| The Grill (with Tony Danza)
By unknown
Submitted by taxifan
For a boxer from Brooklyn, Tony Danza, 50, makes a good TV star. The
70’s and 80’s heart-throb is proving his stellar staying power, returning
in Ten’s Family Law. He shapes up to
Julietta Jameson.
I’d never watched this show before having to do
research on you, but now I’m a fan.
Well, you know something? That’s how I ended up on the show. I was asked
to join it and my instinct was, well, it’s not exactly ER. But they sent
me a bunch of tapes and I knew I wanted to be part of it.
Your character is not called Tony (as he was in
Taxi,
Who’s the Boss?
And The Tony Danza Show).
Yes, it’s a good thing-a stretch. However, I’m up for the challenge.
You can turn around at the right time when they
call you something else?
Yes, I do answer to other names. I don’t know if you know this, but my
character in Taxi was not originally an Italian middleweight but an Irish
heavyweight nmaed Phil Ryan and then a few days into shooting they made
it inot an Italian middleweight and changed it to Phil Banta. Then a few
days later, they said they were changing the name from Phil Banda to Tony
Banta. I thought, wow, they’re doing that for me. But it was a reflection
of my acting ability. They were afraid I wouldn’t’ answer to Phil.
And are the chicks swooning over you all over
again?
I’m a little old for chicks. I just had my 15th wedding anniversary. I
can’t even think about that stuff.
You don’t seem to have aged. How come?
I try to stay in shape, but I’ve my mother and father to thank for the
genes.
Your show’s been on hiatus. What did you do?
I [took my cabaret act to] Atlantic City for six nights, and Pennsylvania.
I played for 95 minutes with a quartet. I must be out of my mind. And
then I stuck my chin out and went to NY. We played Michael Feinstein’s
new club, the coolest club in NY to play cabaret and did three weeks there.
We got a good review in The New York Times. But it was good to come back
home. I live near the beach [Malibu] and I’m back enjoying my kids…I have
Katie, 14, Emily, 8, and an older boy [Marc, 30] I don’t admit to.
I heard that you got to introduce your mum, Anne,
to Frank Sinatra…
Frank was a friend of mine [and] he did an episode of Who’s
the Boss? My mother was a bobby soxer and a big fan and she likes
to do this joke where if she saw me signing autographs and getting a big
head she’d say, “Hey, big shot, when you introduce me to Sinatra, then you’re
a star.” So I got the chance to do it and he was so winderful to her. He
took pictures with her and he treated her like she was the Queen. I will
never forget him for that. It’s some kind of crazy cirle, the way things
work out. I sang for his 80th birthday TV special [and] told that story
on it and they put the picture of my mother and Frank together in the special
and if she’d been alive, she’d have died that day. |
