Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - (Page 38) GOLDEN APPLE DINNER THEATRE By Judy Pokras A few months ago, a professional ghost hunting group from Tampa visited Sarasota’s Golden Apple Dinner Theatre and found evidence of ghosts. This was nothing new to the people who work and play there. The oldest continuously operating equity professional dinner theater in the United States, Golden Apple buzzes with creativity and occasional ghosts, as actors and crew serve up a tasty new season of shows. Although Golden Apple is known for its musicals, this September—for the first time in eight years—it opened with a non-musical, Laughter on the 23rd Floor, which Roberta MacDonald says is Neil Simon’s funniest play. “Nobody can do musicals like we can,” says the strikingly attractive actress, singer and dancer. “But there are fewer and fewer musicals now, and the rights get harder and harder to fight for. So Bob said, ‘Let’s start this year off with a play.’” MacDonald, whose third cousin Shelley Winters once stayed with her family while doing Oklahoma on Broadway, got her first acting job at the age of 15. A graduate of New York City’s High School for the Performing Arts, she made a deal with her lawyer dad, who wanted her to go into his profession. MacDonald said she would go to law school if she didn’t make $12,000 a year as an actress. “I immediately got a job in the chorus of South Pacific for $11,025.” That was good enough for her father, and the rest is history. Bob is Robert Ennis Turoff, her husband of 46 years, who founded The Golden Apple exactly 291 productions and nearly 37 years ago, in a World War II era building that was once a Morrison’s Cafeteria. Golden Apple opened in December 1971 with a production of Stop the World I Want to Get Off, starring Betty Buckley. “Bob is a genius,” MacDonald says. “He knows how to produce. We’re the only theater in town that doesn’t get any public funding. We don’t live on the public tit.” They are doing so well, they will be opening a second Golden Apple Dinner Theatre in Lakewood Ranch’s San Marco Plaza. “Hopefully in the first quarter of 2008,” Turoff says. It 38 : : arts and culture magazine
Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 Contents Extra! Extra! Modern Times Gallery Interview - Jopseph Caulkins Exhibitions Dodi Reifenberg and Bradley Wester Profiles Center Stage Carnevale Horse Feathers Grill & Lounge Dancing on the Stage of Life Gallery Guide Calendar of Events Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page Cover1) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page Cover2) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 1) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 2) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 3) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 4) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 5) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 6) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 7) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 8) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 (Page 9) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Contents (Page 10) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Contents (Page 11) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Contents (Page 12) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Contents (Page 13) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Contents (Page 14) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Contents (Page 15) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Extra! 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(Page 17) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Modern Times Gallery (Page 18) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Modern Times Gallery (Page 19) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Interview - Jopseph Caulkins (Page 20) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Interview - Jopseph Caulkins (Page 21) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Exhibitions (Page 22) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Dodi Reifenberg and Bradley Wester (Page 23) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Profiles (Page 24) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Profiles (Page 25) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Profiles (Page 26) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Profiles (Page 27) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Center Stage (Page 28) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Center Stage (Page 29) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - 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November/December 2007 - Carnevale (Page 58) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Carnevale (Page 59) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Carnevale (Page 60) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Horse Feathers Grill & Lounge (Page 61) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Horse Feathers Grill & Lounge (Page 62) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Horse Feathers Grill & Lounge (Page 63) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Dancing on the Stage of Life (Page 64) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Dancing on the Stage of Life (Page 65) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Dancing on the Stage of Life (Page 66) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Dancing on the Stage of Life (Page 67) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Gallery Guide (Page 68) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Gallery Guide (Page 69) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Gallery Guide (Page 70) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Gallery Guide (Page 71) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 72) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 73) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 74) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 75) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 76) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 77) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 78) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 79) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 80) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 81) Arts & Culture Magazine - November/December 2007 - Calendar of Events (Page 82) Arts & Culture Magazine - 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