October 9, 2009  7pm

DLC's interview with Seth Rudetsky on his Sirius XM Radio show "Live On Broadway" will air Friday night, October 9th at 7pm. The show will air on SIRIUS Channel 77 and XM Channel 75.

“Donna Lynne Champlin proved that she needs to play Agnes Gooch as soon as possible with her hilarious "Gooch's Song" from Mame.”

BroadwayWorld

“(Among the outstanding performances)…Donna Lynne Champlin, in full pregnancy costume, performed "Gooch's Song" from "Mame" to full comedic effect.”  

AMNY

“Donna Lynne Champlin, (with) a costumed stomach seeming to extend cross-stage, brought out both the humor and pathos of “Gooch’s Song,” the lament from “Mame,”

Wolf Entertainment Guide

(Standouts included)…laughs with Donna Lynne Champlin's big and broad "Gooch's Song."

“Donna Lynne Champlin did magnificent work all evening, but her performance of the show's big number, Mr. Schwartz's "It's An Art," had star-making written all over it.”

Talkin' Broadway

“Donna Lynne Champlin…disappears totally into characters such as the thorny old school teacher and that indomitable waitress, never sinking into stereotype.”

San Diego.com

“Donna Lynne Champlin,  provides the bulk of the laughs as, among other characters, an over-decorating cubicle worker, a no-nonsense teacher, a veteran waitress, and a fundraiser.”

Theatremania

“Champlin eclipses (with) the idiosyncratic specificity that marks Schwartz’s “It’s an Art,” about a waitress who takes exuberant pride in her singular style of service.”

LA Times

 “To its credit, "Working" neither demeans its witnesses nor idealizes them: We're brought up short when, for instance, a kindly schoolteacher (Donna Lynne Champlin) remembers her class writing out spelling words: "Ten times for the dumb ones/And twice for the smart….so sympathetically and skillfully is every figure played.”

Variety

“a versatile six-member cast…all six performers have moments to shine: Donna Lynne Champlin as a lovable waitress who makes her work a virtuoso performance in Schwartz's “It's an Art”(and) Champlin's (undeniably funny) take on a clueless socialite and philanthropist.”

“(Donna Lynne Champlin) possesses a powerhouse singing voice and a chameleon-like ability to completely change character almost instantaneously.”

North County Times

“This is a talented cast…my favorite is (Donna Lynne Champlin’s) jaunty “It’s An Art"." 

Gay & Lesbian Times

“It’s An Art’ (was) performed brilliantly by Donna Lynne Champlin.”

San Diego Daily Transcript

“…(showing spectacular range) the excellent Donna Lynne Champlin is equally comfortable as a third grade teacher lamenting the days when kids respected adults as she is a waitress who describes herself as “a one woman show”.”

Edge

“Highlights include Donna Lynne Champlin’s engaging turn at the funny and proud waitress anthem “It’s An Art”.

San Diego News Network

“Donna Lynne Champlin is a standout and shows enormous range in the way that she transforms herself…”

News Chieftan

January 18^th, 2009  4pm

DLC will be performing with the SONG AND DANCE BY BROADWAY ARTISTS series at the Nuyorican Theatre, 232 East 3^rd Street (between B & C). 

Come and watch Broadway artists perform their favorite numbers in an intimate setting.

Tickets: $10 (call 2122-780-9386 for reservation).

More information at: http://www.nuyorican.org/directions/directions.html

“If Donna Lynne Champlin's performance is not considered one of the finest of the season it will mean we've been blessed with a year of staggering excellence in stage acting.”

*****

The cast shines with one woman, Donna Lynne Champlin, playing all the female roles with virtuosic skill. Champlin's final, fierce characterization of an angry young wife wondering what took all the poor soldiers so long to "stand up" thrills — as it's meant to.

Backstage

A solid, wonderful (Champlin) delivers a fine performance with some of the most astonishing and deeply effective acting I have been treated to.

