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(11/28/07 2:36am)
NEW YORK – Talks ended Tuesday morning between striking Broadway stagehands and theater producers without a deal to end the labor dispute that has darkened theaters for more than two weeks.\n“There is no deal,” said Bruce Cohen, a spokesman for Local 1, the stagehands’ union, at about 7:30 a.m. “There are no talks scheduled.”\nHe said it was “not a breakdown” in negotiations.\nA spokeswoman for the League of American Theatres and Producers could not immediately confirm that talks ended Tuesday.\nThe two sides returned to the bargaining table Monday, 12 hours after ending a marathon negotiating session aimed at settling a labor dispute that has kept most of Broadway dark for more than two weeks.\nA long Sunday meeting between Local 1 and the League of American Theatres and Producers spilled into the early morning hours of Monday. Both sides resumed their talks Monday evening and continued until past dawn, fueled by pizza and soda deliveries.\nRenewed efforts to end the work stoppage came at the end of the Thanksgiving holiday week, usually one of the best times of the year for Broadway. Not so this year, with most of Broadway, including such big hits as “Wicked,” “Jersey Boys,” “The Lion King,” “Mamma Mia!” and “The Phantom of the Opera” shut down since the stagehands walked out Nov. 10.\nBoth Local 1 and the league have been under pressure to find a solution to the conflict as box-office losses climb and other unions that work on Broadway, such as Actors’ Equity Association, began to feel the effects of no paychecks.\nTheater-related businesses have been hurt, too.\nCity Comptroller William Thompson has estimated the economic impact of the strike at $2 million a day, based on survey data, including theatergoers total spending on tickets, dining, shopping and other activities.\nThe complicated contract dispute has focused on how many stagehands are required to open a Broadway show and keep it running. That means moving scenery, lights, sound systems and props into the theater; installing the set and making sure it works and keeping everything functioning well for the life of the production.\nEight shows remain open, including “Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas!” at the St. James Theatre. The limited-run musical originally had been shut by the strike but was reopened last week by court order.\nJujamcyn Theaters, which owns the St. James, initially announced it would appeal the state Supreme Court decision. But on Monday, Jujamcyn agreed not to seek an immediate appeal, meaning the $6 million production can continue uninterrupted for the rest of its holiday run. The engagement ends Jan. 6.
(11/26/07 1:14am)
NEW YORK – It’s a worst-case scenario that became a reality.\nAs the Broadway stagehands strike enters its third week Saturday, there doesn’t seem to be any way out of the thorny, seemingly intractable dispute that has shut down more than two dozen plays and musicals since Nov. 10.\nLosses because of canceled performances are in the millions and climbing each day – a disaster not only for producers and theater owners, but for everyone employed in the theater and for those whose businesses depend on curtains going up.\nBoth sides are hanging tough and have not talked for almost a week. The standoff has meant dark theaters during the Thanksgiving holiday, usually one of the year’s best weeks for business.\nNot this year. There was a weird disconnect in the Times Square area during the holiday. On Thanksgiving Eve, side streets were filled with lively, noisy crowds. They were in stark contrast to the silent pickets walking slowly in front of padlocked theaters that looked forlorn even with lighted marquees.\nLocal 1 of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees says it’s willing to meet again with the League of American Theatres and Producers. But the league says it won’t go back to the bargaining table unless the union is ready to make a deal.\nAnd none is in sight.\nA settlement was believed to be in the works last Sunday after a marathon weekend of negotiations. But the talks ended abruptly when the producers informed union president James J. Claffey Jr. that what the local had offered was not enough.\nThe complicated contract dispute has focused on how many stagehands are required to open a Broadway show and keep it running. That means moving scenery, lights, sound systems and props into the theater; installing the set and making sure it works; and keeping everything functioning well for the life of the production.\nThe producers want a flexible number; the union more specificity, including ample compensation for any concessions made.\nThe talks, from all reports, have been businesslike, with only an occasional flaring of tempers. Yet both sides seem more adept at preparing for a strike than in negotiating their way out of one.\nThe producers set up a $20 million strike emergency fund, taking a couple cents out of each ticket sold over the last several years to pay for it. The money would help struck shows struggling with the costs of a shutdown.\nThe union, too, has its own fund – benefits of more than $4.1 million for its members as well as another $1 million allotted for members of other unions affected by the walkout.\nAnd if an agreement isn’t reached before Christmas, both parties may end up using every penny.
(11/15/07 5:17am)
NEW YORK – No talks. No comment. And no opening nights.\nWednesday was to have been the New York premiere of “The Farnsworth Invention,” the eagerly anticipated return to Broadway of playwright Aaron Sorkin, the creator of such television shows as “The West Wing” and “Sports Night.”\nInstead, the Music Box Theatre, one of Broadway’s most elegant playhouses, sits dark along with 26 other theaters as Local 1, the stagehands union, and the League of American Theatres and Producers remain deadlocked in the fifth day of an acrimonious contract dispute.\nNeither side is talking to the other. Silent pickets stand in front of locked theater lobbies. Other unions, including Actors’ Equity and the musicians’ local, have lined up in support of the stagehands. Even Broadway press agents, instructed by their own union to honor Local 1’s picket line, are silent.\n“The Farnsworth Invention,” Sorkin’s look at the birth of television starring Hank Azaria, wasn’t the only opening scheduled this week. “The Seafarer” by Irish playwright Conor McPherson had been set for Thursday. It, too, is shut, and its opening uncertain.\nMcPherson, author of “The Weir” and “Shining City,” says the challenge now is to psychologically stay ready even though the actors aren’t allowed to rehearse at the theater. “We’ll be doing our best to sort of get together and talk about it and keep our chin up,” he said.\nPreviews, which began in late October, stopped after last Friday’s performance.\n“I’m confident that if we get a chance to open, it should be all right,” the playwright said. “We’ll just keep our fingers crossed and pray – pray that the testosterone levels drop on both sides of the strike and see how it goes.”\n“August: Osage County,” imported from Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre Company, had an opening planned for next Tuesday. But the play by Tracy Letts also went dark in mid-previews, and its producers have offered to fly the Chicago actors home for the duration of the walkout.\nIn a gesture of support, Second Stage Theatre has offered a little bit of off-Broadway hospitality to the Steppenwolf actors. Carole Rothman, its artistic director, has set aside 15 tickets for the Wednesday matinee performance of “Edward Albee’s Peter and Jerry” for the Chicago performers who remain here.\nThe contract dispute has focused on how many stagehands are required to open a show and keep it running. That means moving scenery, lights, sound systems and props into the theater; installing the set and making sure it works; and keeping everything functioning well for the life of the production.
