Vaudeville

In the one-man show Say Goodnight Gracie, when actor Frank Gorshin - in the guise of George Burns - talks about breaking into vaudeville at age 14, a slide of an audience in a vaudeville palace appears on a screen behind him. At the Hippodrome Theatre, Gorshin happens to be facing a live audience in a former vaudeville palace. The verisimilitude continues when he describes various vaudeville acts, from comics to singers to animal acts, many of which probably appeared on this very stage.

Eats Sushi King -- a longtime Columbia favorite -- is tucked next to a Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration and offers tasty food and an exceptionally pleasant ambience, page 18 Trips Just in time for Thanksgiving shopping, take a road trip out to the numerous markets in York County, page 28 Scene Notre Maison, a Charles Village teahouse and poetry cafe, celebrates its second anniversary Saturday. It offers events ranging from open-mike nights to game nights to philosophical "open chats."

Cindy Marvell's job keeps her constantly in touch with her inner child. Marvell performs with Lazer Vaudeville, a three-person troupe that combines traditional vaudeville tricks such as juggling with new forms of technology, such as laser lights. The group will perform at the Gordon Center on Sunday afternoon. A seasoned juggler, Marvell has performed with Lazer Vaudeville for about a decade, touring around the world. What started as an offhand childhood hobby became a passion and then a livelihood that she says keeps her young at heart.

EVER WISH your dog could fetch something more useful than a moldy old chew toy? Like say, a snack from the fridge, or sweater from the chair? Or wouldn't it be great, when surprise guests turn up, if Fido could be instructed to use that big, fluffy tail to give the furniture a quick dusting - maybe clear cobwebs out of some corners? Looks like there's hope for house pets to begin pulling their weight. In fact, lazy, old Bowser might have been holding out on us. There's some chance the dog not only can eat your homework, but also do it for you. Old assumptions about the limits of canine intelligence are being reconsidered because of the skills of Rico, a German border collie with a vocabulary of 200 words who can find and match an unfamiliar object with a term he's never heard before.

Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre's Gypsy is a strong season opener. Based on the early life of stripper Gypsy Rose Lee and her formidable stage mother, Mama Rose, Gypsy is set in the final days of vaudeville. Debuting in 1957, the only collaboration between Stephen Sondheim and Jule Styne boasts a great score filled with songs such as "Small World," "Let Me Entertain You," "All I Need Is the Girl" and "Everything's Coming up Roses." Making his Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre directing debut, veteran actor, director and playwright Alan Kootsher moves the action along swiftly through a variety of scene changes.

They have spent $62 million of public and private money to transform the Hippodrome Theater from a decrepit hulk on downtown Baltimore's west side into the region's sparkling showcase for Broadway shows. But a month before actors take the stage for opening night of The Producers, those guiding the theater's revival say the public does not seem to realize what a big change has taken place on North Eutaw Street. "I think it's still a well-kept secret in Baltimore," said Mark Sissman, president and chief executive of the Hippodrome Foundation Inc. "I was just with a bank manager, and she was shocked it was getting redone."

I was huffing up Charles Street the other morning when I glanced westward toward Lexington Street. There in the distance was a freshly painted wall. It said simply, "Stewart's." I was amazed. Someone has had the wit to restore a painted wall sign that had disappeared for so many years. Stewart's, of course, was the old department store at Howard and Lexington streets that closed about 23 years ago. The Weinberg Foundation, which owns the building, has restored this fine commercial structure.

Bob Hope, the wisecracking comedian with the ever-present golf club and trademark ski-slope nose, died of pneumonia late Sunday, two months after turning 100. The entertainer, who became an American institution renowned for his performances for U.S. troops and for his rapid-fire delivery, died at his home in Toluca Lake, Calif., surrounded by his family. With a career that began in the 1920s in vaudeville and continued into the mid-1990s on television, Mr. Hope was the nation's entertainer laureate.

What could be more fitting than a musical about senior citizens trying (albeit in bizarre fashion) to shake off the doldrums of old age -- brought to the stage by a group of older players with their unique brand of vim and vigor? That ensemble is Howard County's own Fabulous Fifty Plus Players, a troupe of actors known for bringing plays, revues and vignettes to nursing homes and retirement communities in the area. The show the troupe will present over the next two weekends at Howard County Center for the Arts in Ellicott City is "70, Girls, 70," the quirky 1971 musical by John Kander and Fred Ebb, the pair responsible for such mega-hits as "Cabaret," "Chicago" and "Kiss of the Spider Woman."