1975Liza Minnelli to the rescue! With only six days to learn the role of merry murderess Roxie Hart, the Academy Award-winning stage and film star agrees to fill in for an ailing Gwen Verdon in Chicago. Minnelli stays with the show until mid-September. Always willing to do a friend a favor, Minnelli makes a highly-publicized return to the stage in 1997 as she fills in for a vacationing Julie Andrews in the musical Victor/Victoria.
1989Shenandoah returns to Broadway for a revival run that proves to be brief. Starring John Cullum as Charlie Anderson, the production of the Civil War-era musical closes September 2 after approximately four weeks of performances.
1998 After arguing for 600 performances about a white-on-white painting, the three characters in Yasmina Reza‘s Tony Award-winning play, Art end their run at Broadway’s Royale Theatre. The comedy, translated from French by Christopher Hampton, begins its national tour September 14 starring Judd Hirsch, who also appeared in the play on Broadway and in London. During the Broadway run, various trios of stars played the roles of three friends that Alan Alda, Victor Garber, and Alfred Molina originated.
2002Edie Falco and Stanley Tucci open on Broadway in Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune at the Belasco Theatre. This marks the Broadway debut for Terrence McNally‘s romance, which played Off-Broadway’s Manhattan Theatre Club in 1987. The production is much in the press due to the presence of screen actors Falco and Tucci and their onstage nudity throughout the opening scene.
2004 Actor Todd Cerveris stars opposite his brother, Tony winner Michael Cerveris, in The Booth Variations, playing the actor brothers Edwin Booth and John Wilkes Booth.
The London revival of MaryPoppins, based on the P.L. Travers stories and the original Walt Disney film, resumes performances at the Prince Edward Theatre August 7.
The cast is led by Zizi Strallen as Mary Poppins, Charlie Stemp as Bert, Charlie Anson as George Banks, Amy Griffiths as Winifred Banks, Petula Clark as Bird Woman, Liz Robertson as Miss Andrew, Claire Machin as Mrs Brill, Jack North as Robertson Ay, and Paul F. Monaghan as Admiral Boom and Bank Chairman.
Zizi Strallen and Charlie Stemp Seamus Ryan
Katie Cox, Rose Dawson, Megan Donovan, Megan Judge, Ellie Kit Jones, and Maddison Thew alternate in the role of Jane Banks with Logan Clark, George Hamblin, Charlie Murphy, Frankie Treadaway, and Fred Wilcox alternating in the role of Michael Banks.
The ensemble comprises Yves Adang, Angeline Bell, Lydia Boulton, Alison Connell, Adam Davidson, Danielle Delys, Joseph Dockree, Charlie Donnelly, Stan Doughty, Glen Facey, Davide Fienauri, Harry Francis, Lyndsey Gardiner, Ian Gareth-Jones, Maria Garrett, Mark Goldthorp, Jacqueline Hughes, Emma Hunter, Jason Kajdi, Sam Lathwood, Jordan Livesey, Tania Mathurin, Laura Medforth, Alex Pinder, Ben Redfern, Clare Rickard, Lucie-Mae Sumner, Scott Waugh, and Monique Young.
The stage production is co-created by Cameron Mackintosh and has a book by Oscar-winning screenwriter and Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes. The score by Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman includes the film songs “Jolly Holiday,” “Step in Time,” “Feed the Birds,” and “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,” with new songs and additional music and lyrics by the Olivier award-winning team of George Stiles and Anthony Drewe. The producer for Disney Theatrical Productions is Thomas Schumacher.
The musical also has orchestrations by William David Brohn, dance and vocal arrangements by George Stiles, sound design by Paul Gatehouse, lighting by Hugh Vanstone and Natasha Katz, co-choreography by Stephen Mear, reimagined set and costume designs by Bob Crowley, co-direction and choreography by Matthew Bourne, and direction by Richard Eyre.
The stage production of Mary Poppins originally opened in the West End in December 2004, running for over 1,250 performances. The production won two Olivier Awards and an Evening Standard Award and subsequently ran on Broadway for over six years.
Live entertainment giant,Live Nationwill require proof of vaccination or a negative Covid test for entry to live events and shows held in the United States.
Together Apart, 10 mini-musicals about connecting on Zoom at the beginning of the pandemic—written, directed, and starring Brown University alumni—stream on Broadway on Demand beginning August 6 to benefit The Actors Fund.
Conceived by and featuring Grammy winner Lisa Loeb, the cast also includes Emmy winner Julie Bowen (Modern Family), Emmy winner Josh Hamilton (13 Reasons Why), Ann Harada (Avenue Q),and JoBeth Williams (Kramer vs. Kramer).
