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December 6, 2002/Tevet 1 5763, Vol. 55, No. 15
Actors bring love, laughs to 'It Had To Be You'
LILA BALTMAN
Special to Jewish News
It's been 37 years since they exchanged wedding vows on the Merv Griffin show, and Renee Taylor and Joe Bologna are still using love and marriage to entertain audiences and make people laugh.
A couple of years ago, the couple came to Phoenix to perform their semi-autobiographical comedy "If You Ever Leave Me ... I'm Going With You," and now they're returning to the Orpheum Theatre with another romantic comedy they wrote together - "It Had To Be You."
This time, Taylor stars as "Theda Blau," a failed actress/health nut/playwright wannabe who is seeking love and success in New York. Bologna plays "Vito Pignolia," a hugely successful television commercial director. Theda convinces Vito to become her partner in dramaturgy and marriage...by holding him hostage in her apartment on a snowy Christmas Eve.
This production of "It Had To Be You" will be even more of a family affair because the couple's only son, Gabriel, will be working as the show's assistant stage manager.
"This is a very nice time for me right now, working with both my husband and my son," says Taylor in a phone interview. "I'm at a very happy place in my life."
Since leaving the hit TV series "The Nanny" in 1999, in which Taylor earned an Emmy nomination for playing Fran Drescher's laughably "over-the-top" Jewish mother, Taylor hasn't slowed down for a minute.
When she's not touring around the country with Bologna, she's performing by herself in a one-woman show she recently wrote called "Golda" about the inspiring life of Golda Meir.
While Taylor may be famous for playing "the outrageous mother type" on television, it is her real-life role as Jewish mother that, she says, "has been her greatest honor."
"My son used to joke that I was such an overprotective mother that I would pick him up before he fell down," laughs Taylor. "I think one of the hardest things as a mother is to stay out of your children's lives and let them fall down on their own."
Today, one of her favorite hobbies is buying clothes for her 8-year-old grandson. "We have a deal ... I buy him toys if he lets me buy him clothes."
Taylor and Bologna also share a joint passion for food and dining out - and not dieting. Taylor even wrote a 1986 best-selling satire spoof about "how to" celebrity health books called, "My Life on a Diet: Confessions of a Hollywood Diet Junkie."
"Yes, we both love to eat. We eat out for dinner every night. Italian is our first choice, Chinese is our second choice, and our third choice is a tie between French food and a good steak dinner," she says. "But every Sunday night we eat at Ruth's Chris. That is our weekly ritual. And then on Monday, I become a vegetarian."
When asked what she likes to watch on television these days, she says, "I love to watch 'Curb Your Enthusiasm' and 'The Gary Shandling Show.' "
She and Joe also went to the movies recently to see "Frida," starring Salma Hayek, and they both "loved it...it was such a beautiful movie."
Taylor also loved "My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding" which stars her good friend Lanie Kazan, who plays the loud, over-the-top Greek mother in that movie.
"You know, in this business, you have many ups and downs," adds Taylor. "You're famous and then you're not famous. But being a real-life wife and mother has really brought me my greatest joy."
Details
- What: "It Had To Be You"
- When: Through Dec. 8
- Where: Orpheum Theatre, 203 W. Adams St., Phoenix
- Cost: $26.50-$32.50
- Call: 602-262-7272 or (800) 905-3315
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