Some curiosities about the show titles scheduled for the new season:

Why is the young Philip Shelburne once again directing "Jesus Christ Superstar" (at Spring Mountain Ranch) and "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat" (at Signature Productions)? It's a little early for him to be resting on his laurels.

Why is Signature Productions doing two shows that have been done to death locally ("The Foreigner" and "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat")? How about we make a deal with Signature: For the good of the community, do at least one show a year that's something of a challenge.

Why is the six-year-old New York Stage & Beyond series continuing to bring performers back for an encore when there are so many "New York" performers we have yet to see? This year it's Mandy Patinkin. We've already seen "encores" by at least half-a-dozen others. Program chief Larry Henley says it's because "Mandy's show did very well for us financially." That's all well and good, but it's too bad such a young program is already taking the easy way out by recycling the tried and true. ...

Stage Door director Terrence Williams, whose "The Last Five Years," runs through Sept. 17 at the Fischer Black Box, is apparently a very self-disciplined man. He inadvertently got Stephen Sondheim's cell number and refused to give it out, at any price.

It seems he once was in e-mail contact with author John Weidman, who wrote "Assassins," a recent Stage Door production. Recently, Weidman got his Terrences mixed up. He sent who he thought was Tony-winning playwright Terrence McNally an e-mail asking him to speak at a gathering. He included Sondheim's phone number, as well as McNally's e-mail address.

Now lesser mortals might have just agreed to the speech and shown up, or at the very least called Stephen and e-mailed McNally and arranged for lunch. But no, Williams did the right (and boring) thing by writing Weidman and telling him of his error. In an e-mail to me telling of the incident, he even blocked out the Sondheim/McNally contact info. Says Williams: "Give me a couple of more years, and I'll know everyone in this business." ...

A couple of recent book releases have local ties. Sharon Wheatley, who played Kate Monster in the Wynn Las Vegas production of "Avenue Q," has published the memoir, "'til the Fat Girl Sings: From an Overweight Nobody to a Broadway Somebody." Surprisingly, it's not about the evils of fat. It's about finding the proportions (in all matters) that are right for you.

Marni Nixon has a memoir titled "I Could Have Sung All Night." Nixon, of course, dubbed the singing voices for Deborah Kerr in "The King and I," Natalie Wood in "West Side Story," and Audrey Hepburn in "My Fair Lady." She also worked as a vocal coach in the 1990s for the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.

Anthony Del Valle can be reached at DelValle@aol.com. You can write him c/o Las Vegas Review-Journal, P.O. Box 70, Las Vegas, NV 89125.