NY Theatre

 Champlin, playing the sweethearts, wives, and mothers of the various refuse-to-stay-dead soldiers is magnificent.

Theatremania

 Champlin's innocent eccentric completely shifts into a series of contrasting and skillfully committed portrayals.  She (is alternatively) a touching rural wife, a hard-nosed dame in love, a heartbreaking mother, and an amusingly abrasive romantic. If Donna Lynne Champlin's performance is not considered one of the finest of the season it will mean we've been blessed with a year of staggering excellence in stage acting.

Broadway World

Donna Lynne Champlin, plays all the weeping, angry and despairing women. These riveting and quietly heartbreaking scenes are the real meat of the play. Champlin is moving as the wife of the farmer who longs to see another spring, sadder still as the mother of a 20-year-old boy, and quite rousing as the mechanic's wife who yells at him for waiting until he was dead before taking a stand against the many injustices of his life.

Variety

The excellent Champlin looks on, alternately rapt and aghast; later, she heroically plays the female relatives and romantic partners of each soldier in turn…masterfully blurring and scrambling the material.

Time Out New York

Donna Lynne Champlin shines in the six roles she takes on opposite the soldiers. For each, she creates a distinct personality, altering the inflection of her voice and her posture to suit her personality. If there's a reason to see the production, it's her. She’s a powerhouse with whom to be reckoned

Music OMH

Ms. Champlin becomes a sort of Everywoman, playing all the women in the dead soliders’ lives and displaying an impressive range.

NY Times

Asked to help persuade the dead men to accept their fate, Champlin reunites with them in a series of brief and powerful scenes, the best of which occurs between a mother and son. Her silent anguish when he finally agrees to let her see his disfigured face is deeply moving.

NY Post

Shaw's ends with a cry for justice, as Champlin insists, "Tell 'em. Tell 'em all to stand up." As the applause began, quite a few members of the audience obliged her

Village Voice

Donna Lynne Champlin has always wowed me, but never more than now in her most dramatic role yet as the little abused lad's mother (in Love Jerry).

Peter Filichia

Champlin’s blend of sensitivity and blood-curdling rage is alternately heartbreaking and terrifying, a masterful depiction of a mother brought to the brink of insanity by the men she loves - her eyes speak volumes of poetry even when (or perhaps especially when) she’s avoiding looking directly at another person.

Talkin’ Broadway

Champlin as Kate is the most familiar name in the company and she gives a restrained and convincing performance as she begins to comprehend what’s going on under her own roof.

Curtain Up

Donna Lynne Champlin gives a moving performance as the distraught and outraged Kate

Backstage

(Giving a) committed, fiercely brave performance, Champlin moves from blissful denial to consuming rage, capping her magnetic performance with "Cry," a mother's anguished plea to reach the son who's withdrawn from her.

Theatremania 

The cast does a truly amazing job. Donna Lynne Champlin is magnificent as Kate, who senses that there might be something wrong. Champlin's portrayal of Kate is so thoughtful and sincere, and she nearly brought the house down during "Cry." Champlin is a pleasure to watch—I love her quirkiness in the lighter parts of the show and her strength when Kate has to deal with the harsh realities of what has happened to her family. I also really love the way that these three actors interact with one another. Doran, Arbogast , and Champlin have really great chemistry. Arbogast and Champlin are a lovely couple and it was difficult to see their relationship struggle. They shine on the song "Arbor Avenue."

**Please note that this show is not recommended for children or pre-teens.**

"Unique, clever, funny, inspired, creative!  That’s what Donna Lynne Champlin has artistically invented in her on-going theater piece Finishing The Hat.”  What does it mean?  It's stories with songs from her personal and show business life.

Although the thought of putting a lot of work and time into creating a one-woman show wasn’t particularly appealing, after sitting and talking with friend Emily Skinner, it was evident that an audience would want to hear the various stories surrounding this multi-talented gal’s life. After all, DL (Donna Lynne) is not only a gloriously trained Broadway soprano, but also a dancer and musician (she plays piano, flute, accordion).

