Many of you may have caught Nick Spangler and his Dallas Cowboys cheerleader sister Starr on Sunday night’s premiere of six-time Emmy winner The Amazing Race on CBS (if you didn’t, watch clips here). Spangler may be the first New York actor who’s doing eight shows a week while also appearing on a hit reality series. (And the TV world plucked him from the thea-tah — unlike the more-prevalent opposite.) Despite his busy schedule playing romantic lead Matt inThe Fantasticks (after several months put in as The Mute in the very same show), the affable actor with the Colgate smile was kind enough to provide us with a diary charting a day in his life.
10:10 a.m. Saturday mornings, once dedicated to cereal and cartoons, have changed. As a member of the Off Broadway cast of The Fantasticks, they mark the beginning of four performances over two days. The sudden fall weather makes it hard to leave the haven of my bed. I head to the kitchen to gargle and I jump in the shower. I read a bit of my current book, Clive and Dirk Cussler’s Treasure of Kahn. After a brief vocal warm-up and a kiss to my sleepy girlfriend, Monica, I’m on my way to the Jerry Orbach Theater—my home away from home.
1:25 p.m. Emerging from the subway I marvel for the umpteenth time at the fact that I live, breathe, and work in this city. Heck, my theater is across the street from Wicked and Mamma Mia!. Signing my initials on the call sheet, I say hello to cast members Gene Jones (I idolize his performance in No Country for Old Men—he was the gas station attendant taunted by Javier Bardem) and Steve Routman (who I envy for his appearance in an Apple TV spot). We’ve got 30 minutes to showtime and there is a flurry of activity. Margaret Anne Florence’s voice drifts through the air vents as she warms up in her dressing room and our understudies banter in the greenroom.
I just found out that my friend Sheila has never seen Pretty Woman, and that after holding out 18 years, she's made it her mission in life not to — just because she wants to see if she can pull it off. I was going to ridicule her until I remembered that I'm never going to see Pulp Fiction. Or a single moment of The Hills.
I suspect we're all playing this irrational, stubborn game with something... So out with it: What movie, TV show, or stage production are you trying never to give yourself the opportunity to enjoy? Or maybe there's a book you've vowed not to read or a song you've refused to hear?
Trick question! Gorillaz are the fake cartoon band created by musician Damon Albarn and visual artist Jamie Hewlett for two awesome albums (so far, fingers crossed) in '01 and '05 — "Clint Eastwood,""Feel Good Inc.," all that. Monkey: Journey to the West is the title of an innovative opera that Albarn, Hewlett, and director Chen Shi-Zheng created last year based on a 16th-century Chinese epic saga, as well as a soundtrack CD they released this week. Oh, and Albarn and Hewlett also created a cool related animation for the BBC's Olympics coverage this summer.
Confused yet? Have I mentioned that the lyrics to Monkey are all in Mandarin, at Albarn's insistence? But wait! At a recent informal press conference I attended with about a dozen
other reporters, Albarn said it was pure "coincidence" that Gorillaz and Monkey share such similar names. I'll leave it up to
you to debate that point. But the Monkey album is definitely worth checking out for Gorillaz fans — whether or not you had a chance to see the opera during its runs in the U.K., France, and South Carolina. (They're still figuring out whether it'll be possible to bring the stage performance in some form or another to more locations in the U.S.) And don't be turned off by the opera thing if you're not into that. Said Albarn at the press
conference: "The music in the show had to be slightly different from
how I envisaged it, because of the nature of opera houses — the
acoustics, and the respect for those amazing spaces that are more
comfortable with Verdi and Mozart. So a lot of my electronics and my
drum machines, I tried to keep them less apparent; on the record it's
much more my style of production." Sure enough, it's fascinating to hear how his sonic trademarks from Gorillaz and elsewhere show up on Monkey, only they've been developed into extended instrumental suites instead of three-minute pop tunes.
You can check out a preview clip below to get an idea of how that works. I know I'm digging it, but I'm a huge fan of practically everything Albarn's worked on in the past decade and a half. So what do you say, Gorillaz appreciators — have you heard any of the Monkey music? What do you make of it?
Get ready for the biggest feel-good Broadway musical since Sweeney Todd: it's the forthcoming stage version of American Psycho. Yes, according to Variety, someone really is making a musical out of Bret Easton Ellis' notorious novel about an '80s Wall Street yuppie/serial killer. Ellis' Patrick Bateman will soon be showing theatergoers his custom-crafted business cards and slashing his way into their hearts, perhaps to the show-stopping strains of Huey Lewis' "Hip to Be Square." (The rights holders haven't yet hired a librettist or a composer, but Lewis and Phil Collins probably aren't too busy right now.) No word on whether the orchestra seats will be under plastic sheeting to protect theatergoers from the spatters, like at a Gallagher show.
