Loose Lips

SECOND TO NUN
Cherry Jones has been in the habit of giving outstanding performances but she’s literally in another kind of habit as the protagonist of Doubt at Manhattan Theatre Club. In John Patrick Shanley‘s new drama, Jones plays Sister Aloysius, a nun who’s teaching in a school in the Bronx in 1964 and who is convinced that one of the priests (played by fellow Tony Award winner Brían F. O’Byrne) has abused a young male student.

“Brían is unbelievable,” says Jones. “He’s one of the two or three finest actors I’ve ever worked with. But the arguments are the real star of this play — these vivid, muscular truths. On the first day of rehearsal, Doug Hughes, our director, told us that only he and Brían would really know the true story of what happened. And that’s right; I don’t need to know, nor do Heather Goldenhersh or Adriane Lenox. But we made Brían promise under penalty of death that, immediately after the curtain call on closing night, he has to tell us what they decided.”

Jones says that playing Sister Aloysius is quite a stretch for her: “I know I wasn’t the first girl on the list, but when they finally came to me, I said yes. Then, as we got closer, I thought, ‘No, no, no, this isn’t going to work!’ I’ve never played such an extreme character. There’s a mental rigor here that I’ve never had to use before; it’s hard to keep up with her. I’m also much more used to being the misunderstood or abused character.” Another small fact concerning Jones is that she isn’t Catholic. “I’m always afraid that I’m going to get the Hail Mary wrong and two-thirds of the audience is going to correct me,” she says with a laugh.

Had she not taken the role, she wouldn’t have found herself at Manhattan Theatre Club’s rehearsal space, working right across the hall from the cast of the upcoming Signature Theatre revival of The Baltimore Waltz — the original production of which first put Jones on the theatrical map in 1992. “I knew it was coming this season, but I didn’t know it was now until I bumped into Paula Vogel in the ladies’ room,” Jones tells me. “Kristen Johnston [who is playing Jones’s part] and I have had a couple of very sweet talks about the role on our breaks. I told her that I found doing the role so scary. At one point, I even said to Joe Mantello, my co-star, ‘I have to get fired. I have no idea what I’m doing.’ He told me to just trust the play, and he was so right. I really want to see this new production but our schedules are identical, so I don’t know if I will be able to. And, if I do, Kristen made me promise not to tell her when I’ll be there.”

HARK! THE HAROLD ANGELS SING
The official Harold Arlen centennial doesn’t begin until 2005 but it’s never too early to start belting out “Over the Rainbow” and “Stormy Weather.” Arlen is one of five composers who will be saluted at the star-studded Encores! Birthday Bash at City Center on November 21-22. The great jazz pianist Barbara Carroll is including some of her old pal’s hits in her Sunday shows in the Oak Room of the Algonquin Hotel (click here for more information) and on her soon-to-be-released CD Barbara at Birdland. Meanwhile, the lovely Barbara Fasano continues her Arlen salute, i had a love once, at the Duplex through November 30. That same night, her husband Eric Comstock begins crooning songs of Arlen and a slew of other greats in his new show Singing Astaire, which will play Birdland through January 9.

HITTING THE MOTHER LODE
Some phone calls are worth interrupting dinner for. Just ask Kathryn Grody: She was in Sierra Leone when she got the offer to appear in Winter Miller‘s new comedy The Penetration Play, which begins November 20 at the Mint Space. “I had gone there with Search for Common Ground [a humanitarian organization] and I was dining with Parliamentarians and some radio soap opera people when the call came in asking me to do this play,” says Grody. “And I said yes even though I knew nothing about it, which I’ve never done before.” So, why did she take such a leap of faith? “It had been recommended by the literary agent Morgan Jenness, who I trust. And to get any interesting part when you’re an actress over 40 is like a two-in-100 chance,” she says. “Once I read the play, I found that Winter is the real deal. She deals with complicated issues, and I really love her use of language; she writes such believable but quirky dialogue.”

In the three-character piece, Grody plays Maggie, whose daughter Ashley (Mia Barron) ends up as the unwanted object of desire of best friend Rain (played by Mandy Siegfried). The lesbian angle doesn’t bother Grody — who is married to Tony Award winner Mandy Patinkin and has two grown sons, Isaac and Gideon — but the OBIE-winning actress did get a bit of a shock on her first day of rehearsal. “I found out that Maggie’s a Republican,” says Grody, who actively worked on John Kerry’s presidential campaign along with her family. “I hope I can manage it.”

Being the mother of two boys also makes this part a challenge. “I think it’s terribly different playing a mother of a daughter,” Grody remarks. “Winter had to explain to me that some mothers and daughters aren’t always intimate. I feel blessed that God gave me sons, because they’re still so close to me. The funny thing is that I always wanted a daughter — but after some of my friends had them and I saw what they were put through, I think I probably couldn’t have handled it.”

BRUSH UP YOUR SHAKESPEARE
Oscar winner F. Murray Abraham, the adorable Alice Ripley, and Lion King lead Alton Fitzgerald White will star in Standup Shakespeare, a patchwork of song and story based on the Bard’s work, at 45 Bleecker on November 22. The event will benefit The Acting Company…Broadway veterans Joel Blum and Elena Shaddow will head up the cast of Peter Mills’ Illyria — a musical adaptation of Twelfth Night — from November 30 to December 26 at the Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey…The legendary British director Sir Peter Hall will make his first-ever visit to BAM from January 18-30 with an all-new production of As You Like It starring his daughter, Rebecca Hall.

THEY’RE THE TOP
Tony-winning director Daniel Sullivan is the recipient of the 2004 Joe A. Callaway Award from the Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation for his work on Intimate Apparel…John Travolta, who appeared on Broadway in Grease and Over Here!, will become the 20th honoree saluted by the Museum of the Moving Image on December 5 at the Waldorf-Astoria…The American Theatre Wing has named Sondra Gilman as its chairman of the board and Douglas Leeds as its president.

********************

[To contact Brian Scott Lipton directly, e-mail him at BSL@theatermania.com.]