Animals in the News - Softcover

RICHARD "RIP" CRYSTAL was born into a show business family. His father, Jack, produced jazz concerts and managed the legendary Commodore Music Shop in Manhattan. His mother, Helen, was an amateur actress and encouraged her three sons to perform in school plays. The Crystal boys performed comedy routines at all the family functions and were sports crazy kids. His high school career in Long Beach, Long Island, displayed his remarkable versatility and variety of interests. He was president of his class, starting point guard on the varsity basketball team, played clarinet and saxophone in the orchestra and swing bands and sang the lead role in the school musical. Upon graduation, he attended the University of Bridgeport on a basketball scholarship but his career at Bridgeport ended abruptly with the unexpected death of his father - an event that greatly shaped his life. He moved back home, worked in the jewelry exchange on 47th Street and transferred to Brooklyn College. He was encouraged by a drama professor to audition for the Brooklyn College Opera Theatre and was cast as Simone in Puccini's one act comic opera, "Gianni Schicci". It was this performance that caught the eye of a musical director at The Banff School of Fine Arts in Banff, Canada, and granted Rip a full scholarship in their musical theatre division. He was cast as Conrad Birdie in their touring production of "Bye, Bye Birdie" and received unanimously rave reviews. Rip returned to Brooklyn College to finish his Bachelor's degree in Speech and Drama when he answered an open call he noticed in Backstage magazine. He was selected from over 500 young performers as a Kraft Music Hall singer by Gary Smith and Dwight Hemion and performed in a number of NBC television specials with Bobby Darin, Liza Minelli, Tony Randall and Michelle Lee. During the next few years in New York, he studied acting at the Herbert Berghof Studio and voice with Albert Malver. He performed in numerous musicals including "The Fantasticks", "Jacques Brel", "Finian's Rainbow" and was featured in a variety of musical revues - "The Great American Fun Factory", "What's A Nice Country Like You Doing In a State Like This?" and "Nash At Nine" - a Broadway musical revue based on Ogden Nash's poetry. Besides his blossoming career as a singer and actor, Rip was writing and developing projects for movies and television shows. His eyewitness account of the riots at the Newport Jazz Festival in the early seventies, was published in High Fidelity Magazine and was the feature article in their year end issue. During this time, he began playing guitar, writing his own music and singing in coffee houses all over the New York area. His comedy song, "I Love to Play Basketball" was featured by sports journalists Larry Merchant and Roy Firestone and became the genesis for his first original screenplay, "Hoops" which was sold to NBC as a two hour movie for television. He continued writing scripts and performing small roles in a number of movies but his career really took off when he created a reality comedy show called "Life's Most Embarrassing Moments". The show became a big hit on ABC and Rip grew into his natural role as writer/producer/show runner under the guidance of Executive Producers Alan Landsburg and Woody Fraser. All of his talents - performing, writing and music - were now valuable assets to his successful producing career. He has basically worked non-stop ever since. In the television reality area, Rip has now produced dozens of shows and hundreds of hours, among them "Wild & Crazy Kids" for Nickelodeon, "Family Challenge" for Fox Family, "America Talks Back" for Lifetime and "Funny Flubs & Screw Ups" for CBS. He has worked with everyone from Milton Berle, Sid Caesar and Steve Allen to Andrew Dice Clay, Tim Conway, Catherine Bell, Kevin James, Cheech Marin, Tony Danza, John Ritter, and most recently, Sandra Bullock. He was recently asked to produce the second season of the h