Tuesday, November 28, 2023

A NICE PLACE TO VISIT By Peter Filichia

Channel-surfing brought me to a program that started me thinking and made me disagree with what it had to say. It was a first-season episode of THE TWILIGHT ZONE called “A Nice Place to Vi…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, November 21, 2023

THE REAL PAL JOEY By Peter Filichia

Granted, hearing most any song with music by Richard Rodgers and lyrics by Lorenz Hart is a pleasure. However, some theatergoers were disappointed to hear so many of them in the recent PAL J…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 11:13AM
Tuesday, November 14, 2023

GET IT: WHOLESALE By Peter Filichia

Whether you’re discovering or revisiting Harold Rome’s score for I CAN GET IT FOR YOU WHOLESALE, you’ll have a splendid time. The 1962 musical was not his biggest hit. The revues PINS …

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, November 7, 2023

HERE’S TO THE LADIES WHO TALKED By Peter Filichia

He’s the one who put together dozens of interviews for his previous tomes. One was called A Wonderful Guy: Conversations with the Great Men of Musical Theater. Before that, though, he prov…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, October 31, 2023

TITANIC SAILS AGAIN By Peter Filichia

If you see the Oscar-winning film TITANIC at your local multiplex on November 4 or 8, you may soon be asking yourself a question. Has there ever been a musical that offers more dramatic iron…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, October 24, 2023

MERRILY AT LAST ROLLS ALONG ON BROADWAY By Peter Filichia

So where were all of you 42 years ago? MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG certainly could have used you then. All right, many of you who are reading this weren’t yet born, or you hadn’t yet reached t…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, October 17, 2023

ANSWERS FOR BROADWAY GENIUSES By Peter Filichia

Faithful readers will recall that last week I gave some selections from my new book BRAINTEASERS FOR BROADWAY GENIUSES – now available, as they say, “in fine bookstores everywhere.” If…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, October 10, 2023

BRAINTEASERS FOR BROADWAY GENIUSES By Peter Filichia

For the last 14 years, I’ve spent most of my Sunday mornings on www.broadwayradio.com. It’s James Marino’s podcast that also features eminent critic Michael Portantiere. One of the seg…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, October 3, 2023

NATIONAL DO SOMETHING NICE DAY By Peter Filichia

I vehemently disagree with Little Red Riding Hood. In INTO THE WOODS, the sadder-but-wiser girl decides that “Nice is different than good.” I not only take issue with her grammar – “…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, September 26, 2023

ALLOWING FOR INFLATION … By Peter Filichia 

Looking over my two recent pieces on Tom Jones, I saw that I addressed one issue but neglected to take on another. When citing that Agnes” in I DO! I DO! wore “an eighty-five-dollar hat,…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, September 19, 2023

A NEW SOUND FOR SONDHEIM By Peter Filichia

I have heard the future, and it is here. It happened from listening to COMPANY, SWEENEY TODD, INTO THE WOODS and ASSASSINS. You’re about to quote Katz from WOMAN OF THE YEAR and say, “So…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, September 12, 2023

FUNNY GIRL: FUNNY LYRICS AND MORE By Peter Filichia

Although FUNNY GIRL is on Broadway no more, the revival cast album lives on to prove an important point. When musical theater enthusiasts discuss the 1964 musical, far more often than not th…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, September 5, 2023

MARRIAGE A LA JONES By Peter Filichia

Only once, in the entire history of the Tonys, has a Best Play been adapted into a successful Broadway musical. Now that both bookwriter-lyricist Tom Jones and composer Harvey Schmidt have b…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, August 29, 2023

REMEMBERING TOM JONES By Peter Filichia 

And to think there was a time when musical theater enthusiasts assumed they’d get a new show from Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt every three years. Do the math. THE FANTASTICKS in 1960. 110 …

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, August 22, 2023

ELECTION RETURNS By Peter Filichia

From the title HOW TO STEAL AN ELECTION, you might assume that the creators of this musical started writing it in mid-November 2020. No, it actually was a 1968 off-Broadway musical that was …

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, August 15, 2023

THE FUTURE IS BACK WITH US By Peter Filichia 

Let’s not just concentrate on the fabulous flying car and astonishing video designs. If you read the Broadway reviews for BACK TO THE FUTURE: THE MUSICAL, you saw many a mention of those. …

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, August 8, 2023

LA CAGE AUX AUSTRALIA By Peter Filichia

Doug Kingsman, David Mitchell and Tony Sheldon all agree on the number. These Australians who have been involved with Down Under theater for decades estimate that only 5% of American musical…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, August 1, 2023

