On the latest episode ofJessie Ware’s Table Manners Podcast, legendary composer Andrew Lloyd Webber stops byto talk all things Cinderella, his campaign to get theatres open safely, being a TikTok sensation and his unforgettable New Years Eve party with Shirley Bassey and Joan Collins.
A group of Black, femme theatremakers have banded together to form a new collective called Afrofemononomy, which will present a series of digital and in-person events exploring explore Black women, art, health, and balance. The founders include Lileana Blain-Cruz, Eisa Davis, Charlotte Brathwaite, Jackie Sibblies Drury, Ayesha Jordan, Joie Lee, April Matthis, Jennifer Harrison Newman, Okwui Okpokwasili, Stacey Karen Robinson, and Kaneza Schaal.
The group’s first residency, titled Work the Roots, begins March 1 at Performance Space New York to illuminate texts by Kathleen Collins and Adrienne Kennedy. Throughout, Afrofemononomy plans to broadcast their investigations via a dedicated web-based radio station.
The artists will examine Begin The Beguine, a 1984 quartet of unproduced one-acts by the late Kathleen Collins, via panel discussions and rehearsals. Afrofemononomy will also explore Etta and Ella On The Upper West Side/The Vanishing Literary Club, a recent duo of intertwined texts by Adrienne Kennedy, and The Essentialisn’t, a music-theatre project by Eisa Davis.
The group’s engagement with these pieces will manifest as a synchronized world premiere of live outdoor offerings during the weekends of May 15 and 22: in the 122CC courtyard of Performance Space in NYC; on a lower Manhattan loading dock as part of Downtown Live, presented by the Downtown Alliance in association with En Garde Arts and The Tank; in various outdoor venues in Brooklyn and Harlem; at a parking lot drive-in performance spearheaded by Oakland Theater Project; and in Norway and Senegal with Afrofemononomy artists overseas.
Along with live outdoor offerings, Afrofemononomy will also host an in-person, pay-what-you-can, audiovisual installation with the occasional surprise live sound interaction at Performance Space May 22–June 27 with COVID-19 safety protocols in place. A portion of proceeds from the ticketed production will benefit Black Women’s Health Imperative.
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Tartaglia earned a Tony Award nomination for his performance in the Tony Award-winning Broadway musical, Avenue Q, for which he originated the roles of Princeton and Rod. Additional Broadway credits include Shrek the Musical and Beauty and the Beast.
1898 Birthday of Broadway leading lady and producer Katharine Cornell, who stars in and/or produces A Bill of Divorcement, The Age of Innocence, The Barretts of Wimpole Street, Alien Corn, Jezebel, Saint Joan, The Wingless Victory, No Time for Comedy, Candida, and Dear Liar.
1956 Eric Machwitz and Hy Kraft write the book and Bernard Grun arranges Antonin Dvorak‘s music for Summer Song. The musical deals with the composer’s stay in America. Charles Hickman directs the 19-week run at London’s Prince’s Theatre.
1959 Gertrude Berg plays a Jewish mother who charms a Japanese widower (Cedric Hardwicke) in A Majority of One. The comedy by Leonard Spigelgass runs at the Shubert Theatre, and later the Barrymore Theatre, for a total of 556 performances.
1960 Sidney Lumet directs Caligula at the 54th Street Theatre in New York. Albert Camus’ vision of the Roman emperor is accompanied by music composed by David Amram. It runs for 38 performances.
1964 Comedian Bert Lahr has his final Broadway opening night in Foxy, a musical based on Ben Johnson‘s Volpone, but relocated to the California Gold Rush. Lyrics are by Johnny Mercer. Also in the cast are Larry Blyden and the young John Davidson. The show, which tried out in a remote Canadian mining down, manages only a 72-performance run at the Ziegfeld Theatre.
1965 Opening night for the Sherlock Holmes musical Baker Street at the Broadway Theatre, starring Fritz Weaver as the detective, Inga Swenson as the love interest, and Martin Gabel as Moriarty. It runs 311 performances.
1977 The success of three inept thieves out for a major score is the starting point for American Buffalo. Robert Duvall, Kenneth McMillan, and John Savage thrash through the drama that marks David Mamet‘s Broadway debut. It runs at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre for 122 performances.
1989 Pauline Collins stars on Broadway at the Booth Theatre as Shirley Valentine. The one-character play by Willy Russell earns a Tony nomination for Best Play, while its star wins the Tony, the Drama Desk, and the Outer Critics Circle Award.
2002 Edward Albee‘s controversial play The Goat, Or Who Is Sylvia? begins previews at the Golden Theatre. Bill Pullman and Mercedes Ruehl star in the drama about a man whose attraction for the ungulate of the title destroys his marriage. It wins the Tony Award for Best Play later that year.
2007 Sheridan Morley, the larger-than-life London theatre critic, author, and a long-time Playbill writer, dies in his sleep at age 65 at his home in London.
