“Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill” (written by Lanie Robertson, musical arrangement by Danny Holgate) opened at New Stage Theatre last week, and I was lucky enough to catch the opening-night performance. The show, directed by Patrick Benton, depicts Billie Holiday late in her career, when she has returned to Philadelphia to perform at one of her old haunts. Throughout the course of the revue-style show, Holiday sings some of her most famous songs and comments on the often stormy experiences of her life as an artist, a drug addict and a woman in love.
