John Kander News

Piedmont Players Theatre will present the final 4 performances of Chicago April 9-12 at 7:30m at the Meroney Theatre. Tickets are $18 for adults and $15 for seniors and students. Wednesday is value night, in which all tickets are only $10. Tickets can be purchased by calling 704-633-5471 or online at piedmontplayers.com.

Al Tapper, composer of the Off Broadway shows Sessions, An Evening at the Carlyle and National Pastime, has won a highly prestigious Peabody Award for his documentary Broadway Musicals: A Jewish Legacy. Tapper produced the 90 minute show for WNET. The Peabody Award celebrates excellence in broadcasting. Broadway Musicals: A Jewish Legacy is the first documentary film to explore the phenomenal relationship that Broadway has had with Jewish Americans. From George Gershwin to Irving Berlin to Kander and Ebb to Stephen Sondheim, the Broadway musical has been dominated by Jewish writers and composers.

Roundabout Theatre Company's revival of Cabaret by Joe Masteroff, John Kander and Fred Ebb, featuring three-time Academy Award nominee Michelle Williams for the first time on Broadway as Sally Bowles, and Alan Cumming, reprising his Tony Award-winning role as the Emcee, is currently in previews on Broadway. CABARET will play a 24-week limited engagement, with an official opening on April 24, 2014 at the newly transformed Kit Kat Klub at Studio 54. Below, BWW brings you a first look at Cumming, Williams, and the entire Kit Kat company on stage and in action!

Piedmont Players Theatre along with Ed Brown & Fibrant present CHICAGO, with Book by Fred Ebb and Bob Fosse, Music by John Kander Lyrics by Fred Ebb, Based on the play by Maurine Dallas Watkins. The show runs today, April 3-5 and 9-12 at 7:30pm and April 6 at 2:30pm.

The music of singer/composer Alex Maxwell comes to NYC's premier cabaret venue Stage 72 at the Triad, on April 4th @ 7PM in his original show 'Alex Maxwell Plays With Himself, . . . Tonight'. The one-man show features Maxwell accompanying himself in an evening that presents a full set of original solo tracks by the Jersey artist who has recently migrated to the city. Stripped down, raw, and unfiltered his songs are laced with wit and invoke an honest look at behaviors and the human condition. Maxwell has been inspired by a plethora of artists from Lennon to Neil Young to Dylan and Cobain and has created a progressive twist on the sound of these timeless classics in the shape of Country Grunge Folk, a hybrid genre evolving all over the Tri-State area.

Alan Cumming and the Kit Kat band from Broadway's current Cabaret revival will perform 'Willkommen' on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on April 10!

Virginia's Tony-Award winning Signature Theatre announces the cast for The Threepenny Opera, Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's cutting and enduring critique of capitalism and corruption. Directed by Signature Theatre's Associate Artistic Director Matthew Gardiner (Tender Napalm, Dreamgirls, Really Really), the production stars Mitchell Jarvis (Broadway's Rock of Ages) as the charismatic Macheath, known to popular culture as Mack the Knife.

TOO MUCH SUN - the newest play by Nicky Silver - will be given its world-premiere production this spring at the Vineyard Theatre (108 E. 15 St.) starring the Tony Award-winning actress Linda Lavin, joined by the newly-announced cast: Ken Barnett, Richard Bekins, Matt Dellapina, Matt Dickson and Jennifer Westfeldt, it has been announced by Douglas Aibel, The Vineyard's Artistic Director, and Sarah Stern, Co-Artistic Director. Mark Brokaw directs the production, scheduled to begin previews May 1 prior to an official opening night on May 18.

Urban Stages Frances Hill, Founding Artistic Director and producer Peter Napolitano, announced the final week of the World Premiere engagement of Character Man. Jim Brochu's new musical memoir at Urban Stages Theatre (259 West 30th Street). This limited run will continue through April 6th only. Robert Bartley directs, with musical direction by Carl Haan. The Final Post-Show Talk will take place on Wednesday, April 2nd with Special Guest Karen Mason (Mamma Mia, Sunset Boulevard, Hairspray), moderated by Peter Filichia.

Coming up this week, 54 BELOW, the performance venue located just below the legendary Studio 54 at 254 West 54th Street, presents some of the brightest stars from Broadway, cabaret, jazz and beyond:

Penny Fuller and Anita Gillette return to the stage at 54 Below with SIN TWISTERS, a new evening of story and song. BroadwayWorld brings you phOtos from the concert below!

Alan Cumming has just tweeted that he is feeling better and will be returning to the stage for tonight's preview performance of Cabaret. He tweeted, 'Thanks to my nursemaid, miss Honey, I'm getting back on the @Cabaret_Musical horse tonight. Flu is a total bitch btw.' Check below to see the picture he tweeted with his message.

BroadwayWorld has confirmed that understudy Leeds Hill is on this afternoon as the Emcee in Cabaret, filling in for a sick Alan Cumming, who is hoping to return to the show tonight.

Theatre Communications Group (TCG), the national organization for theatre, is pleased to announce the recipients of the 2013 Edgerton Foundation New Play Awards. The awards, totaling $1,108,000, allow 39 productions extra time in the development and rehearsal of new plays with the entire creative team, helping to extend the life of the play after its first run.

BroadwayWorld has just learned that tonight's preview performance of Cabaret has been cancelled. Alan Cumming, who plays the Emcee, has fallen ill, and since the show is only in its first week of performances, Cumming's understudy hasn't been rehearsed. Performances are expected to resume tomorrow. Subscribers will receive a call to reschedule their tickets and single ticket holders may exchange their tickets from the original point of purchase.

This April, May and June at 54 BELOW presents an exciting lineup of the brightest talent from Broadway and beyond. Located just below the legendary Studio 54 at 254 West 54thStreet. For a detailed schedule of upcoming performances at 54 Below and to purchase tickets, visit www.54Below.com.

SecondStory Repertory will present Kander and Ebb's rarely produced masterpiece, Kiss of the Spider Woman, a sensual musical set all at once in the brutal reality of a Latin American prison, and in the airily glamorous world of the silver screen that plays endlessly in the mind of long-time prison inmate, Luis Alberto Molina. With a book by Terrence McNally, and based on the Manuel Puig novel 'El Beso de la Mujer Araña', Kiss of the Spider Woman won the 1993 Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Book, and Best Score. Running today, March 28 through April 13, 2014, Kiss of the Spider Woman is directed by Billie Wildrick who recently returned to Seattle after her Broadway debut in Kathy Lee Gifford's Scandalous.

Latina superstar Bianca Marroquin returns to Broadway's Chicago as Roxie Hart beginning Monday, March 31. She is also the newly-crowned National Ambassador for the Broadway industry's new Viva Broadway initiative. (Click image to download full-size JPG) On Monday, March 31, 2014, Broadway's celebrated revival of John Kander, Fred Ebb and Bob Fosse's Tony Award-winning musical Chicago is pleased to welcome back Latina stage and screen sensation Bianca Marroquin to the starring role of Roxie Hart.

Broadway's current Cabaret revival, starring Alan Cumming and Michelle Williams, just revealed a shot from Williams' upcoming feature spread in Vogue's April 2014 issue. Check it out below!