Broadway Journal

‘PLAZA SUITE’ ADVANCE SALE TOPS $10 MILLION; BOSTON CRITICS SIDELINED

by

EXCLUSIVE: A month before previews start on Broadway, the limited run of Neil Simon’s Plaza Suite  is approaching full occupancy.

The advance sale for the revival with husband-and-wife stars Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker has surpassed $10 million, according to a person familiar with the production. Its tryout at Boston’s Emerson Colonial Theatre ends on Saturday and previews begin on March 13 at the Hudson Theatre.

In response to the strong demand for tickets in Boston and New York, lead producer Ambassador Theatre Group, which operates the Colonial and the Hudson, has already raised prices on Broadway by as much as 150 percent.Continue Reading

IDINA MENZEL LOOKS LIKE A GO FOR ‘FUNNY GIRL’ (EXCLUSIVE)

by

Idina Menzel is in talks to play Fanny Brice this fall in the first Broadway revival of Funny Girl, the hit 1964 Jule Styne-Bob Merrill-Isobel Lennart musical that starred Barbra Streisand.

The show would be directed by Michael Mayer and overseen by the U.K. producers Sonia Friedman and David Babani, according to two people familiar with the project. In 2015, Mayer staged a Funny Girl revival at London’s Menier Chocolate Factory (where Babani serves as artistic director) starring Sheridan Smith. The production had a revised book by Harvey Fierstein and transferred to the West End.Continue Reading

‘SING STREET’ LIKELY TO OPEN AT THE LYCEUM IN APRIL (EXCLUSIVE)

by

The producers of Sing Street  are in talks to transfer their musical to the Shubert Organization’s Lyceum Theatre this spring, in time to qualify for Tony Award nominations.

The adaptation of the highly-regarded 2016 movie, about Dublin schoolboys who form a band influenced by Duran Duran and other English pop groups of the era, would begin previews in late March ahead of an April 19 opening, according to a person familiar with the negotiations. A developmental production at New York Theatre Workshop opened on Dec. 16 and is scheduled to close on Jan. 26. Continue Reading

ACTORS’ EQUITY ENDS STRIKE AGAINST BROADWAY LEAGUE

by

After 33 days, Actors’ Equity has ended its limited strike against the Broadway League over how its members are compensated for developing new work.

Actors had sought profit share and a raise from the current $1,000 weekly salary when participating in a developmental lab, which are multi-week workshops to create new plays and musicals.Continue Reading

‘OKLAHOMA!’ IN DUMBO IS A BOLD TAKE ON A PERFECT MUSICAL: REVIEW

by

Rebecca Naomi Jones & Damon Daunno/Teddy Wolff

Some theatrical ideas are so ambitious it almost doesn’t matter whether they succeed or fail – the fun is in seeing them play out. In his audacious, stripped-down staging of Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Oklahoma!,  which opened Sunday at St Ann’s Warehouse, director Daniel Fish exposes the repression, lust, and violence that always lay beneath the surface of this seminal musical.

Continue Reading

FONTANA FANTASTIC IN JUICY ‘TOOTSIE’ ROLE: REVIEW

by

The marquee in Chicago

CHICAGO — “Being a woman is no job for a man,” Michael Dorsey (Santino Fontana) concludes in the winning but inconsistent Broadway-bound musical comedy Tootsie,  which opened last night at the Cadillac Palace Theatre here. So how come his Dorothy Michaels holds the stage as well as his Michael Dorsey?

In an auburn wig, beige high heels and glasses, Fontana is sublime as Michael/Dorothy, the temperamental, opinionated, unemployed New York actor who finds stardom and self-awareness after putting on a dress and posing as an actress. Fontana borrows a gesture or two from Dustin Hoffman’s performance in the brilliant 1982 Columbia Pictures comedy. But Fontana makes the role his own with fine timing, crisp dancing and a gender-bending vocal range interpreting David Yazbek’s varied and mostly wonderful score. (Plus, of course, nonstop changes of William Ivey Long’s wry costumes.)Continue Reading

Copyright © 2019 Broadway Journal.