Marc Shaiman News

It is always great when the performers on stage are having such a good time that those watching can't help but get swept up in the fun, and that is exactly what happens in Curtain Call Players' tightly-paced production of Hairspray, making it a joy from start to finish. * * * * 1/2 (out of 5)

On Wednesday, November 9th, DIFFA: Design Industries Foundation Fighting AIDS will present a 'Tribute to Honor David Rockwell,' DIFFA Board Chairman and world-renowned New York based architect and designer, for 12 years of commitment and dedication to the organization.

Today we are talking to a Broadway stalwart with a string of hit shows on his resume - CATS, A CHORUS LINE, JOSEPH AND THE AMAZING TECHNICOLOR DREAMCOAT, THE WHO'S TOMMY, CHICAGO and more included - as well as hit solo albums of his own, such as his new release CHANGE BEGINS WITH ME; the one and only Matt Zarley. He also shares all about the shoot for the three music videos for the songs on his new dance album - "WTF" and "Forgive Me" included. Additionally, he shares his thoughts on Broadway now versus when he started out in the late-80s, Gillian Lynne versus Michael Bennett, as well as opinions on GLEE, his own favorite shows and scores, co-stars' careers and much, much more!

The show, which is about a group of people who come together to put on a Broadway musical was developed by NBC's Robert Greenblatt, Steven Spielberg, and Broadway producing team Craig Zadan and Neil Meron. Broadway's Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman (HAIRSPRAY, CATCH ME IF YOU CAN), wrote the music for the show. Michael Mayer directed the project, and playwright Theresa Rebeck penned the script. Hear what the stars of the show had to say below!

The New York Musical Theatre Festival (NYMF) has announced the winners of the NYMF 2011 Awards for Excellence. Awards will be presented at the Eight Season Awards Gala taking place on Sunday, November 6th at The Hudson Theatre (145 W. 44th Street) beginning at 6:00pm. As previously announced, producers Neil Meron and Craig Zadan will also be honored for their work in bringing musical theatre to a worldwide, pop-culture audience.

Join the party! Tease it up. Throw on your best A-line and go-go boots...or that shagadelic wide tie - and put on your dancin' shoes. On Saturday, November 5th at 8:00pm, Signature Theatre will be transforming their theater into a Hairspray-style dance party with ‘The Big Hair Ball.'

Chanhassen Dinner Theatres has announced that it will extend its currently running Main Stage production of HAIRSPRAY. Originally slated to close on January 28th, HAIRSPRAY will be extended through May 26th, 2012.

You can hardly swing a cat in Nashville without hitting someone in costume as Edna Turnblad or her dancing progeny Tracy, so popular has the show become with local theaterati. But, truth be told, if I never live to see another Hairspray, I can now die a happy man: Because I saw director/choreographer Justin Boccitto's exceptional, extraordinary and exhilarating take on the show, starring a phenomenal cast of Lipscomb University theatre students who so brilliantly bring the now-iconic characters of 1962 Baltimore to life with thorough commitment and so much energy you can't help but leave the theater with a spring in your step and a song in your heart.

Cincinnati Music Theatre (CMT) welcomes the public to the 60's! Join us November 4 - 12, 2011 at the Aronoff Center's Jarson-Kaplan Theater for our larger-than-life production of Hairspray: The Broadway Musical.

'American Idol' season four finalist and recording artist Anthony Fedorov will star as 'Link Larkin' in the Hartford Children's Theatre production of Hairspray November 18 through 27, 2011 at the Wadsworth Atheneum's Aetna Theatre (600 Main Street) in downtown Hartford.

The New York Musical Theatre Festival (NYMF) announced today that special $75 show-only general admission tickets have also been made available for purchase for the Eighth Annual Season Awards Gala taking place on Sunday, November 6th at The Hudson Theatre (145 W. 44th Street).

Hairspray, can't get enough of that Hairspray! 60s girls lacquered up their dos - hair, that is, with oodles and oodles of it until their hair was a sticky, gooey mess; well, the musical of the same name has been seen close to a half dozen times in the last several months, and few seem to tire of it...why? It's a stroll down memory lane, it's nostalgia... that is pleasant - even when it's about issues that aren't... like segregation, it's a far cry from the unpleasantness in today's world, so it goes down easier... and, it has all those crazy song and dance tunes of the era...well, an original score by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, but one that sounds exactly like the hit tunes of the 60s. Musical Theatre West's (MTW) current production of the now classic Hairspray is about the best there is or has been, bar none! With an evenly spectacular cast, super direction by Larry Raben and stupendous choreography by Lee Martino, its star shines ever so brightly.

Hottest Articles on BroadwayWorld.com from this weekend Sunday, October 30, 2011 - Sunday, October 30, 2011.

HAIRSPRAY opened in 2002 on Broadway and had 2,642 performances at the Neil Simon Theatre. With music by Marc Shaiman, Lyrics by Marc Shaiman and Scott Williams and book by Mark O'Donnell and Thomas Meehan, HAIRSPRAY and its feel-good, upbeat score includes the songs 'Good Morning Baltimore,' 'Mama, I'm a Big Girl Now' and 'You Can't Stop the Beat.'

Musical Theatre West is set to announce that it will open its 59th Season with the mega-hit HAIRSPRAY at the beautiful 1,070-seat Carpenter Performing Arts Center in Long Beach.

Musical Theatre West has announced that it will open its 59th Season with the mega-hit HAIRSPRAY at the beautiful 1,070-seat Carpenter Performing Arts Center in Long Beach.

Musical Theatre West is proud to announce that it will open its 59th Season with the mega-hit HAIRSPRAY at the beautiful 1,070-seat Carpenter Performing Arts Center in Long Beach. HAIRSPRAY previews October 28 and runs for fourteen performances through November 13, 2011

Today we are completing BroadwayWorld's seven part analysis of Shakespeare's works, all with an eye towards the new movie ANONYMOUS - which questions the authorship of William Shakespeare - with a look at the greatest moments of deception in theatre taken from the last few decades. While deception and betrayal are both tried and true tactics of creating some tense, terse, taught drama by playwrights and filmmakers the world round - both onstage and onscreen - and it is certainly as much a hackneyed trope used today as it was used five hundred years ago in Shakespeare's time - the acts themselves that we will be focusing on today are the most surprising, effective and entertaining examples of them all. Analyzing moments from entities as diverse as SWEENEY TODD, CARRIE, WICKED, GYPSY, CATCH ME IF YOU CAN, ANYONE CAN WHISTLE, THE MUSIC MAN, SISTER ACT, SIX DEGREES OF SEPARATION, HAMLET, ENRON and more - split into three categories: musical tragedies, musical comedies and straight plays - it becomes quite clear over the course of analyzing these double-crosses that Shakespeare was not the only dramatist who could make the drama's biggest twist also be the moment that stays with us long after the curtain has come down or the screen has gone black. Note: given the nature of today's topic, be forewarned that spoilers copiously abound from here on out!