2011 Following their 2009 Broadway production of Exit the King, Australian theatre company Belvoir returns to New York with an adaptation of Nikolai Gogol‘s The Diary of a Madman, starring Geoffrey Rush. Performed at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, the production reunites Rush with his Exit the King director Neil Armfield.
2012 Shatner’s World: We Just Live in It, featuring Star Trek star William Shatner, opens at Broadway’s Music Box Theatre. The solo show takes audiences on a voyage through Shatner’s life and career, from Shakespearean stage actor to internationally known icon and raconteur.
2017 The U.S. premiere of Wallace Shawn’s Evening at the Talk House opens Off-Broadway at the Romulus Linney Courtyard Theatre. The play about the 10th anniversary celebration for an “under-appreciated theatrical masterpiece” stars playwright Shawn opposite Matthew Broderick, Jill Eikenberry, and Claudia Shear.
More of Today’s Birthdays: William Le Baron (1883-1958). Albert Hackett (1900-1995). Vera-Ellen (1921-1981). Gretchen Wyler (1932-2007). Brian Bedford (1935-2016). Maria Björnson (1949-2002). John Tartaglia (b. 1978).
Watch Seth Rudetsky’s “Obsessed!” interview with John Tartaglia:
In honor of Valentine’s Day, Andrew Lloyd Webber shared a medley of love songs on his social media accounts. He kicked off the medley with I Know I Have a Heart, the newly-released song from his upcoming production of Cinderella. The medley also included songs from Aspects of Love, The Phantom of the Opera, and more.
“I Can Hear the Bells”: theatre has long had the ability to melt our hearts. From love at first sight to gorgeous declarations of adoration, the stage has seen an abundance of romance over the ages. Celebrate Valentine’s Day with these 10 swoon-worthy moments on Broadway.
Broadway might be dark, but that doesn’t mean that theatre isn’t happening everywhere Below, check out where you can get your daily fix of Broadway this weekend, February 13-14, 2020.
1904 Set and costume designer Oliver Messel is born in London.
1911 Ethel Barrymore gives The Twelve Pound Look at the Empire Theatre. The James M. Barrie one-act is preceded by a revival of his Alice Sit-by-the-Fire also starring Barrymore. Later she tours the vaudeville circuit with the first mentioned show.
1957 Tom Ewell, Nancy Olson, and Darren McGavin navigate The Tunnel of Love at the the Royale Theatre. Joseph Fields directs and helps adapt Peter DeVries‘ novel. The comedy sails for 417 performances.
1963 City Center Light Opera revives Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden, Adolph Green, Joseph Fields, and Jerome Chodorov‘s Wonderful Town for 16 performances. Featured performers include Kaye Ballard and Gabriel Dell.
1973 El Grande de Coca Cola stars Ron House as a nightclub owner whose family poses as famous stars to entertain the customers. It runs for 1,114 performances at the Mercer Arts Theatre in New York.
1983 Hoping to follow up his success in The Magic Show, magician Doug Henning plays the title role in the musical Merlin at the Mark Hellinger Theatre. The show runs six months, and is regularly stolen by Chita Rivera, who plays the villainous Queen, and by a young actor named Nathan Lane, who has just his second Broadway role as her son, Prince Fergus.
1996 Jonathan Larson‘s alt-rock musical Rent opens Off-Broadway at New York Theatre Workshop. It quickly transfers to Broadway’s Nederlander Theatre where it garners Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Book, and Best Score. It is also awarded the year’s Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
1997 A Broadway revival of Anton Chekhov‘s Three Sisters opens at the Criterion Theatre. The cast features Amy Irving, Lili Taylor, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Calista Flockhart, Billy Crudup, David Strathairn, Jerry Stiller, and Eric Stoltz.
2003 The New York City Council overrides a mayoral veto and bans cell phones in Broadway and Off-Broadway theatres, and other public cultural events. Offenders can face a fine of $50 and eviction from the venue in question. Mayor Michael Bloomberg objects that the law will be impossible to enforce.
2012 An Off-Broadway revival of Paula Vogel’s How I Learned to Drive, her dark Pulitzer Prize-winning coming-of-age play, opens at Second Stage Theatre. Directed by Kate Whoriskey, the cast features Elizabeth Reaser, Norbert Leo Butz, Kevin Cahoon, Jennifer Regan, and Marnie Schulenburg.
2013 Betty Buckley returns to the London stage in The Charing Cross Theatre production of Jerry Herman‘s musical Dear World. The production is directed and choreographed by Gillian Lynne, the choreographer who helped guide Buckley to a Tony Award for her portrayal of the faded glamour cat Grizabella in Andrew Lloyd Webber‘s Cats.
More of Today’s Birthdays: George Segal (b. 1934). Stockard Channing (b. 1944).
