Item World: Tommy Tune's tumble and Zach Curtis' heavyweight role

Actor Zach Curtis told I.W. last weekend that he's lost 15 pounds rehearsing for "The Whale," which opened this week in a Walking Shadow/Mixed Blood production. Curtis, a big-boned fella, is playing a 500-pound literature tutor in the play. So isn't he going the wrong way with that weight? Curtis said that rehearsing in the fat suit has slimmed him up. I.W. would love to get a whiff of that foamy, obese creation after a couple of weeks under the hot lights — the fat suit, not Curtis. We'll check back when the show ends Dec. 20 to see where Zach's weight is.

GRAYDON ROYCE

Tommy Tune, in the Twin Cities last week to headline a benefit for the Lundstrum Center for the Performing Arts, cut a dashing figure despite a big white bandage over a gash on his forehead. Tune had slipped on the ice in downtown Minneapolis — a fall he attributed to his grief over the death of director Mike Nichols: "I was down about Mike, bereft and walking around, and then I was literally down on the ground," he told I.W. "A woman from Boston, who seemed like an angel, came and helped me. She gave me her glove to stop the blood." Nichols was Tune's angel in 1982 when the musical "My One and Only" was flopping during a 1982 tryout run. "The producers had fired the director, Peter Sellars, and much of the creative team. They asked me to direct but I was already starring in the show and choreographing it, so I asked Mike to come in and put some eyes on it. He agreed to do it for a few days, and then he stayed." The show ran for two years on Broadway and Tune won two Tonys.

Rohan Preston

Jeremy Messersmith seems like a nice young man, but the truth is out: "For whatever reason, presents, candy canes, Santa and caroling — especially caroling — don't do much for me," the Minneapolis pop/rocker admitted in an online note for fans. "So, I did what you'd expect and wrote a Christmas song." And with that, comes Messersmith's swaggering, Sinatra-style, big-band single titled "Let's Ditch Christmas," which imagines swapping the usual yuletide gatherings for a tropical getaway. ("Who needs snow and mistletoe when you've got the beach?") You can get it on his site or streaming sites such as Spotify along with an ungrinchy "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas." We know Messersmith won't shove off for warmer shores until he plays the last gig of his busy 2014 at First Avenue on Dec. 19.

CHRIS RIEMENSCHNEIDER

Elizabeth Armstrong, founding curator of the Minneapolis Institute of Arts' contemporary-art department, is leaving to become executive director of the Palm Springs Art Museum in California — not a bad place to land in January. The MIA had collected contemporary art, but in a haphazard way, before hiring the former Walker Art Center staffer in 2008. A dynamic personality who brought a casual style and keen intellect, Armstrong curated a number of key exhibits including "More Real: Art in the Age of Truthiness" while also leading efforts to engage museumgoers in fresh ways. Mary Abbe

G.R.

The directing debut of Minneapolis filmmaker Bill Eigen is getting its public premiere at the Riverview Theater at 7 p.m. Dec. 4. "The Jingle Dress," which is one of the first films to receive a nice chunk of state Legecy Fund money ($175,000), follows an Ojibwe family living on a northern reservation as they relocate to the Twin Cities to find out what happened to a long-lost uncle who has turned up dead there. "It's sort of an immigrant story, really, about a rural family moving into the urban core," said Eigen, who's produced documentaries on Harry Belafonte and Pete Seeger. A jingle dress, if you're wondering, is a ceremonial garment adorned with small bits of tin rolled into cones that symbolizes healing for the wearer and those around her.

Kristin Tillotson

One of the Twin Cities' most esteemed non-rock songwriters, singer/pianist and educator Marissa Dodge, has had her creations recorded by stars such as Lena Horne and Karrin Allyson as well as lots of local bright lights (Debbie Duncan, Dennis Spears, Irv Williams, Connie Evingson, VoiceTrek). Her composing output has been slowed by treatments for lymphoma, so there's a benefit at 7 p.m. Monday at the School II Bistro in Chanhassen, organized by multi-instrumentalist Mark Arneson and Tony Axtell, bassist and house sound man for "A Prairie Home Companion." The list of talent includes singers Kimberly Michaels and Patty Peterson.

TOM SUROWICZ