Asbury Park Press from Asbury Park, New Jersey • Page 163

Sept. 20, 1987 Asbury Park Press IE 2 Movie Timetable 8 Atlantic City 1 1 This Week QiGfc" mi Jo Performer likes busy schedule The Ballet Iff if' lit- y. "if; ir- BARBARA MANORELL and the Do-Rites are scheduled to perform at 8:30 p.m. Saturday at the Garden State Arts Center, exit 1 1 6 on the Garden State Parkway. Tickets remain for section at $22.50 and lawn seating for $12.50.

Press Staff Report 6s -i f.ffi 1 When things become too hectic, Barbara Mandrell, sometimes has to remind herself she enjoys ing so much to do. 2 "When things are going real fast, I stop and tell; myself I can remember when I wasn't this busy," Mandrell said. "I just wish there were more hours in the' day." 1411' 3 in i. iiipinni.il i.jii. 3 a KB- The angel scene (above) from the 1986 production of Shore Ballet's "The Nutcracker." At left, co-directors Doris Jacoby (left) and Sally Topham, who have volunteered thier time for 10 of the 15 years the ballet company has been in existence.

Ms. Mandrell knows what it means to be busy. She has been in show business for 27 years, with a career combining recording, performing livP concerts and doing television programs. Earlier this summer, her latest album, "Sure Feels Good," was released; she is currently on the road for a four-month Asbury Park Press 15 years of ups and downs to Barbara Mandrell is planning write her autobiography. Association of Regional Ballet (which will hold it annual conference in May in Dover, presentation of a full-length production of "Cinderella," and a June performance in the Cultural Fund Series at the Garden State Arts Center, Holmdel Township.

Public performances this year of "The Nutcracker" will be at 1 and 4 p.m. Dec. 6 at the Paramount Theatre and at 1 and 4 THE SHORE BALLET celebrates the be-gining of its 15th anniversary season today with an open house at 4 p.m. at the Monmouth School of Ballet, Broad Street, Red Bank Orchestra; a lecture demonstration series in public schools; preparation of two original ballets for adjudication by the National concert tour. "This is my only tour in 1987, and we're doing 50 dates in those four months," she said.

"It's a lot of dates to do, but it's fun most of the time." Her concert dates will occupy most of her time through the end of the year. After the tour is completed, she said she may become involved in television projects, possibly including a TV movie, but no plans were definite. Whatever happens in the future, she said television is her friend. "I was a regular on TV when I was a child (age II, performing on a local Los Angeles program) and I'm glad to have had the opportunity to work with some great By FRANCES MOLINARO Press Staff Writer Fortunately, Sally Topham said, there have been more ups than downs during her years with the Shore Ballet Company. The ups have been in the company's artistic success, Ms.

Topham said. "The downs have been mainly in recruiting volunteers who will stay on year after year," she said. Ms. Topham and Doris Jacoby, artistic directors of Shore Ballet, have volunteered their time for 10 of the 15 years the ballet company has been in existence. Most others have not been as dedicated, Ms.

Topham said. "You get tired of hearing how this area is a cultural wasteland," Mrs. Jacoby said "A lot of times it's hard to get people involved to change that. But lately, more people are getting involved with us." "They're mostly Shore Ballet parents," Ms. Topham said.

"They're involved because their children are dancing with the company." Volunteers help with varied responsibilities including fund raising to help subsidize the company. One fund-raising event, a cocktail party to be held Oct. 10 at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Harry Osborne, Rumson, will celebrate the 15th anniversary of the Shore Ballet Company.

Another event is today's open house at the Monmouth School of Ballet. Ms. Topham is director of the school where the Shore Ballet Company meets weekly for class. The Shore Ballet Company's 15th anniversary season schedule will include seven performances of "The Nutcracker" presented with the New Jersey State p.m. p.m.

Dec. 13 at the Strand Theatre, Lakewood. "Cinderella" will be presented at 3 p.m. April 17 at the Strand Theatre and at 3 p.m. April 24 at the Count Basie Theatre.

This is the third season for the full scale production of "The Nutcracker." "I think the reaction we got from 'Nutcracker' when we started was one of disbelief," said Mrs. Jacoby, who is director of the Shore Ballet School, Island Heights. "People didn't expect anything that elaborate or well-staged from a local group. "But Sally Topham doesn't spare anything when she's staging a production," Mrs. Jacoby said.

"She wants everything and generally gets it. If you reach a little bit higher, you get a little bit higher." Special project grants from the Ocean County Heritage Commission of $5,000 and the Monmouth Arts Council of $3,400 will help subsidize the company's spring production. "We're very pleased to be able to sponsor a dance company," said Pauline Miller, director of the Ocean County Cultural and Heritage Commission. "They do some really high quality productions in the area," said Mary Grace Cangemi, administrative assistant for the Monmouth Arts Council. "Their whole ballet company is very professional." Ms.

Topham and Mrs. Jacoby, who took over as artistic directors when Angela Whitehill, founder of the Shore Ballet Company, moved from the area, are proud of the company's evolution. "When we came here, it was a nice little company, but I would consider it a student company," Mrs. Jacoby said. "I would now consider it semi-professional.

See BALLET, page Gil minds that are no longer with us, she said. "I enjoy it (television) very much. Television enables me, in a marvelous manner, to reach a lot of people, and I've done television in every aspect I can think of." Ms. Mandrell has made guest appearances on more than 30 shows, including four Bob Hope specials. She has also been a guest host of the Tonight Show and has been the emcee of two Ringling Brothers Barn urn and Bailey Circus specials.

