Boldface Sept. 10: A.D. Amorosi rounds up the local gossip

KJ Hippensteel and Josh Breckenridge look very different out of their “Book of Mormon” costumes. The show is at the Forrest Theatre through Sunday.
Credit: A.D. Amorosi

Jennifer Salhoff is starting her gig as executive chef at Cuba Libre — after working at Cerise in Bryn Mawr and Fork on Market Street as its pastry chef — the same week that she’ll debut on Fox’s “Hell’s Kitchen,” hosted by Gordon Ramsay. Cuba Libre takes advantage of this with a first-episode viewing party tonight.

Jodi Throckmorton has been named curator of contemporary art at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, just in time for David Lynch to return to Philly for his massive retrospective exhibition at PAFA, opening Sept. 13.

It’s starting to look as if Keen, Randall Hoppmann’s re-do of the 17th and Lombard space that housed Astral Plane, Millennium, Fish and Brick American Eatery is slicing, dicing and shooting for an October opening. Christopher and Caitlin Rorer will run the kitchen.

When Iranian playwright Nassim Soleimanpour’s “White Rabbit, Red Rabbit” opened at FringeArts’ waterfront theater on Saturday, Philly thespian David Morse (“Treme,” “World War Z,” “Horns,” the locally filmed “McCanick”) took the stage. The colorful “Rabbit” drama features different lead actors during every performance, each reading the script for the first time. It’s now at Christ Church Neighborhood House for the rest of its Fringe Fest run.

Seen on the scene

All 53 Miss America contestants dined at The Continental in Atlantic City.
Credit: Rebecca Dublin

“The Book of Mormon” started at Forrest Theatre on July 29, ends Sept. 14, and in-between broke a Forrest house record for ticket sales, topping the previous record held by “Jersey Boys” in 2012. Outside the theater, lead actor KJ Hippensteel, who plays Elder Price, and Josh Breckenridge, the doctor who yells the “maggots in my scrotum” line, mentioned that there are still a few tickets left (www.telecharge.com).

It wasn’t easy cramming 53 Miss America contestants into The Continental at the Pier Shops at Caesar’s in in Atlantic City, but there they were, a week before the competition, eating Buffalo chicken meatballs, cheesesteak eggrolls and lobster mac n’ cheese.