In an event that was rescheduled from a couple of weeks ago, journalist and editor Regan Hofmann visits River Road Books to read from and sign her memoir, I HAVE SOMETHING TO TELL YOU.

They don’t have a whole rack devoted to remaindered tie-ins to old WB network shows. There’s not an entire aisle of get-rich-quick guides or karmic astrology dayplanners. In fact, the entire square footage of their shop probably adds up to less than they devote to Lindt chocolates over at the local B&N superstore. But what the owners of River Road Books in Fair Haven have is stories — the kind that are crammed between the covers of their biblio-boutique (a cranny of culture comfortably coccooned between a friendly neighborhood cleaner and one of the Shore’s most sublime bakeries), not to mention the kind that come directly from people whose passion is creating words and pictures.

Now, we’ve been known to take advantage of the late hours, sit-down cafe and “free” magazines at Borders on many a dreary night — but where the four(!) owners of River Road Books (Sharon Everett, Laurie Potter, Kim Robinson and Karen Rumage) have beaten the big chains at their own game is in the area of author appearances — setting up readings and signing events with such nationally known figures as former NY Giant (turned novelist) Mark Bavaro, network newsman Jack Ford and New Yorker cartoonist/ graphic novelist Marisa Acocella Marchetto. At the same time, the River Road renegades have made a concerted effort to spotlight the best of the prodigious talents who happen to hail from our own back yard — people like Red Bank children’s author and illustrator Elise Primavera, Rumson-based sailing expert and nautical-history novelist William H. White, and Little Silver’s own supermodel, “Soupermom” and safety advocate Farley Boyle. All of whom we’ve been pleased and proud to profile here in oRBit.

This month, the intimately-scaled indie does it again — not just once, but three times, beginning this Thursday evening with a special guest whose event was rescheduled from a supremely snowy February 25 — and continuing through March with two talented neighbors, one of whom is making a long-awaited and well-deserved homecoming.

Thursday’s 7:30pm event spotlights a memoir by a woman who, it’s been said, “seemed to have it all.” By which they mean beauty, brains, a Princeton pedigree, prep school, summers in the Hamptons, thoroughbred horse riding and a career in big-city publishing. For Regan Hofmann, however, “having it all” also meant being HIV-positive — a fact that she endeavored to conceal from the world at large since being diagnosed at age 25, until she decided to go public with what turns out to be a remarkable story. Now the editor in chief of POZ Magazine, the elegant and tireless advocate for HIV issues and awareness has composed her story as I Have Something to Tell You, a volume that’s been acclaimed as “candid and inspiring.” Hofmann will share passages from her book in an event that’s free with the purchase of a signing copy; call (732)747-9455 to reserve, or email riverroadbooks@verizon.net. Then Continue Reading to see what other surprises are in store.

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Author Dwayne Raymond — pictured at right with the late author Norman Mailer — visits Red Bank on Tuesday night to promote MORNINGS WITH MAILER, his book about the years he spent as the literary lion’s editorial assistant, cook and friend.

By TOM CHESEK

He was called a lot of things in his time — working class champion and fame-hungry narcissist; sweet-natured guy and wifebeating misogynist; courageous activist and confrontational a-hole; a good friend and a great writer. During the 60 years that preceded his passing at age 84 in 2007, Norman Mailer staked a career-long claim on a position as alpha dog of American letters — in an era when writers were household celebs, sought-after guests, respected pundits, and above all, people who wrote what they damn well pleased.

From the time he punched his way into the literary scene with his breakthrough book The Naked and the Dead, Mailer wrote scores of well-known novels (The Pulitzer-winning Executioner’s Song), nonfictions (fellow Pulitzer winner Armies of the Night), biographies (Marilyn), essays (The White Negro), poems, plays, columns and correspondence. He also found time to run for Mayor of New York City, to co-found The Village Voice, and to direct a series of way-out, largely improvised 1960s films like Wild 90 and Maidstone — the latter of which climaxes with a real-life fight between a shirtless Mailer and a hammer-wielding Rip Torn.

And he was born in Long Branch, NJ, although you probably didn’t hear that from him.

