Next on cue, a major international honor for a Pittsburgh artist.

We'll introduce you to Michael Fratangelo and show you wh he has been asked to participate in Italy's Florence Biennale art exhibition.

Also tonight, more than 200 Pittsburgh natives recently gathered in New York City.

We'll tell you what they all have in common.

And what brought them together.

And we'll hear from one of Pittsburgh's most recognizable performers, Phat Mandee.

You'll see why she has such a loyal following.

It's coming up next.

So stay connected.

Welcome to OnQ magazine.

I'm Stacy Smith.

It can take years for an artist to be recognized for his or her work.

And for some, it never happens at all.

But for local artist Michael Fratangelo, recognition has come early in his career.

Just a couple of months ago, he received an email from an art exhibitors in Italy saying they wanted him to display one of his painting in the 2005 Florence Biennale.

The exhibit is recognized by the United Nations, and more than 800 artists from 72 different countries.

They participate forging a common language through art.

Painting is my vocation, my my calling.

I sense color in nature and people, people's personalities.

When someone looks at my painting, I want them to be touched, like their, you know, their spirit or their soul.

And I want them to just see the world differently.

My name is Michael Fratangelo.

I'm a painter.

I'm a teacher.

I always did art since I was a little kid.

You know, I always love to draw but I never took it seriously.

I had people comment tha it was good, but it wasn't until I took a class with a professor named John Bowman who really changed the direction of my life.

He really took me aside and told me I should go with the art, go with my painting, and it really became a passion.

And that's when it all started.

And that was about about six years ago.

We're in my studio now.

It's outside of Pittsburgh, in the Carrick neighborhoods.

This is where I paint.

This is where I do my work.

I like it because it gives me solitude, and I feel tha I need solitude to do my work.

I don't need any disturbances.

It's a it's a really focused atmosphere, and I feel like I have this creative urge.

I need to do it.

When I don't do it, I feel like a miserable.

It's okay to make mistakes.

It's all right.

It just fought.

Keep going.

The important thing i to make the effort and continue.

I'm a middle school art teacher.

Sixth, seventh and eighth grade at the Pleasant Hills Middle School.

The Wes Jefferson Hills school district.

What's that word?

Elizabeth style.

To find your own unique style.

Where does style come from?

Why is everyone have a unique style?

Natty general.

Personality.

Exactly.

Don't worry.

Now you don't think you're doing it like you should be doing.

There's no right way to do it.

You're all unique individuals.

So the important thing is effort.

You are your own artist.

This is the painting that's going to the Florence.

Biennale.

It's called Iraq one.

It's six feet by six feet.

I did seven paintings.

I titled them Iraq, one through seven.

The Florence Biennale is an international art competition, and it follows in the footsteps of a couple other, Biennales across the world.

Ones in Venice.

There's a few in Spain.

The one in Florence, though, really focuses on contemporary art.

The focus is on the children in their eyes.

We have the boy with the girl.

We have the baby girl, and it's in a triangle.

And their glares are powerful.

And they're all looking at the two American soldiers, one here and one here.

One day in December or January, I got an email from the Florence Biennale, the committee, the International Scientific committee.

They call it.

And they asked me they wanted to for me to be a part of this.

The Florence Biennale the paintings to be able to be in the exhibition and, you know, at first I thought it was a jok because I hadn't contacted them.

I thought, you know, you never know.

With the internet, it could be a scam.

But I looked into it it was real.

This isn't an anti-war statement.

This isn't a pro-war statement.

This is just a documentation of what is happening in the 21st century.

I feel as an artist, it's our job.

An artist's job to document their times.

Because art brings about different ways of thinking, especially painting.

I'm using the color in the faces and their bodies.

It's not realistic.

I'm using color to expression.

It's expressionistic.

And I'm using color to cause, a feeling, a vibration in people.

The viewer.

When he puts those color down, he's not imitating light.

He is creating light there.

And the trick to get it straight.

I'm Rena Klump and my husband and I own the gallery below our Bella Arte Gallery here in Shadyside.

One day he came into the gallery and he said, I think I was juried into a show.

And I said, you think you were?

You're not sure?

And he said, well, how about if I put it up on a website and you check it out?

And here he was jurie into the Florence Contemporary Biennial show in Florence Italy, and I was like in it all.

I'm like, you don't start small.

You just go right for the top.

Michael, you know, this is an international art show.

They have probably clos to 800 participants, 72 nations.

It's international.

It's fabulous.

