Newsday Article

Daddy’s fame has her bailing

BY ROBERT KAHN
STAFF WRITER

January 4, 2006

Howard Stern's daughter Emily has pulled out of a satirical stage performance in which she appears nude, apparently worried that enemies of her father would distribute pictures of her on the Internet.

Emily Stern, 22, has starred since "November in "Kaballah," staged by the Jewish Theater of New York at the Triad Theater, 158 W. 72nd St. She has been playing Madonna, the pop singer who gained an interest in the mystic Jewish form of study.

Yesterday, the company abruptly canceled its scheduled performances for this week at the 136-seat theater, saying Stern had dropped out after learning that she had become the subject of rumors on several Howard Stern fan club Web sites.

"She's very scared now," said Isi Tenonbom, a spokeswoman for the Jewish Theater, who said the company was looking for a replacement actress.

Tenonbom said that members of at least one fan club had left "vulgar" comments about Emily in online chat rooms, "thus creating the possibility that throngs of them would come to take her pictures in compromising poses."

The operator of one site said he was aware that some nude photos of Emily had made their way to the Web, and that site administrators were attempting to have them removed.

Tenonbom said the company had previously agreed not to divulge Stern's relationship to the talk show host, whose morning program enters a second life Monday on satellite radio.

A Web site for "Kaballah," www.jewish theater.org, says only that the lead, Madonna, will be played by a "Long Island-born-and-raised Jewish actress, the talented Emily Stern."

Tuvia Tenonbom, the show's director, said Stern's departure puts the rest of the cast "in a very tough spot."

Isi Tenonbom said Emily Stern's mother, Alison, had seen the show but that Howard had not and that he did not want his daughter to do the show because his enemies would exploit the situation.

A spokesman for Howard Stern could not be reached for comment last night.

Copyright 2006 Newsday Inc.