John Tartaglia was enjoying his first major professional success, as the focal performance of Broadway’s “Avenue Q” when something even more miraculous than new-found stardom happened.
Tartaglia received a call to have dinner with an executive from The Disney Channel.
As if knowing by osmosis Tartaglia had a broad theatrical background that went beyond performing to awareness of backstage tricks to create illusions, designing as well as working with puppets, writing, and directing, the executive wanted to know whether Tartaglia had an idea for a children’s television show.
Of course, he did. That show, “Johnny and the Sprites,” was the first program Tartaglia conceived and saw put into production. More recently, he was worked with Jim Henson production on an animated series, “Splash and Bubbles,” that has underwater creatures showing concern for the environment of their ocean world. Both can be seen on Netflix and other sites.
Work on the creative side of the camera has not kept Tartaglia from the stage. He continues to act, but more often these days, he buzzes between one large regional theater to another staging shows. He is the director of the current Bucks County Playhouse attraction, “Mamma Mia,” which he says he wants to endow with his usual combination of fun and human relationship.
“‘Mamma Mia’ is an ‘escape’ musical,” Tartaglia says by telephone from New York where the show was rehearsed before coming to New Hope. It runs through Aug. 3. “Within the escape, a story is being told, and I want to bring forward the ‘disco silly,’ with lavish costumes, go-go boots, and the lot while also treating the story of a mother and daughter who have come to a new place in their relationship, a place that involves the daughter getting married, having her ideas about adult life, and a mystery about who the daughter’s father might be.
“This is a musical that provides a lot of possibility because it has such a strong and universal story as regards the mother and daughter but is filled with wonderful popular tunes. You sing and dance to ABBA while feeling what a mother, daughter, and others go through as important aspects their life change. I don’t want to lose the fun, but I want audiences to see the parts that give the show some gravity.”
Finding the “impact” that takes a story beyond elemental entertainment is important to Tartaglia.
“I never wanting to be exclusive by doing one thing instead of everything, like performing without ever creating, writing, or directing,” Tartaglia says.
“Being in the theater, or in a television studio, which I consider an extension of theater comes natural to me.
“I was literally raised backstage and, in significant ways, on stage. My mother, Angie Radosh, is an actress. She performed in regional productions when I was growing up in Maple Shade, N.J. and Willow Grove and Upper Dublin, Pa. Now she’s the Angela Lansbury of South Florida, playing the roles and having the career she put aside to raise me and my siblings in the Philadelphia suburbs.
“I mean it about being raised backstage. Not only did I learn how to perform but I found out all about fog machines, backlighting, and shaking a sheet of metal to make thunder.
“I also performed as a child. I was on ‘Sesame Street’ for 16 years beginning when I was a teen. Summers, growing up in Philly, I worked at Sesame Place. Performing is natural to me.
“So is imagining. Someone calling to ask if you have an idea for a children’s television show is like a fantasy fulfilled, but I was ready for it because I had a show in mind.
“Theater and television are a cross-breed. They tell stories, they entertain. One is live. The other appears to be live. The point for me is to tell stories that have an impact, that impart some knowledge that goes beyond the story and makes a difference in someone’s life by making them realize something or think about a matter in a different way.
“That’s why it was amazing when someone from Disney says, ‘Here’s the money. Do the show.’ Stunned as I was by the opportunity, and the money, I was ready to fulfill what Disney wanted.
“I was also up to the responsibility of creating a show that would go beyond entertainment and make points that can be taken from it. ‘Johnny and the Sprites’ was for pre-schoolers. It had music and adventure, but the characters discussed things that were going on, and the sprites, being magical, let children see possibilities and taught them to be open to things that happened in their lives.
“‘Splash and Bubbles’ is set in the ocean. Splash travels throughout the seas and chooses the place he wants to settle. The ocean provides a great way to talk about the environment and keeping it clean and healthy. It promotes empathy, tolerance, and a global outlook.
“I love that ‘Johnny and the Sprites’ was made a decade ago, and ‘Splash and Bubbles”‘ was last produced in 2018, but people can see it right now if they like. In the theater, you create something. It entertains for a finite time and disappears. With television, you make something, and it lives on for people to continue to enjoy and for audiences yet to come to discover.”
Tartaglia says he hopes Jim Henson Productions will consider a new season of “Splash and Bubbles,” but “even if they don’t, there’s new things to do.”