DL recently starred in the Broadway revival of Sweeney Todd, as well as James Joyce’s The Dead, By Jeeves and Hollywood Arms.

When Finishing The Hat first began at Ars Nova it was called Songs and Stories. About 15 stories were put into a hat and DL only got through half of them. So when the producer came backstage after the show and said you have to come back to FinishThe Hat, that cinched the theme and the name of the show.

“First and foremost, there's Carnegie Mellon University graduate Donna Lynne Champlin as the dowdy and timid Agnes Gooch. Tremendously talented and confident  (she) entertains with a three-dimensional and humorous performance.”

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

“Pittsburgh favorite Donna Lynne Champlin is thoroughly at home as the awkward Gooch, and she stirs our sympathy, too. Although (Gooch is) potentially a caricature, (she) transcends it.”

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

“Champlin is hysterical as Agnes Gooch, Mame’s conservative, naive secretary who eventually adopts the free living lifestyle- with some surprising results.”

“Champlin, who offers the evening's single best solo with a poignant "Get Out of Town," kept in her tremulous head voice…when she gets around to the appropriately included "I'm Throwin' a Ball Tonight," she joins pianist Mark Berman and Steven F. Silverstein at the ivory-tickler's piano and plays some hot jazz chords.”

TheatreMania

“Romantic conflicts give a melancholy context to Donna Lynne Champlin's fine singing on "Get Out of Town."

Variety

“All of the (gifted and accomplished) performers should be fitted for swings but one in particular, Champlin not only sings and dances with élan, but she plays soulful blues riffs on the piano.”

The Minuteman

“As the person around whom much of the story of the evening seems to spin, Donna Lynne creates a very full character and invests great energy into her role. She's a ball of dynamite when joining Mark Berman on the keys during "I'm Throwin' a Ball Tonight," and she meets Shonn (Wiley) toe to toe in their joyous tap duet.”

BroadwayWorld

“Donna Lynne Champlin…(is) like having (a) sexy seasoning which, when properly mixed, could serve up everything from a soufflé to a nourishing entrée to a mouth watering dessert.”

DC Theatre Scene

“Donna Lynne Champlin and Lewis Cleale best display the laid back, nonchalant attitude necessary for Porter’s songs…Peter Reardon and Donna Lynne do a beautiful rendition of “From This Moment On.”

WMNR-88

“Most memorable on the distaff side (is) Donna Lynne Champlin’s “Get Out of Town.”

SSG Syndicate

“Donna Lynne Champlin and Lewis Cleale are (obviously) the kind of party guests who get asked to sing,”

The News Times

“Donna Lynne Champlin’s personality shines through, truly connects with the music and puts herself into the songs. (She) excels in putting over her numbers (and) owns the music.”

The Waterbury Republican American

“Donna Lynne Champlin shines in her solo number in “Take Me Back to Manhattan.”

Brooks Newspaper

“Donna Lynne Champlin is an accomplished performer”

The Hour

“As hauntingly played by Donna Lynne Champlin (one of the multitasking stars of John Doyle's "Sweeney Todd"), Marcy is the sort of struggling, single New Yorker who spends New Year's Day alone thinking about her life…We wouldn't care as much about the admittedly self-pitying Marcy if she were not as sensitively played by Champlin, the luminous actress whose previous work for the Transport Group ("Dark at the Top of the Stairs" and "The Audience") has established her as their most valuable player. Her face poignantly registering equal degrees of sadness and perseverance, this gifted actress presents a portrait of the sort of anonymous urban despair to which one is exposed every day.”

            NY Post

“Champlin is luminescent as the frustrated artist (Marcy), even when she is at her lowest, and sings Shayne's lilting melodies with precision, warmth, and a wealth of emotion…funny and touching, and most important, beautifully crisp.”

            Theatremania

“Marcy is in the best possible hands as played by Donna Lynne Champlin, whose past performances have been jewels in some of the Transport Groups crowning achievements (the musicalsThe Audience, the First Lady Suite, and a straight play, The Dark at the Top of the Stairs).

