ROBERTA REED CRENSHAW
Paramount Theatre Benefactor
Austin American Statesman article
by Michael Barnes
August 2, 2015
Paramount at 100
How Roberta Reed Crenshaw became the Paramount’s patron saint
Citywide philanthropist made possible the restoration of the theater in the 1970s.
During the 1970s, when the Paramount Theatre was being restored, Roberta “Bobbie” Reed Crenshaw dropped by to check on a particularly difficult painting […]
AMERICAN STATESMAN ARTICLE – PARAMOUNT THEATRE 100 YEARS
By Michael Barnes
July 26, 2015
In the run up to the Paramount Theatre’s 100th anniversary, the Austin American Statesman and Michael Barnes published an historic article that captured the very essence of one of the greatest theatres of the 20th Century and beyond. While untold millions were suffering through […]
FANNY BRICE, COMEDIAN
“Everything I know I learned in vaudeville.” James Cagney
At the turn of the century in America, the Wright Brothers made their first successful flight, Jack London wrote Call of the Wild, Henry Ford started his motor company, and thousands of people escaped small apartments in big cities to see the amazing acts of […]
Sally Rand, Legendary Striptease Artist
Paramount Theatre circa 1935
Sally had a standing order that follow spot operators were only to “hit her” with a blue light. The point of this was to “fan” the illusion that she was naked. She wore a flesh colored body suit. Between the lighting, her costuming and the fans, she really […]
Welcome to a new comedy series treatment called “Andiamo Giovanni” about how one man can turn the most simplistic task in to the Apollo moon landings.
“ANDIAMO GIOVANNI”!
HIS GRAND CANYON ADVENTURE
June 24, 2015
See Giovanni wake up on Wednesday morning, June 23, 2015, at 5:30am. Not much left to do in Sedona, Arizona. Grand Canyon! Only 2 […]
100th Anniversary Countdown Paramount Theatre Continued!
My Dear Friends. This is what we kept from happening, in a decaying downtown Austin in 1975, by answering the call. Those of us from that movement, are placing a new call for support to tell an untold story to thousands of Austinites. Who will answer the call?
The trailblazing times […]
E. G. MARSHALL IN “MASS APPEAL”
November 15 to 20, 1983
The next show I chose for a Paramount production was the two time Tony Winning Broadway play, Mass Appeal which originally starred Milo O’Shea (Best Actor) directed by Geraldine Fitzgerald (Best Director). The play also won the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding New Play.
This was yet […]
UPRIGHT GRAND PIANO – PARAMOUNT THEATRE
During one of the many TV talk shows I appeared on in about 1975 to raise the Paramount’s profile, a viewer called in to ask a question of me. She said, “Are you aware of the upright grand piano backstage”? I said that I had seen it. She said, “Have […]
Equus is a play by Peter Shaffer written in 1973, telling the story of a psychiatrist who attempts to treat a young man who has a pathological religious fascination with horses.
Shaffer was inspired to write Equus when he heard of a crime involving a 17-year-old who blinded six horses in a small town near Suffolk. […]
EARL AND LENA PODOLNICK
Lena Novy, at age 18, an actress and singer working in Hollywood, alongside John Wayne on RKO’s “Mesquiteers” movies. She was managed by MGM’s legendary Roger Edens whose only other client was Judy Garland. While attending UCLA, Lena met Earl Podolnick and decided that having a family would bring more happiness into […]