A resident of Provincetown, Massachusetts in the last decade of his life, Mailer never deviated from his prolific pace — producing his last four books with the help of a young writer named Dwayne Raymond. It was Raymond — who Mailer met when the younger guy was waiting tables in a P-town bistro — that became the literary lion’s first and only editorial assistant, as well as personal cook and, most importantly, a good friend. And it’s that relationship that forms the basis of Mornings with Mailer: A Recollection of Friendship, a memoir that the Huffington Post contributor will be reading from, discussing and signing when he stops in Tuesday evening at NovelTeas Authors Aromas & Gifts on the Left Bank of Red Bank.

Established by Kim Widener as a home base and focal point for her nascent NovelTeas brand, the recently inaugurated book salon/ tea room/ gift boutique previously hosted financial-thriller journalist William D. Cohan (a followup appearance by The Happiness Project author Gretchen Rubin was snowed out and will be rescheduled for a later date). The 7pm event includes a signing copy of the book and a reception catered by Monmouth County’s own international celebri-chef David Burke (of David Burke Fromagerie and many other restaurants of renown). Admission is $45, and you can take it here to register. 

The event is also part of “Memoir March” over at NovelTeas, with the shop inviting guests to enjoy a complimentary cup of tea and share their own “six word memoir” (a la Hemingway’s profoundly brief “For sale: baby shoes, never worn”). Here at Red Bank oRBit (where it takes us six words just to tell you we love you), we’re happy to share this interview with wordsmith Raymond, available to all when you Continue Reading.

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At left, Susan Stein wrote and stars in ETTY, a one-woman theatrical presentation based on the journals of Esther “Etty” Hillesum (lower right), who died in the gas chamber at Auschwitz. The acclaimed solo piece was directed by Austin Pendleton (upper right) and will be presented tomorrow at Brookdale Community College.

Looking for something to do in the early part of a late-winter’s week? There’s a movie double feature playing tonight, as part of something called the Holocaust Genocide Film Education Program.

Or how about a play tomorrow night, presented by one of the greatest directors of the American stage, and hosted by an organization called the Holocaust, Genocide and Human Rights Education Center? 

If these don’t sound like your idea of a good time, you might just find yourself drawn to them nonetheless — not from some grudging guilt or a sense of having “done your part” simply by attending, but because their stories compel your attention, get into your head, invade your dreams. Shut you up. Kick your ass.

To most of us, “holocaust” conjures up visions in black and white — the grainy vintage footage of stacked corpses and walking skeletons in the liberated camps; the computer-tweaked monochromatics of Schindler’s List. It’s as if the mere mention of the word drains the color from the world — but the Community Relations Committee of the Jewish Federation of Monmouth County knows that the impulses that led to the capitalized Holocaust didn’t vanish when a nurse kissed a sailor in Times Square. As the JFMC’s Annual Holocaust Genocide Film Education Program spells out in tonight’s event, genocide exists in the here and now, and in living color.

Going on at 7pm (with a reception and awards ceremony preceding the screening at 6pm) at the Axelrod Performing Arts Center inside the JCC of Monmouth, the program entitled The Road to Recovery and Reconciliation features “two very powerful films which explore the psychological, emotional, and incredible path to living and reconciling with perpetrators of genocide.”

My Neighbor, My Killer is the first of the featured films; a documentary by San Francisco-based filmmaker Anne Aghion that examines “the moving journey to reconciliation in Rwanda between the incited Hutus and the families of massacred Tutsis.” The film (winner of the Human Rights Watch 2009 Nestor Almendros Prize for courage in filmmaking, and an Official Selection at the 2009 Cannes Film Festival) is paired with a selection of scenes from a documentary with a similar theme of healing against all odds — Children of the Third Reich, a film that “documents the implausible meeting of children of Holocaust survivors and children of Nazis.”

The program is free (suggested donations of $10 are welcomed toward the funding of future programs)and open to the public — and director Aghion will be there in person to participate in a panel discussion that also includes Jane Denny, Director of Education of the HGHREC at Brookdale, as well as children of Holocaust survivors and Rwandan genocide survivors. Reserve seating by calling (732)531-9100, extension 142.

There’s more going on Tuesday night in a different corner of Monmouth County — but if you think you know what to expect, think again.

