Everyone Seems to Like ‘Will Rogers,’ Especially Mac

One of Mac Davis’ favorites moments in “The Will Rogers Follies” is when he comes on stage with a newspaper and plays off the stories of the day.

“I check out the morning news and then have some fun with it--the way Will Rogers might have done,” said Davis on Tuesday at the post-performance party at Birraporetti’s that celebrated the musical’s opening at Segerstrom Hall.

But Tuesday was tricky. Stories of fire-ravaged homes dotted the paper.

“There was no way I would touch it,” Davis said. “My job was to take peoples’ minds off those fires.”

So he took a few well-aimed jabs at political types and left it at that.

Using fresh news stories to get jokes is one of his personal contributions to the show. “I love doing it,” he said.

But mostly, Davis loves bringing the values of his childhood hero (“There was a statue of Rogers across the street from our house, “ he confided) to the public.

“Playing Rogers has taught me about humility and honesty,” Davis said. “Not that I didn’t always have a touch of that. But I never realized how very important those qualities were. I really do try to emulate him in my life.”

When party guests weren’t cozying up to Davis or piling their plates with pizza, they were buzzing about the show and chatting with other cast members.

Said Tom Nielsen, chairman of the Orange County Performing Arts Center: “I really enjoyed the production. And I think any man who can say he ‘never met a man he didn’t like’ has to be one good guy .”

Cast member George Riddle, who played Rogers’ father, said the center was made for a follies production. “I checked out the stage before the sets were unloaded,” he said, “and I thought: ‘Flo Ziegfeld would have loved this place!’ ”

Also among guests were the tykes who played Rogers’ children. Thomas O’Connell II, 10, was Freddy Rogers, who died of diphtheria. “It feels kind of strange” playing a little boy who died, O’Connell said. “But you get used to it.”

Piped Gina Bishop, 9, who plays James Rogers: “Playing a boy this time is OK. I played Mary Rogers on Broadway for 10 weeks.

“The hardest part is trying to walk like a boy. I have to be careful not to walk ditsy like a girl. I walk sorta stud-ish, you know?”

Other faces in the crowd: Danette Cuming, who played Rogers’ wife, Betty (“Being up there with Mac Davis is like butter--he’s so smooth,” she said); center president Tom Tomlinson; Susan and Tim Strader; Carol Wilken; Rich and Mary Lu Hamill; Janet and Robert Lind; Patricia and Charles Poss; Lois and Matthew Osborne and Lois and Buzz Aldrin (“When I talked to Davis,” Buzz whispered, “I asked him about the important stuff . . . like, was he really chewing gum up there? He told me he was and that he swallowed it once in Seattle.”)

* REVIEW: “The Will Rogers Follies.” F3