Together Apart evolved out of a Brown Musical Theatre class reunion on Zoom held during the pandemic attended by graduates from the early ’80s through the late ’90s. The seven-minute musicals are interspersed with short pieces by Eric Kirchberger, who plays Dr. Anthony Fauci.
Loeb says, “As I sat in the Zoom reunion, listening to everyone talk about their current lives, connecting with friends, and reflecting on all of our vivid musical theatre memories from Brown, I realized that we shouldn’t just talk about what happened in the past, but we should write a Zoom musical about what’s going on, and it should happen all in the world of Zoom. And by sharing our storytelling and our passion and love for theatre, we can work together to provide an outlet for our shared creativity while giving back to this incredible cause.”
The mini-musicals include How Can I Connect?, It’s Okay Mom, The New Normal, Find The Music, Red State/Blue State, Teaching Online, Breathe, Care and Feeding, Family Game Night, and La Dolce Jersey.
Danny Ursetti serves as copyist with post-production video/audio by Kevin Surace. The recording engineer/coordinator is Tye Hunt Fitzgerald, the streaming coordinator is Joe Porter, and the musical director is David Lai.
Together Apart is executive produced by Loeb and produced by Beth Wishnie. It is co-produced by Carl Belfatti, Leslie Buxbaum, Matt Hoverman, Maria Seigenthaler, and The 24 Hour Plays.
Tickets are free of charge with a suggested donation to The Actors Fund. For further information click here.
Get a first look at the Broadway prpduction of Antoinette Chinonye Nwandusacclaimed, award-winning playPASSOVER, directed by Obie Award winnerDanya Taymor.
After suspending its traditional theatre program due to the coronavirus pandemic, California’s Sundance Institute turned its live performance efforts and support to an Interdisciplinary Program. One outcome of this initiative, released August 4, shares insights from over 70 theatre artists as they contemplate the current state of an artform brought to a halt and what’s needed in its road to recovery.
The Emerging From the Cave field study, commissioned by Sundance and executed by longtime advisor Jesse Cameron Alick (recently named associate artistic director at Off-Broadway’s Vineyard Theatre), presents not hard data but rather a collection of ideas, thoughts, feelings, frustrations, and more from 76 individuals. Alick classifies these people, to whom he interviewed via Zoom over the course of several months earlier this year, as “performance innovators, field leaders, thought leaders, and field donors.” Participants include Pulitzer Prize winners Lynn Nottage, Suzan-Lori Parks, and Michael R. Jackson, plus Robert O’Hara, Liesl Tommy, Shaina Taub, Mike Lew, and Ty Defoe.
Jesse Cameron Alick
“The sampling of voices here is just that, a sampling, and there are 10 times as many smart people I didn’t speak with, who I hope will add to this conversation as it continues,” Alick says. “This study aims to give us a road map to follow in this new future in which we now find ourselves.”
Alick determines from his findings that skepticism towards commitment to equity and supporting local communities permeates the community, and identifies four calls to action to address this: an exploration of “Collective Leadership” models, long-term “Holistic Artist Support,” an embrace of “Digital Theater and Hybrid Futures,” and continued, communal “Field Ideation.”
See below for individual excerpts exploring each of these four themes; the full study, including interviews from all interviewees, is available at EmergingFromtheCave.com.
Collective Leadership “Our structure as a team, as a collaborative leadership, is that no one person has the answer. And I think that this can be a novel idea when combating white supremacy and patriarchy. It’s like not one person has all the answers and is obligated to have all the answers—they aren’t the special one or the exceptional one.” Eric Lockley (Performer, writer, and producer, Movement Theatre Company)
Holistic Artist Support “We need to be thinking about the ways in which we are establishing a different model of work and making it clear to artists that actually this is not a one-time deal. We’re not interested in having one project with them where we pay them and then we move on to the next thing, as if this is some sort of news cycle.” Legacy Russell (Writer and curator, The Kitchen)
Digital Theatre/Hybrid Futures “I call it the tyranny of the proscenium. Rather than theatres thinking about how we can create theatre anywhere that demands that stage, they think, ‘How can you create theatre that meets the needs of our individual space?’” Lynn Nottage (Playwright, Sweat, Intimate Apparel, Ruined)
Field Ideation “I think about the seven-generations model that many different Native nations or tribes have. It’s the question of are you thinking seven generations ahead? Why this piece of work now? Why this play now? Why is it important?” Ty Defoe (Interdisciplinary artist and co-founder, Indigenous Direction)