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Stairway to heaven: Fitness professional, artist and catalyst for some pretty exciting things going on around Long Branch, the Reverend Chris Murphy is also the curator of this month’s elementally elegant art show at In Spirit Living. (Photo by Jeff Smith)

1. EARTH, SEA, SKY Group Show at In Spirit Living Studio. It’s just been a fistful of months since Christine “Reverend Chris” Murphy and Ksenia Poulber reconfigured their Yoga Studio in Long Branch’s Uptown Broadway neighborhood into a spirited space they called the Spiritual Art Gallery — a venue for regularly scheduled exhibits of work by some of the most iconoclastic characters on the local artscape (and a pretty swank spot for the occasional art party, too). Bursting with energy and ideas, the fitness professionals, artists and business partners at In Spirit Living have charmed their way across the snow-battered seaside city, taking the lead in the formation of the city’s new Arts and Business Coalition and forging a coalition from a lot of disparate subsets who didn’t always work toward common goals in the past. As you read this, Chris ‘n Ks are hard at work on the first of a planned Second Saturdays series of Imagine Long Branch art parties — this one a fundraising Masquerade Ball scheduled for April 10 at the eminently amazing Architectural Accents near LB City Hall. It’s a night featuring a mad mix of music (everything from the Brighton-bred garage psychedelia of Secret Syde to the Japanese gypsy folk of Kagero), multiple generations of poets (including oRBit fave Rock Wilk), an array of visual artists and catering that runs a happy gamut from Branches to the Nip & Tuck Bar! You’d best believe we’ll have full details on this affair coming soon; take it here to register. 

In the meantime, they’ll be rolling up the mats this Friday evening, for the fifth in their series of public-invited art receptions, one that invites attendees to “shake off the snow and come get ready for spring.” Curated and featuring work by Reverend Chris herself, EARTH, SEA, SKY is a group effort that also includes contributions by Caroline Urbania, Kristin Kruger, Josh Matson, Jane Craven and Ms. Poulber. There’s live music too, by Thor Fister (who you might recognize as frontman for A Diary of Need), as well as Sunny Daze. In Spirit Living is located on the second floor (suite 202) of 560 Broadway (corner of Pearl Street); free parking is available in the nearby municipal lot at Broadway and Branchport Avenue. Show runs through March 26; check website for hours. Friday, 7pm/ FREE

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Matt Levine and Neen are bachelor and bachelorette of the hour, as the Asbury Lanes Dating Game comes to the Shore’s favorite retro rec room on Friday. (Levine photo by Dustin Racioppi)

1. The Asbury Lanes Dating Game.  This is supposed to be the rundown on stage and film-themed activities for the weekend of March 5-7, but we had no idea how to categorize this item, so here we go: in a profile that appeared a couple of weeks ago in oRBit, we introduced you to 22-year-old Matt Levine, executive chef at Restaurant Plan B in Asbury Park, host of his own cooking demo series at the Cookman Avenue restaurant — and come Friday, the featured eligible bachelor for the first-ever Dating Game event at Asbury Lanes. Since then, the folks at the atom-age alterna-arts odditorium have added a segment in which guys can vie for a date with a featured bachelorette (one Neen of South River). It’s co-hosted by our old pal Gentleman Jim and DJ Values, and a complete tale o’ the tape on Levine-and-Neen’s vital stats — along with a sample list of questions — can be found here on the Lanes Facebook page. And if you’re able to tune in NBC40 out of South Jersey, watch for Matt and Plan B owner Jeffrey Haveson on Ed Hitzel’s dining segments, airing during the weekend news and Saturday Today shows. Friday, 8pm/ $8

2. The Spencers Theatre of Illusion at Count Basie Theatre. Partners in prestidigitation as well as in wedlock, Kevin and Cindy Spencer transform the Count’s crib into a Theatre of Illusion, with a road-tested roster of grand gags (many of them unique to their act) that includes an awesome Walk Through a Brick Wall, a Mind-Read with the entire audience, and the ever-popular Spikes of Doom. Check out our exclusive interview with the gifted Mr. Spencer right here.  Friday, 8pm/ $19.50, $29.50

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The distaff Defenders of the Faith that are Judas Priestess return to the Stone Pony — and we STILL resist making any “Jugulator” references.