She has done shows for CBS and HBO, but she is best known for "Barbara Mandrell and the Mandrell Sisters," which ran for two seasons on NBC. "I pulled out of the show because I'm not willing to do anything halfway, and I felt it would be physically impossible for me to continue at that pace every week," she said. "It was a real challenge. I'm very proud of it and of my sisters (Louise and Irlene, her co-stars)." Ms. Mandrell said she doesn't play favorites between audiences at concerts or TV tapings.

"Asking which is my favorite well, I have three children, and that question is like asking me to choose which of them is my favorite. They're totally different. There are so many aspects to entertaining that I would be very bored if all I did was record in the studio, or perform live or do television," she said. "It's a marvellous thing about my occupation that no two days are alike. There's no drudgery, no something different every day," she added.

"Something different" may not be hard to find while travelling all over the country, but Ms. Mandrell said she was looking forward to returning to New Jersey. "New Jersey is one of my favorite areas, along with New York and Massachusetts, and the people there are very good to me I like it there. Here in Tennessee, we brag about southern hospitality, but the way I'm treated up there, we could take lessons!" After the tour, she will be working on something very different from recording and television; Ms. Mandrell said she has just signed a contract with Bantam See BANTAM, page GI0 Diane Fay, Spring Lake, danced the Snow Queen and Bryant Young, New York, was her escort in last season's production of "The Nutcracker." Matt Dillon film stars his 'arm' the best the top character in town.

"He wants to make enough money so he can get out while his hands are still clean to a certain degree," Dillon McQueen and Jean-Paul Belmondo. Besides Miss Lane, "The Big Town" co-stars Bruce Dern as a blind bankroller, Tom Skerritt as a slick gambler and Tommy Lee Jones as a truculent club-owner. "The movie isn't necessarily just IF 'Lt' i. --li IN I if see a street game once in awhile, but I mean, a legitimate floating crap game they've disappeared. "But we did find this place on the South Side of Chicago.

It was the roughest bar I've ever been in, an all-black place. I thought I had run into some kind of encounter. But then we relaxed and everybody had a ball, and naturally we lost. "There was Jackie Wilson on the juke box. The drinks were flowing and the dice were rolling.

Part of me began to get into the mentality of the addicted gambler, the kind of guy who wants to lose. I didn't want to win, I wanted to play until I'd have to leave. "I got this terrible feeling after awhile. I felt that if I won, it wouldn't really be honest. It would be just a little step above getting it dishonestly.

I had this over- whelming feeling that I should be out working. "Then I thought, 'Hey, I am working. This is Miss Lane indulged in a little research too, for her role as an "exotic dancer." She attended a performance and found the art to be in a sorry state. "It's not what it was," she says. "It's no longer a tease, it's a straight-out anatomy lesson.

In the '50s, the stripper and the audience egged each other on. There was a relationship almost flirting. That's all gone." Like Dillon, Miss Lane is playing a character in "The Big Town" not a thousand miles from one she's played before. In "The Cotton Club," her last movie, she was a gangster's moll. Here, she says, "The lady is owned, part and parcel with the club, by her husband (Tommy Lee Jones).

She hates him but she sticks with him By BART MILLS Press Correspondent It's been awhile since Matt Dillon played a kid with a talent for gambling in a movie set in a period before he was born. So, three years after he was a gin rummy shark in 'The Flamingo Kid" he's now a champion crapshooter in "The Big Town," a Columbia film scheduled to open locally on Friday. It's Chicago in 1957. Dillon's wearing the black shirt and the gray slacks with a slim belt. He has the ID bracelet on one wrist and on the other he's got the watch with the face turned to the inside.

He's in the kind of plushly upholstered joint where people spend tainted money, and he's sitting across a table from a painted woman, Diane Lane. Dillon is telling Miss Lane, who plays a stripper, "You're just using me, is that it?" The big action fin the scene is the sizzle of cognac in somebody's flambe. The smoke guns are hyperactive, creating the hazy air that catches movie lighting so atmospherically. Dillon says his speech 1 1 times before the director is satisfied, and then he gladly escapes from the smoky club. Outside, where it's actually suburban Toronto in the daytime, not Chicago at night, Dillon explains why he's back playing a youthful gambler.

'The Flamingo Kid' was a comedy, and this is darker," he said. "The only similarity is the gambling. This one definitely makes a statement. The other scripts I was reading threw curves. This character Cullie there's something pure about him." Cullie arrives in Chicago from state Indiana, restless for recognition as i Matt Dillon and Diane Lane in "The Big Town," scheduled to open locally Friday.

A III about crapshooting," Dillon said. "That's just the setting. It's about the world, about how you should live your life, you know, that kind of thing." Still, authenticity is necessary. "I lost a lot of Columbia's money doing Dillon recalled. "Well, maybe $500.

It was a game we found in Adept at playing youthful gambling whizzes, Dillon is one of many stars who have undergone this cinematic rite of passage: among others have been Paul Newman in "The Hustler," Steve McQueen in "The Cincinnati Kid," Tom Cruise in "The Color of Money." Dillon's new film is based on a book, "The Arm," by Clark Howard, which during the years has been optioned for Steve Chicago. Since Atlantic City opened up it's BARBARA MANDRELL: "No two days are alike." hard to find a game in New York. You'll See DILLON, page G2 fir I.