23 Days 'til Godspell: A visit to the rehearsal studios. by Ken

As a Producer I spent a lot of time in my office, a lot of time in conference rooms, and a lot of time at lunches. Today, I took a break from proofing ads and returning calls about cast albu…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 20, 2011☆⚑

24 Days 'til Godspell: Assembling a street team. by Ken

Times Square has become a wild west of promoters. But since so many theatergoers walk through the crossroads of the world and are interested in seeing a show (many of whom still haven’…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 19, 2011☆⚑

25 Days 'til Godspell: A Godspell field trip. by Ken

Godspell is one of the most produced musicals on the planet.  There have been close to 100,000 productions worldwide.  There is something about its message and its music that resonates…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 18, 2011☆⚑

26 Days 'til Godspell: Raise a glass to the cast at the end of the first week. by Ken

And on the 26th day before the start of previews, there was rejoicing. Today, after the end of the first week of rehearsals, we had a casual cocktail party for the company, who have been wor…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 11:52pm on September 17, 2011☆⚑

27 Days 'til Godspell: To rent or to buy? by Ken

Broadway shows need a lot of . . . stuff.  It used to be that you rented every piece of equipment you needed from one of the few shops that provided it, paid the weeklies until your show …

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 16, 2011☆⚑

28 Days 'til Godspell: The Box Office opens. by Ken

Remember that time, oh, about 23 days ago when I wrote a blog about planning the opening of the Godspell Box Office?  (Click here if you don’t.) Well, those 23 days passed, and toda…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 11:26pm on September 15, 2011☆⚑

29 Days 'til Godspell: The load-in. by Ken

A “load-in” is the period of time when a show’s set/lights/sound are literally loaded into the theater from the streets, where they’ve been brought by trucks from sho…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 14, 2011☆⚑

30 Days 'til Godspell: Approving our NY Times Announcement Ad by Ken

This Sunday, the New York Times will publish one of the biggest issues of the year for arts lovers.  It’s the annual Fall Preview. So, while print may not be where we’re spend…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 13, 2011☆⚑

31 Days 'til Godspell: The first day of rehearsal. by Ken

I’ve always considered pre-production of Broadway shows to be in four phases, or to use a driving metaphor since I like fast cars, four gears: 1st Gear – Pre-production2nd Gear &…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 12, 2011☆⚑

32 Days 'til Godspell: A Marketing retreat by Ken

We have weekly internal marketing meetings about everything we work on here at DTE.  But, as you can imagine, we’ve been focusing on Godspell more and more as our day-by-day countdo…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 11, 2011☆⚑

33 Days 'til Godspell: Godspell hits the street . . . fair. by Ken

Every fall, there’s a street fair on the Upper East Side with a block dedicated just to theater.  I usually take a few booths for some of my other shows, and this year I took one fo…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 10, 2011☆⚑

34 Days 'til Godspell: Becoming a part of the Broadway community. by Ken

Because today was the last business day before we start rehearsals on Monday, there was a flurry of activity in my office.  In fact, it’s 8:23 PM right now, and about five of my sta…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 9, 2011☆⚑

35 Days 'til Godspell: Recording a radio spot. by Ken

Although our official Meet & Greet isn’t until Monday, today, four of our cast members got a chance to say hello to each other for the first time at a recording studio in Midtown. …

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 8, 2011☆⚑

36 Days 'til Godspell: Danny and I and the NY Times. by Ken

As the numbers on our Day by Day countdown get closer and closer to zero, more and more opportunities for us to to speak to the media about our production of Godspell pop up.   Makes sens…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 7, 2011☆⚑

37 Days 'til Godspell: Danny walks the Producers through the show. by Ken

With only 6 days before Director Danny Goldstein dives into rehearsals, I thought it was a great time to ask Danny to walk me and my other Producers through the show, scene-by-scene, from Th…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 6, 2011☆⚑

38 Days 'til Godspell: Preparing the bond. by Ken

I spent Labor Day working on Godspell paperwork, including the forms required by Actors’ Equity Association for our “bond.”  The bond is a financial guarantee (approxima…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 5, 2011☆⚑

39 Days 'til Godspell: A Sunday surprise in the New York Times. by Ken

I spent the last couple of days in LA and arrived back in the city early this morning.  I picked up the Sunday New York Times at JFK to read in the taxi on the way back from the airport. …

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 4, 2011☆⚑

40 days 'til Godspell: Other People's ideas. by Ken

If you read my other blog, you know that I’ve got a lot of ideas.  My theory is, the more the better, because honestly, they’re not all going to be great.  But if you keep …

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 3, 2011☆⚑

41 Days 'til Godspell: The meet and greet on our very first day. by Ken

There may be 41 days until performances begin, but there are less than 10 (!) days until the first rehearsal. The first day of rehearsal of any show always feels like the first day of school…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 2, 2011☆⚑

42 Days 'til Godspell: Finding a way for Godspell to give back. by Ken

One of the messages of Godspell is that we are all part of one giant community, and that the members of that community should look out for one another. So, in the spirit of being a “Go…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on September 1, 2011☆⚑

43 Days 'til Godspell: A first look at the costumes. by Ken

Godspell is a show about a unique group of people, and every single cast member plays a major role in the production. So, when designing the costumes for the show, our Director, Danny Goldst…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on August 31, 2011☆⚑

44 Days 'til Godspell: Our first Producer meeting by Ken

Today we held our first Producer Ad Meeting, which was an opportunity for the other Above-The-Title Producers and Associate Producers on the show to hear about the ad and marketing campaign …

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on August 30, 2011☆⚑

45 Days 'til Godspell: The last of the cast announced. by Ken

Today we announced the last of our Godspell cast members, including a star of “Hannah Montana” and Camp Rock, Anna Maria Perez de Tagle. Anna Maria happens to have quite a few fo…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on August 29, 2011☆⚑

46 Days 'til Godspell: Picking a payroll company. by Ken

Since I was holed up in my apartment on this hurricane weekend, I decided to spend today on some of Godspell’s administrative details. And since we’re only two weeks away from ou…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on August 28, 2011☆⚑

47 Days 'til Godspell: Rescheduling this and rescheduling that. by Ken

I had a bunch of Godspell meetings set for today, including a financial update with my GM and a preview of our costume sketches with our Director,  but this very rude young lady named Ire…

SOURCE: Day By Day: The Producer’s Perspective at 9:00pm on August 27, 2011☆⚑