1. Judas Priestess at the Stone Pony. Their formidable résumés feature stints in such bands as the all-female Crue tribute Girls Girls Girls, and the all-female Bowie tribute Ziggy Starlet (the singer’s also cut her teeth in Van Helsing’s Curse, the backing band of Nancy Sinatra and the cast of Jesus Christ Superstar). With the likes of Lez Zeppelin setting regional stages afire, the world has proven ready for Judas Priestess, an homage that received Rob Halford’s personal stamp of approval after notching just one gig. The Angels of Retribution (MilitiA, Gyda Gash, JoJo, Grace Wendroff and “D”) return to the Stoney atop a bill that further features Claire’s Well, Surgeon, Jaded Faith and SnakeHeart.   Friday, 8pm/ $10

2. The Nelson Riddle Studio Sessions at Tim McLoone’s Supper Club. A 17 piece orchestra led by Christopher Riddle brings the music of the late great composer/ arranger Nelson Riddle back to the stage of McLoone’s in Asbury for a pair of concerts showcasing the Rumson HS grad’s great hits (by Sinatra, Ella, Nat, Judy and more), favorite TV/movie themes and lasting legacy. Call (732)774-1155 for reservations, and make sure to check our interview with Riddle’s daughter Rosemary Acerra, right here in oRBit. Friday and Saturday, 8pm/ $79.95 incl. dinner

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As ye sew, so shall ye rip: A scene from REPO! THE GENETIC OPERA, the sci-fi musical cult phenom that makes its local screen debut this Saturday in Asbury Park — complete with live-actor accompaniment. And they said the movie musical was dead!

If you’re the sort of filmgoer who scrambles to catch up with all of the Oscar nominated pictures before Sunday night’s Academy Awards ceremony — a pretty daunting prospect now that there’s ten of them — may we recommend turning a Blind Side to the latest crop of overly Precious and Serious Basterds, and letting those last few discretionary dollars ride on a film that’s likely to have way more long-lasting cultural impact than Dances with Smurfs.

Positioned as a cross between Blade Runner and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, the cult phenomenon that is REPO! The Genetic Opera combines the cyber/slobberpunk esthetic of the former with the gorezone glam and fan-driven excitement of the latter. Originating as an underground stage show by Darren Smith and Terrance Zdunich (who, a la Richard “Riff Raff” O’Brien, plays a crucial supporting role as a graverobber), the 2008 film by Saw franchise director Darren Lynn Bousman plays out in a dystopian future society, where body-mod surgeries and organ transplants have become so mainstream that you can buy them on layaway like that three-piece sectional from Discount Bob’s. Only when they come to repossess your purchase in this case, they’ll be ripping more than just your sticky shirtless back from the vinyl slipcover.

Now if that sounds a whole lot like the forthcoming Jude Law movie Repo Men, bear in mind that the makers of this Genetic Opera did it first — and they did it to the tune of an all-singing soundtrack performed by an intriguing cast of TV heartthrobs, popculture princesses and actual operatic voices. There’s Paul Sorvino as Rotti Largo, head of the all-powerful replacement parts factory GeneCo. Paris Hilton is Amber, his surgery-addict daughter, while Ogre of the band Skinny Puppy is his masked son. Anthony Head of Buffy the Vampire Slayer is the ruthlessly efficient repo man Nathan; Alexa Vega (of Spy Kids!) is Nathan’s innocent daughter, and Sarah Brightman — that’s right, the ex-Mrs. Andrew Lloyd Webber — is an operatic protege.

A once-in-a-lifetime cast like that surely deserved a better fate than to be dumped by Lionsgate into a scattershot limited-release run that saw the movie screen in Mobile and Ottawa instead of New York and LA. But, beginning with a series of Road Tours undertaken by the writers — and picked up by a growing nationwide network of rabid fans — REPO! has returned with a vengeance to take possession of our hearts and minds, in a way that puts a supercharged social spin on the word-of-lips momentum generated by Rocky Horror in its midnight makeover.

