Theater recovering from Moore's exit

NEW YORK — The Manhattan Theater Club has been doing damage control since the Mary Tyler Moore-Neil Simon imbroglio last week. Moore's face was removed from the logo for "Rose's Dilemma" on the theater's Web site (www.mtc-nyc.org), leaving a ghostly house in the distance. Refunds were issued for about 300 tickets after the relatively unknown understudy, Patricia Hodges, stepped in. The show opens Thursday.

Manhattan Theater Club's executive producer, Barry Grove, tried to put a happy face on the news, saying in a statement that it was impossible to tell if the single-ticket refunds were due to Moore's departure or the weekend snow. "Overall the impact was insignificant," he said. And in a phone call on Wednesday, the theater's artistic director, Lynne Meadow, concentrated on saying that Hodges saved the day. "It's a fabulous show business story," she said.

The theater, which recently had bad press over departures from "The Violet Hour" on Broadway, tried to find a last-second marketable star to replace Moore.

Several actresses, including Swoosie Kurtz, were approached, said Meadow, the play's director. Penny Fuller, who starred in Simon's "Dinner Party" on Broadway in 2000, was made an offer and started rearranging her schedule, which includes the National Actors Theater's production "Right You Are," which opened this week.

But the issue became moot after the show on Dec. 4, when Simon saw Hodges in the role for the first time. "We were dazzled by her," Meadow said. "Neil thought she was wonderful."

Bringing in a new star would have required more rehearsal time and perhaps a postponement, and it would have created problems with an already rattled cast. One person close to the production said that some actors were ready to bolt the production if there was an extension. Another early exit by an actor is the last thing Manhattan Theater Club needs this season.

• ANOTHER INSIDE SPAT — Backstage spats are not always bad for box office. Take "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," racked by bad press after Ned Beatty criticized two co-stars, Ashley Judd and Jason Patric, in an interview in The New York Times on Nov. 25. Beatty said he liked them personally but thought them ill equipped for their parts. Many in the theater industry predicted that his comments would hurt the play, but maybe Beatty knew something that they didn't. Since his remarks, the show has received a torrent of publicity, and ticket sales have steadily increased.