And for him to be selected, one artist, you know, I think they may have anywhere between 8 and 11 artists from the United States.

But you figure how many artists are in the United States?

It's quite an honor for him, and we're very proud of him.

I'm not seeking fame and fortune.

You know that's not what I'm trying to do.

You know, I think a lot of people that get into the arts want that, and it's a good ego boost to have that, and it propels you forward.

But it means to me, it's another step in getting my art out there to the masses, to the world.

So I'm excite for the opportunity just to go over and and feel like I' a part of a world community now.

I feel like I'm getting my name out there, my my work out there.

So it means it means a lot.

I mean, it means a lot.

That's what I want to do.

But I think it's just another step in the right direction.

Iraq one and the other paintings from the Iraq series were all based on Iraq War photographs that were taken by New York Times photographers.

We're also told that Michael just completed two new series of paintings, and you can see all of his work on his website to get there.

Log on to our website, wqed.org, and click the OnQ logo on the first page.

Well, coming up next, Pittsburghers making it big on Broadway.

We'll show you why.

More than 200 expatriates who now work in theater in New York recently got together to celebrate their Pittsburgh roots.

And then coming up a little bit later, an entertainer who has not left home.

We'll take you a place up clos and personal with local singer and all aroun colorful character Phat Mandee.

So stay connected.

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Recently, more than 200 Pittsburgh expatriates who now liv and work in theater in New York City got together to celebrate their Pittsburgh roots.

The event was sponsore by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and drama editor Christopher Rawson was there.

And he joins us now to tell us a little bit more.

Chris, welcome to argue magazine.

Thanks, Stacey.

Tell us a little bit about this.

This is not the first time you did.

No.

We did it in 1994.

I just noticed there were an awful lot of Pittsburghers showing up and Broadway shows and I thought it was some time that the city did something to say.

You know, we care about you We really value this connection.

And I discovered that they responded.

I mean, they love this city here, you know, and that's one of the things about Pittsburgh inspires a lot of loyalty.

So they thought it was such fun.

We got about 200 of them together in 1994.

So this year I thought we'd try it again.

It's been 11 years.

And, you know, some of the same people showed up, bu it was also a whole new group.

And you have some pictures.

We do.

We do start there are there.

We're going to start with this, this big picture of 200.

My current count is 238 people in that picture, although there are a couple of people hidden it, maybe like 243.

We're still wavering, but we sent out emails starting about three weeks ahead, and they spread like wildfire from one person to another.

And I know a lot of people in Broadway shows who weren't there, but, you know, and some of these people are actually playing lead roles in Broadway shows.

Some are in the ensemble, some are working backstage.

Not all of them are on.

No, no, no.

And a lot of them are actors who are working as waiters, you know and trying to make it as actors.

I mean, there are peopl at every stage of their career.

I found it interesting you had 1 or 2 people who won, who's given up a career in the law to to try to become an actress, I believe, and others who are doing basically the same sort of thing.

That's right.

And people also claim, oh, here I am trying to organize the group early on.

You see people sort of primping an getting ready for the picture.

And we then we had given them little little cards with numbers on them when they arrived on the traffic islan in the middle of times Square.

We signed them in and gave them a little card.

And so here we are taking a picture of them, you see, so that we could identify them, of course.

Turns out in the pictur we couldn't see all the numbers, so it was still hunting for needles and haystack to figure out who everybody was.

And you had all age groups too.

We did, in fact.

Here's a picture of the guy on the left.

Here is Bill Herz, who was class of 1937 at Carnegie Mellon which makes him just about 90.

He went to work for Orson Welles at the Mercury Theater right out of college.

And on the right is Anne Kaufman Schneider, who's the daughter of George S. Kaufman, the great playwright and November 16th, the day we did this gathering, is George S. Kaufman's birthday.

Oh, is that right?

Yeah, that's the connection.

I consider that sort of Pittsburgh and New York day.

Okay, good.

And the gentleman, Herz is of the Mercury Theater.

Right?

He played a role in the in the War of the Worlds.

He was.

Yes.

He he he's the last living person who was connected with that, that broadcast.

Now, doe he consider himself a Pittsburgh because he went to Carnegie Tech.

You know, we left it up to people to decid whether they were Pittsburghers, as most of the people in that picture grew up in Pittsburgh, and some of them went to school here and so on.

Some of them adopted Pittsburgh later in life.

Some of them just came to college here and so on.

We sent out an invitation.

You you mentioned it.

What kind of a draw this is.

If I'm not mistaken, somebody even flew in to be a girl.