(11/14/07 4:01am)
NEW YORK – The drama was on the streets and not on stage for disappointed theatergoers as striking stagehands picketed behind barricades in the Times Square area.\nFrom “Wicked” to “The Phantom of the Opera,” from “Mamma Mia!” to “Rent,” most shows did not go on Saturday as Broadway stagehands walked off the job, shutting down more than two dozen plays and musicals.\nThe Local One union had no official comment on the walkout, and no new negotiations have been scheduled with the League of American Theatres and Producers. So the outlook for a quick settlement \nlooks murky.\nThe two sides have been in contentious negotiations for more than three months. Much of their disagreements involve work rules and staffing requirements, particularly rules governing the expensive process of loading in and setting up a show. The producers want more flexibility in hiring; the stagehands don’t want to give up what they say are hard-won benefits without something \nin return.\n“We must remain committed to achieving a fair contract,” Charlotte St. Martin, executive director of the league, said. “Our goal is simple: to pay for workers we need and for work that is actually performed.”\nCity officials said Saturday that it was too early to estimate the economic impact of the strike. Mayor Michael Bloomberg expressed disappointment that the two sides couldn’t settle their differences without a strike, but reiterated, “The city continues to stand ready to help in any way we can.”\nThe work stoppage first affected “Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical,” a holiday attraction for families that had an early 11 a.m. matinee.\nSchool counselor Vicki Michel, with teacher husband Pat, came to New York from their home in Puyallup, Wash., for a weekend of Broadway shows. The three shows they intended to see were all canceled: “Grinch,” ‘’Hairspray” and “Mamma Mia!” They managed to nab tickets to “Young Frankenstein” (which was not affected by the walkout) and the “Radio City Christmas Spectacular,” and were headed to the Metropolitan Museum of Art on Saturday instead of the “Grinch.”\nOutside the Gershwin Theatre where “Wicked” plays, Wanda Antonetti, of DuBois, Pa., and her daughter, Sherry Antonetti, of Dover, Del., contemplated where to shop. They arrived Saturday morning to celebrate Wanda Antonetti’s 70th birthday and did not know about the strike until they arrived at the theater. “We came a long way for lunch,” Wanda Antonetti said.\nPatrons will be able to get refunds for tickets to canceled shows or exchange the tickets for the next available date, the league said. At “Wicked,” several received pamphlets for “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee,” which was playing next door and was open for business.\nOn West 52nd Street, where Tony Award-winning musicals “Jersey Boys” and “Hairspray” play on either side of the street, pickets stood behind police barricades as theatergoers received directions on how to get their refunds. The stagehands carried signs reading, “Our families are No. 1.”
(09/24/07 11:51pm)
NEW YORK – It’s called simply “The August Wilson Century Cycle” – 10 plays celebrating the black experience in 20th-century America – one for each decade.\nAnd now Wilson’s masterworks are available in one place: a 10-volume, hardcover, boxed set, to be published Oct. 1 by Theatre Communications Group at a special introductory price of $200. Each play, from “Gem of the Ocean,” which takes place in 1904, to ‘“Radio Golf,” set in 1997, will also be \navailable separately.\nIntroductions to each of the plays were written by artists who knew Wilson’s dramas well, from novelist Toni Morrison, who champions “The Piano Lesson,” to playwright Tony Kushner, who extols “Seven Guitars,” to actor Laurence Fishburne, who starred on Broadway in “Two Trains Running.”\nWilson, who died of liver cancer in 2005 at the age of 60, set most of his plays in Pittsburgh’s Hill District. The neighborhood, as well as a lengthy parade of indelible characters, come alive in these works.
(08/31/07 1:56am)
NEW YORK – JoAnne Worley swirls into Angus McIndoe’s, the Broadway theater hangout, notices a crooked painting on the wall, straightens it and then settles into a back corner table for a light bite.\nBut then Worley is a take-charge kind of gal, even more so on stage where her raucous comedy style is currently earning cheers in “The Drowsy Chaperone,” the hit musical at the Marquis Theatre.\nAs Casey Nicholaw, the director of “Drowsy,” puts it, “She just sort of knocks you over the head with it. There are no apologies at all: ‘This is what I am, this is what I do – and love me.’” And audiences do.\n“For me, the show is a joyous ride,” says Worley, describing the musical in which she plays the ditsy dowager, Mrs. Tottendale, a woman who knows how to wear a tiara and swing her pearls (a Worley specialty). “It’s so beautifully constructed that doing eight shows a week is a pleasure and energizing.”\nEnergy is what the actress is all about this quiet summer morning before the lunch crowd has started to drift into the restaurant.\nIt doesn’t take long before Worley, dressed stylishly in a black, vaguely Mandarin-looking outfit and gold earrings, bursts into song. It’s a little ditty she wrote for “Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In,” that legendary, late 1960s TV hit that showcased her unique comedic talents.\n“I’m loud, I’m loud, I’m proud that I’m loud,” she sings. “People can hear me when I’m in a crowd. Those soft-spoken, shy folk would never be my folk ‘cause I am a folk who is loud.” She holds the last “loud” for full sonic effect.\n“Thank God, we’re in here alone,” she says with a laugh before digging enthusiastically into a salmon salad. The impromptu warbling demonstrates Worley’s sure way with a revue song.\nThe Indiana-born performer got much of her early show-biz education in Los Angeles with the fabled Billy Barnes, a master at creating revues. She worked with Barnes in California and came to New York in 1961 with “Billy Barnes People,” a short-lived Broadway edition of one of his shows.\n“When I first started, I was so dumb, but I did know how to make people laugh,” Worley says. “All I know is I learned early on that I could do that, and it was a wonderful thing.”\nShe remembers once, as a child, standing with a church choir in front of the congregation and chewing gum, pulling the gum out in a long string and then slowly nibbling it back into her mouth. “I got a wonderful laugh – and in church,” she enthuses. “Do you know how seductive that is?”\nOne of Worley’s first New York theater gigs was standing by for Carol Channing in the original production of “Hello, Dolly!” But Channing, famous for never missing a performance, told her, “JoAnne, you will never have to go on.” And she didn’t. \n“I knew to trust Carol,” Worley says. “I knew she was telling me the truth.” But Worley didn’t mind the inaction. At the time, she also was working with the fabled improv group, Second City, “so it was nice to get two paychecks.”\nIt was Nicholaw who got Worley to come back to New York from California for more than just a short stay. Earlier this year, he cast her in a City Center “Encores!” concert version of the Stephen Sondheim-James Goldman musical, “Follies.” In it, she belted the big production number, “Who’s That Woman?”\n“JoAnne is someone I’ve always wanted to work with,” Nicholaw says, recalling that he was first blown away by her performance in a production of “The Pirates of Penzance” in Los Angeles.\n“When I got ‘Follies,’ I said, “I don’t know what part yet, but she has to be in the show. I’ve always known how talented she is. Everyone just thinks of her from ‘Laugh-In’ and that she only does that persona – although we let her do a lot of it in ‘The Drowsy Chaperone’ because that’s the kind of \nshow it is.”
