Though the shows expected to rack up the nominations–Pippin, Matilda, Kinky Boots, and Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike–did just that, the 67th Annual Tony Award Nominations were filled with surprises. The biggest shocker, to me, is that the…
What is it that has kept us coming back to Shakespeare again and again for centuries? Is it the masterful wordplay? The colorful characters? The layers of meaning and themes interwoven throughout? The structure that binds each play together? Alan…
I’ve been obsessed with Carrie: The Musical for much of my life. The ill-fated big budget Broadway adaptation of the Stephen King novel and the Brian De Palma film has perplexed and delighted theater fans for years. The infamous soundboard…
Allegiance is an original musical with Broadway ambitions. They even called it Allegiance, A New Broadway Musical in some press releases earlier this year. It’s now more humbly subtitled A New American Musical but you just know they want to…
Jayne Houdyshell was nominated for Featured Actress in a Musical at the Tony Awards for her performance as Hattie Walker in the Follies revival. That character gets to perform one of the more cheerful and upbeat numbers in the show,…
There’s an odd trend popping up on Broadway that I’m getting a kick out of. Shows that recently closed on Broadway are coming back a year or two later for limited sit down engagements. This is not to be confused…
The 66th Annual Tony Awards were held last night and it was a great night if you were connected to Once or Peter and the Starcatcher. These two shows picked up the lion’s share of the statues last night. Once…
Seeing Taboo was one of those theater experiences I will never forget. Though the crowd was already dwindling by the time I caught it, the attendees were very enthusiastic. Taboo is a show that has a strong identity and will…
Part of the fun of following the Tony Awards is digging into the meat of the unusual nominations. A good place to start in recent years is Best Original Score (Music and/or Lyrics) Written for the Theater. See how long…
I often get lost on YouTube. The more information I can take in before writing about a topic or working on a score, the better. Today, by chance, I wound up in a cycle that kept leading me to a…
The 66th Annual Tony Award Nominations were announced a few minutes ago and they’re filled with surprises. It seems that shows that closed were remembered fondly and shows that are still running but not so good were mostly ignored. Even…
Two really strange but believable theater news stories popped up over the weekend as jokes on Internet theater and geek culture fans. The problem? Unlike the pranks at a site like XKCD or Film School Rejects, there really weren’t any…
I don’t know when I’m going to see Once, the new Broadway musical adapted from the popular indie film musical of the same name. It opens on 18 March, the last day of performances for the show I’m music directing,…
Ruth Leon wrote a great piece about Andrew Lloyd Webber for Playbill. It really does feel like the right time to look back at his career in the context of Broadway. Phantom of the Opera played its 10000th performance. Both…