Jerome Robbins News

Tom Gold was one of my favorite dancers when he was a soloist with New York City Ballet. You never expected anything but the very best when he was on stage, and I always got it. After leaving the company in 2007 he founded his own company, Tom Gold Dance, which I attended on Thursday, March 8.

The world premiere production of the brand new musical comedy Bullets Over Broadway, written by Woody Allen and based on the screenplay by Allen and Douglas McGrath for the 1994 film, will begin preview performances tomorrow, March 11 and officially open Thursday, April 10, 2014 at The St. James Theatre (246 West 44th Street). The new musical will be directed and choreographed by five-time Tony Award winner Susan Stroman. Scroll down to learn more about the Bullets Over Broadway company, and watch interviews with the cast!

Northrop at the University of Minnesota reopens on April 4, 8:00 pm with its Northrop Inside Out Grand Reopening Gala. The opening night gala features American Ballet Theatre, America's National Ballet Company performing the classic romantic ballet Giselle with live orchestra, a post-performance dessert and champagne reception, and Northrop Inside Out After Dark dance party featuring a live DJ and special performances.

It's a Broadway tradition! According to the New York Times, Fiddler on the Roof is coming back to Broadway, for the sixth time since it opened in 1964. The revival will be produced by Jeffrey Richards and Jerry Frankel, and directed by Barlett Sher, who is currently being represented on Broadway with The Bridges of Madison County. This version will be based on original conceptions and choreography by Jerome Robbins, with choreography by Hofesh Shechter.

Target Margin Theater, presented by The Chocolate Factory Theater, continues its exploration of Yiddish Theater with a new adaptation of one of the central plays of Yiddish history, Uriel Acosta: I Want That Man!, taken from myriad literary and historical sources. Created and directed by TMT's Artistic Director, David Herskovits, with original songs by Rebecca Hart, and toy theater created by Kathleen Kennedy Tobin, the four-member cast features Don Castro, James Tigger! Ferguson, Mary Rasmussen and J.H. Smith III.

Producers Howard & Janet Kagan (Pippin, The Gershwins' Porgy & Bess) just announced that a new Broadway revival of ON THE TOWN - the musical-comedy love letter to New York City - will open in October 2014 at the Lyric Theatre. This year marks the 70thanniversary of the opening of this iconic musical comedy created by the legendary creative team of Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden, Adolph Green, and Jerome Robbins. The Lyric Theatre will be reopened after a renovation being completed by its new owners, Ambassador Theatre Group. This historic theater at the crossroads of 42nd Street and Times Square was created from a combination of the original Apollo Theater, and the original Lyric Theatre that stood on the site, and the facade of which still stands on 42nd and 43rd Streets.

A big screen revival of the clasic film WEST SIDE STORY may be in the works at Fox.

The tour of the smash hit Broadway revival of WEST SIDE STORY is coming to Thousand Oaks. WEST SIDE STORY plays at the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza March 11-16, 2014 as part of the 2013-14 Broadway in Thousand Oaks Series. Tony Award-winning librettist Arthur Laurents' Broadway direction is recreated for the tour by David Saint, the Associate Director on Broadway. The original Jerome Robbins choreography is reproduced by Tony Award-nominee Joey McKneely (The Boy from Oz, The Life).

'West Side Story' takes center stage at The Grand 1894 Opera House Sunday, April 13 for two high-energy performances at 2 and 7 pm. As an updated version of 'Romeo and Juliet', 'West Side Story' tells the heartwarming tale of an unspeakable love between Tony and Maria, whose families are members of two rival gangs. Sponsored in part by The Galveston Daily News, Sunny 99.1, and The William J. and Merri S. Edwards Charitable Gift Fund, West Side Story delivers one of Broadway's best dance-driven musicals.

The newly established Cleveland Ballet Youth Company will make its debut performance with the program Where it All Began, April 25 at 7:00 p.m. in PlayhouseSquare's Hanna Theatre. It is no coincidence that this production will take place on the very stage where the former Cleveland Ballet hosted its first professional performances during the late 1970's. Founded by former Cleveland San Jose Ballet principal dancer, Gladisa Guadalupe, who also serves as the company's artistic director, Cleveland Ballet Youth Company is laying the ground work to re-introduce professional ballet to Cleveland audiences. Where it All Began will feature the entire company of Cleveland Ballet Youth Company along with several guest artists from the company's professional division. Musical accompaniment will come courtesy of the newly-founded Cleveland Ballet Orchestra.

