LITTLE BLACK BOOK (World Premiere Recording) – Various Artists (Broadway Records – Downloads)
Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
A musical about Heidi Fleiss? Really? Yes indeed – called Little Black Book and told through 11 pop/rock songs and it is actually very entertaining.
For those who are asking: Who is Heidi Fleiss? Heidi Lynne Fleiss (born 1965) is an American former Madam. She ran an upscale prostitution ring based in Los Angeles, California, and is often referred to as the “Hollywood Madam”. Fleiss is also a columnist and was a television personality regularly featured in the 1990s in American media. So there!
Heidi now resides in the middle of the deserts of Nevada with 40 parrots. Backed by three fierce back-up singers playing all the supporting roles and an all-female rock band, we join Heidi as she muses on how she’s been wronged by powerful and manipulative men in an industry based on the exploitation of women, and as she clamours to tell her side of a story distorted by the media. Little Black Book is a sharp-tongued, raucous, and ultimately moving 90-minute ride, examining a woman who flew too close to the sun and the society that caged her for it.
Book, music and lyrics are by Billy Recce. His works include the long running Off-Broadway hit A Musical About Star Wars, Balloon Boy, for which he was the youngest writer ever selected for the prestigious NYMF at 17, and his sold-out Snowflake Jamboree series (54 Below).
He has written songs for Bernadette Peters, Mandy Patinkin, Laura Benanti, Titus Burgess, Lillias White, Mandy Gonzalez, Alice Ripley, Jessica Vosk and more. The show was co-conceived and directed by Will Nunziata – the 2019 recipient of BroadwayWorld’s Best Director Award. Recently, Will directed the first NYC revival of the Tony-winning musical Over Here, the first NYC revival of the Kander and Ebb musical The Act, and conceived/directed the critically-acclaimed Off-Broadway revue Our Guy, Cy: The Songs of Cy Coleman.
The score is sung by a sterling cast: Tony winner Alice Ripley, Tony nominee Orfeh, In the Heights and Hamilton star Mandy Gonzalez, Wicked stars Jessica Vosk and Brittney Johnson, American Idol alums Diana DeGarmo and Vonzell Solomon, Lortel and Drama Desk Award winner Kuhoo Verma, SIX: The Musical’s Samantha Pauly and Billboard artist Natalie Weiss. Tony winner Lillias White appears as Heidi’s mentor, Madame Alex.
Tracks are: ‘Opening (Heidi)’, ‘Little Black Book’, ‘Streets of LA’, ‘One of the Girls’, ‘Enterprise’, ‘No Sympathy’, ‘Pandering’, ‘Serial Fuckup’, ‘Cage Song’ and ‘Summer in Nevada’. As you can tell by one of those titles – the album has an ‘Explicit Lyrics’ sticker for three of the tracks.
Don’t let the ‘musical/rock concert hybrid’ description in the marketing blurb put you off – it is ‘rocky’ but more middle-of-the-road rock, otherwise I certainly wouldn’t be reviewing it and would have to hand it over to another more suitable reviewer!
Nick Wakeham
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