WAKE UP with BWW 3/31/2015 - Lane & Knight in IT'S ONLY A PLAY, Barbeau in PIPPIN, YOUNGER and More!
By: Jessica Showers Mar. 31, 2015
Good morning, BroadwayWorld! Because we know all our readers eat, sleep and breathe Broadway, what could be better than waking up to it? Today's big news: IT'S ONLY A PLAY gains two "new" cast members, the PIPPIN tour gets a new 'Berthe', Sutton Foster leads TV Land's new series YOUNGER and more!
Next up in our series of stars introducing BWW's morning feature is Jay Armstrong Johnson (portrait by Walter McBride), currrent star of Broadway's ON THE TOWN who has also appeared in HANDS ON A HARDBODY, CATCH ME IF YOU CAN and HAIR!
Photo by Walter McBride
TODAY'S TOP ITEMS:
- Nathan Lane returns to Broadway's IT'S ONLY A PLAY with new cast member T.R. Knight!
- National Yiddish Theater Folksbiene celebrates its 100th Anniversary this evening Jordan Roth and more.
- Nominations for The Tony Awards' Excellence in Theatre Education Award are due today!
- Adrienne Barbeau joins the PIPPIN National Tour in Fort Lauderdale tonight.
- The RSC's OPPENHEIMER transfers to the West End this evening...
- And the company of off-Broadway's THE 39 STEPS meets the press today, so stay tuned for photos!
NEWS YOU MISSED YESTERDAY:
- THE WIZ is NBC's 2015 live musical, with a Broadway Revival in the works!
- AN ACT OF GOD has set its full creative team.
- Pollock, Taylor, Molina, Murin and more will lead NERDS labs in NYC next month.
- NT Live is screening the Benedict Cumberbatch-led HAMLET in US cinemas this fall!
- Signature's 2015-16 season will feature the new musicals CAKE OFF and GIRLSTAR.
- We got a peek (right) at the new BROADWAY LEGACY exhibition, featuring Chuck Cooper and more!
- Sondheim will receive the Chicago Public Library's Carl Sandburg Award; while Grey, Daldry & WNET will be honored at the 2015 Drama League Awards...
- Disney is developing a live-action MULAN movie!
- And stage vets Ciara Renee and Arthur Darvill have joined The CW's ARROW/FLASH spinoff.
Broadway Weather Forecast: Rain this afternoon with a high of 48 degrees - don't forget your umbrella!
Quote of the Day: A word from birthday boy Christopher Walken...
"I'd love to do a character with a wife, a nice little house, a couple of kids, a dog, maybe a bit of singing, and no guns and no killing, but nobody offers me those kind of parts."
-- Christopher Walken (via BrainyQuote)
What we're watching: TV Land's YOUNGER, starring Broadway's Sutton Foster, premiering tonight. Watch a promo below!
Video of the Day: Watch CABARET's new tour montage!
And a Happy Birthday shout-out to Christopher Walken, who turns 72 today!
Walken last appeared on Broadway in 2010's A Behanding in Spokane -- he was nominated for a Tony for Best Actor in a Play. Before that, he starred in James Joyce's The Dead (which earned him his first Tony nod for Best Actor in a Musical), as well as Hurlyburly, Sweet Bird of Youth, The Merchant of Venice, The Plough and the Stars, Enemies, The Unknown Soldier and His Wife, The Rose Tattoo, Baker Street, High Spirits, and J.B. He has also appeared in several Shakespeare plays off-Broadway. Among hundreds of film credits, Walken's more notable roles are in The Deer Hunter (for which he won an Oscar in 1978), Annie Hall, True Romance, Pulp Fiction, Catch Me If You Can, Hairspray, Seven Psychopaths, Jersey Boys and more. He also recently played 'Captain Hook' in NBC's Peter Pan Live! and is lending his voice to the new Jungle Book movie.
Photo by Virginia Sherwood/NBC
See you bright and early tomorrow, BroadwayWorld!