Well, that's Stephen Flaherty, who is, you know, one of our bright lights.

He's composed a half dozen Broadway musicals, including Ragtime Seussical, Once on This Island.

And he.

He was doing a show in Chicago, and he took a 6 a.m.

flight.

So he can get there in time.

He's right in one of those front rows, along with Kathleen Marshall, who's, hot Broadway director choreographer right now, and Billy Porter.

I mean, there's there's a lot of people whose names, you know, but a lot you wouldn't know, a lot that you wouldn't know.

Now, you besides the photograph, you got them all together for a little party.

Yeah.

That's right.

Yeah.

I over at Sardi's, of course, because that's just a block away.

And that's the theater hang out, and we we rented a room at Sardi's, and we brought a lot of banners from Pittsburgh, you know, the sports teams and the colleges and five cases of Iron City beer, you know, and I'm not doing commercial here.

I mean, there's something about Iron City that people really like, particularly when they're outside the city.

Exactly.

I mean, they do it more when they're outside, and particularly with the we had the aluminum bottles with the Dan Marino on them.

So they were kind of collector's items in New York.

They all had to have had a good time doing this.

They did.

You know, we do it on a Wednesday because that's matinee day.

So everyone's in town okay.

Yeah.

So a lot of people had to go off and do their matinee.

But there were about a hunt.

About hal the group came over to Sardi's and hung around for a couple of hours.

People were running into people hadn't seen in 20 years.

Gee, I didn't know you were in New York.

You know, a lot of contacts being made, people reunited.

You'v also done this in Los Angeles?

No we haven't.

Oh, but it's time to go to.

Yeah, the post.

That's pretty well agreed that, sometime in the New year, winter, spring, we'll try to convene a expatriate Pittsburghers in the movie business in L and do the same thing out there, maybe in front of the Hollywood sign.

You have any idea how many might be out there?

No.

In fact, I mean, I know there are a lot more than 238 in New York.

I know it's five, six, 700, but how many can you get on any given day?

We'll see.

Well, that'll b it should be very interesting.

Chris, thanks so much for being with us.

Thank you.

I mean, I think Pittsburgh needs to stick a stick behind its talent.

You know, it's our greatest export nowadays.

It's not steel anymore.

It's talent.

It is.

And unfortunately they do leave, but they have to leave some time.

But then they yeah, they have to go out and grow and then they can come back.

Exactly right.

Chris thanks so much for with space.

All right.

Still to come, a Pittsburgh performe whose unique look turns heads.

But that isn't her only claim to fame.

We will be up close with Phat Mandee.

It's coming up next, so stay connected.

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We've given, and you can send us through viewer comments.

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The following weekday afternoon.

She is a person of whom it can be truly said that there is no one else quite like her.

She is Phat Mandee, a local artist and singer who has also been known to wrestle in ramen noodles OnQ contributor, Minette Seate reports.

Sister.

She calls herself Le Chanteuse chauve, which translates roughly into the Bald girl singer, and that she is.

as well as probably the only local artist to have an entire wedding parade.

Not to mentio an appearance on Judge Joe Brown when her wedding float was, well, let's say, misplaced.

My pink wedding elephant had serious value, and I'm just very grateful for the opportunity to receive justice in this very tragic matter.

Well, this is our apartment.

She is Phat Mandee.

And here is how we spent a lovely afternoon.

This chair.

And that's Ganesha.

Who is the pink elephant god of the Hindu.

And who sits in this chair here?

Oh, this is Lucy, the dog.

She has eaten her treat.

It is all gone.

So now she is perfectly safe.

Oh!

Who wants revolution?

Oh, Okay, good.

First thing that I remember seeing you do as a performance artist was the ramen noodle wrestling with all kinds of work.

But you said that was the best ramen noodle wrestling we ever had.

That was the interplanetary Ramen Noodle Wrestling Federation's mayhem.

And you were taking all comers.

Oh, yeah.

Oh yeah.

I'm a terrible wrestler.

I mean, it's not like I wa gonna do anything but get hurt.

Sometimes it's like I'm a lover, not a fighter.

But then years pass and then not like the next thing you know, I see you resplendent flame coming down from the ceiling in this velvet swing.

Oh, you were at the Massenet for the opera.

Oh, I don't get invited to those things.

I saw it in the paper.

Oh, yes.

Oh ho ho!

I have a good voice teacher and she's very strict with me.

She doesn't love me an put my fist in my mouth anymore.

And she doesn't let me glass anymore.

