Liz Callaway

Her sister, the lounge singer Ann Hampton Callaway, has had the smoother career.

She actually first appeared in the famous flop, Sondheim's "Merrily We Roll Along", yet does not appear to have taken part in the documentary of it, "The Best Worst Thing That Could Have Happened" a couple years ago. Hmmmm.....?

She also played the thankless wife role of Ellen in the dreary original production of "Miss Saigon", looking more like Willy Falk's mother than his wife. They were both terribly miscast, but her somewhat matronly look didn't do her career any favors.

Liz is a far superior singer to that blubbery sister of hers who has made a career of imitating black women.

Liz is not a good actress, but she has become a good solo performer in clubs, and is a nice person to work with.

The show tune queen

Because of her male pattern baldness, which even her airbrushed headshot can't hide.

Saw Liz in that short-lived Bacharach revue. She was awful.

The Bacharach show was terrible and ill-conceived. She sang the songs well, but the show was pointless. It was the first time I saw Capathia Jenkins, who is a great performer now.

She’s likable (they both are) but rather white bread and bland

R3, I think you're full of shit. Anne Hampton Callaway is a fantastic singer and performer.

It blows my mind she has played Norma Desmond.

Ann is an empty barrel. Loud, soulless and cheezy. She makes me cringe. Liz can convey warmth and sincerity.

R9. "Like her? Dyke, ya know!"

Same problem most musical theatre, Broadway-centric actors have: no sense of style or care for personal appearance. She has no compelling look or personality. This, in entertainment, should be anathema, but since so many in the Broadway world shop at Conway and don’t think twice about looking like a sub-average slob most of the time, average audience members, who are looking around to be dazzled by something, anything, simply won’t be drawn to a plain-Jane cypher, no matter how great the voice.

Literally just came home from a Liz Calloway concert in Westchester, NY. She sounds amazing and is funny!

[quote] It was the first time I saw Capathia Jenkins, who is a great performer now.

Me, too. I think that was Capathia's first show. She is great.

I love Liz and goto hear her whenever I can. I loved her in the Bachrach musical which everyone hated. I also loved her in an off-broadway production of The Spitfire Grill. She was great in that. I wish she got more roles. Her voice is flawless.

She has, unfortunately, become the sidekick of Seth Rudetsky. Seth's Broadway Cruise is where careers go to die.

Is she a carpet muncher?

R18 No, but her sister (Ann Hampton Callaway) is.

Ann Hampton has been munching on a whole lot more than carpet. She has eaten herself out of a career.

Liz is no great thespian...

A poor man’s Bette Midler!

Did Ann have to munch on Fran Drescher's carpet in order to get that gig on "The Nanny?"

She wrote a song for one of the worst films I've ever seen. Alec Baldwin is blind... and in love with...Demi Moore who now looks like Auschwitz Catherine Keener. Tacky and not in a fun way.

She can't act. Plain and simple.

I've loved her and her voice since the early 80s. She's always worked steadily in theater and played Grizabella for years during the original run of Cats.

I used to listen to this a lot after my partner died.

r27 very sorry for your loss. Might I suggest Billie Holiday's version. Real emotion.

I’m not particularly a fan but I thought she was perfect for the singing voice of Anastasia Romanov.

LIz was a Lez.

Here she is singing a duet with the amazing Lea Salonga. They have similar voices. Incidentally, they both voiced Princess Jasmine in the Aladdin Disney franchise (Lea in the original film, Liz in the sequels).

I still watch Anastasia.

No shame, R32. It’s a stunning animation with a lovely score.

And there’s those palaces & jewels! And the divine Angela Lansbury as Empress Marie.

r33 But......Meg Ryan. I try to forget Meg Ryan.

Does anyone other than me own this album?

her Norma

Jesus Christ, even as a toddler, Ann looked like she was about to stomp Tokyo.

R36 Pittsburgh? Doesn't she know the only role one plays in Pittsburgh is Mother Cabrini ...during lent.

