A Vegas Holiday! Songs From “Live at the Sahara” presented by El Portal Theatre, Weddington Street Productions and Pixie Dust Storm Productions. Opens Dec. 19; plays Sat., Tues & Wed., 8 pm; Sat. & Sun., 3; Thurs. New Year’s Eve, 4 (includes champagne & dessert) & 9 (includes champagne and gourmet buffet); through Dec. 31. Regular Tickets: $45-$60; New Year’s $60-$100. Code word “Sahara” for $15 off any ticket purchase. El Portal, 5269 Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood. 866.811.4111 or elportaltheatre.com

Though the Equity Waiver, now 99-seat-plan, was originally designed for actors to stretch their muscles and showcase their talents to the film and television industry, the laws of unintended consequences stepped in and determined a thriving small theatre scene in Los Angeles would be a breeding ground for some of the most original and exciting stage work in the world. Proving this thesis are Jake Broder and Vanessa Claire Smith, two remarkable performers who turned a college girl’s fantasy into a bona fide hit with Louis and Keely: Live at the Sahara.

The small musical about the tempestuous relationship between bad-boy band singer Louis Prima and sultry jazz stylist Keely Smith garnered critical and popular acclaim with its first incarnation at one of LA’s most innovative theatres, Sacred Fools. The show continued to gain steam and brought on notable bio-pic director Taylor Hackford to reshape it for a successful run at the Geffen Playhouse’s Audrey Skirball Kenis Theatre, which garnered five Ovation nominations for last season. Plans for a New York tour with Broadway ambitions are underway but meanwhile Broder and Smith are opening a pure entertainment piece, A Vegas Holiday! Songs From “Live at the Sahara” for a Christmas run at the El Portal.

Broder explains, “We’re doing a really fun holiday treat for our fans. We wanted to do some new songs, let the band off the leash and have a blast. Thank you to Los Angeles. This is our chance to have fun with it and work on the Vegas act side of the play.”

Smith agrees, “We’re really trying to perfect the Louis and Keely act. No story, just bringing back the banter and their music, as if you were going to see them in Vegas.”

The seed of Louis and Keely was planted in Smith’s college playwriting class, during which she researched entertainment from her native New Orleans. She knew about Louis but became fascinated by the complicated love story that intertwined his on stage relationship with Keely. She recalls, “Originally I started writing about Louis and about my home town’s experience of depression era jazz. I found in my research I was more drawn to the love story. I was amazed it hadn’t been told yet. As I had been married to a performer, it spoke very strongly to me.”

Through several years of trying to establish herself as a performer in Los Angeles, Smith kept the idea alive in a compartment of her creative imagination. Then at Hollywood’s trendy M Bar she saw Broder performing his acclaimed His Royal Hipness Lord Buckley in the Zam Zam Room and saw Louis Prima in him. She describes the moment. “Things weren’t working out so well for me here. I was giving up my job and apartment and going home. I had one last shift bartending and Jake was doing his show. I was taken by him and his performance. It was all the qualities I’d wanted in a Louis Prima. I had never thought about producing the show because I didn’t think I’d find anyone who could do all that. There he was. He had the musicianship and the charisma, the language skills, the energy.

“I just took a chance and asked him if he wanted to take on the project. He said, ‘Show me a script.’ I said I had to go home and write it. I used my one-way ticket and went to Louisiana. I wrote the first draft of the script. I had no way to get back to LA because I had no job. But people at Sacred Fools passed the hat on New Year’s Eve to get me a ticket. I came back and showed Jake the first draft of the script. Eventually he became my writing partner. He’s so good at structure and I am good at character and language - we make a really good team.”

Broder and Smith

Their chemistry as writing partners and performers paid off when the show opened at Sacred Fools. Then Hackford contacted them with the idea of developing the story and directing the project. Smith continues, “He had wanted to tell this story for awhile. He had a relationship with Keely and knew some stories we didn’t know. We felt we could get more of the story of this lady and be true to what happened if we had a partnership with him. We thought it would be a great experiment to see what we could mine. We learned a lot. We expanded the story. The biggest change was we didn’t know until Taylor came along that she had an affair with Frank Sinatra. We included that story, adding two new actors, which made it more commercially viable.”

But Hackford is a movie man and the new play was more cinematic than Smith and Broder ultimately wanted for the production. So the newer version being developed for the New York tour will revert back to much of the original structure, without Hackford, though the pair is grateful for the intensified story work he had brought in.

Broder is excited about the New York plans but is still amazed at the turn of events. “This is an interesting moment. Every time I work on this show I realize I have been preparing to do this my whole live. I started as a musician when I was six, so a lot of the work I do is with music. I suppose I am preoccupied with the role of the musician because I am not one.” But he never knew how far it would go. “This whole thing has been a complete surprise from beginning to end. We’re just going to try and do the best work we can and let the chips fall where they may. We’ll try to make sure the art and quest for excellence and telling the story stay at the forefront of the project. That will be our main thrust. If audiences react the same way in New York as they have here, then our job is not to screw this thing up.”

Though warned New York critics often look down on productions from LA, Broder dismisses the idea. “I don’t believe in stigmas like that. I don’t think other people do either. Vanessa is from New Orleans and I spent most of my creative life in London. Work is work. Where it comes from doesn’t matter if it is good and has a compelling narrative. This is a little show from nowhere that will do whatever it is going to do. I don’t think it matters if it came from the North Pole or Russia or Los Angeles. It is a little thing that started in Hollywood and it is going on.”

Feature image by David Miller

Article by Tom Provenzano