484 stories from Masterworks Broadway
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. Al…
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 the sam…
Who knew that "Follow Me" had so many fans? But since Aaron Sorkin's revisal of CAMELOT started previews at the Vivian Beaumont on March 9, friends have been calling me to complain. "They dr…
Can you picture Alfred Hitchcock singing and dancing? In A FINE ROMANCE, Geoffrey Block's excellent new book from Oxford University Press, he mentions that director Rouben Mamoulian actually…
Sometimes we breeze past an "Author's Note" because we're so anxious to get to the meat of a book. Don't do that with Thomas Mallon's new 337-page tome. "UP WITH THE SUN," he wrote, "is a fi…
Is KPOP the first cast album in which the booklet's lyrics are printed in Korean? No. With all the American musicals that have proliferated and profited in South Korea " EVITA and MAN OF LA …
And now for a very different homage to a 50th anniversary. Much has been made here in recent weeks of some great 1973 events in musical theater. Two involved a certain composer-lyricist whos…
I don't remember exactly where I was on March 11, 1973, but I certainly know where I wasn't. Alas, you wouldn't have found me at the Shubert Theatre in New York where SONDHEIM: A MUSICAL TRI…
My turntable is spinning again. Recent vinyl reissues of some vintage cast albums and vinyl debuts of some new ones have me dropping a tone arm and stylus " the fancy term for needle " on on…
By Peter Filichia Perhaps it would have been a musical in which such words as "domineering" and such phrases as "Dear Frederick" would have appeared. Midnight would have been a significant s…
Last November, Jim Vagias had to be a little worried. Earlier in 2022, Vagias, the producing artistic director of American Theater Group, had arranged with Music Theatre International to pro…
Well, at least he gave us one musical. Neil Hefti didn't. Billy Joel hasn't. Ditto Bruce Springsteen. But Burt Bacharach, who worked in the same pop arena as they, did in 1968. He and Hal Da…
Maybe it should have happened years ago, when newspapers made the change. For there was a time when those looking for jobs saw classified ads that said "Help Wanted " Men" and "Help Wanted "…
If you're in a bridge tournament and play a Jack " only to see your opponent put a King on the table " you may hear the trick-taker say, "Don't send a boy out to do a man's job." That, howev…
This must be unprecedented. Visit the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on West 46th Street, and you may be equally astonished. The signage is up for the upcoming revival of SWEENEY TODD, the show's thi…
In baseball, whenever a pitcher becomes tired and ineffective, a new pitcher known as a reliever succeeds him, in order to prevent further damage. The one who does this most consistently wil…
Devoted musical theater aficionados know that the nine-performance ANYONE CAN WHISTLE was Stephen Sondheim's shortest-running show. They can also tell you that MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG, despite…
Why are there such babyish voices on "Miracle"? If you haven't yet seen the excellent feature film of ROALD DAHL'S MATILDA THE MUSICAL " but know the original cast album " this might be your…
After the end of each song, no theatergoer shouted "Whooo!" None of the performers held a note for an inordinately long length of time, so no attendee was moved to scream at the halfway mark…
In a used bookshop in Morristown, New Jersey, I sauntered by the magazine section and gave out with a smile. Considering that the Life magazine that topped the pile was over 60 years old, it…
If a picture is worth a thousand words, how many does an Al Hirschfeld caricature rate? On the other hand, you may be speechless and offer none, after strolling through Memory Lane (and Shub…
Has this ever happened before? A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that YOUR OWN THING was the first off-Broadway musical to be optioned and sold for a film that was never made. But here's BE…
No, it doesn't offer quite a lotta Roman terra cotta or livin' lava from the flanks of Etna that the eponymous title character of BARNUM had promised you. However, the Museum of Broadway …
If you're attending that musical version of TWELFTH NIGHT on December 12, you can forget about seeing Malvolio and Sir Toby Belch. When Donald Driver, Hal Hester and Danny Apolinar adapted S…
By Peter Filichia It's already been a year since we lost Stephen Sondheim, but now we have another way of remembering him. Paul Salsini, who founded The Sondheim Review in 1994 and kept at i…