Should any of this tantalize the taste buds, you’ve got a chance to be part of the event when REPO! comes to our fair Shore for the first time, in a Saturday night screening at The Showroom (Mike Sodano and Nancy Sabino’s nimble nickelodeon in downtown Asbury) that promises a little something more than popcorn breath and passive viewing.

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Bee-yootiful minds: The cast of THE 25th ANNUAL PUTNAM COUNTY SPELLING BEE heads back to school, as the Jersey Shore Arts Center hosts the area’s first production of the Tony winning musical comedy.

Last we reported in on Nick Montesano, the producer-director and his NENAproductions Theater Project were proud to announce that they’d scored something of a coup, being the first area troupe to produce a fully staged version of Jonathan Larson’s musical, RENT. In fact, not only did Montesano snap up the rights to the Tony and Pulitzer winner well ahead of anyone else on the Shore theater scene, he also secured the special-appearance services of original New York cast member Fredi Walker-Browne.

All in a day’s work for the resident stage company at the Jersey Shore Arts Center, that old-school (literally; it’s an old school) performance space at the corner of Main (Street) and Main (Avenue) in Ocean Grove. The community group has distinguished itself in a sometimes crowded field by disdaining the usual-suspects warhorses that have been done to zombified un-death — preferring instead to bring us standout modern musicals (Urinetown, Kiss of the Spider Woman), quirky theatrical oddities (Bat Boy: The Musical), challenging dramas (Doubt) and, in the case of Terrance McNally’s Corpus Christi, a healthy jolt of threat-magnet controversy. Montesano’s also displayed a particular passion and expertise with the works of Stephen Sondheim, from perennials (Into the Woods, Sweeney Todd) to experimental shows that are almost pariahs (Merrily We Roll Along).

Beginning this Friday and continuing through the next couple of weekends, the nabobs of NENA can once again boast dibs (and bragging rights in perpetuity) for being the first guys to bring another fervently followed 21st century favorite — one that journeyed from Off Broadway to the plexiglas podiums of the Tony awards — to area audiences. It’s The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, a viably viral smash that’s more crowdpleasing than controversial — to the point of involving the crowd more than any opus this side of The Godfather’s Meshuggenah Wedding.

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Though they sometimes seem to provide no visible means of support to each other, the prestidigitatin’ partnership of Kevin and Cindy Spencer defies the eyes and suspends the disbelief, as THE SPENCERS THEATRE OF ILLUSION comes to the Count Basie on Friday.

By TOM CHESEK

Poor Mrs. Mark Wilson got herself sawed in two so many times by her TV magician husband, he was probably being quite literal whenever he referred to her as his “better half.”

Although she’d been called “indispensable” to her spouse’s success — and kept his memory alive after his 1926 death by attempting to contact his spirit via seance every Halloween — Bess Houdini never worked in show business again after hubby Harry’s passing. And it’s not her that we wait for, in hopes that she’ll rise up like the Great Pumpkin on October 31.

Harry Blackstone, Jr.’s wife was director of Hollywood’s famous Magic Castle. Doug Henning’s first missus (relationship guru Barbara De Angelis) graduated from onstage assistant to co-creator of his Merlin show. And while she’s long held a special power for levitating magic wands, David Copperfield’s ex-fiancee Claudia Schiffer never became part of the act.

Stage magicians have disappeared them, chopped them into pieces, turned them into zoo animals, switched places with them inside padlocked trunks — and in one notorious case, convinced the world that they didn’t even exist — but magician’s wives have by and large not magically breached that glass ceiling, and the husband-and-wife illusionist team is still a thing as rarely seen as old Houdini’s ectoplasmic hide.

Okay, we’ll grant you The Pendragons, but with Jonathan in jail on weapons and assault charges (and Charlotte now performing as a solo act), all bets are off there.

Rather, we submit for your approval The Spencers — husband and wife for over 25 years, partners in prestidigitation, co-winners of the way-prestigious International Magician of the Year award (an honor conferred only on the echelon occupied by the Angels, Copperfields, Penns and Tellers). Veteran magic man Kevin Spencer has been plying his tricky trade since he was in elementary school — and Cindy Spencer, who transformed from assistant into co-star when Kevin sustained car-crash injuries in the late 1980s, has since made the business of magic as second-nature as flouting the law of gravity. 

