Gwen Verdon News

Everything you love about Broadway -- unique showbiz treasures, the opportunity to meet your favorite performers and the chance to bid on exclusive backstage experiences -- will come together as Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS presents the 29th Annual BROADWAY FLEA MARKET & GRAND AUCTION on Sunday, September 27, 2015. And BroadwayWorld can report that pre-bidding is now open!

Clips of Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera, Norbert Leo Butz and Rebecca Naomi Jones bringing Broadway to your television screen.

Today in 1977, Chicago closed at the 46th Street Theatre (now the Richard Rodgers Theatre), where it ran for 936 performances. Chicago is a musical set in Prohibition-era Chicago, with music is by John Kander with lyrics by Fred Ebb and a book by Ebb and Bob Fosse. Chicago's 1996 Broadway revival holds the record for the longest-running musical revival on Broadway and is its fourth longest-running show.

Audra McDonald has a big year ahead of her! After embarking on a concert tour this fall, the six-time Tony winner, who recenty wrapped filming for Disney's live action Beauty and the Beast, will be back on Broadway, starring alongside Brian Stokes Mitchell, Billy Porter, Joshua Henry and Brandon Victor Dixon in SHUFFLE ALONG. Before all of that, McDonald will head to Provincetown, MA to take part in the acclaimed Broadway @ Town Hall concert series, hosted by SiriusXM radio star Seth Rudetsky. For one show only on Monday, August 24 (6:30 PM), she will be joined onstage by her husband and fellow Broadway star Will Swenson, with whom she is currently starring in Williamstown Theatre Festival's A MOON FOR THE MISBEGOTTEN. McDonald recently checked in with BroadwayWorld about Monday's concert, and updated us on all of her upcoming projects! Check out the full interview below:

The acclaimed Broadway @ Town Hall concert series in Provincetown, MA, produced by Mark Cortale, will welcome Audra McDonald -- the historic 6-time Tony-winner and star of Broadway's LADY DAY AT EMERSON'S BAR AND GRILL, PORGY AND BESS, RAGTIME, MASTER CLASS and TV's PRIVATE PRACTICE -- for one show only on Monday, August 24 at 6:30 PM. She will be joined onstage by a very special guest, her husband and fellow Broadway star Will Swenson.

The replacement star. One of the trickiest and most problematic facets of any production facing an enterprising producer and director is casting a fitting replacement, particularly for a star role. Of course, John Kander and Fred Ebb's vaudeville-based performance opportunity extravaganza CHICAGO allows for a copious amount of star turns, so the likely candidates for filling the famous shoes of the roles of Roxie, Velma, Billy Flynn and Matron Mama Morton are nearly overwhelming to consider. Furthermore, August 8 marked the momentous day in Broadway history when legendary Broadway and Hollywood superstar Liza Minnelli famously stepped in for an ailing Gwen Verdon in the original Bob Fosse production of CHICAGO on Broadway. Now, with notable pop star Brandy Norwood as the current Roxie and reality competition show standout Rumer Willis poised to take over in early September giving a slew of fresh buzz to one of Broadway's longest-running musicals of all time, the 1996 revival of CHICAGO, now is an ideal time to consider some familiar faces who have excelled in the role in the past and could continue the tradition and keep the momentum going for a production that has now played nearly 8,000 performances on the Great White Way. Time may have marched on, but these ladies certainly still have the stuff!

'You really don't choose this business; it chooses you,' Jessica Lee Goldyn says of her becoming a professional dancer and actress while still in her teens. That bright career which has taken her to Broadway and around the country performing in musical theatre now brings her to Brunswick, Maine, to reprise the role of Elizabeth in Mel Brooks' Young Frankenstein, which opened at Maine State Music Theatre August 6th. The role of Frederick Frankenstein's glamorous and fickle wife has been tailored to her extraordinary dancing abilities by director Marc Robin, and, as she tells Broadway World a few days before opening, she is enjoying the experience enormously!

Over in Addison, WaterTown Theatre has had a nearly invincible season. With stellar performances of BONNIE AND CLYDE, ALL MY SONS, and even the new work THE SPARK, the past ten months have been exciting and successful for the first-rate group. As their season finale, however, SWEET CHARITY fails to live up to WaterTower's well-deserved reputation.

