Category Archives: Dazzler of the Day

Earlier this month, Chad Putman turned 48 years old and moved to San Juan, Puerto Rico in an effort to recharge and take advantage of a mid-life opportunity. I like that take on what others have traditionally dismissed as a mid-life crisis, and changing woe-is-me perspectives and feelings of powerlessness are two tenets of Putman’s latest endeavor. His website and mantra of Make Your It Happen is a treasure-trove of inspiration and aspiration, and Putman’s indefatigable spirit is gloriously infectious. That’s not to say he’s lost in the clouds and unaware of the reality of life – quite the opposite – he acknowledges and embraces those trying moments, turning them into lessons and signposts of when and how to change and evolve. He’s taken his years of experience and turned them into a hybrid that may have been his destiny all along, in the form of one triumphant triumvirate: Consultant, Coaching & Project Development. For all of that, Putman earns his first Dazzler of the Day crowning. Check out his website here, and follow the journey on his YouTube channel here. 

IYKYK.

This is Jack Smith.

Jack is the Dazzler of the Day.

See Jack indict.

Thank you, Jack.

(Next installment: Mr. Smith goes to Washington.)

Hot off their recent Tony Award for their performance in ‘Shucked’ (which actually looked, and more importantly sounded, like a gleeful musical romp) Alex Newell may now add Dazzler of the Day to an already-impressive resume. Their work includes a celebrated turn on ‘Glee’, but I was more astounded by their talent when I got to see them in the glorious revival of ‘Once On This Island’ a few years ago. Now I’ve added ‘Shucked’ to my wish list in the hopes of witnessing Newell on stage again. 

His ‘Problemattic World Tour‘ is all but sold-out for the next year, including four shows at nearby Proctor’s Theater (to which I’d hoped to score tickets but arrived a few hours too late) and he is easily one of the hottest comedians storming stages today. I caught on to his magic a long time ago, when his Tik Tok drops would send me to sleep laughing my ass off thanks to several viral audience interactions and his talented way of working a crowd into a riotous frenzy. The fact that he is easy on the eyes makes the whole package seem too good to be true, and Matt Rife earns this Dazzler of the Day for making us all laugh without resorting to crude or cheap shots, and piercing through to the heart inherent in the best humor. 

Sara Bareilles wrote one of the best pop songs of the new millennium in the form of ‘Brave’, but to limit her bottomless reservoir of talent to a pop tune is to miss an incredible body of work, such as her song-writing and musical theater genius (she wrote the score for ‘Waitress’ and later appeared in the titular role). More recently, she could be seen and heard treading the boards in the revival of ‘Into the Woods’. She earns this Dazzler of the Day for a career of Grammy, Olivier, Tony, Emmy, Drama Desk, Outer Circle Desk Award nominations and wins. 

During the ‘Sunset Boulevard’ musical obsession that dominated my life in the mid 1990’s, one of the shows that I attended had the stalwart Alan Campbell (another Alan who spells his name correctly) out and his understudy in – and that was the night I became fully aware of Bryan Batt and his brilliance. He took the role of Joe Gillis and made it his own – not an easy feat given how accustomed many of us had become to Mr. Campbell. Batt matched the ferocious but fragile performance of his leading lady Betty Buckley to create an evening of musical theater magic. 

A few years later, I was at a Sunday brunch in the South End of Boston and noticed Batt at a nearby table; to my regret and shame, I was too shy and socially anxious to approach him and offer my accolades on that ‘Sunset’ performance, so all these years later this is my small way of making up for that. 

He’s carved out an impressive theatrical resume – highlights of which include the aforementioned ‘Sunset’ run, a scene-chomping turn in ‘Jeffrey’, a suave, smarmy, and poignantly nuanced role on ‘Mad Men‘ (a role which should have gone on for far longer than it did), and several other Broadway behemoths such as ‘Cats’, ‘Starlight Express’, ‘Beauty and the Beast’, ‘The Scarlet Pimpernel‘, and ‘Saturday Night Fever’. A true Renaissance man who dabbles in all forms of beauty and art, Batt and his husband own a home furnishings and gift store, Hazelnut, that is on my bucket list to visit in New Orleans. He’s also written two books, ‘She Ain’t Heavy, She’s My Mother: A Memoir’ and ‘Big Easy Style’. Taken together, it’s more than an honor to name him as Dazzler of the Day. 

Today marks the opening of the much-anticipated and discussed live-action remake of Disney’s 1989 animated classic ‘The Little Mermaid’. Like every good gay boy of a certain age, I dutifully listened to the soundtrack inside and out during the years following its release, perfecting every number from the wondrously wistful ‘Part of Your World’ (and its hair-flipping reprise) to the sinister machinations of ‘Poor Unfortunate Souls’. Riding the crest of the new movie is Halle Bailey, whose voice soars as expected – Bailey earns this Dazzler of the Day for that alone, but she’s got a few Grammys in her pocket in case anyone needed reminding. 

I’m old enough to have attended the first staging of ‘Here Lies Love’ – the fabulous imagining of an Imelda Marcos musical that is everything you expect such a thing to be and quite a bit more – and seeing that it is returning in even more magnificent form (a proper Broadway theater reconfigured for the immersive magic that formed such a key component of this show) makes me giddy and ready to return to New York. Resuming the role of Ferdinand Marcos is Jose Llana, whose initial take on that polarizing figure was as captivating as it needed to be to showcase how he could attain such popularity and power. Llana earns this Dazzler of the Day for capturing such lightning twice.

It takes a formidable performer to step into the many shoes of Imelda Marcos, and in the new staging of ‘Here Lies Love’ Arielle Jacobs is hellbent on proving that she has the vocal chops and emotional fortitude to transform into the former First Lady of the Philippines. Based on her previous performances in such demanding material as ‘In the Heights’, Jacobs seems a shoo-in for a fabulous showing, and I can’t wait to get tickets for this all-Filipino version of that wondrous show. Jacobs earns this Dazzler of the Day for all of her stage work, including appearances in such classics as ‘Into the Woods’, ‘Wicked’, and ‘Aladdin’. More magic is surely on the way with ‘Here Lies Love’.