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Couple entertains with medley of show tunes

 
Published June 13, 1993|Updated Oct. 9, 2005

Actors Aniko Farrell and Peter Palmer sang show tunes from Oklahoma!, South Pacific and other Broadway shows during a meeting of the Temple Terrace Friendship Club on Wednesday at Temple Terrace Golf and Country Club.

About 100 people attended the meeting. Club member Beth May introduced the couple, who have lived in Temple Terrace since 1988.

Palmer played the lead in Al Capp's Li'l Abner film in the 1950s. "What I don't want to hear about Li'l Abner is "Boy, were you good-looking 37 years ago,'

" Palmer said.

Palmer also played Curly in a Broadway production of Oklahoma! He and Farrell met while performing in The Unsinkable Molly Brown in San Francisco.

They have been married 26 years and have a 10-year-old daughter, Farrell.

Aniko Farrell formed a trio with her sisters and toured Canada. She was named Miss Newfoundland and Miss Canada. She was first runner-up in the Miss Universe competition.

Farrell also did a command performance for Queen Elizabeth II. The couple toured Vietnam, Thailand and other Southeast Asian countriesduring a USO variety show.

Palmer was discovered on the Ed Sullivan Show and cast as Curly. He has starred with Carol Channing and Edie Adams.

"Everything that's good that happened to me was because of Oklahoma!" Palmer said. Agnes DeMille once told him: "You're the best, . . . the best Curly ever."

Farrell sang the theme from The Sound of Music, in which she played Maria for seven months at the Showboat Dinner Theatre in St. Petersburg.

The pair sang duets to People Will Say We're in Love from Oklahoma!, and If I Loved You and Honey Bun from South Pacific. They got the audience singing with Oh! What a Beautiful Morning.

They also performed tunes from Guys and Dolls. They concluded the show with a medley of Bridge Over Troubled Waters and Danny Boy.

The couple sang without microphones. They were backed up solely by a piano player. They perform for senior citizens at nursing homes throughout the area.

Church to honor rector

The Rev. Jerold Stadel of St. Catherine's Episcopal Church will resign as of June 30. The congregation will recognize Stadel on June 27 for his service to the church.

That Sunday, there will be one service at 9 a.m., followed by a reception in the parish hall. Friends of Stadel and his wife, Anne, and daughter, Sarah, are invited.

Stadel has been with the church for more than 22 years. In 1992 he served as the Episcopal Diocese designee for the Episcopal Society of Ministry on Aging, as a consultant to the Diocesan Commission on Ministry, chairman of the Diocesan Deacon training program and a member of the Tampa Deanery committee on church extension.

He also served on the board of trustees for the Episcopal University Center at the University of South Florida and the executive board of the Life Center of the Suncoast. He was a member of the Temple Terrace Ministers Fellowship.

A search for a new rector will take six to 12 months. The church is at 502 Druid Hills Road. For information, call the church at 988-6483.