As You Like It - 1918 - Broadway Articles Page 1

There is plenty of fun to be had in this light-hearted musical.

We Americans should not be too proud to admit we owe the Brits for a few important things - Harry Potter, earl gray tea, a lot of great music, and, to a certain extent, the 19th Amendment.  

James Mirrione, the bookwriter behind The Grippe, invites audiences to revisit a pivotal moment in history through the lens of theatre. Inspired by the overlooked story of the 1918 Spanish Flu and its striking parallels to contemporary society, Mirrione combines rigorous historical research, personal family history, and music of the era to craft a play that is both enlightening and emotionally resonant.

Multiple lost Broadway theaters intersect with the Hammerstein family. This follows since Oscar Hammerstein I was a theater owner and builder. In addition to Hammerstein’s which was named after him and is now the Ed Sullivan, and the New Victory which he originally built, there is also the Hammerstein Ballroom. Read more here!

June Squibb is a beloved actor with an incredibly long career—but does 96 make her the oldest actor to play Broadway in a regular production with 8 performances a week? According to our research, that is indeed the case! 

Theatro São Pedro's opera season brings the comic opera 'Falstaff' by renowned Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi to the public, with musical direction by Ira Levin and staging by Caetano Vilela. With a libretto by Arrigo Boito—written based on the first and second parts of William Shakespeare's plays 'Henry IV' and 'The Merry Wives of Windsor'—Falstaff is Verdi's last opera. Divided into three acts, the title is a lyrical commedia that Verdi released to the world after a lifetime of composing tragedies.

From 1918 to the mid-1930s, African American artists in the United States experienced a cultural blossoming known as the Harlem Renaissance-a period in which theatre, music and literature were created by (and often for) Black Americans.

A new version of the classic, The Pirates of Penzance, is currently commanding the stage at Roundabout’s Todd Haimes Theatre on 42nd Street—formerly the American Airlines and before that, the Selwyn. This revisal of the beloved show is titled: Pirates! The Penzance Musical.

This time, the reader question was: How often do legit Broadway plays and musicals include live animals in their companies? Can you name some recent examples of animals in Broadway shows?

This time, the reader question was: There are only three states in America without known Broadway musicals set within their borders. Can you guess which three? WE're breaking it down state by state.

The 25/26 season at Syracuse Stage will feature a Broadway hit, fresh revivals of award-winning classics, an inspiring new American musical and a knockout world premiere play. See the full season here!

This time, the reader question was: How Often Do Broadway Musicals Tackle the Topic of War? There are actually many musicals about war in the canon. The rare feat of Operation Mincemeat lies in its tone. The show is a fast-paced, zany, comedic take on a mission that used a dead body to mislead the Axis forces, leading to the successful Allied invasion of Sicily.

Cola Boyy's posthumous final album Quit to Play Chess will be released on May 23rd. With this announcement, his team has unveiled a new song “Babylon.' Listen to it here.

Award winning playwright Charles Evered’s play “Adopt a Sailor” has been on a nationwide tour since 2018 to garner support for the Evered House, the playwright’s non-profit that supports creative military members and others who serve. 

As I sat in the audience, waiting for the performance of War Horse In Concert, a Pops presentation for the Wichita Symphony, I overhead several audience members discussing their expectations for what they were about to experience. “Is this a play?”  “It looks like there are narrators!” “Is this different from a regular concert?” Most “In Concert” performances are based on well known musicals, but War Horse In Concert is based on War Horse Suite 2022, a symphonic work derived from the score of the play with the same name. The play is based on the original story written by Michael Morpurgo. War Horse: The Story in Concert premiered at London’s Royal Albert Hall in 2016, with music composed by Adrian Sutton, and the narration was adapted from the play script written in 1982 by Nick Stafford. The performance consisted of a very simple staged version of the piece, with multiple actors playing multiple roles, supplying dialogue at the important points in the story. There was also a main singer and a chorus to help convey the emotions that the spoken word can fail to supply. This allows the orchestra to feature the score so the story to be told by both the music and the word. A concert version is usually a scaled down production, sans sets, props, elaborate costumes, and in the case of War Horse, the puppets used to portray the horses. The audience is asked to use their imaginations, and their mind’s eye, to fill in the remainder of the story.

THE FIELDS OF AMBROSIA will have industry readings in NYC on October 17 and 18, featuring a cast led by Mike McGowan and Sierra Boggess.

This time, the reader question was: What is the history of Romeo and Juliet on Broadway?

Prior to being cast as Hans, I had already been assigned to research him as part of my duties as a dramaturg. Naturally, as soon as I found out I would be playing the role, I consumed every piece of media related to him and his life that I could.

Horizon Theatre Rep will continue the streaming series of German Plays from the 1910s & 1920s. The plays will be directed by Rafael De Mussa.

The new musical Gatsby, being given its world premiere by the American Repertory Theater at the Loeb Drama Center in Cambridge through August 3, isn’t just great, it’s spectacular.

This time, the reader question was: Which Broadway theaters are the largest and which are the smallest and our expert, Jennifer Ashley Tepper has done a deep dive on the sizes of Broadway theatres both past and present!

LAGUNA PLAYHOUSE will present Lerner & Loewe's CAMELOT, directed by Jeffrey D. Moss. The show opens Sunday, July 28 at 5:30pm.

Laguna Playhouse has revealed the creative team and full cast for the transfer of North Coast Repertory Theatre of Lerner & Loewe’s CAMELOT. Learn how to purchase tickets.

Second show this spring at the Shawnee Mission Park Theatre In The Park, is ANASTASIA, a 2017 fairy tale based on a wished-for result concerning the Russian Grand Duchess Anatasia. This, in turn, was based on an earlier 1997 animated film and an even earlier imagining in a 1956 film. ANASTASIA the Musical is fortunate to have found some super voices for all its lead roles.

The world premiere of Gatsby at A.R.T., with a score by Florence Welch, is now open! Read the reviews for Gatsby here!