Monday Night at the Theater: Sweeney Todd
OMG. Found the whole thing. Follow me below the fleur-de-kos for it. But first:Sweeney Todd is a fictional character who first appeared as the murderer of the Victorian penny dreadful The String of...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: La Boheme
Oh, this is fun: Puccini's La Boheme ("The Bohemians" seems the likeliest translation b/c the opera is based on a novel about "the Bohemian life"). This production is set in Paris in the early 20th...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: William Inge's Picnic
If you haven't ever seen it, I think you'll really enjoy Picnic by William Inge. This particular production, from Showtime in 1986, might not be THE definitive production, but it's quite good. This...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: A classic farce: Lend Me a Tenor
A few words about comedy, which most especially apply to farce: The actors can NEVER play it for laughs. They have to play it as if it were real, and the most important thing ever: something their...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Nathan Lane
As the best cowardly lion since Bert Lahr:And imagine the Nathan Lane character's shock when the dud turns into a huge comedic hit!Nathan Lane (born Joseph Lane; February 3, 1956) is an American actor....
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Kinky Boots for Halloween
All blockquotes from Wikipedia, unless otherwise mentioned.Cyndi Lauper's first musical; Harvey Fierstein wrote the book. It won 6 Tony Awards:The musical Kinky Boots led the Tonys with six awards,...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Bernadette Peters
All these clips are from her solo show. All are songs written by Stephen Sondheim...and all showcase why Peters is considered the foremost interpreter of Sondheim's most recent works. (She's much too...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: It's Cold Out There
and I want to be somewhere tropical. So, please forgive, but I wish to revisit my favorite musical in its most exquisite version.A Broadway revival of South Pacific opened on April 3, 2008 at Lincoln...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: My Fair Lady
Wouldn't it be loverly? Kelli O'Hara:In the mid-1930s, film producer Gabriel Pascal acquired the rights to produce film versions of several of George Bernard Shaw's plays, Pygmalion among them....
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Pygmalion by G. B. Shaw
Last week, we looked at My Fair Lady. I thought that this week, it would be fun to take a look at the play on which that musical was based: George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion.Shaw's socialism comes...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Rent
I haven't seen this one live, but it's terrific. I hope you will all enjoy it.Rent is a rock musical with music and lyrics by Jonathan Larson[1] loosely based on Giacomo Puccini's opera La bohème. It...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: A Little Night Music
A Little Night Music is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by Hugh Wheeler. Inspired by the Ingmar Bergman film Smiles of a Summer Night, it involves the romantic lives of...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Sondheim's Pacific Overtures
Pacific Overtures is a musical written by Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman. The show is set in 1853 Japan and follows the difficult Westernization of Japan, told from the point of view of the...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: The Merry Widow
A snippet, from YT, of the current Metropolitan Opera version (final dress rehearsal) featuring Kelli O'Hara in her Met debut:Oh, the gorgeous score by Lehar, in English, by the New York City Opera:...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Hugh Jackman in Oklahoma
full and uncut:I was searching back through past diaries and found the poll from last summer wherein I asked whether people wanted me to post on Monday, even if I had to work, or whatever day I had...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Great Moments in Musicals (with poll)
I've been watching a staged concert of Sweeney Todd; but you've all seen that one already. So, a miscellany tonight. Please vote in the poll for your favorite musical meltdown or high point.To begin,...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: NYC blizzard edition
I've lived through 'em. It's not there yet, but NYers are going to have fun scaling piles of snow at every intersection. (Wishing you all the best! I know how rough it is.)Let's begin with Elaine...
View ArticleMonday Night at the Theater: Stand-Up by Suzanne Westenhoefer
I first saw her when she was hosting an amateur stand-up night at a little bar in the West Village, NYC, besides appearing in much larger venues. Turns out we're both from the same county in PA.I'm at...
View ArticleWednesday Night at the Theater: The Rite of Spring, Nijinski version
I can't speak to the choreography; indeed I don't know from choreography. But the music is as beautiful as it was when Igor Stravinsky wrote it.Stravinsky was a young, virtually unknown composer when...
View Article