Disney Theatrical Group News

Variety reports the news that Disney Theatrical Prods. hit a major theatrical licensee milestone, the company has now scored 20,000 licensees.

The Italian premiere engagement of Disney's BEAUTY AND THE BEAST debuts tonight in Milan at the Teatro Nazionale. BEAUTY AND THE BEAST is presented by Stage Entertainment Ltd., Disney's licensed presenting partner in Europe.

In a special ceremony today, Disney Theatrical Productions donated objects from the Tony and Olivier Award-winning musical 'The Lion King' to the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History. Costume elements from the show's protagonist Simba and the tribal shaman Rafiki will join objects from the musicals 'Cats,' 'Rent' and the 'King and I' in the museum's permanent entertainment collections.

Disney Theatrical Productions will donate objects from the Tony and Olivier Award-winning musical, THE LION KING, to the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History in a special donation ceremony on Thursday, 9/24.

Disney Theatrical Productions will donate objects from the Tony and Olivier Award-winning musical, THE LION KING, to the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History in a special donation ceremony on Thursday, 9/24.

Disney's musical TARZAN® completed its Holland engagement last Sunday at the Circus Theatre in Scheveningen, just outside of Amsterdam, after a record-setting 900 performances. The production, which opened in April 2007, welcomed an astonishing 1.6 million audience members over the course of its run, making it one of the top five most successful musicals in Holland. Disney and Cameron Mackintosh's MARY POPPINS will move into the Circus Theatre in April, 2010 for an extended run.

Casting has been announced for the Las Vegas production of Disney's THE LION KING. The eagerly awaited sit-down production will leap onto the Mandalay Bay Theatre stage with preview performances May 5, and celebrate its official opening May 15. It will join the seven other highly successful companies of THE LION KING currently running all over the world, including New York, London, Hamburg, Paris, Tokyo and Fukuoka, as well as the North American National Tour. Tickets will go on sale to the public March 14.

Casting has been announced for the Las Vegas production of Disney's THE LION KING. The eagerly awaited sit-down production will leap onto the Mandalay Bay Theatre stage with preview performances May 5, and celebrate its official opening May 15. It will join the seven other highly successful companies of THE LION KING currently running all over the world, including New York, London, Hamburg, Paris, Tokyo and Fukuoka, as well as the North American National Tour. Tickets will go on sale to the public March 14.

La Jolla Playhouse welcomes back Rick Elice, co-writer of the Tony Award-winning Jersey Boys, as the playwright of Peter and the Starcatchers. Alex Timbers and Roger Rees are set to direct with choreography by Kelly Devine and music by Wayne Barker. Peter and the Starcatchers will be playing at the Sheila and Hughes Potiker Theatre at La Jolla Playhouse February 13 -March 8, 2009. Based on the best-selling novel by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson, Peter and the Starcatchers dares to tell the real story of precisely how a desperate orphan in Victorian England became The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up. It's a tale that travels halfway round the world and straight up to the stars. It's a comedy that takes aim at social injustice. It's a romance of young heroes who risk everything for the sake of doing right. It's an expos? of extravagant villains possessed of a single-minded ferocity from which no good shall ever spring. In short, it's an awfully big adventure. La Jolla Playhouse will present Peter and the Starcatchers, a new play, as a part of its Page To Stage program, by special arrangement with Disney Theatrical Productions. Adam Green has been cast in the role of Peter. He has appeared in Off-Broadway productions such as Election Day, All This Intimacy and None of the Above. Molly will be played by Celia Keenan-Bolger who most recently appeared on Broadway in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, for which she earned a Tony Award nomination. She also appeared in Saved. Lost boy Prentiss will be played by Carson Elrod, who appeared in the La Jolla Playhouse production of Our Town. Elrod has also appeared on Broadway in Reckless and Noises Off. David Rossmer is cast as the ever - peckish lost boy Teddy. His Broadway credits include Fiddler on the Roof and Titanic. Christian Borle, who will be playing the ravenous Black Stache, received acclaim for his roles in Spamalot. He also received a 2007 Tony Award nomination for his role in the Broadway production of Legally Blonde. Andrew McGinn is set to play Slank. His New York credits include Coast of Utopia and The Invention of Love. Playing Lord Aster is John G. Preston, who recently appeared as Cameron Parker in the Off-Broadway production of Taboos. Greg Hildreth, playing the good hearted Alf, recently appeared in Dance Dance Revolution and Gentlemen of Verona. Teddy Bergman will be playing Fighting Prawn. His New York theater credits include Dance Dance Revolution and Nobody Likes the Mormons.