(08/28/07 1:44am)
NEW YORK – Madame Morrible, the crafty headmistress of “Wicked,” has been played by a parade of impressive ladies including Carol Kane, Rue McClanahan, Jayne Houdyshell and, in London, by \nMiriam Margolyes.\nNow the Broadway original, Carole Shelley, has returned to the New York company of the long-running musical hit which currently stars Julia Murney as the green witch, Elphaba, and Kendra Kassebaum as Glinda, her blonde counterpart.\nShelley was in “Wicked,” a prequel to “The Wizard of Oz,” when it premiered Oct. 30, 2003, at the Gershwin Theatre. The musical has a score by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman and is based on the novel by Gregory Maguire.\nThe actress was one of the Pigeon sisters in the original Broadway cast of Neil Simon’s “The Odd Couple” (1965) and won a best-actress Tony Award for her performance in “The Elephant \nMan” (1979).
(04/23/07 4:00am)
TORONTO – For more than 10 years, the Pantages, a restored movie and vaudeville house on a shabby block of Yonge Street, was home to “The Phantom of the Opera,” the wildly popular Andrew Lloyd Webber musical.\nNow, nearly eight years later, the theater, corporately rechristened the Canon, is occupied by another British import, “We Will Rock You,” which uses songs of that iconic 1970s and ’80s rock band Queen. And while no one is suggesting this futuristic comic strip of a musical will last as long as “Phantom,” its producer and creative team undoubtedly would like to see a successful Toronto run.\n“We have to look to audiences to tell us whether we can have that,” says producer David Mirvish. “The way things are going, we have every hope that that will happen. The chances are we are going to be the home of rock for the summer.”\nIt could be boon for Mirvish and, in general, commercial Toronto theater, which has faltered in recent years, unable to attract long runs like it did in the days of “Phantom,” “Mamma Mia!” and “The Lion King.” Those runs were fueled, in part, by American audiences, who, since Sept. 11 and SARS, have not been as plentiful. One question mark will be if the rising Canadian dollar and more stringent American passport requirements affect cross-border travel.\n“We Will Rock You,” which opened here April 10, premiered in England in May 2002 and is still running there despite what its British director and book writer Ben Elton laughingly says “were possibly the worst reviews in the history of London theater.”\nSome Toronto critics sniffed, too, but the notices were not as scathing as those in England and a few were practically favorable. The Globe and Mail, a national daily, gave the musical three stars out of four. And most of the reviewers cheered the show’s music – the work of all four of the band’s members: singer Freddie Mercury, who died of AIDS in 1991; guitarist Brian May; drummer Roger Taylor and bass player John Deacon.\nIndividually and together, all four members of Queen wrote hits: Mercury, for example, creating “Bohemian Rhapsody,” Deacon writing “Another One Bites the Dust,” Taylor “A Kind of Magic” and May, the well-known anthem “We Will Rock You.” But how do you put them into a musical?\nIt was producer Phil McIntyre who had the idea for a musical, one based on Mercury’s life, but the notion never went anywhere. McIntyre asked Elton to get involved but he was busy with Lloyd Webber writing a musical called “The Beautiful Game.”\nIt was only later that Elton reconsidered, but he rejected the biographical idea. “I wanted something that would reflect the spirit of Queen. And if you think of one word in Britain to reflect Queen it’s `legend,’” the man says. “We like our legendary rock, and the moment you think legend, you think suddenly Arthur ... King Arthur ... the Sword in the Stone and I’m thinking what about an ax in the stone? What about a mighty guitar buried in rock and he who can draw it forth and play the mighty riff? All kinds of heavy-metal silliness.”\nAt the same time, Elton had seen the movie “The Matrix,” and he reveled in its fantasies about people “abused by a vast brain that’s kind of running the planet and nobody knows it.”\n“So I imagined a ‘Matrix’ world where, yes, the machine controls everything, but only in an effort to constantly force it to consume more entertainment and pay for it and download more and more of it.”\nIn this world, 300 years in the future, musical instruments are banned and the kids are only allowed to purchase computerized, digitalized pop music – until a young rebel, an outsider who frees them from their musical bondage to the aptly named Killer Queen.\n“It suddenly struck me that you could combine King Arthur with all the usual future fantasies from ‘1984’ to ‘The Matrix’ and you would have a Queen musical,” Elton says.\nThat includes have an outcast as its young hero, called Galileo, just like in “Bohemian Rhapsody,” who hooks up with a feisty young woman named Scaramouche.\n“We Will Rock You” may be a British musical, but the Toronto production has a unique Canadian flavor, an attempt to localize the show, something which was done for all the other productions including Germany, Switzerland, Japan and an American version in Las Vegas in 2004.\n“We cast it right across the country ... (finding) people from Vancouver Island all the way to Newfoundland,” Mirvish says.
(01/31/06 5:03am)
NEW YORK -- Playwright Wendy Wasserstein, who celebrated women confronting feminism, careers, love and motherhood in such works as "The Heidi Chronicles" and "The Sisters Rosensweig," died Monday. She was 55.\nWasserstein, who had been battling cancer in recent months, died at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. Andre Bishop, head of Lincoln Center Theater and Wasserstein's close friend and mentor, said the cause of death was lymphoma.\n"She was an extraordinary human being whose work and whose life were extremely intertwined," Bishop said. "She was not unlike the heroines of most of her plays -- a strong-minded, independent, serious good person."\nWasserstein's writing was known for its sharp, often wry observations about what women had to do to succeed in a world dominated by men.\nIn "The Heidi Chronicles," which won the best-play Tony as well as the Pulitzer Prize for drama in 1989, its insecure heroine (played by Joan Allen) takes a 20-year journey beginning in the late 1960s and changes her attitudes about herself, men and other women. "The Sisters Rosensweig," which moved from Lincoln Center to Broadway in 1993, concerned three siblings who find strength in themselves and in each other.\nHer most recent work, "Third," which ended a New York run Dec. 18, 2005, dealt with a female college professor, played by Dianne Wiest, whose liberal, feminist convictions are put to the test by a student she sees as the epitome of the white male establishment.\nIn public, Wasserstein was genial, often quite funny, presenting herself as a rumpled observer of the baby-boom generation.\nMany of her plays were initially seen at off-Broadway's Playwrights Horizons and later at Lincoln Center Theater, both run by Bishop.\nWasserstein was first noticed with "Uncommon Women and Others," written as a Yale School of Drama graduate thesis. The one-act play was expanded and done off-Broadway in 1977 with Glenn Close, Jill Eikenberry and Swoosie Kurtz in the cast. A year later, this satire about the anxieties of female college graduates was filmed for public television with Meryl Streep replacing Close.\nThe playwright continued her off-Broadway success with "Isn't It Romantic," about a free spirit who rejects her fiance and tries to find a life as a single woman.\nIn 1997, Broadway saw "An American Daughter," Wasserstein's story of the political downfall of a perfect career woman, played by Kate Nelligan. It was followed in 2000 by "Old Money," her look at money, manners and morals at the beginning and end of the 20th century, done at Lincoln Center's small Mitzi Newhouse Theater.\nWhile primarily a playwright, Wasserstein also wrote for TV and the movies, most notably the screenplay for the 1998 film version of Stephen McCauley's novel, "The Object of My Affection," about a gay man and a pregnant woman who meet and move in together.\nWasserstein was the author of the best-selling children's book, "Pamela's First Musical" (1996). She also wrote two collections of personal essays, "Bachelor Girls," published in 1990, and "Shiksa Goddess: (Or, How I Spent My Forties)" (2001).
