Bartender
and the Pearl.”)
“He brings a special energy to this, a warmth,” Ruggerio says. “Look at that smile. He’s like a little boy in there. We’ve not had that with The Bartender yet.”
Lange is the third actor to play The Bartender since “Christmas on the Rocks” began in 2013. Ronn Carroll did it for the first four seasons, then Tom Bloom did it for two. Lange joins “Christmas on the Rock” veterans Jenn Harris, who’s entering her sixth season with the show, and Randy Harrison, who’s starting his second.
“I feel very lucky,” Lange says. “I have wonderful chemistry with Randy and Jenn.”
As the kindly proprietor of a dive bar, Lange witnesses some bizarre behavior on Christmas Eve. All the patrons on this magical night are grown-up versions of beloved characters from TV Christmas specials or other holiday stories: The depressed drinkers range from Tiny Tim from “A Christmas Carol” and Clara from “The Nutcracker” to Ralphie from “A Christmas Story” and Karen from the cartoon “Frosty the Snowman.”
Each scene in the show was written by a different playwright, some of them big names like Theresa Rebeck, John Cariani and Jeffrey Hatcher. Hartfordbased playwright Jacques Lamarre contributed two scenes, one based on “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and the other on “It’s a
Wonderful Life.”
But back to “The Love Boat.” Lange remembers getting the gig, which became a massive hit.
“I had just come off of playing a teenager on [the mid-1970s sitcom] ‘That’s My Mama.’ I had grown a mustache, and they told me ‘You can’t have hair on your face. Food-service professionals do not have facial hair. But I kept the mustache, and the year after ‘The Love Boat’ premiered every bartender in the country had a mustache. It all changed just like that.”
“This was when there were only three networks. For a premiere episode, you’d get 70,000,000 people watching. Seventy million!”
The anthology series still airs in reruns today. “I still get residual checks,” Lange says.
Lange was one of the few regular cast members on the anthology series, which had several sets of guest stars for each multilove-story episode.
“We resurrected old stars, and gave breaks to new stars who were up and coming. Tom Hanks did our show before he did [his break-out series] ‘Bosom Buddies’.”
Lange wasn’t so sure at first when Ruggerio asked him to do “Christmas on The Rocks.”
“No no no, it’s a Christmas play,” he said. But then he read it.
“It’s hysterical, and I said to Rob, ‘Let’s figure out how to do this’.”
Part of the deal they struck for bringing Lange to Hartford was Ruggiero would have him over for Thanksgiving dinner, since the actor needed to be here for rehearsals but didn’t have anyone in the area to spend the holiday with.
While he’s been in town, Lange has been exploring the local restaurants. Many have invited him to step behind the bar, but he’s putting off those offers until he’s got his lines down for “Christmas on the Rocks.”
As the only character who appears in every scene of the play, leaving the stage for just a minute or two, he’s got his hands full mixing drinks.
“Put it in a blender,” Lange says, laughing, “and I’ll serve it.”