Disney Live Family Entertainment in partnership with Feld Entertainment will bring Disney On Ice and Disney Live! to more families worldwide with new tours in Greece, Malta, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Latvia and Lithuania. As part of this expansion, children and families in these emerging markets will have to look no further than nearby cities to experience Disney's classic tales and enjoy live performances featuring celebrated Disney stars. Amidst a changing global economic landscape, Disney offers families budget-friendly opportunities to experience beloved stories brought to life on ice through Disney On Ice and on the stage through Disney Live!

Disney Theatrical Productions (DTP) today announced that The Walt Disney Studios will celebrate the 45th Anniversary of the 1964 classic film, MARY POPPINS, with a 2-disc special edition DVD featuring brand new bonus materials from the hit stage production based on the popular film starring Julie Andrews and Dick van Dyke and on the P.L. Travers books. To be released on January 27, 2009, the DVD set will feature a new 45-minute documentary, 'Mary Poppins: From Page to Stage' that takes audiences behind the scenes for a close look at the creation of the stage musical produced by DTP and Cameron Mackintosh. Filmed in the UK, France and the United States, the documentary is a series of intimate conversations with many of the stage versions' creators including producers Cameron Macintosh and Thomas Schumacher, composers George Stiles and Anthony Drewe, Richard Sherman, who co-wrote music and lyrics for the original film and set and costume designer Bob Crowley. The documentary also features a roundtable discussion at the world-famous Sardi's restaurant in New York City between Schumacher and actors Ashley Brown and Gavin Lee, who originated the roles of Mary Poppins and Bert in the Broadway production. Another extra from the stage version is the musical number 'Step In Time' shot in its entirety onstage at the New Amsterdam Theatre, the show's Broadway home since 2006. The number showcases showstopping technical effects, as Bert and his chimneysweeps dance with Mary and the Banks children over the rooftops of London. The performance features Brown, Lee and the full Broadway company performing the never-before-filmed popular number from the show, also downloadable as an MP3 audio file.

La Jolla Playhouse welcomes back Rick Elice, co-writer of the Tony Award-winning Jersey Boys, as the playwright of Peter and the Starcatchers. Alex Timbers and Roger Rees are set to direct with choreography by Kelly Devine and music by Wayne Barker. Peter and the Starcatchers will be playing at the Sheila and Hughes Potiker Theatre at La Jolla Playhouse February 13 -March 8, 2009. Based on the best-selling novel by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson, Peter and the Starcatchers dares to tell the real story of precisely how a desperate orphan in Victorian England became The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up. It's a tale that travels halfway round the world and straight up to the stars. It's a comedy that takes aim at social injustice. It's a romance of young heroes who risk everything for the sake of doing right. It's an expos? of extravagant villains possessed of a single-minded ferocity from which no good shall ever spring. In short, it's an awfully big adventure. La Jolla Playhouse will present Peter and the Starcatchers, a new play, as a part of its Page To Stage program, by special arrangement with Disney Theatrical Productions. Adam Green has been cast in the role of Peter. He has appeared in Off-Broadway productions such as Election Day, All This Intimacy and None of the Above. Molly will be played by Celia Keenan-Bolger who most recently appeared on Broadway in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, for which she earned a Tony Award nomination. She also appeared in Saved. Lost boy Prentiss will be played by Carson Elrod, who appeared in the La Jolla Playhouse production of Our Town. Elrod has also appeared on Broadway in Reckless and Noises Off. David Rossmer is cast as the ever - peckish lost boy Teddy. His Broadway credits include Fiddler on the Roof and Titanic. Christian Borle, who will be playing the ravenous Black Stache, received acclaim for his roles in Spamalot. He also received a 2007 Tony Award nomination for his role in the Broadway production of Legally Blonde. Andrew McGinn is set to play Slank. His New York credits include Coast of Utopia and The Invention of Love. Playing Lord Aster is John G. Preston, who recently appeared as Cameron Parker in the Off-Broadway production of Taboos. Greg Hildreth, playing the good hearted Alf, recently appeared in Dance Dance Revolution and Gentlemen of Verona. Teddy Bergman will be playing Fighting Prawn. His New York theater credits include Dance Dance Revolution and Nobody Likes the Mormons.