(01/10/06 4:59am)
NEW YORK -- Broadway has a new long-run champion: "The Phantom of the Opera." \nAndrew Lloyd Webber's lushly romantic musical about a haunted, disfigured composer pining for a beautiful young soprano in the Paris Opera House, was set to surpass "Cats" Monday as the longest-running show in Broadway history.\nWith performance number 7,486 Monday night, the show was to top Lloyd Webber's feline extravaganza, which closed in September 2000. "Phantom" has lasted nearly 18 years at the Majestic Theatre, where it opened Jan. 26, 1988 -- and the end is nowhere in sight.\nAsk Lloyd Webber, whose other megahits include "Jesus Christ Superstar" and "Evita," to explain the phenomenal success of "Phantom," and he says with a laugh, "If I really knew, I would do it again.\n"I think there isn't another musical that has been written in the last two decades or so, which has a plot that is so escapist, that allows high romance to happen."\nCameron Mackintosh, the show's savvy producer, agrees.\n"The musical is a kind of beauty-and-the-beast story. It appeals to everyone because it is about an impossible love, which I think many of us have had," Mackintosh says.\n"The whole framework or design of the show is that you are sucked into this mythical world below the opera house and yet shown something where we can feel the same emotions as one can feel in normal life."\nMackintosh is now in the enviable position of having the three longest-running shows in Broadway history: "Cats," which closed after 7,485 performances, in second place, and "Les Miserables," which shut in May 2003 after, 6,680 performances, in third.\nAll have been enormously profitable, but the money made by "Phantom" has been staggering. Its worldwide box-office gross -- the show is still running in London, too -- has gone past $3.2 billion. More than 80 million people around the world have seen the musical, which has been presented in two dozen countries.\nNew York grosses have been nearly $600 million, with the show seen by nearly 11 million theatergoers at the Majestic. New York has had 11 different Phantoms, starting with Michael Crawford, who originated the role in the London production in October 1986.\nBoth Lloyd Webber and Mackintosh are wary about predicting how long the musical will run.\nA new generation has been turned on to "Phantom" through the release of the movie version and then the DVD, according to Mackintosh. Both have given the musical new life at the box office.\nAnd now, is there life after "Phantom" for the two men?\nMackintosh is busy with several other projects, including co-presenting the Broadway hit "Avenue Q" in London where the musical will open in June. And in the fall, Macktinosh and Disney will produce the stage version of "Mary Poppins" in New York at Disney's New Amsterdam Theatre. An opening is set for Nov. 16.\nLloyd Webber plans to put on his producing hat, too. He may have a hand in producing the first recording for young American singer, 14-year-old Andrea Ross.\nThen there is an upcoming London revival of "Evita," directed by Michael Grandage, that Lloyd Webber says is "going to be more Latin than the original." Auditions are down to three actresses for the title character, he revealed -- with a decision to be made after he returns to London from the "Phantom" festivities.\nBesides producing a revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein's "The Sound of Music," planned for next October at the London Palladium, the composer is reading three projects right now that may find their way to the stage, but he declined to elaborate.\n"I don't want to rush into writing something for the sake of it. Having written 14 musicals now, you don't want to make the 15th something you're doing because you feel you have to," Lloyd Webber says.
(09/14/05 4:38am)
NEW YORK -- Sandy Wilson describes his fascination, some might say obsession, quite simply.\n"The 1920s impinged on me as a child and have remained with me ever since," the composer states with crisp understatement.\nIt was responsible for, among other things, "The Boy Friend," an endearing trifle of a show that became the most frequently performed and revived British musical during the 1950s. Before "Cats," "Les Miserables" and even "Oliver!", Wilson's sweet tale of girl meets boy -- for which he wrote book, music and lyrics -- was a success in London, New York and around the world.\nNow the show is back in a major revival -- first at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Conn., through Sept. 25, and then on a six-month North American tour. And the director is the woman who originated the role of Wilson's heroine, Polly, in the 1954 Broadway production, Julie Andrews.\nIf the star is now better known than the man who made her New York debut possible, the composer holds a special place in the history of musical theater.\n"Wilson is at the very top of the list of British musical theater writers of the postwar period," says historian and critic Ken Mandelbaum, author of "Not Since Carrie."\n"`The Boy Friend' is a perfectly realized spoof, written with wit, affection and great style."\n "The Boy Friend" was born in the early 1950s at the suggestion of Wilson's good friend, actress Diana Maddox. Wilson, who had been writing material for revues, was asked to compose a short piece for the Players Theatre, which specialized in presenting Victorian musicals. It was a smash. A full-length version, equally successful, soon followed and then a move to London's West End.\n"I was under no sort of pressure," he says. The production was only going to last three weeks and Wilson was only earning a few dollars. "I felt, 'This is all that I ever wanted to do. Let's just have fun and enjoy it.' I had no idea what was going to happen. Not at all."\nWhat happened was a run of more than five years, a successful Broadway engagement and even a movie sale to MGM for a film that was not made until 1971.\nThe Broadway production was not a happy experience for Wilson, barred from rehearsals after a disagreement with the American producers over the show's direction. And Wilson describes the movie, directed by Ken Russell and starring Twiggy, by saying, "It wasn't painful. It was just astonishing."\nExpecting to be shocked, he sneaked into a midnight preview before the opening. "I have seen many Ken Russell films, and they are always outrageous and scandalous -- the devil in the nude or something like that. Twiggy was the only sort of human being in it."\nSo far in 2005, about 150 productions of the show have been licensed by Music Theatre International, a licensing company for stage musicals. The show has averaged about 100 productions a year in the United States for the last five years, mostly amateur productions, says Richard Salfas, MTI's director of international licensing. That's similar to other, much better-known shows from the 1950s such as "The Pajama Game" and "Damn Yankees." \n"Vida Hope, who directed the original, was convinced it was going to be a tremendous success ... I didn't believe her. I still don't. But that was 50 years ago, and it's still going strong"
(09/13/05 4:51am)
NEW YORK -- Sandy Wilson describes his fascination, some might say obsession, quite simply.\n"The 1920s impinged on me as a child and have remained with me ever since," the composer states with crisp understatement.\nIt was responsible for, among other things, "The Boy Friend," an endearing trifle of a show that became the most frequently performed and revived British musical during the 1950s. Before "Cats," "Les Miserables" and even "Oliver!", Wilson's sweet tale of girl meets boy -- for which he wrote book, music and lyrics -- was a success in London, New York and around the world.\nNow the show is back in a major revival -- first at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Conn., through Sept. 25, and then on a six-month North American tour. And the director is the woman who originated the role of Wilson's heroine, Polly, in the 1954 Broadway production, Julie Andrews.\nIf the star is now better known than the man who made her New York debut possible, the composer holds a special place in the history of musical theater.\n"Wilson is at the very top of the list of British musical theater writers of the postwar period," says historian and critic Ken Mandelbaum, author of "Not Since Carrie."\n"'The Boy Friend' is a perfectly realized spoof, written with wit, affection and great style."\nThe 81-year-old Wilson, sporting large owl-like eyeglasses, is casually dapper, dressed in a striped, russet-colored shirt and tan slacks. He sits in the lounge of a midtown Manhattan hotel and calmly sips an extra foamy cappuccino. It occasionally frosts his white mustache as he talks fondly about the era that jump-started his show-biz career.