Tony Danza is holding Iowa closer once more, as the veteran actor and song-and-dance man will perform at Davenport’s Rhythm City Casino this Saturday, May 13.
The irrepressible 72-year-old native of Brooklyn, N.Y. is a graduate of the University of Dubuque, and he played at that Iowa city last October. Danza earned a bachelor’s degree in history in 1972 from the University of Dubuque, which he attended on a wrestling scholarship, and he’s attended his 40th and 50th college reunions there.
His live show has continuously entertained audiences around the country since debuting at the world-famous Cafe Carlyle in New York City in 2015. The New York Times has raved: “Tony’s a live wire who tap-dances, plays the ukulele, tells stories and radiates irresistible charm… He exudes the kind of charisma that can’t be taught!”
Broadway World said, “His voice and showmanship is a welcome reminder of why the standards are just that-because they’re timeless.”
“The man has true stage presence like we don’t see anymore. His singing voice is on par with any of the great performers of yesteryear or any year. Seeing Tony Danza on stage in your lifetime is a must, said Scott Spears of WWGH Radio.
The 8 p.m. Davenport show (“Standards & Stories”) is billed as merging “timeless music with wit, charm, storytelling, and a dash of soft shoe and ukulele performances, Danza performs a selection of his favorite standards from the Great American Songbook while interweaving stories about his life and personal connection to the music.”
He started singing after a major skiing accident in 1993, when he almost died and was in intensive care for three weeks, the actor told Local 4 in a Tuesday interview.
“It was like the mob got me. I was thinking, there were some dire predictions on what was gonna happen to me – would I be able to walk?” he said.
“What was I gonna do with this second chance? What I really wanted to do was be a song-and-dance man. I always wanted to do that.”
In the last eight years, Danza has made a living doing precisely that. He’s performed at New York City’s ritzy Café Carlyle since 2015.
Well established as a song-and-dance man, he has starred on Broadway in The Producers, A View from the Bridge, and received rave reviews for his performance in the Broadway musical comedy, Honeymoon In Vegas.
A 2013 New York Times review of a pre-Broadway “Honeymoon in Vegas” said Danza’s Tommy Korman “may be the best musical portrayal of a gentleman gangster since the heyday of ‘Guys and Dolls.’ His clipped, near-monotonal speaking and singing style is all mellow, mellow menace, which allows him to ring a variety of friendly and sinister nuances from the word ‘arrangement’.”
Inspired in high school
Danza can see the luxury Carlyle Hotel (35 E. 76th Street in Manhattan, rooms starting at $1,029 a night) from his apartment, and he had a fantasy about playing there since 11th grade.
The teacher who directed his high school musicals heavily influenced the young Tony. In his senior year, Danza played Luther Billis in “South Pacific,” and the director used to see the great Bobby Short (1924-2005) at the Carlyle.
“He would regale us with these tales of this café, this unbelievable hotel, this café society and Bobby Short, what he played, what he didn’t play, who was there, how dinner was and to me, it was just really, it sounded fantastic,” he said.
Danza found a piano player (John Oddo) after getting his first gig there, to arrange like 15 songs in less than a month. The veteran Oddo was Rosemary Clooney’s music director and main arranger for Woody Herman.
“This guy was unbelievable; he wrote so many great arrangements for me,” Danza said. “This guy was playing for me, so how bad can I be? It gave me a boost, it really did.”
He’s been playing the same act ever since, even though Oddo died April 2, 2019. Danza has a young piano player now, Joe Davidian. “This band is sounding so great,” he said. “It’s this amazing progression and I’m a regular there.”
Danza said the act is just so much fun, like some of TV’s old variety shows.
“I’m the host and all the acts,” he joked. “I’m the variety show, so you do get a modicum of laughs; you get some stories. It’s not just coming listening to a guy sing.”
Connecting with Sinatra
Danza sings from the Great American Songbook, and he talks about his mom’s influence during the show. He recalled while he cleaned the house on Saturdays growing up, she played Frank Sinatra albums.
“That’s how it started,” Danza said. “I can’t tell ya how many times I sang along with him, because I just loved it. I tried to learn every intonation. Then I end up knowing him, which is the craziest.”