            Curtain Up

“The lovely Donna Lynne Champlin's smart, instinctual performance as Marcy illustrates how superior her talent is…(she) essays Marcy like a starburst of dysfunctional life.”

            Backstage

“Champlin zests up Marcy with a few extra dashes of feist and spunk,” 

            Talkin Broadway

“Donna Lynne Champlin is a whiz at suggesting unspoken emotions and she brings a pleasing emotional transparency to Marcy.”

            Lighting and Sound America Online

“But gleaming through the clusters is the face of Donna Lynne Champlin, shining with hopefulness and wonder. On stage throughout the piece and rarely given a break from being the center of attention, Champlin's warmth and spunk, combined with sterling vocals and intelligent, emotional phrasing, keep Marcy a sympathetic presence. “

            Broadway World

“But the evening belongs to Champlin.  The only role in recent memory with similar complexity—calling for operatic range within a delicate story—is the title role in Caroline or Change.  Champlin’s performance is every bit as brilliant as Tonya Pinkins’ was, culminating with a must-see 11 o’clock tour-de-force in which Champlin chants “hang in there.”  It’s a good mantra for any artist, but particularly one interested in serious (and seriously good) musical theatre.  To see both realized, I suggest visiting Champlin—and Marcy in the Galaxy.”

            Adam Perlman

“Champlin works hard, with touching results;”

            Village Voice

“The talented Ms. Champlin (a warm and likable performer) is game in the title role.”

            NY Times

“But you didn’t need a resume of over half a century to win this audience’s heart. Donna Lynne Champlin was the epitome of a performer singing AND acting every moment of a number. Her inclusion was sort of the kind that needed an asterisk. She had sung a very old song used in a very recent non-musical play, Hollywood Arms. But who cared about asterisks or getting in on a technicality when the interpretation was so sensational. The song: I’m Always Chasing Rainbows, which Broadway experts will know was also hear in the musical Irene which - by the way - co-starred, in its revival, George S. Irving. But I digress. You didn’t have to be a Broadway historian or longtime follower to be swept up by this show, but the nostalgia just made it all the more emotional."

EDGE NEW YORK

“The thrilling combination of spectacular vocals and thoughtful phrasing was evident in the performance of Donna Lynne Champlin ("I'm Always Chasing Rainbows" from Hollywood Arms)…”

BroadwayWorld.com

“Not easily categorizable were numbers offered by Jason Graae and Donna Lynne Champlin – both terrific performers who shone despite their curious material. Graae, from the original company of A Grand Night for Singing offered "How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?" that was by turns wonderfully comic and charmingly romantic. Champlin , in an "Originals" first, brought an impassioned "I'm Always Chasing Rainbows" to the stage, a song she performed in a play – "Hollywood Arms."

American Theatre Web

“But these special moments were far from the only ones to provide great pleasure. Consider the following—and you really had to be there: Donna Lynne Champlin performing “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows” from “Hollywood Arms"...

Theatre Mania

"Donna Lynne Champlin...creates (a) wife who is authentic, sympathetic and assertive in (her) expectations, while showing (her) own confusions and uncertainties."

Pittsburgh Tribune Review

"Right from the start, when Donna Lynne Champlin's Georgie warms up the fictional audience for a visiting troupe of male strippers, the real audience joined in, keeping that buzz and engagement right through the full 2 3/4 hours...The audience was so juiced it actually cheered when (she) shouted, "Who says Buffalo doesn't rock?!" If Pittsburghers are willing to pretend to be Buffalonians, something special is going on...Champlin makes ('Georgie') believable and sympathetic."

Pittsburgh Post Gazette

Theatre Mania

"In the central role of Cora Flood, Donna Lynne Champlin cleanly hits all the rightnotes — maternal tenderness and frustration, wifely resentment and affection."