She.

You know, she wants me to be, what I can be and what I want to be and what I want to be is internationally touring singer.

Life just goes on, doesn't it?

Begin the day and use your weight.

I knew that the traditional role of actress was not to be for me.

Like, you know, the whole headshot.

I mean, I have headshots and I have bios and I have resumes now, but at the time I knew that, like I wasn't going to be an artist.

You knew I wasn't going to go audition and be you know, like Gypsy Rose Lee.

I knew that that I had to kind of create my venue because I was too far out of left field for anybody to believe that I was going to fit into their project or their television show or their stage show.

But I've been very successful in, like writing my own shows and picking my own material, and I've had a lot of help.

I mean, like, there's a lot of really wonderful musicians that I'v had the benefit of working with.

So tell me a story, Big Brother.

A lot of people don't know about things like the Bull Seal Collective and your work with them.

What was that about?

The Bull Seal Collective was a Vaudevillains.

This is still a Vaudevillains, performance troupe of madcap poets and artists.

And with them, we did a lot of really fascinating things.

We did lots of neat parades.

One still going on.

It's the Ides of March March.

They were.

The Ides of March March.

My friend David Apocalypse, who used to live here, taught me how to eat glass.

And he taught m how to do a straitjacket escape.

And he taught me how to pound spikes into my face.

And I was on tour with him and the circus for years.

2 or 3 years.

And, I learned all kinds of ways of being.

That reality can just be what you want it to be.

And if you decide tha you want to tour with the circus and you want to be a half man, half woman vaudeville cello playing person, you can and nobody's going to say, no, you won't make a whole lot of money.

But I also learned how to eat out of dumpsters on that tour.

So.

So that I decided to come home and just sing jazz.

It was better on the teeth.

That is, beyond the realm of the Starlight, my love.

Did you know when you started singing that you could really sing?

Well I would say I was in summer camp and we were singing, and that was really the first time I thought, oh, maybe I can do something that other people can't do Remember that wedding parade?

I also got a chance to meet the groom.

Who was this fella?

And this is my lovely husband, the one, and thankfully, only Tommy Amoeba.

The lowest form of life that I'm serving.

You think you're so cute.

You wanna give me love?

They were marching stoically back and forth, and I just thought, well, who is that weird little dude with the giant turkey?

He's kind of cute.

And then the next time I saw him, he was on stage and his whole everything had come off.

He was down to his American flag Speedos and his orange vinyl leisure loafers.

Has marriage mellowed, but Mandee, I would say I have I don't know if I've mellowed so much as I've just there's certain thing that I just won't take anymore.

I'm like, all of a sudden I just like.

I demand respect because that's how my husband treats me.

And why should you be able t treat me less than my husband?

I don't thin we've really mellowed each other because he's actually wilder than I am artistically.

This is what I call a form of fun.

After I performance.

Everybody like Sharon and a friend of mine dared me to get a band to out on a to to play with him the following mont at the Bloomfield Bridge Tavern, and I took him up on it.

And that's how my band of Amoeba Knievel was, formed.

But before we got too comfortable in the sunny parlor with the dogs and the elves and the newlyweds, another visitor dropped off.

We have a very special guest, my dear friend Christine Hammer Andrews, from the belly dance troupe.

Saphira has agreed to join us for a dance.

The entire day at Mandees house felt like I was the guest of honor at some bizarre and wonderful cabaret that just would be in.

And as strange as it may have looked it was actually pretty special.

I'm Jewish, but I'm not particularly religious, and Tommy's Catholic, but he's really not particularly anything.

So we said, well, it doesn't really make any sense for us to try and get married in a house of God.

And besides, God lives everywhere.

So let's just get married in the street and let's have a parade, because all of our fur.

We love a parade.

Yes, we love a parade.

Cause any fat man is feeling phony.

Truly one of a kind.

For more information about Phat Mandee and her upcoming performances log on to our website wqed.org Click the OnQ button on the first page.

Before we go tonight, here's a quick look at what's on the show tomorrow.

Every Friday night OnQ is OffQ.

Tomorrow night, host Chris Moore is joined by OffQ regulars Fred Honsberge from KDKA radio, Alan Cox from 105.9 The X, Ruth Ann Dailey from the Post-Gazette.

And this week's special guest, local freelance writer Ellen James.

It's the week in review.

Tomorrow night live OffQ.

Stay connected.

And thank you for watching.

We'll see you back here live at 7:30 tomorrow night.

Stay connected and have a good night.