Director Ryan Gibbs gives a production of the classic sports musical that's got miles and miles of heart behind it

Do you enjoy theatre trivia and anecdotes? How about talking about a performance immediately following the show with other theatre enthusiasts? Would you like to hear the actors' motivation for their characters? Are you interested in hearing from guest speakers? If you answered yes to any one of these questions, then TheatreZone's TalkBack is a must for you.

Happy Birthday, Bob Fosse! Fosse won an unprecedented eight Tony Awards for choreography, as well as one for direction. He was nominated for an Academy Award four times, winning for his direction of Cabaret. Amonst his many Broadway credits are The Pajama Game, Damn Yankees, Sweet Charity, Pippin, Chicago, Dancin' and many more.

The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust is pleased to announce the fourth season for the 2015-2016 TRUST Cabaret Series. This popular series provides audiences with a rare opportunity to experience the finest cabaret artists and their outstanding musical accompanists at the intimate Cabaret at Theater Square, 655 Penn Avenue, in downtown Pittsburgh's Cultural District. The 2015-2016 TRUST Cabaret Series will showcase award-winning Broadway, stage and film stars Tommy Tune, Stephanie J. Block, Laura Osnes and Santino Fontana performing together on one night, followed by Rebecca Luker and closing the season will be a performance by Paulo Szot. These exceptional performers will share a special evening of cabaret featuring songs from current Broadway, Jazz, American Standards and more.

Whatever Lola wants... Tari Kelly gets? It would seem so with the resume this talented actor presents as she returns to the Ordway for her fourth production on the Saint Paul stage. Get to know more about her in 6 Questions & a Plug.

The bases are loaded with musical theatre magic as Allenberry Playhouse, under the leadership of Artistic Director Ryan Gibbs, presents the Tony Award-winning musical Damn Yankees from tonight, June 17-July 19 on the Allenberry Mainstage.

The bases are loaded with musical theatre magic as Allenberry Playhouse, under the leadership of Artistic Director Ryan Gibbs, presents the Tony Award-winning musical Damn Yankees from June 17-July 19 on the Allenberry Mainstage.

CBS has just announced that Tommy Tune, this year's recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Tony award, will be among the presenters on this year's telecast.

Today in 1975, Chicago opened at the 46th Street Theatre (now the Richard Rogers Theatre), where it ran for 936 performances. Chicago is a musical set in Prohibition-era Chicago, with music is by John Kander with lyrics by Fred Ebb and a book by Ebb and Bob Fosse. The story is a satire on corruption in the administration of criminal justice and the concept of the 'celebrity criminal'. The original cast starred Chita Rivera as Velma Kelly, Gwen Verdon as Roxie Hart, Jerry Orbach as Billy Flynn and Barney Martin as Amos Hart.

Cy Coleman and Dorothy Fields iconic 1960's musical SWEET CHARITY is playing on the stage of the Festival Theatre as this year's musical offering at the Shaw Festival in Niagara on the Lake, Ontario. Visually stunning and often energetically infectious, this musical, with book by Neil Simon, comes at a time when everything mod is new again. The 'MAD MEN' era has made a resurgence in clothing and home furnishings, so this nod to the past seems perfectly placed. Coleman's score includes such standards as 'Big Spender' and 'If My Friends Could See Me Now.'

The Lusty Month of May; like the song says: 'It's time to do a wicked thing or two!' It's May, the time when spring brings that hot-blooded, four letter word: lust. Musicals have had a steady history of lusty musical numbers. There are songs about rolling in the hay, and others extolling the virtues of different (ahem) flavors of man-candy. Some songs are paens to hot, steamy nights, and some are about what you do on those kind of nights. 

The 2015 Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake Ontario is shaping up to be a great mix of Shavian classics, an American musical, Canadian premieres and cutting edge modern day drama. Artistic Director Jackie Maxwell will be leaving after the 2016 Season and is working hard to program an uniquely balanced season, while also hoping to fulfill all of her artistic desires before her tenure ends. The company mandate is: ' The Shaw Festival is a theatre company inspired by the work of Bernard Shaw. We produce plays from and about his era and contemporary plays that share Shaw's provocative exploration of society and celebration of humanity.'