The New York Times

"The first segment crackles because Champlin tears so ferociously into (her) scenes…(she is) a part of the production's stylized world, keeping her gestures to a minimum and… they work the austerity to their advantage. Hand movements feel momentous when they're rarely used, and they accentuate the power of the actor’s thundering voice."

Variety

"The results shine, particularly when Donna Lynne Champlin and Patrick Boll, as Cora and Rubin Flood, engage in their scenes of loving warfare. Champlin's Cora—dowdy, careworn, desperate, and passionate—matches (Boll) nuance for nuance."

Village Voice

"The central performances are particularly strong: Champlin, recently seen in "Sweeney Todd," perfectly conveys Cora's emotional and physical hunger."

NY Post

"Donna Lynne Champlin and Michele Pawk, who co-starred on Broadway in Hollywood Arms, winning Pawk a Tony, are brilliant as Cora Flood and her sister Lottie Lacey, respectively."

NEXT Magazine

"Indelible (is) Champlin's slow to compromise, overly protective Cora."

American Theatre Web

"The actors, particularly Donna Lynne Champlin, have their work cut out for them (and) Champlin is particularly good as the smothering Cora, who walks the razor's edge between being loving and totally nuts."

Backstage

"The evening's anchor though is Champlin who subtly conveys the terror Cora feels at not being able to fit in like all the other wives in town.  Her Cora's devotion to her children comes easy, but Champlin just barely hides her character's frustration at being an ineffective parent and wife."

BroadwayWorld.com

"The actors assembled to bring the play's characters back to life are wonderful. They include topnotch Broadway performer Donna Lynne Champlin as Cora Flood…who could easily come across as an impossible-to-like nag (but instead) grounds the story as the loving but pragmatic wife and mother."

CurtainUp

"The actors on the stage can very easily be divided into 2 categories: Donna Lynne Champlin...and everybody else. Champlin, so excellent in John Doyle's Sweeney Todd, was one of the main reasons I wanted to see this in the first place, and she's giving another fine, nuanced performance in Stairs."

Restricted View.com

"Donna Lynne Champlin, last seen squeezing an accordion as the greedy Pirelli in John Doyle's "Sweeney Todd," is utterly divine as the overbearing Cora Flood, the over-protective and over-doting wife and mother."

The Lunar Gemini

“…it is clear some excellent performances are being carved. Donna Lynne Champlin…finds warmth in a role that could careen toward icy detachment. Champlin’s ability to surrender her status as a parent as well as usurp the power of her husband is not only effective, but also surprising within the context of the play. When Patrick Boll as Rubin flood makes his return late in the third act, one expects a grateful outpouring on Cora’s behalf. However, no sooner does her husband reveal that he hasn’t in fact been avoiding his family, but in search of work on the road does Champlin pull a quick turn becoming the domineering woman who drove him away in the first place. Within the script Cora is asked to scold her children as well as coddle them to her in a moment’s time - it is here that Champlin is at her best. Not only does she express the wonder and frustration of parenting, but also Champlin with childlike need crushes her children to her for comfort. Rarely is this better exemplified than the scene where Cora lays her head on the lap of her young son Sonny Flood…”

Edge New York

“…journalist gal Ann Mitchell (a fiercely compelling Donna Lynne Champlin in a role that couldn't fit her more perfectly if it were made of melted wax and she were dipped in a vat of it)… Champlin's knock-out solo "I'm Your Man" has her pleading for her job by boasting of "newspaper ink in her veins".

-BroadwayWorld.com

“It also helps that the show has the talented Donna Lynne Champlin for its leading lady. Her electric eyes and rangy belting voice grab you and don't let go, turning her unsatisfying half-formed character Ann Mitchell into a likable personality… Ann's first big number "I'm Your Man" is a real catchy winner (particularly as sung by Champlin), sharply revealing Ann's tough and eager personality.”

-Talkin Broadway.com

“Donna Lynne Champlin's committed performance. Champlin lines out Ann Mitchell's songs as if her career, not just Mitchell's job, depended on it.”