In conjunction with the second edition of his hit book How Does the Show Go On?, Broadway producer Thomas Schumacher gave the keynote address at the Junior Theater Festival in Atlanta. The national festival dedicated to groups working with elementary and middle school aged young people, ran from January 16 -18, 2009. Schumacher's presentation (on Sunday, January 18), much like his book, enlightened more than 1,500 theater lovers about what goes into putting on a Broadway show. Child actor Henry Hodges, who starred as ?Michael Banks' in the original Broadway cast of Disney & Cameron Mackintosh's Mary Poppins joined Schumacher. Schumacher's much heralded book, How Does the Show Go On?, was originally released in 2007 and went on to sell over 50,000 copies. A second edition was released in late 2008 and has been updated to include Broadway's The Little Mermaid and the stage production of the mega-hit High School Musical. A library edition of How Does the Show Go On? is also available. The book, written with Jeff Kurtti, gives readers the opportunity to meet the cast of characters who work onstage and behind the scenes to deliver unforgettable performances, and explore the inner workings of the theater building itself.

Disney Theatrical Productions (DTP) today announced that The Walt Disney Studios will celebrate the 45th Anniversary of the 1964 classic film, MARY POPPINS, with a 2-disc special edition DVD featuring brand new bonus materials from the hit stage production based on the popular film starring Julie Andrews and Dick van Dyke and on the P.L. Travers books. To be released on January 27, 2009, the DVD set will feature a new 45-minute documentary, 'Mary Poppins: From Page to Stage' that takes audiences behind the scenes for a close look at the creation of the stage musical produced by DTP and Cameron Mackintosh. Filmed in the UK, France and the United States, the documentary is a series of intimate conversations with many of the stage versions' creators including producers Cameron Macintosh and Thomas Schumacher, composers George Stiles and Anthony Drewe, Richard Sherman, who co-wrote music and lyrics for the original film and set and costume designer Bob Crowley. The documentary also features a roundtable discussion at the world-famous Sardi's restaurant in New York City between Schumacher and actors Ashley Brown and Gavin Lee, who originated the roles of Mary Poppins and Bert in the Broadway production. Another extra from the stage version is the musical number 'Step In Time' shot in its entirety onstage at the New Amsterdam Theatre, the show's Broadway home since 2006. The number showcases showstopping technical effects, as Bert and his chimneysweeps dance with Mary and the Banks children over the rooftops of London. The performance features Brown, Lee and the full Broadway company performing the never-before-filmed popular number from the show, also downloadable as an MP3 audio file.

In conjunction with the second edition of his hit book How Does the Show Go On?, Broadway producer Thomas Schumacher will give the keynote address at the Junior Theater Festival in Atlanta. The national festival dedicated togroups working with elementary and middle school aged young people, runs January 16 -18, 2009.Schumacher's presentation (on Sunday, January 18) will, much like his book, enlightenmore than 1,500 theater lovers about what goes into putting on a Broadway show.

In conjunction with the second edition of his hit book How Does the Show Go On?, Broadway producer Thomas Schumacher will give the keynote address at the Junior Theater Festival in Atlanta. The national festival dedicated togroups working with elementary and middle school aged young people, runs January 16 -18, 2009.Schumacher's presentation (on Sunday, January 18) will, much like his book, enlightenmore than 1,500 theater lovers about what goes into putting on a Broadway show.

Disney's THE LION KING celebrates its 10th Anniversary in Tokyo, Japan on Saturday, December 20, 2008 with a gala performance and celebration at the Theatre Haru. The Tokyo production of The Lion King was the first to be mounted after the show's award-winning New York City debut and is the second longest-running staging of the show, after Broadway.

Disney Theatrical Productions today announced that it is extending its Kids Go Free! ticket offer until 11:59 PM on Tuesday, December 23, 2008.

Disney Editions has released an updated edition of How Does the Show Go On?, Broadway producer Thomas Schumacher's introduction to the theater for young people.