SAVING THE BEST FOR LAST By Peter Filichia

Have you heard about the surprising last line in the new, big-hit Barbie movie? Well, ending on a note of surprise is always good for a story – and that certainly goes for songs, too. Lyri…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, July 25, 2023

ETHAN MORDDEN’S NEWEST ACHIEVEMENT By Peter Filichia

Here’s a book that you can bet Ron DeSantis won’t read. Ethan Mordden, one of the greatest writers to comment on American theater, has now concentrated on Gays on Broadway. Mordden begin…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, July 18, 2023

AN OPERATION YOU’LL BE GLAD TO UNDERGO By Peter Filichia

What’s the best way to celebrate the 80th anniversary of World War II’s “Operation Mincemeat”? No, don’t go into your kitchen to mix currants, raisins, sugar, apples, candied citr…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, July 11, 2023

BARITONES AND BASSES By Peter Filichia

My recent experience with Jason Alexander has had me repeatedly playing the cast album of JEROME ROBBINS’ BROADWAY. I’ve particularly savored Alexander and company in one of Broadway’s…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, July 4, 2023

REMEMBERING SHELDON HARNICK By Peter Filichia

Whenever a great musical theater luminary dies, I listen to every cast album that represents this songwriter’s work in chronological order. This past week has been especially moving, than…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, June 27, 2023

JEROME ROBBINS’ BROADWAY REDUX By Peter Filichia

Jason Alexander gave me a brilliant pre-emptive strike. That was late ’88, I recall. He was about to open as the leading man of JEROME ROBBINS’ BROADWAY. In addition to performing, he’…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, June 20, 2023

LA CAGE AUX BOSTON By Peter Filichia

“Thank you, Boston!” So read the small round sticker that adorned the cover of some LA CAGE AUX FOLLES original cast albums. Given that hundreds of musicals had met with rapturous succes…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, June 13, 2023

THREE CHEERS FOR THE RED, WHITE AND BLUE By Peter Filichia

This week, you might wish that you lived in Pennsylvania. (Even if it’s hot as hell in Philadelphia.) For The Keystone State, as it’s chummily called, considers Flag Day – June 14th �…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Wednesday, June 7, 2023

ANOTHER LISTEN TO DEAR WORLD By Peter Filichia

So, after writing the scores to HELLO, DOLLY! in 1964 and MAME in 1966, what could Jerry Herman do for an encore? In 1967, when DOLLY was on course to becoming the longest-running musical in…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 10:26AM
Tuesday, May 30, 2023

OLIVER! REVIEWING THE SITUATION By Peter Filichia

These two brief stories are true. Walking down West 43rd Street last week, I saw a teenage boy and a teenage girl holding hands, swinging them back and forth, and loudly singing with gr…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, May 23, 2023

The Tom Swifty Goes Broadway By Peter Filichia

There have been knock-knock jokes, practical jokes and light-bulb jokes. But 60 years ago, the joke that was sweeping the country was the Tom Swifty. Never heard of it? Let your youth be you…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, May 16, 2023

CHITA AND HER ACHIEVEMENTS By Peter Filichia

What does Chita Rivera not have in common with Jean Hersholt, Isabelle Stevenson and Irving G. Thalberg? She didn’t have to die to get an award named for her. Next week, choreographers and…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, May 9, 2023

The World Is SHUCKED’s Oyster By Peter Filichia

What started out as a musical variation on HEE-HAW has had the last laugh. SHUCKED was originally inspired by that erstwhile TV series that’s been rarely off the air since its 1969 debut. …

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM
Tuesday, May 2, 2023

SWEENEY TODD: 1979 VS. 2023 By Peter Filichia

Wait a minute! Where’s “Johanna”?!? Those who attend the current Broadway revival of SWEENEY TODD and are familiar with the score will miss one of the three songs that happen to have t…

SOURCE: Masterworks Broadway at 06:00AM

All that Chat

2023-2024 BROADWAY SEASON
May 30, 2023: Grey House - Lyceum Theatre
Jun 26, 2023: Just For Us - Hudson Theatre
Jul 24, 2023: The Cottage - Hayes Theater
Nov 16, 2023: Spamalot - St. James Theatre
Dec 18, 2023: Appropriate - Hayes Theater
Apr 14, 2024: Lempicka - Longacre Theatre
Apr 17, 2024: The Wiz - Marquis Theatre
Apr 18, 2024: Suffs - Music Box Theatre
Apr 25, 2024: Mother Play - Hayes Theater