Liz Callaway is the poor man's (fill in the blank)

(fill in the blank) is the poor man's Liz Callaway

Liz Callaway is the poor man's Liza Callaway.

She has a great voice, but there's something so bland about her. I remember growing up listening to her sing Princess Odette in The Swan Princess.

I'm having a hard time picturing her as someone like Norma Desmond or Mama Rose or any role where a lot of personality is involved. She still seems more like a Betty Schaffer - the bland, inoffensive romantic lead that we forget about as soon as the curtain call is over.

Thanks, r28. I meant to mention that the melody for I'll Be Seeing You is lifted almost note for note from Mahler's 3rd Symphony and Mahler was Gary's religion.

And Billie, of course, is sublime.

I'm on my second Sibling Revelry CD. Wore out the first one.

[quote] I'm on my second Sibling Revelry CD. Wore out the first one.

How, dear? By setting highballs on it?

Both sisters are glib and lack substance. At least Liz is pleasant.

At a performance of Baby on 1984, I was among the members of the audience who were stunned by Liz singing "The Story Goes On".

*in.

Dan, is that you?

As someone noted above, she's not a good actress. But she is an excellent singer IMO. While I love Sibling Revelry, her earlier CD The Story Goes On is a must-have, if only for her version of "Meadowlark," which is the best I've ever heard (and that includes LuPone and Buckley). Even curmudgeon John Simon thought Callaway's version of the song was the best he'd heard. The song is also on Sibling Revelry, but I like the studio version a bit better.

Like a lot of Broadway singers, she doesn't have anything particularly "distinctive" about her which is why she isn't a star, but I love her in concert.

Ann has a terrific voice as well but on her recent disks she tries too hard on songs like "Blues In The Night" and "At Last." She wants to be soulful, but she really is too white-bread to get away with it, though she must be aware of it to some degree given that she wrote a song called "The 'I'm Too White To Sing the Blues' Blues." He best disc IMO is the Ella tribute - she has good musicians and handles the songs well.

Leave the soulful to the great Dianne Reeves.

I feel like Liz was the start of that theatre actor epidemic that's still going on now. It's like a bunch of people who are clearly talented and can act, sing, and dance a little, but they all feel like they should be in an ensemble. Whenever they get a chance to really strut their stuff and play a lead, it's a one way ticket to dullsville.

I see it so much these days. It's like they're training these kids to blend in, because the only jobs they'll get at first are chorus jobs, but then once they're given the chance to shine, they've forgotten what made them interesting to begin with (or maybe some of them were never interesting in the first place).

I don't see many LuPones, Channings, or Mermans in our future.

There is white bread and then there is the total lack of empathy. Ann knows how to put on a show, but she lacks any genuine emotion. Sometimes one sees the imitation of emotion, but it's painful to watch. I don't think a connection to the song is too much to ask. Her appropriation of black culture is insulting. She is a white woman who serves up black culture for the comfortable consumption of old white folks. Liz is very genuine, and my company has hired her to sing a few times over the years.

Ann is a big fat person, yes?

That Nanny theme song is really catchy...

Catchy, like the plague.

Judging from OPs photo, Liz Callaway has a cheap dye job, cheap makeup, cheap haircut, cheap clothes. Cheap, cheap, cheap. Remember that line from MASTER CLASS, when Callas tells the student she needs to have “a look.” What’s endemic amongst Broadway types is a complete lack of attention to their look. If you want to be a star, you must LOOK like one. This is so fundamental that one must wonder if this is just cluelessness or abject laziness. As Katharine Hepburn said, “be fascinating.” A great deal of being a star is how you carry yourself offstage. She looks like she walked right out of that short-lived Midwest mall store from the early 80s, County Seat. Pick up a magazine, see how glamorous women present themselves. Model yourself after them. Get a clue, and you’ll get more work and attention from the public.

Met Ann once. She repeated herself four times saying that she was dating a diva. Yuck

Bet your ass, r55!