\nThose memories began with his sister's gramophone records. Wilson, born in the north of England, had three older sisters. The eldest, 14 years older than her brother, was a fan of such 1920s shows as "Lady Be Good," "Oh, Kay!" and especially "No, No, Nanette," which was a big success at the time.\n"I instinctively knew all the songs from it ('Nanette'), such as 'Tea for Two' and 'I Want to Be Happy,'" Wilson recalls. "That's why the theme song of 'The Boy Friend' is 'I Could Be Happy With You.' I knew `happy' had to come in somewhere."\nWilson remembers sitting on the floor and watching his sisters and their friends dance the Charleston. "For some reason, I just loved it. There was a sense of optimism and joy in the 1920s."\nEven as a child, he could compose tunes in his head, but could not write them down. Because he wanted to write music, he learned to play the piano.\n"I bought all the new music by people like Irving Berlin, Cole Porter, the Gershwins, Rodgers and Hart, played them and learned from them. That's the only musical education I really had. I never learned to compose. I learned from what I consider the great masters."\nEchoes of their work can be found in "The Boy Friend," which is set on the French Riviera in 1926. \n"Perfect young ladies" from the Villa Caprice, Mme. Dubonnet's finishing school, as well as several pairs of older folks are on the lookout for love, and, of course, they find it.\n"The Boy Friend" was born in the early 1950s at the suggestion of Wilson's good friend, actress Diana Maddox. Wilson, who had been writing material for revues, was asked to compose a short piece for the Players Theatre, which specialized in presenting Victorian musicals. It was a smash. A full-length version, equally successful, soon followed and then a move to London's West End.\n"I was under no sort of pressure," he says. The production was only going to last three weeks and Wilson was only earning a few dollars. "I felt, 'This is all that I ever wanted to do. Let's just have fun and enjoy it.' I had no idea what was going to happen. Not at all."\nWhat happened was a run of more than five years, a successful Broadway engagement and even a movie sale to MGM for a film that was not made until 1971.\nThe Broadway production was not a happy experience for Wilson, barred from rehearsals after a disagreement with the American producers over the show's direction. And Wilson describes the movie, directed by Ken Russell and starring Twiggy, by saying, "It wasn't painful. It was just astonishing."\nExpecting to be shocked, he sneaked into a midnight preview before the opening. "I have seen many Ken Russell films, and they are always outrageous and scandalous -- the devil in the nude or something like that. Twiggy was the only sort of human being in it."\nWilson's other musicals are virtually unknown in the United States, although some have had runs in England, including "Divorce Me Darling," a 1930s sequel to "The Boy Friend." His favorite is "Valmouth," adapted from a novel by Ronald Firbank about the eccentric female residents of an English spa town. It had a short run off-Broadway in 1960, apparently too rarified for American tastes.\n"Once you've had a success you are under pressure. What are you going to do next? What's it going to be like? And the only effect it's had, which is very difficult for me, is that everything I write is compared to 'The Boy Friend.'"\nAnd yet it is "The Boy Friend" that persists onstage.\nSo far in 2005, about 150 productions of the show have been licensed by Music Theatre International, a licensing company for stage musicals. The show has averaged about 100 productions a year in the United States for the last five years, mostly amateur productions, says Richard Salfas, MTI's director of international licensing. That's similar to other, much better-known shows from the 1950s such as "The Pajama Game" and "Damn Yankees." Not bad for a musical that has been available for nearly five decades.\n"I've never written anything else like 'The Boy Friend.' And I have no intention of doing so," Wilson says.\n"When people ask, 'Do you resent "The Boy Friend?" or are you fed up with it?' I say, `No, not at all. I love it.' But what I do resent is that critics can't see beyond that. But you have to live with it.\n"Vida Hope, who directed the original, was convinced it was going to be a tremendous success. ... I didn't believe her. I still don't. But that was 50 years ago, and it's still going strong"
(09/14/04 4:20am)
NEW YORK -- Fred Ebb, who wrote the lyrics for such hit Broadway musicals as "Chicago" and "Cabaret" as well as the big-city anthem "New York, New York," has died of a heart attack. \nEbb died Saturday at his home, said David McKeown, an assistant to composer John Kander, Ebb's longtime collaborator. The lyricist was believed to be 76, though Ebb always was "sweetly vague" about his age, said director Scott Ellis, who worked with him on several shows.\nWith Kander, Ebb wrote the scores for 11 Broadway musicals, many of them for such leading ladies as Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera, Liza Minnelli and Lauren Bacall. Minnelli was a particular favorite of the songwriting team, and over the years, the duo created special material for the performer's solo appearances on Broadway and on television specials.\nAmong the other musicals Kander and Ebb wrote during their four decades of collaboration were "Kiss of the Spider Woman" (1993), "The Rink" (1984), "Woman of the Year" (1981) and "Zorba" (1968). "New York, New York" was written for the 1977 Martin Scorcese film of the same name, which starred Minnelli and Robert De Niro. The song became a standard, particularly after it was recorded by Frank Sinatra.Together, the songwriting team won Tony Awards for their scores of "Cabaret," "Woman of the Year" and "Kiss of the Spider Woman." In addition, the 2002 film version of "Chicago," directed by Rob Marshall, won the Academy Award for best picture.\nBorn in New York, Ebb went to school at both New York University and Columbia, where he received a master' degree in English literature. The lyricist got his start in the theater writing for revues, one of which, "From A to Z," had a short run on Broadway in 1960. Ebb was brought together with Kander in the 1960s by music publisher Tommy Valando and one of their first collaborations, the song "My Coloring Book," was recorded by Barbra Streisand.\nThe team was hired by producer Harold Prince and veteran director George Abbott to write the score for "Flora, the Red Menace," starring a 19-year-old Minnelli. The show, which opened on Broadway in 1965, was not a success, but Kander and Ebb were signed to do Prince's next musical, a show based on Christopher Isherwood's "Berlin Stories" and the play "I Am a Camera." Called "Cabaret," it opened in November 1966 and ran for 1,165 performances, immediately establishing Kander and Ebb as musical-theater songwriters to watch. The production, set in pre-World War II Germany, featured a huge mirror which reflected back into the audience and featured a sexually provocative master of ceremonies, played by Joel Grey, who taunted and teased the audience in song. \n"Cabaret" has been revived twice on Broadway -- in 1987 with Grey repeating his role as the lascivious master of ceremonies and again in 1998 by the Roundabout Theatre Company in an environmentally staged production which ran until early this year. The revival of "Chicago," which opened on Broadway in 1996, also has outlasted the original. The first production, starring Verdon and Rivera and directed by Bob Fosse, opened on Broadway in 1975 and, despite a two-year run, was overshadowed by another hit show of that year, "A Chorus Line." "Chicago," a sardonic, cynical take on murder and mayhem in the 1920s, came into its own with the 1996 revival, which featured Ann Reinking and Bebe Neuwirth. It is still running at the Ambassador Theatre, having recently passed performance number 3,250.\nThe team's last Broadway collaboration, an original musical called "Steel Pier" had a short run in 1997. They also did a musical version of "The Visit," starring Chita Rivera, at Chicago's Goodman Theatre in 2001, but a New York engagement never materialized. At the time of Ebb's death, the team was working on several projects including revising "Over and Over," a musical version of Thornton Wilder's classic "The Skin of Our Teeth," and a murder-mystery musical called "Curtains."\nFuneral services will be Tuesday. There were no immediate survivors.
