dogs and a happy ending, of course …the authors of 'Lucky Stiff,' Lynn Ahrens (book and lyrics) and Stephen Flaherty (music), should be cherished both for their promise and for their willingness to embrace old-style musical-comedy silliness and romance without apologies.

Ms. Ahrens's book starts with a premise so airily mindless it makes 'Me and My Girl' seem like Dostoyevsky. Harry Witherspoon, a dreary English shoe salesman, learns by telegram that he is the heir to the fortune left by his Uncle Tony, an Atlantic City casino manager. Tony's last will and testament attaches only one condition to its bequest: Harry must first cart the dead but taxidermically preserved uncle around in a wheelchair for a fun-packed vacation in Monte Carlo. Why should a stiff be denied the joys of skydiving, snorkeling and around-the-clock roulette?

What happens thereafter I won't tell you, except to say that not nearly enough does. By Act II, the plot, like Tony, must be propped up artificially with arbitrary twists and a ponderous nightmare sequence. While Mr. Flaherty's score is less distinctive, it is professional and, in the ballads, serviceably tuneful.

The whole production ends up pounding too hard. Emerging from the long shadow of his frequent collaborator, Tommy Tune, the director Thommie Walsh demonstrates a lot of musical-theater savvy in his staging. 'Lucky Stiff' just misses, but it's a nearer miss than most, by a talented writing team whose future is more in need of guidance than luck.

The Real Monte Carlo Casino

The Monte Carlo Casino is one of the most famous tourist attractions in Europe, located off the Riviera, in Monaco. The casino complex is not only a gambling facility, but also houses the Grand Théâtre de Monte Carlo, an opera and ballet house, and the headquarters of the Ballets de Monte Carlo. It also hosts the European Poker Grand Final, the most prestigious poker tourney in Europe.

The casino is owned by the Société des Bains de Mer, a public company, who also own the principal hotels and clubs of the community that serve the tourist trade. The casino has facilities to play a variety of games including: Roulette, Stud poker, Blackjack, Craps, Baccarat, Video poker, and Slot machines. There is a special poker room for the very wealthy.

The casino was designed and built by the architect Charles Garnier, who also created the Paris Opéra House. It is distinctly Beaux Arts in design, an Empire style referred to by Garnier as "Napoleon III." The first casino was opened in 1856 in a villa near the harbor. The construction of the current building started in 1858. The new facility opened in 1863.

In 1873, Joseph Jagger gained the casino great publicity by "breaking the bank at Monte Carlo" by discovering a bias in the casino's roulette wheel. The 1892 song The Man that Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo, was probably inspired by the exploits of Charles Wells, who broke the bank on many occasions.

Yes, Virginia, There Is A Mob In New Jersey

By Devin McDonald, www.americanmafia.com

Think you know the fictional Soprano's? New Jersey has been a place for organized crime activity since early Prohibition. It's geographically in the heart of Mob America with New York directly above it and Philadelphia neighboring it.

"Sam the Plumber" DeCavalcante led the Jersey mob during the 1960s and ran things his own way. For example, in the making ceremony for a mob member he did not prick the trigger finger. He often chastised soldiers for not showing proper respect to higher ups in the family. After serving time for extortion he would retire, and unlike many mobsters he lived the last years of his life not in a jail cell, but in sunny Florida.

Union manipulator John Riggi took over the family in 1976. He was very well liked and could be spotted in Little Italy with some of New York's bosses, such as Gambino boss John Gotti. Riggi would be convicted of labor racketeering in September 1990 and is still incarcerated today.

Since the DeCavalcante's mob boss was imprisoned, Riggi appointed a very unpopular captain, John D'Amato to take over. He did what other bosses told him to do and didn't stick up for the family. In November 1991 John D'Amato was reputedly killed. His body has never been found.

The next street boss was Giacomo "Jake" Amari. He would lead the family until his death in June 1997. The man who replaced him has served very little jail time, Vincent "Vinny Ocean" Palermo. He was very legally legitimate with interests in a gambling boat, strip clubs and construction industries.

Nowadays, organized crime in New Jersey is mostly inhabited by outside families from New York who have taken over and run the Jersey Waterfront.

Where's The Body? Memorable Corpse Comedy Flix

The Trouble with Harry is a 1955 American black comedy film directed by Alfred Hitchcock, based on the novel by Jack Trevor Story. The film starred John Forsythe and Edmund Gwenn; Shirley MacLaine and Jerry "The Beaver" Mathers co-starred, both in their first film roles. The plot follows the quirky but down-to-earth residents of a small village in Vermont in the autumn, as they deal with the freshly dead body of a man, which has inconveniently appeared on the hillside above the town. The problem of what to do with the body, and more importantly how and why he was killed, is the eponymous "Trouble with Harry."

The Wrong Box (a coffin) is a 1966 British comedy film, produced and directed by Bryan Forbes from a screenplay by Larry Gelbart (of TV's M*A*S*H) and Burt Shevelove, based on the novel by Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne. The farcical film is notable for using inter-titles to describe the action, a technique associated with silent films. The cast includes a number of Britain's leading comic actors of the time, including John Mills, Ralph Richardson, Michael Caine, Peter Cook, Dudley Moore, and Peter Sellers.

The 1965 play, Loot, by Joe Orton, follows the fortunes of two young thieves, Hal and Dennis. Together they rob the bank next to the funeral parlor return to Hal's home to hide the money. Hal's mother has just died and the money is hidden in her coffin while her body keeps on appearing around the house.

Messing with the conventions of popular farce, Orton creates a hectic world and examines English attitudes and perceptions in the mid twentieth century. Loot has been described as a "masterpiece of black farce." Loot was made into a film of the same name in 1970, starring Richard Attenborough, Lee Remick, and comedian Dick Emery.

Weekend at Bernie's is an American black comedy motion picture comedy released in 1989. Directed by Ted Kotcheff, it stars Andrew McCarthy and Jonathan Silverman as a couple of young insurance executives who discover their boss has suddenly deceased. Believing that they are responsible for his death and that a hitman won't kill them if Bernie is around, they attempt to convince people that he is still alive. The film was profitable and spawned a lackluster sequel in 1993, Weekend at Bernie's 2.

Death at a Funeral is a 2007 British black comedy film directed by Frank Oz. The screenplay by Dean Craig focuses on a dysfunctional family attempting to resolve a variety of problems while attending the funeral of the patriarch. When Daniel's father dies, it is up to him to organize his funeral. But preserving the dignity inherent in such circumstances will be a very daunting task. Particularly with an undertaker who botches his work, his cousin's loopy fiancé who has accidentally ingested drugs, the presence of a moron who takes advantage of the sad event to win back the heart (or rather the body) of a woman who is about to marry another, and of a infirm, flatulent old uncle who is the most unbearable pain in the ass. To cap it all, Daniel notices the among the mourners a mysterious dwarf nobody else seems to know.

Lucky Stiff Dramaturgy © 2009, Ross Harmon: The Barn Players

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