remembering a different Hollywood

Published in The Post-Star (D1)
9/9/05

These days, the news from Hollywood seems to be all about who has the most money, the best plastic surgeon, or the messiest divorce. But George Bookasta lives in the glow of memories of a different Hollywood, one where names like Greta Garbo or Ginger Rogers created a stir when dropped into conversation -- a time when women wore elegant hats and knew how to dance a foxtrot.

It's this sentiment that informs his new musical comedy, "Dear Femininity," which opens Saturday at the Saratoga Arts Council.

The show, which Bookasta wrote, produced and directed, has a one-woman cast -- Annie Wiley. The plot is based on her own real-life journey as an emerging performer whose career was launched by a chance encounter with Bookasta about seven years ago. Wiley was selling cosmetics at Bloomingdale's, making her coworkers laugh by crouching down behind the counter to imitate the doll that stars in the "Chuckie" horror movies. Impressed by her "vibrant face" and comic talent, Bookasta invited her to audition for a commercial he was directing.

"She couldn't read worth a dime .. .but when I heard her lovely, melodic voice, I knew I could develop it," recalls Bookasta. He taught her how to add phrasing and Sinatra-style drama to her voice, and helped her book performances at hotels throughout southern California. Then he decided she deserved a bigger stage, so he wrote "Dear Femininity."

Bookasta won't say how old he is, exactly, but he's got at least 80 years worth of stories to tell. He's been involved with the performing arts since a Hollywood talent scout picked him out as a 5-year-old with a knack for vaudeville in Kansas City, Mo. Bookasta appeared as a child actor in several silent films with legends such as Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks in the 1920s and 30s. He made many famous friends during his long career, which also included stints as a set estimator for Paramount, an editor for TV Time magazine, and an Army radio operator during World War II.

He began directing television commercials in the late 1960s.
"Having directed so many women, I never wanted to date actresses," says Bookasta, but he made an exception for Ginger Rogers and Joan Fontaine. He credits his "appreciation for femininity" to his father, a traveling salesman who sold women's undergarments.

In 2001, Bookasta brought Wiley to New York City to rehearse for the premiere of "Dear Femininity." According to Bookasta, the show was in its final stages of rehearsal at "one of the major theaters" in Manhattan when 9/11 changed everything. Theaters were shuttered for months in the aftermath, and the show opened instead in Irvington, N.Y.

That seemed to be the beginning of a run of bad luck for Bookasta. In 2002, a car accident left him with a cracked vertebrae that still hampers his gait. Not long after he moved to Saratoga Springs last year, his prized mare, Alylivia, went lame. Then he went through a vicious bout of pneumonia.

Yet none of this has doused his "desire, drive, and determination" -- the mantra he considers the key to personal success. He's realistic about the odds that "Dear Femininity" will attract a major audience.

"I put my own money into the show, and I expect to lose some," admits Bookasta. "But it's a joy."