(11/12/03 5:20am)
NEW YORK -- Since the death last year of her writing partner Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden has carried on alone, attending rehearsals of "Wonderful Town," which she co-wrote with Adolph Green and Bernstein and working on a new book about her legendary collaboration with the effervescent Green.\n"It was Adolph's favorite show of ours," she said. "Everything came together: the songs, the characters and the stories. He would be so happy that it's being done again. We usually met at my place because that's where most of the records of our work were. I miss him desperately. I really do. We were so close."\nTheir collaboration included more than a dozen Broadway musicals from "On the Town" in 1944 to "The Will Rogers Follies" in 1991 and at least two motion picture classics, "Singin' in the Rain" and "The Band Wagon." And performing stints of their own, from a Greenwich Village club act called "The Revuers" in the late 1930s and early 1940s to a stylish, two-person show, appropriately titled "A Party With Betty Comden and Adolph Green."\n"They were on the same track and thought a lot about the same things," Phyllis Newman said, who is Green's widow. "They had different senses of humor, actually. My husband's was much more out there and antic. Betty's is more sophisticated and quiet. They met every day of their lives. That was a huge thing to keep meeting whether they had a new project or didn't have a project. They were always working and trying to find one."\nThese days, "Wonderful Town" and her memories of Green have Comden's complete attention, she said.\nComden sits at a corner table in Sardi's, the venerable theater-district restaurant where caricatures of theater notables grace the walls. Of course, Comden and Green are there. Together, naturally.\nAt 88, Comden speaks slowly yet deliberately and with a soft, almost shy laugh as she recalls the frantic birth pains of "Wonderful Town," which first opened on Broadway on Feb. 25, 1953.\nThe involvement of Comden, Green and Bernstein was born out of director George Abbott's desperation. The musical, based on Ruth McKinney's short stories for The New Yorker and the play "My Sister Eileen," tells the story of two sisters from Ohio who come to New York in 1935 to make it big. Rosalind Russell was set to star as Ruth and Edie Adams was hired to play her sister, Eileen. With rehearsals only five weeks away, the original composer and lyricist didn't work out and were paid off.\nDirector George Abbott put in a desperate call to Comden for help with a new score. She and Green raced to Bernstein's apartment to talk over the offer. During their discussions, the phone rang and the no-nonsense Abbott said, growling, "Well, is it 'yes' or is it 'no'?"\n"Yes," it was, and five weeks later, Abbott had his new music and lyrics.
(09/03/03 5:10am)
NEW YORK -- From Peter Allen to Jerome Kern, from Boy George to Leonard Bernstein, the sound of music on Broadway this fall will be the most eclectic in years.\nFive new musicals and two revivals are expected to arrive before 2004, starring such performers as Hugh Jackman, Donna Murphy, Kristin Chenoweth, Joel Grey and, yes, Jackie Mason.\nUp first is a revival of "Little Shop of Horrors," the 1982 off-Broadway hit about a man-eating plant that ran for more than five years in the East Village. The Broadway production, now in previews, opens Oct. 2 at the Virginia Theatre, but it almost didn't happen.\nThe show foundered during its summer tryout in Coral Gables, Fla., shut down and then got back on track with a new director (Jerry Zaks), a new leading lady (Kerry Butler) and a new supporting cast. Retained from the Florida cast was Hunter Foster, as Seymour, the nebbish plant-shop sales clerk.\nAustralian pop entertainer and songwriter Peter Allen starred in and wrote only one Broadway musical, the 1988 "Legs Diamond." Now the performer, who died of AIDS in 1992, is the subject of "The Boy From Oz," a musical biography opening Oct. 16 at the Imperial.\nMovie heartthrob Jackman plays Allen, who was discovered by Judy Garland and who later married Garland's daughter, Liza Minnelli. Stephanie Block is Minnelli and Isabel Keating has the difficult task of impersonating Garland in the show, which uses many of Allen's own songs. Previews begin Sept. 16.\n"Wicked" promises to be big -- or at least expensive. It's a lavish, $14 million adaptation by Winnie Holtzman of the novel by Gregory Maguire about those Wizard of Oz witches -- both the good and the bad one -- before Dorothy and Toto ever arrived.\nChenoweth portrays the good one; Idina Menzel plays the one made famous by Margaret Hamilton in the 1939 film classic. Grey, in his first Broadway appearance since the revival of "Chicago" in 1996, portrays the Wizard.\nThe score is by Stephen Schwartz, the composer of such hits as "Godspell," "Pippin" and "The Magic Show." Previews start Oct. 7, with an opening set for Oct. 30 at the Gershwin.\n"Taboo" is a musical about Boy George, with music and lyrics by Boy George and starring Boy George -- but with a different actor playing Boy George.\nEuan Morton portrays the cross-dressing pop superstar whose real name is George O'Dowd. The composer portrays real-life performance artist and painter Leigh Bowery. The musical, a celebration of 1980s London nightlife, was seen last year in England. The New York production will have a new book by Charles Busch, author of "The Tale of the Allergist's Wife." And the show will have a high-profile producer, former talk show goddess Rosie O'Donnell.\nPreviews start at the Plymouth Theatre on Oct. 24; the opening is set for Nov. 13.\n"Wonderful Town" was one of two valentines to New York with scores by Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden and Adolph Green -- the other being "On the Town."\nThe show is based on short stories by Ruth McKinney that appeared in The New Yorker. They concern two young women from Ohio who arrive in New York during the Depression.\nIn 1953, "Wonderful Town" was a big hit for Rosalind Russell. This latest version, directed and choreographed by Kathleen Marshall, stars Donna Murphy. Preview performances begin Nov. 4 at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre, and the opening will be Nov. 23.\nJackie Mason has made a name for himself doing his one-man shows on Broadway. Now, he's trying his hand with a musical modestly titled "Jackie Mason Laughing Room Only." Mason, of course, stars. Previews are tentatively set to begin Oct. 23, with the curtain officially going up Nov. 19 at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre.\nThe season's first old-new musical will be "Never Gonna Dance," a show which that classic Jerome Kern songs interpolated into a new book by Jeffrey Hatcher. In it, a young dancer comes to New York to prove to his fiancee's father that he can make a living in a field other than dancing.\nThe stars are a couple of unknowns, Noah Racey and Nancy Lemenager. They are backed by some expert hoofers including Karen Ziemba and Deidre Goodwin. The choreography is by Jerry Mitchell, the man who made "Hairspray" move. Look for the show to begin preview performances at the Broadhurst on Oct. 27 and open Dec. 4.