A born comedienne in the mold of Nancy Walker or Kaye Ballard, with a voice capable of everything from standards to light opera, Champlin got her early break in New York in a concert production of Very Warm for May at Carnegie's Weill Recital Hall. This lead to Broadway roles in James Joyce's The Dead, By Jeeves, Hollywood Arms and, of course, Sweeney Todd, with stops in Bloomer Girl, My Life With Albertine, First Lady Suite, Meet John Doe and The Flight of the Lawnchair Man from 3hree which Champlin reprised at NYMF in September in its expanded version following a run at Goodspeed.

Her solo-show, accompanied by the versatile Andrew Gerle is an inspired pairing of stories from her personal travails in life and show business with songs from Broadway and the pop world. The gimmick for Finishing The Hat is that Champlin has audience members pick cards out of a top hat, each of which contains the name of a particular story that she and her friends have selected as those worthy of re-telling in her show. A song is then paired up with each story so that each section is in itself a small three-act play or vignette. For example, at this performance, she concluded the show with a story about the worst audition she can't forget (for Broadway’s recent revival of Oklahoma) as well as the best audition she can't remember (for the legendary Hal Prince). Both are hysterical.

Champlin's song choices are as smart as her observations about her life are funny. And heartbreaking! To be sure, Champlin's humor is self-deprecating and her storytelling is filled with satirical panache, but in her show, she also opens a window onto her soul that is as riveting in what it reveals about truths that have informed her entire life, as it is about her bravery as a performer. And yet her revelations never feel calculated or exploitative.

An Irish pub song serves as her encore in which she admonishes the young musical theatre aspirants in the audience not to believe stories they may hear about how being on Broadway is just another job and isn't really special. She details her Broadway debut in what's an emotional story about the power of theatre and the magic of performing. It's a story young actors should cherish. And it's a tribute to Champlin that, as the show ended after two hours of sustained laughter, the audience could have stayed all night."

 “The cast, led by the wonderful Donna Lynne Champlin, took its curtain call to enthusiastic applause…”

The New York Observer

“…but the evening belongs to Champlin, who digs enough nuance out of her “supportive girlfriend” role to make Gracie the heart and soul of the evening.  Even when merrily jiggling like a bowl of cherry Jell-o in a thick sing-songy accent, there is a strength to her character and a realistic passion in her belief in following your convictions.  Her blazing voice defiantly proclaiming in musical anthem, “The Air Is Free”, is what takes Flight Of The Lawnchair Man into the stratosphere.”

BroadwayWorld.com

“Donna Lynne Champlin, fresh from “Sweeney Todd,” sang the role of the supportive girlfriend with gusto."

The New York Times

“Champlin brings a touching pathos to the go-nowhere Gracie that transcends the dumb-broad stereotyping she has apparently been encouraged to utilize. Her spectacular belting at the end of "The Air is Free" doesn't hurt either, and is one of the few times Flight of the Lawnchair Man truly soars. The reason is obvious: A good performer is allowed to do what she does best, free of all affectation. If it works so well for Champlin, might it not for the rest of the show, too?”

TalkinBroadway.com

“…Donna Lynne Champlin's starry performance as the adventure-starved Jerry Gorman's (Christopher Sutton) ever supportive girl friend Gracie…"

CurtainUp.com

“Lead Christopher Sutton sweetly conveys the wonder of flight and Donna Lynne Champlin is appealing as his zany girlfriend.”

Bloomberg.com

                                                Peter Filichia, Theatremania.com

"From hit shows to hopeless romances, Donna Lynne Champlin has been through it all - and learned to laugh (and sing) about it. In "Finishing the Hat," Champlin combines sidesplitting comedy, touching insight, exhilarating music, and audience participation in a madcap mixture that makes each performance a thrill ride. It's a perfect showcase for the dynamic voice and personality of one of Broadway's most exciting rising stars. Not just another cabaret show, Donna Lynne Champlin's "Finishing the Hat” is great musical theater, better written (and better-performed) than most shows you'll see this year."

Tim Dunleavy, BroadwayStars.com