Every year, Kevin and Cindy Spencer crisscross the continent with what the late Ed Sullivan would have called “a really big shew;” a theater-scale experience that boasts a remarkable degree of audience interaction and a constantly updated/upgraded menu of grand illusions — many of them completely unique to their act. 

This Friday, March 5 will see the Spencers rolling into Red Bank at the vanguard of their Theatre of Illusion extravaganza — with the Count Basie Theatre one of many stops on a tour that’s racked up nearly as many awards as it has miles. At the heart of it is a show that includes such highlights as a justifiably famous mind-reading exercise involving the whole audience, as well as the dreaded Spikes of Doom and the Giant Fan of, well, Doom.

But don’t let us play spoiler for any of this cool stuff. Continue Reading for the backstage tour, direct from the gifted Mr. Spencer.

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Tommy’s Coal Fired Pizza is among the three new participating Red Bank restaurants, as the townwide Dine Downtown promotion returns every Tuesday and Wednesday in March.

Make no mistake — we’re finished with the Feb. We even take back some of the mean things we said about January.

In fact, every one of us deserves to be wined and dined just for slushin’ and survivin’ these past four weeks of record-crushing snowpocalypse, lost productivity, snowmageddon, cancelled flights, snow-er-dammerung, quiet cash registers, dreams deferred, cabin fever — and did we mention snow?

Everywhere you look, sooty reminders of that shortest and cruelest of months abound in the streets and parking spaces of the greater Red Bank orbit, piled up like mounds of chocolate-chip gelato but scarcely as sweet. As the foul Feb-breezes become the lion’s roar of early March, however, we’re picking up an end note of lamb in there — a phenomenon fostered by one of the friendliest of seasonal signifiers, the return of the Dine Downtown promotion.

As they’ve done with great success in seasons past, Red Bank RiverCenter joins with the NJ Restaurant Association in presenting a promotion designed to entice hibernating diners from their burrows, and take advantage of a slate of midweek Prix Fixe dinner deals at some 20 participating restaurants in the borough’s downtown and theater/antiques districts. It’s a list that includes no less than three first-timers, all of them brand new to town and eager to make new friends — and the owners of Tommy’s, Monticello and Mangia Mangia are teaming with a great group of returning favorites to offer a choice of special event menus that include appetizer, entrée and dessert for a lusciously low price (beverages, tax and gratuities not included).

The Dine Downtown deal kicks off tomorrow night, March 2, and continues Tuesday and Wednesday evenings through March 31. Returning once more are the three distinct pricing levels ($15, $25 and $30) offered in past promotions — giving frugal foodies an expanded choice and a streetside smorgasbord of cuisines that ranges from Thai, seafood, Italian, contemporary American, vegetarian and European, to some cool fusions that we’ve yet to triangulate with our gastronomic GPS.

The list of participants spotlights both long-established landmarks and buzzworthy newcomers; a romantic jacket-required dining room and a jam-packed nitespot. There are vibes that span the comfy side of casual to the cutting edge of cosmopolitan — and, with eight of the twenty located west of Maple Avenue, Dine Downtown is just as likely to mean Bridge Avenue and the banks of the Navesink as it does any address in or around Broad Street.

There are also several opportunities to pair dinner with a live show, such as a discount-priced preview performance of Aaron Posner’s much-anticipated Orestes: A Tragic Romp at Two River Theater (begins Tuesday, March 23). There are even a couple of opportunities to chase that Prix Fixe dinner with a free event at the Count Basie Theatre, including a big-screen showing of Alfred Hitchcock’s suspense epic North by Northwest (March 3), and a special indoor preview of July’s annual KaBoom! Fireworks on the Navesink event, starring the pyrotechnic artists from Garden State Fireworks. 

We’re getting peckish just contemplating it, so flip the menu over and Continue Reading for an annotated list of participants.

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The music of the late great composer, arranger, conductor, and Rumson HS grad Nelson Riddle lives again this weekend in Asbury Park — with a series of big-band tribute shows at McLoone’s Supper Club, and a special Oscar’s Eve screening event at The Showroom.