(04/30/03 4:19am)
NEW YORK -- The tabloids may be sniping and the Internet chat rooms chirping, but director Sam Mendes has more important things to worry about - getting "Gypsy," starring Bernadette Peters, ready for Broadway.\nFor five weeks, Mendes has operated in the pressure-cooker atmosphere of previewing the season's most anticipated musical revival in front of New York audiences.\n"Things do take longer here, and I don't know why, but they do," said the British-born Mendes of his $8.5 million production, which opens Thursday. "And I've used every day of it."\n"Gypsy" is the show-biz saga of Rose, the ultimate stage mother who helps turn her forlorn, gawky daughter into one of the most famous strippers of all time, Gypsy Rose Lee. It's a classic American musical, and some consider the show -- book by Arthur Laurents, music by Jule Styne and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim -- the best ever written.\nPreviews began March 31 and from the moment the curtain came down on that initial performance, the buzz began, much of it not particularly kind to the show or its star.\nThe New York Post reported that Laurents, 84, was unhappy with what he saw at that first preview and stormed up the aisle after the performance to confront its producers. Not true, according to Laurents, who said that he was not the vocal theatergoer.\nHe said the press was "lurking around looking for trouble, and I guess they overheard something and then didn't bother to identify who it was.\n"Sam and I have had a terrific working relationship," Laurents said. "I have not been breathing down his neck. I came (to rehearsals) when I thought it was necessary. Sam listens -- and that's very rare, particularly for a director of his stature."\nEven so, chat rooms began whispering about the kewpie-doll Peters, best-known for her performances in such shows as "Sunday in the Park With George," "Into the Woods" and the 1999 revival of "Annie Get Your Gun."\nAs Rose, Peters was miscast, some said. They worried her voice would not hold out while playing what is considered the musical-theater equivalent of Hamlet. When she missed several performances last week because of a cold and vocal strain, it seemed their worst fears were confirmed. Yet, as the weeks went on, chat-room gossip has grown more positive, with the most recent comments -- particularly on www.talkinbroadway.com -- often downright laudatory.\nNot that Mendes has paid \nattention.\n"My rule in previews is: You don't read anything," he said. "You keep your head down and work.\n"I did give the cast a speech: 'There's been a lot written about this. Please don't read things and if you do, keep them to yourself and don't get knocked off course.'"\nFrom the original production in 1959 (starring Ethel Merman) to subsequent revivals in 1974 (Angela Lansbury) and in 1989 (Tyne Daly), "Gypsy" has appeared on Broadway every 15 or so years. All were critical and box-office successes, with Lansbury and Daly -- but not Merman -- winning Tony Awards.\n"Gypsy" faces stiff competition in this year's Tony race for best musical revival, with "Nine" and "La Boheme" likely to be major contenders.\nMendes, who won an Academy Award for his direction of "American Beauty," has confounded his critics before with casting and come up a winner -- getting Nicole Kidman to act on stage, and discreetly take off her clothes, in "The Blue Room," or having the likable Tom Hanks play a hit man in the film "The Road to Perdition."\n"There's one thing better than having a really wonderful actor," Mendes said. "And that's having a really wonderful actor who has never done what you are asking them to do before."\nMendes told Peters she would have to play her age (she's 55), she couldn't wear her customary mountain of hair and she was not going to look glamorous. "Rose can be sexy, but she's a vulgar, brassy broad," the director says.\n"You just pray that whatever chemistry exists between you works, and it's worked with Bernadette," Mendes said.
