Lucie Arnaz |
Jim Dale |
Cindy Guyer |
Tony LoBianco and
Elizabeth Fitzpatrick |
Isabella Stevenson, Tommy Tune
and Liliane Montevecchi |
JEWISH
NATIONAL FUND
Isabelle
Stevenson Helps
Sell Trees On Broadway
Story and Photos by Tim Boxer
 UCIE
ARNAZ said she was
kvelling to serve as benefit chair of a Jewish National Fund dinner
honoring Isabelle Stevenson, the venerated board chairman of
the American Theatre Wing Monday at the New York Marriott Marquis.
“This may come as a shock
to you,” she said, “but I’m actually not Jewish. I’m a
Cuban-American shiksa. In our house we consider theater our
religion.”
Tony LoBianco, LeRoy
Reams, Tommy Tune, Liliane Montevecchi, Celeste Holm, Marian Seldes,
Karen Ziemba, Audra McDonald
and Shubert honcho Gerald Schoenbrun came to praise
the woman who’s been a prominent figure in theatrical circles for
35 years, not least as head of the annual Tony Awards.
Laura Mason, one of
Isabelle’s three daughters, said her mother taught her “the
meaning of tzedaka before I even knew how to say it.”
Rabbi Joseph Potasnik,
a fire department chaplain, said he came to buy a tree. He
remembered his mother giving him $2 to buy a tree. “I see you’ve
raised the price,” he cracked.
LoBianco recalled going to
Israel in 1973 to make a biblical film. The day he arrived, the Yom
Kippur War broke out. Everybody was leaving the country, but Tony
convinced his producer and director to stay. They went out in the
desert to film.
“There were two brothers
in a scene,” Tony said. “When the army called up, they took off
their robes, picked up their gear, and went off to battle.”
When Stevenson got up to
receive a Tree of Life Award from New York chapter president Rita
Salfeld, she knew what the actors in the Tony Awards feel when
they thank everybody, “starting with their agent and ending with
their agent.”
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