In an interview that appeared here in oRBit a few months back, a lady by the name of Rosemary Acerra told us, “We have this great asset in the family, and the richness of this asset is not something that’s measured in money. It’s the sound of our dad’s work, and that’s what means the most to us; the part that will live on forever.”

Dad in this case was Nelson Riddle — composer, conductor, arranger, and the man who created what became the signature sounds for both Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole (while working on some pretty classic stuff by everyone from Ella Fitzgerald, Dean Martin and Judy Garland, to Linda Ronstadt and Batman).

This Oscar/ Emmy/ Grammy-winning linchpin of the entertainment business was also a man with a connection to the greater Red Bank orbit — he was in the first graduating class of what was then Rumson High School, in 1939 — and before his passing in 1985 he’d be famous not only for his own memorable movie scores and TV themes (including Route 66 and The Untouchables), but for a signature style that was so sought after by top recording artists, that Riddle’s name and picture would often appear on the album cover alongside the star. 

Following a protracted legal wrangle for the rights to their father’s sonic legacy, Acerra and her siblings from Riddle’s first marriage (including bandleader brother Christopher Riddle) wasted no time assembling a new 21st century edition of the Nelson Riddle Orchestra —  an organization that played a pair of sold-out showcases last November at Tim McLoone’s Supper Club in Asbury Park.

This Friday and Saturday, Christopher Riddle and 17-piece company return to the fabuluxe setting of Mr. McLoone’s sophisticated saucer-shaped space, in a two-night program entitled The Nelson Riddle Studio Sessions. A swinging salute to the Jersey-born maestro and his greatest musical partnerships, the events (close to selling out as we post this) include dinner and show for $79.95 per person, with the band joined by vocalists Shawnn Monteiro and Byran Anthony. 

There are also a few surprises in store; some old (the family has been granted permission to use the original charts from Ella Fitzgerald’s sessions with their dad), and at least one welcome new idea — on Thursday, McLoone’s will host The Nelson Riddle Show Rehearsals, in which for a $50 ticket patrons can enjoy a champagne cocktail reception while they watch and listen to the orchestra at work on the weekend’s shows.

As an added bonus, Asbury’s Showroom screening space will be the venue for a Saturday afternoon event in which the 1974 version of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby — the film for which Riddle bagged his Academy Award — will be shown at 1pm, followed by a Q&A session featuring Rosemary Acerra and Christopher Riddle. Tickets for the screening are $10, and can be reserved by calling (732)502-0472.

You can look back at our conversation with Acerra right here — and call (732)774-1155 for reservations and info on the shows at McLoone’s.

The Dark Side of the Room: The Pink Floyd Experience returns to the Basie boards, with their annual dose of aural ecstasy for all four of your ears. 

1. The Pink Floyd Experience at Count Basie Theatre.  As the Canadian-based Annerin Productions hastens to point out, The Pink Floyd Experience is NOT an impostor show. Of course, they are NOT Pink Floyd (there are six musicians on stage for one thing), but “a truly unforgettable interpretation and celebration of one of the great musical and theatrical concert experiences of all time.” They are, to again quote their publicity material, the FULL Pink Floyd Experience, full to the tune of some $2.5 million worth of equipment on stage. In addition to purveying letter-perfect renditions of such Floyd signatures as “Money,” “Have a Cigar” and “Another Brick in the Wall,” guitarist-bandleader Tom Quinn and his seasoned crew also play host to a spectacular high-tech show the likes of which haven’t been seen since the halcyon days of the major record labels. Taking the most jaw-dropping elements of several stadium tours and re-scaling them for the more intimate dimensions of the Basie and its sister auditoriums, the Experience recreates such legendary stage effects as the iconic pig balloon of the Animals album cover; the eye-popping images and breakway barrier from The Wall, and yes, the sound effects from The Dark Side of the Moon, presented in living quad.  Friday, 8pm/ $25 - $55

2. THE FULA FROM AMERICA at Two River Theater. It’s a one-weekend stand for the acclaimed one-man show at the Two River Theater; check here for ticket availability — and here for our interview with actor and author Carlyle Brown. Friday and Saturday, 8pm; Sunday, 3pm/ $20

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