Marie Osmond Brings Solo Show To AMT
by Mary Ellen Wright
August 14, 2011
Marie Osmond is a bit behind on her schedule of phone interviews with the media.
She apologizes, unleashes a lyrical laugh, and explains: "My kids were playing with my phone, on my apps, and they didn't tell me. And they turned the volume off." Hence, the missed calls to her Las Vegas home.
It's just another day in the life of a working mother — her children range in age from 8 to 28 — who also happens to be a chart-topping country singer, Broadway and television actress, weight-loss spokeswoman, doll designer, talk-show host, TV dancing-competition finalist and half of a famous brother-and-sister act.
The musical aspects of Osmond's ever-evolving career will be on display Thursday, Aug. 25, at Lancaster's American Music Theatre, in one of just six solo concerts she'll perform while she and her brother, Donny, are on a short break from their long-running Las Vegas variety show.
"I could have taken some time off," Osmond said. "But I've had so many incredible Facebook and Twitter comments (from my fans) … and they say, 'We love the Vegas show but we want to hear your songs.' And I haven't toured for 15 years, 14 years, something like that.
"And so I thought, 'You know what? Let's take two weeks and get out there on the bus and have some fun.'!\p"
She said fans have told her they want to hear some of her 1980s country hits, such as "You're Still New to Me" and "Meet Me in Montana" — No. 1 country duets with Paul Davis and Dan Seals, respectively — and "There's No Stopping Your Heart."
Others want her to perform selections from her 2010 inspirational CD, "I Can Do This," or the songs she recorded with Donny back in the '70s.
"I'm going to try to give them what they want in a fun, unique way," Osmond said. "We're gonna kick some booty."
She said some show tunes also will be on the set list of her concert, titled "A Little Bit Country … and a Whole Lot More." Osmond starred in "The King and I" on Broadway and in a national tour of "The Sound of Music."
She'll also show some video clips that reflect her decades in showbiz.
"I guess I'm kind of a little bit eclectic and a little unusual — unique, I guess — in the sense that I sing many styles of music," Osmond said. She promised the show, in which she'll be backed by a four-piece band, "will be really laid back. We'll do some fun stuff with the audience. … I think people will have a good time."
Osmond said she might also sing "Pie Jesu," the soaring choral piece from Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Requiem" that she regularly performs and dedicates to the memory of her late son, Michael.
While some celebrities avoid comment and put a hand up in front of the camera lens, Osmond has always worn both her vulnerability and her strength on her sleeve — facing her private trials in a very public way.
She wrote a book about the severe postpartum depression she suffered after the birth of one of her eight children. She shared raw emotion and tears with Oprah Winfrey and a national TV audience last year after her 18-year-old son took his own life; he had battled depression.
After struggling with her weight in an unforgiving industry, Osmond lost 50 pounds and became a successful Nutrisystem pitchwoman. And after going through two divorces, she emerged, beaming, from the Las Vegas Mormon Temple in May, after remarrying her first husband, Steven Craig.
The little sister of the toothy and talented Osmond Brothers distinguished herself from her pop-group siblings with the 1973 country-crossover hit "Paper Roses." She and Donny hosted the "Donny and Marie" TV variety show in the late '70s.
Osmond, 51, has also starred in TV movies and series, hosted a daytime talk show with Donny, and quickstepped her way to the finals of ABC's 2007 season of "Dancing with the Stars."
She is approaching her 20th anniversary as the designer of her own line of collectible dolls, which she regularly sells on the QVC shopping network. The Children's Miracle Network charity she co-founded nearly three decades ago with actor John Schneider has reportedly raised $4 billion for children's hospitals around the country.
And Osmond and her brother have just released a video for "The Good Life," the first single off their contemporary country CD, "Donny & Marie" — the first album they've recorded together in more than 30 years.
So what hasn't Osmond done? A soap opera, you say?
Not so fast. Sometime in the fall, Osmond will make a guest-star turn on CBS' "The Bold and the Beautiful," on which her good friend, Adam Gregory, plays the character of Thomas Forrester.
Osmond's role "will be one of those characters that pops in and out," she said. "I'm doing it because I know Adam, and because I think it would be fun.
"At this point in my life, I've done everything except that."
Marie Osmond will perform at 8 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 25, at American Music Theatre, 2425 Lincoln Highway East. For ticket information, call 397-7700 or visit amtshows.com.
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