Fame or Famine

No, this is not some weird new musical, this is exactly what I’m saying it is: sex workers in western Maharashtra, India, have spent over a month taking acting lessons and then putting together a play about their lives.
Entitled  My Mother, the Gharwali, Her Maalak, His Wife, the play has the avowed message that “We too are human beings like you, and this is a profession like any other.” The play opens March 18, to portray the people who interact with the sex workers in everyday life.
“We are also humans” 
“We sell our bodies to earn money,” says Sangeeta, a sex …read more

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Monday night is when the magic happened: Dancing With the Stars kicked off another season. I missed the premiere, but thanks to Dancewatcher I can catch the highlights. Even more detail is over at TVGrapevine, including profiles of the dancers.
Straight from the Dancer’s Foot
Why settle for second-hand reviews, though? Kristi Yamaguchi is blogging about the experience first hand, and it’s a pleasure to read her well-spoken perspective. For example, she talks about doing a slow, easy foxtrot…and all I can think about is “damn, foxtrot? Never could get that…“She’s very complimentary to her fellow stars, and seems sweetly excited about …read more

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It is perhaps a sign of just how unimpressed the world was with the first reality casting (resulting in the disastrous restaging of GREASE: You’re the One! ) that the second attempt, to replace Elle on the Broadway production of Legally Blonde, is reaching its finale and looking to fill seats.
For that reason, Playbill has announced that you can email legallyblondeonmtv@gmail.com and reserve seats (“make sure you can fill them!” it notes) and you can cheer on your final contestant for free as Haylie Duff hosts. They will make you sign a confidentiality agreement, though…which leads to the question “Who …read more

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Over the weekend I traveled to and from Minnesota, about a 5 hour drive, with a friend to attend a lecture on performance art. For those of you lucky coasties, the land of northern Wisconsin this time of year is less than exciting – sort of a gray slushy mess.
However, we had my iPod, and discovered a mutual love for belting out songs from musicals, occasionally even with her alto complementing my baritone.
Here are our top 5 Road Music Musicals.

Moulin Rouge (not technically broadway, but still fun, especially for duets)
The Pirates of Penzance
Phantom of the Opera
Les Mis (more hers than …read more

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When I was waxing rhapsodic about Raul Esparza’s lead in the PBS special of Stephen Sondheim’s Company, I neglected to really focus on the fact that he was also supported by a stellar cast.
Thankfully, BroadwayWorld.com has made up for it, with a fantastic interview with Barbara Walsh. A true gypsy who started in the kind of dinner theatre where “you rehearsed a show in the daytime, did another show at night, and did things like paint and move scenery.”, she went on to a stellar career being in shows such as:

Chess
Some Men
Falsettos
Blood Brothers
Hairspray
Ragtime
Big, the Musical
Ragtime
Company (as captured in Great Performances …read more

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Just a note of admiration: in spite of what must have been crushing news (their founder, Gus Giordano, died on Sunday) the Giordano Dance troupe got rave reviews from Hedy Weiss in the Chicago Sun-Times. It’s a tribute to the professionalism of the performers and the ethics he instilled in them that they kick off a five week tour of Hawaii with such a stellar performance. Even the one sour note in the review, Davis Robertson’s premiere of “Moanin Low” didn’t change her opinion: “…the company is in high-flying form.”
Incidentally, for those So You Think You Can Dance fans: number …read more

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In the realm of “Broadway Cast Albums I’d Like to Own” is the chance to hear crooner Harry Connick Jr. playing the role of Jimmy in the remake of Gershwin’s Oh, Kay! You may not have heard of the musical, but it was the source of perennial torch song favorite Someone to Watch Over Me.
The new musical (which is working under the title “Untitled Gershwin Project” since they change the name of the character Kay) will premiere in Boston in fall of 2008 before a Broadway opening in 2009. Other cast members have not been announced, though the project will …read more

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Dancer, Choreographer, Former U.S. Marine, and founder of the Giordano Dance Company of Chicago died yesterday morning of pneumonia. He was 84. One of the great pioneers of jazz dance in this country, he studied with Hanya Holm, Katherine Dunham and Alwin Nikolais, as well as appearing on Broadway in Wish You Were Here and Paint Your Wagon.
Semper Fi, Gus, and thank you.

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or, : From Broadway to Virginia to Melbourne to Hometown, USA in search of a Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.
I had expected to write, today, about the revival of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, featuring Tony-award winning actors such as Phylicia Rashad, James Earl Jones, and Anika Noni Rose (all of whom are also TV and movie stars, but it does my luddite heart good to only list them as being paragons of the theatre). It’s a production that has sparked some controversy due to the cast being entirely African American. However, living in the midwest, I can’t …read more

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I’m indebted to Paul Thompson of the Broadway blog for his series on “My Times Square“. A Chicago native, his documentation of wandering around the Big Apple brings back the same kind of memories that this midwesterner has.
They’re Showing WHAT, WHERE?
He comments on the amazing fact that Studio 54 is now a theatre, something that I was not really all that surprised at when I saw the revival of Cabaret there a few years back. That’s a musical that suits the scandalous history of the place, and the fact that I could only afford nosebleed seats was eased by the …read more

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