(03/31/03 4:40am)
NEW YORK -- "Urban Cowboy" is back in the saddle again.\nIn a dramatic, on-stage announcement Saturday night, at what was to have been the new musical's fourth and final performance, director Lonny Price announced the show would continue its Broadway run.\n"We had planned to do a medley of all the songs we cut from the show during previews," Price told the audience. "But the producers just informed me that we are not closing tonight."\nPrice's statement was met with cheers from theatergoers and astonished cast members, several of whom wept at the unexpected news.\nThe director said Sunday he found out only minutes before the final curtain that producer Chase Mishkin had decided to keep the musical going despite mostly negative reviews, including a particularly harsh notice in The New York Times. The paper's reviews are extremely important in the Broadway community because the Times carries the most clout with theatergoers, especially in the New York area.\n"To go from the high of Thursday night -- which had been a great opening -- to the disappointment of Friday's reviews to Saturday packing up our stuff to leave the theater to Saturday night saying, 'We're going to run' -- it's been quite a roller coaster," Price said.\nIt was uncertain how long the run would continue.\n"We are going to do this week by week and see how we do," Mishkin said Sunday. The producer and her investors already have spent an estimated $4.5 million on the show, but she declined to say how much more would be committed to the production.\n"We had hundreds of phone calls from people who urged us to keep it playing because it's entertaining and just a good time," Mishkin said. "We got knocked around pretty good by the critical establishment but the fact is, we get a great audience reaction.\n"Urban Cowboy," based on the 1980 film that starred John Travolta and Debra Winger, had trouble even before opening last Thursday at the Broadhurst Theatre.\nThe musical's original director and the co-author of the book, Phillip Oesterman, died before rehearsals began last fall for the out-of-town tryout. During the show's Florida engagement, new songwriters were brought in to beef up the score.\nThe production's preview period in New York was hurt by the four-day musicians strike earlier this month and valuable rehearsal time was lost when the performers had to rehearse with tapes in the event there was a walkout. Advance sales were weak, and the show, which features newcomers Matt Cavenaugh and Jenn Colella, had no star power to sell.\nMishkin said she would meet Monday with her advertising team to determine how to proceed with a television and radio campaign to attract theatergoers.\n"It's probably a dumb decision from a financial standpoint -- we're apt not to crawl from behind this eight ball," she said. "But it's just too good (a show) to let go"
(03/12/03 4:24am)
NEW YORK -- After a four-day walkout that cost the city $10 million, Broadway musicians settled the first strike on the Great White Way in nearly 30 years Tuesday by agreeing to cut the number of orchestra players a show must hire.\nThe breakthrough came during an all-night negotiating session set up by Mayor Michael Bloomberg as the walkout by about 325 musicians began costing theaters, restaurants and hotels vital tourism dollars in a city already ailing financially.\n"Broadway is no longer dark," Bloomberg said in announcing the agreement that allowed 18 musicals, including "The Producers," "The Lion King," "Mamma Mia!" and "Hairspray," to resume Tuesday night.\nCrystal Heitman, a student on spring break from the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Ind., said she started screaming after learning the strike had been settled.\n"I've always been a big fan of musicals and one of the big reasons that I came up here this week was to see a show," she said.\nThe strike, which began Friday and was honored by actors and stagehands, shut down all but one of Broadway's 19 musicals. By Tuesday, it had cost the city $10 million in lost box-office receipts and revenue from other businesses, according to city tourism officials.\nAt the center of the dispute was the number of musicians required for a Broadway orchestra. The union agreed to reduce the minimum in the 13 largest theaters to 18 or 19 musicians, down from 24 to 26 in the very biggest houses.\n"The musicians had a very strongly held artistic belief, and so did the producers, about how to determine the right size orchestra to play for a particular project," said Jed Bernstein, head of the League of American Theatres and Producers. "I think both of us are very confident that we got to a good place."\nThe mayor brought the two parties together after they failed to talk during a long weekend that saw musicians, actors and stagehands on picket lines and disgruntled theatergoers lining up for refunds or ticket exchanges. The final round of negotiations lasted nearly 12 hours.\n"Both sides understood that they had to resolve this," said union official Bill Dennison. "There was no escaping finding a solution."\nAlthough the new contract is for four years, the minimum number will remain in effect for a decade, said Bill Moriarity, head of Local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians. Union members will vote on the offer later this week, most likely Saturday.\nWhen the strike began, producers vowed to keep shows running and replace the musicians with computer-generated virtual orchestras. But when Actors' Equity, the performers' union, and the stagehands refused to cross picket lines, the musicals had to close.\nThe last time Broadway musicians went on strike was in September 1975, when nine musicals were shut down for 25 days.\nThe producers initially demanded no minimums on the number of musicians per show, then offered seven and later 15. The union charged that producers were trying to save money at the cost of artistic quality.\n"I'm glad they settled, but I think it's unfortunate that they had to reduce the minimum," said Glenn Dolan of Millburn, N. J., as he bought two tickets to "Man of La Mancha." "I think it will compromise the quality of the sound"
(03/11/03 5:57am)
NEW YORK -- Neither striking musicians nor theater producers were optimistic Monday about when talks would resume to end a walkout that has shut down nearly every Broadway musical.\nOfficials of the League of American Theatres and Producers and Local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians haven't spoken since Friday, when 18 of Broadway's 19 musicals, including "Hairspray," "The Lion King," "Mamma Mia!" and "The Phantom of the Opera," went dark.\nBoth sides said no talks were scheduled. Producers met Monday and canceled the evening performances of "Chicago," "Rent," "Urban Cowboy" and "Phantom of the Opera." Monday is generally a dark night for most shows.\n"We are ready to have productive negotiations," union president Bill Moriarity said Sunday. "We are right now faced with what the league has termed its final offer. As long as the offer is 'final,' it is difficult to negotiate against it."\nJed Bernstein, head of the league, was equally downbeat. Yet neither the league nor the union -- battling over what the minimum size of musical orchestras should be -- made a move Sunday to break the impasse.\n"We are sitting by the phone," Bernstein said. "It's very difficult to engage in a negotiation when you don't have a negotiating partner ... somebody who wants to bargain toward a compromise."\nShutting down the 18 shows has cost about $1.2 million per performance in terms of lost box-office revenue, according to Bernstein. The city's tourism office estimated weekend losses for ancillary businesses, such as restaurants, hotels and taxis, at more than $7 million.\nWhile talks were stymied, picketing continued at all musical houses except Studio 54 where "Cabaret," which operates under a separate contract, was the only Broadway musical playing. The long-running revival, now starring Deborah Gibson and Neil Patrick Harris, sold out and had lines of people waiting for cancellations.\nOutside the affected houses, musicians picketed and passed out leaflets urging people to "save live music on Broadway," while disappointed theatergoers exchanged tickets for later dates or refunds.\nAt a meeting Sunday, unions for the stagehands and performers reiterated their support of the strikers.\n"Our actors have told us that they will not work on a stage on Broadway unless their union musicians are in the pit," said Patrick Quinn, head of Actors' Equity.\nDuring initial negotiations, the producers demanded no minimum number of musicians, then offered seven, raised it to 14 and, on Friday, to 15 for the biggest theaters, which currently require 24 to 26 musicians.
(03/03/03 4:45am)
NEW YORK -- From the Brooklyn Academy of Music to a coffeehouse in northern New Mexico to the National Theatre of Iceland, actors are planning a day of international theater protest against a possible war with Iraq.\nMonday, participants in all 50 states and on six continents will read "Lysistrata," Aristophanes' bawdy comedy of ancient Greece in which women withhold sex until men agree to outlaw war.\nAt last count, 919 readings were set in 56 countries, and the number was climbing, according to Kathryn Blume and Sharron Bower, two New York actresses who started the Lysistrata Project.\nThe project began with Blume, who had been working on a modern adaptation of "Lysistrata" as a screenplay. She had heard about a group called Theaters Against War that was urging theater companies to put an anti-war statement in their programs or make a curtain speech against war. Blume thought she would do a reading of "Lysistrata" as her contribution.\nThat same day in early January, Bower called suggesting they work together on something. "It was a magic moment in the history of politics and theater," Blume said. "It turned into something very large very fast."\nBy the next night, the women had readings planned in two other cities, and the Lysistrata Project was born.\n"We put up a Web site, e-mailed everyone we knew and they e-mailed everyone they knew," Blume said. "Soon we were getting e-mails from all over the country and all over the world."\nAmong those who responded were Michael Paulukonis, a volunteer at Artists for Art, a community-based, nonprofit arts organization in Scranton, Pa., and Stefan Baldursson, artistic director of the National Theatre of Iceland.