THE NIGHT MAXIE TORTELLINI
HIT LOLA LATROBE'S
Music by Peter Brittain: Book and Lyrics by Colin Swift
THE STORY
(Chicago in the 20s)
"Oh, Chicago, this terrible city we love", sing the whole
company as the Prologue to this pastiche about life in the 'windy city'.
Set in the seedy night club of the redoubtable Miss Lola Latrobe, we follow
the goings-on during one evening there. The Casino Club used to be the
hottest night-spot in town, but, like its owner and its performers, it
has seen better days. "The Night Maxie Tortellini Hit Big Lola Latrobe's"
is the story of Fingers Rafferty, the piano player who used to be the
best, of Lola, whose world is crumbling all around her, who still can't
'find her man', of Maxie Tortellini, the biggest hoodlum in town who was
Lola's lover ten years before, of Tony di Martino, who still claims to
be the greatest Vaudeville singer in America today, and of the loves and
lives of the chorus girls, some coming up for the scrap heap, some starting
out with their eyes full of stars. There's romance, there's danger, there's
music, there's dance in this fast-moving stylish cliché of Chicago
life -gangsters, molls, chorus girls, musicians, jazz, booze, pills, laughs,
disasters. The tale builds up to the climax of the "hit" -
but there's a twist and just when everything appears to be resolving
itself happily - there's another twist - and all set to the strident,
dramatic, exciting heartbeat that is Chicago in the days of prohibition,
in the days of Jazz.
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