What Ever Happened to Baby Jan Crouch?

Huey Lewis is appearing in Chicago. No, not the “Color My World” band but the musical. Huey Lewis? Huey Lewis! I know he does have the credentials of being in an Altman film and all, but do I really want to plop down $70 or more bucks to go see this guy in a 32-year-old musical?

This, and the surprising popularity of my Jan Crouch Declares Holy War video, got me to wondering what it would be like if some really good bad performers were given to chance to go on stage for some really good bad productions.

And heading that list would have to be the beloved pink head herself in Whatever Happened to Baby Jan Crouch? with Tammy Faye Bakker as Blanche. Maybe Tammy Faye is too obvious of a choice, and a post-White House Laura Bush might work better. Would Jan leave her lucrative career of bilking grocery money from old ladies for he pink wigs and rococo TV sets for the stage? Perhaps if it was pitched to her as a ministry in which she could hawk her love gifts after the show and ask people to plead for salvation it might just sell. FIlling out the cast could be where the real fun comes in, starting with Clay Aiken as Edwin, her accompaniest. I think this might be away for Jan to get in touch with her spiritual side that the confines of the glitz and heavy handed money grubbing of televangelism simply does not allow. Beneath Jan's shimmering pink veneer, I think there is a deeply spiritual person longing to let her true colors be shown to the world. I'm praying for you, Jan.

But perhaps Jan should consider hitting the stage with her husband Paul, and I think the idea of the two of them in a production of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? sends chills up my spin. Just hearing Jan’s Florida twang wrapping itself around “You’re at the meat of it, baby,” gives me a great thrill. And what a chance for them to tell the uncoverted about the evils of alcohol once the curtain falls.So, if that one sold, what would we follow it up with? Love Letters with Bill and Hilary Clinton and then with Tony Blair and George W. Bush?

Soiled politicians make great fodder for late night TV and the stage. With Mark Foley now "in rehab" (translation: working on his six-figure confessional memoir), Jim McGreevey is warming his seat on the Daily Show and magazine covers where we'll likely see Foley come Valentine's Day. So why not have Foley and McGreevey together in a stage version of The Birdcage, some may ask. It's set in Florida anyway. Well, for one thing McGreevey is actually kind of cute, and I wouldn't get too bent out of shape if he were sending me suggestive e-mails. But Mark Foley? Eww... I'd rather see him as Brick in a production of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof with Katherine Harris as Maggie, Jeb Bush as Goober and Janet Reno as Big Daddy.

And while Mr. T is destined to star in the King and I, finding the proper Anna is difficult. Although something perfectly wrong such as casting Suzanne Somers or Loni Anderson sort of makes sense, perhaps the properly spunky gal with the right accent such as Sheena Easton or Amanda Donahoe might work even better. Nancy Reagan is perhaps a bit too frail to reunite with Mr. T, but the idea is worth considering. Hearing Mr. T's raspy query "Shall we dance -- fool?" is the stuff of Broadway legend. Though perhaps Nancy should save her energy for the roadshow version of Grey Gardens and serve as a form of reconciliation with daughter Patty Davis in the role of Little Edie.

Oh, I am sure there are more, better, ones. Like Erik Estrada as Lancelot in Camelot as once mentioned on Northern Exposure. Surely there’s a really good, bad Valerie Bertinelli musical waiting to happen. Perhaps the title role of Gypsy with Meredith Baxter Bernie as Mama Rose. No, that’s too obvious.

Calista Flockhart and Jenna Elfman are a that appropriately freshly washed up stage to be in something really bad…like a musical version of The Odd Couple as a musical with the roles gender-switched.

Aw, well. I sound a tad too cynical, don’t I? I’ve not even talked about which musical I’d want to star in.