Danza first met Ol’ Blue Eyes in 1981 while filming “Cannonball Run II,” and he got to hang out with him.
“It was beyond anything you could imagine,” he recalled. “Sammy Davis and Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra, it’s heady. Billy Wilder became my friend.”
Danza’s mother was a huge Sinatra fan, he said.
“When you tread on the hallowed ground of Sinatra songs – you’re not an imitator, you’re not trying to do it with his arrangements. You’re just trying to sing those songs – it’s daunting and it’s a little unnerving,” he said. “To sing ‘One for My Baby’ with just a piano at the Carlyle Hotel is pretty, strap on, baby.”
An even greater thrill was when he got introduce Sinatra to his mom in 1989, when he guest starred on “Who’s the Boss?” (1984-1992).
Danza starred in two of TV’s most cherished and long-running series, Taxi and Who’s The Boss, and in hit films such as Angels In Outfield, She’s Out of Control, Hollywood Knights, and Don Jon.
He received an Emmy nomination for his guest spot on The Practice, and has recently made special appearances on hit shows like Blue Bloods and Broad City.
Living the dream in music
“I wish I would have come up with this 20 years earlier,” Danza said of his music show. “It took me 20 years to get good at it.” He’s working on a new show in tribute to Sinatra.
He’s hoping to make a reboot of “Who’s the Boss,” which is in development, but delayed by the current writers’ strike.
“We think we can do a very, very interesting show, because of the times,” Danza said. “Norman Lear is one of our producers, and if you think of the shows that he put on, that were delving into issues, I think we have a chance to do something like that.”
“The conversation about our cultural differences is as great as it was when ‘All In the Family’ was on, so I think we could make some hay with that,” he said. “I think there’s something there, and I think it’s gonna happen.”
Created by Martin Cohan and Blake Hunter, Who’s the Boss? ran from 1984 to 1992 on ABC. It was produced by Norman Lear’s Embassy Communications, which Sony acquired as part of its 1991 deal for Columbia Pictures. The studio and Lear have collaborated on several updates of the legendary producer’s shows in recent years, including Netflix and Pop TV’s One Day at a Time, an animated version of Good Times set at Netflix and ABC’s Live in Front of a Studio Audience specials.
Lear and his Act III Productions partner Brent Miller will executive produce Who’s the Boss? with Dan Farah of Farah Films, who brought the sequel to Sony with the stars Danza and Alyssa Milano attached.
Danza was intimidated first joining the “Taxi” cast, as a 27-year-old professional boxer with no professional acting experience.
“They welcomed me with open arms,” he recalled. “And it was because of that welcome that I was able to thrive. I was talking to Judd about it the other day, and said, ‘You’re Judd Hirsch, and you said, ‘Welcome’ as opposed to ‘What are you doing here?’”
“I was blissfully ignorant,” he said of the late ‘70s. “And here I am – it’s because of that welcome, I really believe that.”
Danza posted on Twitter a recent photo of his “Taxi” gang, including co-stars Judd Hirsch, Christopher Lloyd and Carol Kane.
“We are the closest group, it’s incredible,” he said, calling show co-star Marilu Henner “the straw that stirs the drink.” During COVID shutdowns, she arranged a monthly Zoom call among the cast, for 2-3 hours. “I’m making pasta and it’s incredible. We really do love each other and we’ve been there for each other for so long.
“We’re in one of the greatest shows of all time,” Danza said. “I think it hasn’t gotten the acclaim that it deserves.”
“That really is the foundation of all our careers. It really is gratifying to still be together,” he said.
Danza has a teen acting program in New York called “The Stars of Tomorrow.” “When you teach a kid how to act, you teach a kid how to act. That’s my slogan,” he said.
It’s a stand-alone nonprofit, and “Taxi” star Danny DeVito and James L. Brooks funded it for a year. That’s also been a dream.
Danza most recently starred in the Hulu original film, Darby and the Dead, Power Book III: Raising Kanan on Starz, the Netflix series The Good Cop, There’s Johnny on Hulu, and the animated feature, Rumble, for Paramount. He will next be seen in the new season of And Just Like That, the sequel to Sex in The City, on HBO Max, and the upcoming season of Power Book III: Raising Kanin.
For more information on Danza, visit his website HERE.