Boston Ballet Artistic Director Mikko Nissinen today announced the programming for the 2014-2015 season at the Boston Opera House. Boston Ballet's 51st season kicks off with the world premiere of Mikko Nissinen's Swan Lake, featuring glorious new sets and costumes by award winning designer Robert Perdziola. The season continues with the beloved new production of Nissinen's The Nutcracker and Val Caniparoli's romantic drama Lady of the Camellias. The spring season heats up with a burst of contemporary and neo-classical choreography from masters such as William Forsythe, Jerome Robbins, Helen Pickett, and Wayne McGregor, including the Company premieres of George Balanchine's Episodes and Hans van Manen's Black Cake. Adding to the excitement, Boston Ballet will present world premieres by Resident Choreographer Jorma Elo and Principal Dancer Jeffrey Cirio.

Philadelphia, PA

As a welcome surprise during the New York City Ballet matinee on Saturday, March 1st 2014 at the Koch Theater, the recently renovated orchestra pit rose so that Interim Music Director Andrews Sills could give us an interesting history lesson with the musicians in full view. Under the direction of Guest Conductor Henrik Vagn Christensen, they played passages from Debussy's "Prelude to an Afternoon of a Faun" and from works by Saint-Saens, Wagner, and Chopin while Sills explained that Debussy was "a bridge" between the legacy of the romantic age and the modern era.

The upcoming performance of Winning Works: Choreographers of Color Award by The Joffrey Academy of Dance has changed venues due to last week's electrical fire at the Harris Theater, an event unrelated to the Winning Works production. The production will now take place at the Broadway Playhouse at Water Tower Place, 175 E. Chestnut Street, and the date and time of the performance remain unchanged, which is tonight, March 1 at 7:00 pm. Winning Works ticket holders will be notified by the Joffrey Ballet box office staff about the change of venue.

Ravinia's 2014 season, dubbed 'Summer of Love/Season of Stars,' was announced today by Ravinia President and CEO Welz Kauffman. Brimming with talent and romance, the festival's 2014 schedule brings some the biggest names in the world of music as well as repertoire that explores the theme of great love in its various manifestations. No fewer than three musical incarnations of the most famous love story of all time, Romeo and Juliet, will be featured, with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performing Tchaikovsky's Overture-Fantasy (July 27), a suite from Prokofiev's ballet setting of the story (July 16) and the score of West Side Story as the classic film is shown (July 17-18). In other examples of love, soprano Deborah Voigt describes it as 'Something Wonderful' on a Broadway evening (July 13), the legendary Broadway team of Lerner and Loewe will be celebrated (July 20), and Chanticleer even jabs at the battle of the sexes in an evening titled 'She Said/He Said' (July 6). In fact, love lurks, longs and lingers across genres in most of the more than 130 events that Ravinia will present in 2014, its 110th year and its 78th as the summer residence of the CSO.

Following his acclaimed New York Philharmonic debut on the ASIA / WINTER 2014 tour, jazz pianist Makoto Ozone will join Music Director Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic in a newly added concert Tuesday, April 22, 2014, at 7:30 p.m. The all-American program will include Bernstein's Candide Overture; Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, featuring Mr. Ozone as soloist; Bernstein's Symphonic Dances from West Side Story; and Gershwin's An American in Paris. The concert will mark Mr. Ozone's U.S. orchestral debut; his appearances with the Philharmonic on the ASIA / WINTER 2014 tour marked his first performances with an American orchestra.

THEATER TALK celebrates the 50th Anniversary of Hello, Dolly! with a trio of guests, each with a different association with the long-running show. Actress Sondra Lee was the production's original Minnie Fay; Lee Roy Reams was Cornelius in the 1978 revival and directed the second revival in 1995; and dancer Marge Champion, married to the show's director-choreographer Gower Champion, was present at the show's creation. The 1964 mega-hit was a musical adaptation of Thornton Wilder's The Matchmaker, with a book by Michael Stewart, score by 26-year-old Jerry Herman and produced by the notorious David Merrick. The show's original cast included: Carol Channing, David Burns, Charles Nelson Reilly, Eileen Brennan and Ms. Lee. It ran for a record-breaking 2,844 performances from Jan. 15, 1964 to Dec. 27, 1970 and won 10 Tony Awards, a record it held for 35 years.