977 stories by "Michael Portantiere"
Original London Cast, 1985 (Safari/First Night) It's hard to understand the rationale or need for Jerome Kern Goes to Hollywood, a songwriter revue that was devised by one of its British co-…
Original Broadway Cast, 1963 (RCA) A star vehicle for Mary Martin, Jennie is a prime example of how a musical with wonderful ingredients can fail to jell. Arnold Schulman's book, a fictional…
Original Broadway Cast, 1992 (Mercury) With a score inventively cobbled together from Jelly Roll Morton's musical catalogue, Jelly's Last Jam tells the composer's life story in a show that i…
Studio Cast, 1990 (RCA) As a musical theater composer, Frank Wildhorn writes great pop songs. That's amply demonstrated by this "concept" recording of Jekyll & Hyde, which lacks any thea…
Original Broadway Cast, 2000 (Sony) Based on Charlotte Brontë's classic novel of sturm und drang on the English moors, the musical Jane Eyre represented the last gasp of the pop-opera cyc…
Original Broadway Cast, 1957 (RCA) Some Broadway musicals are timeless, while others spoke only to their era and audience and then were never heard from again. Jamaica is decidedly in the la…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1968 (Columbia) This is the show to blame! The success of Jacques Brei Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris began the songwriter-revue revolution, but it would b…
Original Broadway Cast, 1966 (Columbia/Sony) This show seemed to have so much going for it, with a central character beloved by millions through the comic books and a popular television seri…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 2002 (JAY) Based on It, the 1927 film that starred Clara Bow, The It Girl is a small-scale, 1920s-style musical comedy. It was presented Off-Broadway by the York …
Original Broadway Cast, 1982 (Original Cast Records) If this show had opened Off-Broadway instead of on Broadway in 1982, it might have run a lot longer. Is There Life After High School?…
Original London Cast, 1958 (Philips/Sepiano CD) This recording was not released in CD format until 2008. It will come as something of a revelation to those who only know Irma la Douce from t…
Broadway Cast, 1973 (Columbia/Sony) Encouraged by the success of the 1971 Broadway revisal of No, No, Nannette, producer Harry Rigby and colleagues reworked and mounted Irene, a musical that…
A Tony Award nominee for Spring Awakening, Jonathan Groff has been away from theater for a while, making himself known and beloved in two of the most disparate roles imaginable: as the flawe…
Studio Cast, 1985 (Polygram) Richard Rodgers' musical imagination persisted throughout his life, despite depression, a heart attack, and cancer of the vocal cords. His final show opened just…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1979 (Original Cast Records) Long before the William Finn character known simply as Marvin experienced joy and pain in March of the Falsettos, Falsettoland, or th…
Original Broadway Cast, 1987 (RCA) One of Stephen Sondheim's most commercially successful shows, Into the Woods has one of his least distinctive scores. Perhaps he wasn't really inspired by …
Original Cast Members, 1948 (SHB-Show-Biz Productions/Sepia) Almost forgotten today but the second-longest-running revue of 1948, this Howard Dietz-Arthur Schwartz opus inspired by John Gunt…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1978 (Columbia/Fynsworth Alley/Masterworks Broadway) The book and lyrics are by Gretchen Cryer, who also plays the lead character, Heather. The music is by Nancy …
Off-Broadway Cast, 1996 (Varèse Sarabande) "Oh my God, that's me up there!" was an audience whisper heard often during the long run of this musical revue, the winning work of Joe DiPietro (…
Original Broadway Cast, 1977 (Atlantic/DRG) "Wife-swapping" was already a dated topic in 1977, but this miniature musical sex farce was the surprise hit of the season. Audiences were taken w…
Original Broadway Cast, 1967 (United Artists/Kritzerland) No stars; not recommended. Having had an art-house film hit with Never on Sunday, writer-director Jules Dassin and the Mrs., otherwi…
Original Off-Broadway Cast, 1999 (Varèse Sarabande) In an introductory note, this diversion's creator Sheridan Morley recalls that Noël Coward and Gertrude Lawrence acted together only t…
Original Broadway Cast, 1964 (Mercury/Decca) With Buddy Hackett starring as a Coney Island psychic who screws up his friends' love lives, it's safe to say that I Had a Ball doesn't have a th…
Original Broadway Cast, 1966 (RCA)Â Â A two-character musical based on the play The Fourposter by Jan de Hartog, about a long-married couple, I Do! I Do! holds a mirror up to the audie…
Original Broadway Cast, 1962 (Columbia/Sony) This show has gone down in history for having launched the career of Barbra Streisand, but there's so much more here. Jerome Weidman adapted his …