Tartaglia lives in L.A. now, but he loves being in New Hope and back in the parts of Pennsylvania where he grew up.
“Wherever I go, this is my home. It’s great to be here and to be putting on something as wonderful as ‘Mamma Mia’ for audiences here.”
Channel 10 gets leg up on July 4
Channel 10 and its NBC sister station, Telemundo, are once again sponsors of Philadelphia’s six-day Independence Day celebration, “Wawa Welcome Philadelphia.”
Being a media partner has its rewards. In addition to ongoing stories about free concerts, movies, food, and museum admissions, from 7-10 p.m. Thursday, NBC 10 will air the annual July 4 concert from the Benjamin Franklin Parkway and the fireworks following it.
The concert is one of two featuring one of the city’s premiere orchestras, the Philly Pops. That ensemble is its own reward, but on the 4th, two soloists of note will take stage with them.
One is Meghan Trainor, who came to wide attention a few years back with her hit, “All About That Bass,” followed by several other chart-toppers such as “Lips Are Movin'” and “Dear Future Husband.”
The other is Jennifer Hudson, a 2006 Oscar recipient for playing Effie in “Dreamgirls” and a major star and influence since.
Hudson was first introduced to TV audiences as a contestant on “American Idol.” She did not win but became one of the biggest celebrities to come from that show. She has been on stage in “The Color Purple” and earned the empathy of the nation when her family was violently killed.
Fireworks are always popular. They will follow on Channel 10 directly after Trainor, Hudson, and the Pops complete their concert.
Those Dem debates
Presidential politics is garnering interest.
The twin Democratic free-for-alls conducted by NBC, MSNBC, and Telemundo earned strong ratings on both nights for the Peacock network.
Wednesday’s debate among Dems vying to face Republican incumbent Donald Trump in the 2020 Presidential election attracted 15.26 million viewers. Thursday’s roster, with more heavy-hitters, such as Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, and Kamala Harris, broke all-time debate broadcast record with 15.46 million people watching.
The welter of participants, 10 each night, and the format, which had to accommodate the verbal traffic of candidates eager to speak and set themselves apart, did not give anyone significant time to expand or explain their ideas.
In spite of that, Elizabeth Warren benefited from Wednesday’s program, because she tended to begin by answering the questions moderators posed and because she had ready, articulate responses for most issues. The majority of the panel heard their names and launched, Pavlovian, into canned campaign spiels that skirted or avoided the issue presented.
Warren saying she “has a plan for that” has already become a joke, but she seemed, more than any of her rivals, to have firm grasp on what her plan is. She also set the tone for the debate. Most of Warren’s competitors amplified or took their lead from what she said. I was expecting someone to refute or challenge the Massachusetts senator on some vulnerable points, but no one did. No wonder she’s rising in polls while the others would kill for a second digit, or even a high single digit, in their favorability numbers.
Another who increased advantage by Wednesday’s performance is former Housing and Urban Development Secretary, Julian Castro, who accomplished more with decorum and demeanor than with anything he actually said.
Two did not come across that well on Wednesday. Beto O’Rourke continued a habit or talking just to talk, whether in English or Spanish, but without substance, point, or originality. Guess he depended on being telegenic. Bill di Blasio registered as being more anxious than eager. Though he sometimes had points of his own to make, he made them with bluster, disregard to whose turn it was, and heedless of the time moderators allotted. Then, he is from New York. Maybe his style, which is akin to President Trump’s, reflected his hometown more than Presidential poise.
The moderators were generally terrible. Lester Holt, Savannah Guthrie, and Jose Diaz-Balart, in Wednesday’s first hour, seemed to work more from a script than from a probing interest to make candidates define or clarify points. Rachel Maddow and Chuck Todd acted like children invited to the big people’s party instead of like serious journalists. Looking at Todd, you’d think you were watching an entertainment program, and not a good one. He may have consumed more air time than Warren or Cory Booker.
Neither Maddow nor Todd was adept at handling an embarrassing technical glitch.
Thursday night provided some drama as Kamala Harris went straight at the person to beat, Joe Biden, regarding the former Vice President working with segregationists to get bills passed during his Senate days. Biden, seasoned by almost 50 years in politics, handled Harris’s onslaught adeptly.
Neal Zoren’s television column appears every Monday.
