Actors’ Equity Association, which has been negotiating a new contract for play and musical development, authorized a strike today to halt collaboration in rehearsal rooms known as developmental labs.
RECORD WEEK CAPS RECORD YEAR — WITH HIGHEST PRICES FOR LONG-RUNNING HITS (TABLE)
Broadway celebrated 2019 with a slew of milestones: highest-grossing week and year in history and best-attended week and year since at least 1984, according to the Broadway League.
Long-running shows such as Wicked ($3.4 million), The Lion King ($3.7 million) and Hamilton ($4 million) recorded their best sales last week and charged their highest average prices, with tourists continuing to flock to Broadway’s biggest brands.
Hamilton, whose composer-lyricist, Lin-Manuel Miranda, returns to the show next week for a short engagement in San Juan, Puerto Rico, became the first Broadway show to clear $4 million over eight performances.Continue Reading
FROM ‘REBECCA’ TO RUMPELMAYER’S: PRODUCER SEEKS INVESTORS FOR REVIVAL OF DINING ICON
EXCLUSIVE: Ben Sprecher raised and spent millions on a Broadway musical version of Rebecca that never opened. For his next act, he wants to recreate an Old World family restaurant, updated for the Instagram age.
Will investors pick up the tab?
‘CHER SHOW’ SHINES WITH STEPHANIE J. BLOCK: REVIEW
Early in The Cher Show, Sonny Bono reprimands Cher when she complains about the rigors of stardom. “You bought the ticket; take the ride.”
The target audience at the Neil Simon Theatre is onboard.
Book writer Rick Elice (Jersey Boys), director Jason Moore (Avenue Q) and choreographer Christopher Gattelli have created a celebratory jukebox musical that has energy and style. Continue Reading
BROADWAY HAS RICHEST THANKSGIVING IN HISTORY
Broadway sold $43 million of tickets in the week ending on Sunday, up 10 percent from a year ago for its best Thanksgiving ever.
In an ugly week for stocks but fine one for tourism and premium pricing, most shows bounced, especially musicals that performed in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.Continue Reading
IN ‘THE NEW ONE,’ BIRBIGLIA TAKES HILARIOUS DEEP DIVE INTO POSTPARTUM AGGRESSION: REVIEW
Mike Birbiglia likes lists. Early in his irresistible one-man comedy The New One, he cites seven reasons why he never wanted a child.
“Number 1: I’ve never felt like there should be more of me in the world.” That leads to a roundup of his horrific medical history, which includes a life-threatening sleep disorder, which he depicted in an earlier show, book and indie movie called Sleepwalk with Me.Continue Reading
LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA TO PRODUCE & OCCASIONALLY STAR IN HIP-HOP SHOW
With a top-ticket (so far) of $119, Lin-Manuel Miranda and three co-producers are mounting an engagement early next year of Freestyle Love Supreme, the improv hip-hop group that the Hamilton creator has performed in since 2004.
“There is nothing like a live hip-hop show that is improvised from the first moment til the final curtain,” Miranda said in a statement. Previews begin on Jan. 30 at the tiny Greenwich House Theater. That’s three days after a run of Hamilton is scheduled to end in San Juan, Puerto Rico, which stars Miranda in the title role. Continue Reading
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD NAMED FOR REVERED YALE DESIGNER (VIDEO)
The set designer and Yale professor Ming Cho Lee is officially synonymous with excellence in theatrical design.
Last week at the Palm West Side restaurant, Lee was recognized for lifetime achievement as part of the annual Henry Hewes Design Awards. Jeffrey Eric Jenkins, a professor of theatre at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign and the Hewes Design chairman, announced that future lifetime achievers will be given an award named after Lee.Continue Reading
‘THE FERRYMAN’ IS GREAT FECKIN’ THEATER: REVIEW
Ninety minutes, no intermission has its appeal. But Jez Butterworth’s The Ferryman, with two dozen actors, a rabbit, goose, and a real-life baby dramatizing plot lines that explosively coalesce, makes the case for epic drama.
As directed by Sam Mendes, it has more humor and vitality than one might expect from a play set in Northern Ireland during the Troubles.Continue Reading
THE PLAY BOOM & DERREN BROWN’S ‘SECRET’ AMBITION: WEEKLY WRAP
Derren Brown‘s challenge: make a vacant Broadway theater appear out of thin air.
In a conversation with Adam Green at the New Yorker Festival on Oct. 7, the British illusionist said he’s “hopefully doing Broadway next spring, fingers crossed.” Greg Day, his United Kingdom-based spokesman, told Broadway Journal that Brown seeks to bring in Secret later this season. Ben Brantley called the show “enthrallingly baffling” when it played off-Broadway at the Atlantic Theater in 2017.