What was it about Ellis' 1991 novel, and the 2000 movie adapted from it, that suddenly sang, "Broadway musical!" to the producers? As one of them told Variety, "Now in particular it seems relevant, especially given what's happening on Wall Street." That's true, even if the current financial bloodbath is just a metaphorical one (so far). Still, if the fiscal meltdown continues, who'll be able to afford to pay upwards of $100 a ticket to see a gruesome satire of the excesses of consumer capitalism?
It would be fun to see Christian Bale (pictured) reprise his movie role (and we know from Newsies he can sing and dance), but his dance card is a little full these days. Oh well, at least there's no shortage of American Psycho Idol also-rans who could fill Patrick Bateman's wingtips. (Michael Johns, this is your now!) Any additional suggestions for the producers on how to make Psycho a killer at the Tonys and at the box office are welcome in the comments section below.
The hot weather is supposed to be behind us (damn you, global warming!) and chillier nights should play host to the new wave of shows. And while it would be utterly loco of me to include everything between now and early December, I figured it would be a good idea to give you some choice highlights, both in and out of the Big Apple, of the upcoming theater season.
EQUUS
Direct from London, here comes the heartwarming tale of a boy (Daniel Radcliffe), horsies, and how he likes to blind said horsies. Buzz is deafening. And you can even nab onstage seats to get a better view of Harry Potter, uh, up close and personal. (Broadhurst Theatre on Broadway, in previews, opens 9/25, www.telecharge.com)
FIFTY WORDS
Playwright Michael Weller is busy this season (he also has Beast at New York Theater Workshop right now), but any play with both Norbert Leo Butz and Elizabeth Marvel(ous, always), playing a couple immersed in marital woes, gets the edge. (Lucille Lortel Theatre Off Broadway, in previews, opens 9/28, http://www.mcctheater.org/tickets.html)
Okay, so the Kennedy Center probably doesn't need our help to cast the annual tribute show — this year honoring Barbra Streisand, George Jones, Morgan Freeman, choreographer Twyla Tharp and The Who's Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey. But then again, after that Jessica Simpson-does-Dolly debacle a couple of years ago, you can't be certain.... So, who do you want to see honoring these artists come December? I'm particularly concerned about who's going to sing the greatest country song ever, George Jones' "He Stopped Loving Her Today" (below).
If you've got favorite Kennedy Center Honors moments, list 'em. (If you've never seen Mikhail Baryshnikov dance, I suggest you watch his tribute, introduced by the late, great Gregory Hines.)
Greetings PopWatchers! Welcome to EW.com's brand-new, biweekly column devoted solely to the stage (show queens rejoice!), and a fine place to start in the wake of Labor Day weekend is to spotlight those workhorse types who step into long-running shows, often with very little rehearsal, and try to make firm imprints on well-established roles. So let's jump right in and take a look at some shows with legs that have a few new gams on display:
Legally Blonde: This one is perhaps the most high-profile replacement casting of the year, thanks to MTV's reality series chronicling the tireless search for the next Elle Woods. I wasn't a big fan of the TV show -- if actual casting was this defeating, antidepressants would be handed out at casting guru Bernie Telsey's door -- and was apprehensive about anyone being able to duplicate original star Laura Bell Bundy's “Positive”-ly aces Elle, a physically and vocally demanding part that's neck-and-neck with Patti LuPone's Gypsy as Broadway's most arduous current gig. But -- surprise! -- Bailey Hanks (pictured, center), the 20-year-old Southern belle winner, has put her own twist on Elle, using a combination of youthful physicality and cheery optimism. Not only is she a joy to watch, but she's age-appropriate for the part, too.
Monty Python's Spamalot:7th Heaven's Stephen Collins and Dancing with the Stars champ Drew Lachey (pictured, left) have brought fresh energy to a show that's been running since February 2005, and they're doing it without going too far over the top. Spamalot is the kind of show that almost begs its performers to mug incessantly, yet amazingly, Collins and Lachey resist the urge, and playing King Arthur and his put-upon flunky Patsy respectively, they are the cuddliest duo I've seen in the roles to date. The guys bounce off each other with complete, gleeful ease, it's the first time I've ever heard anyone utter “Awww” after their (sort of) Act II duet “I'm All Alone.”
After seeing the new comedy Hamlet 2, something was bugging me. The film, which depicts a high-school drama teacher's attempt to stage a controversial sequel to Shakespeare's tragedy, culminates with an energetic number called "Rock Me Sexy Jesus."
The song, which Focus Features is already hyping for Oscar consideration, is amusing in its politically incorrect telling of a time-traveling Jesus Christ. It features lyrics such as "He's the son of God and I think that's cool. But he's got a swimmer's bod like nobody do." All good and fun, except to my ears, the song's chorus sounds disturbingly similar to the chorus for "Little Shop of Horrors," the title song from the 1982 off-Broadway musical and subsequent 1986 movie.
A rep for Focus Features says "Sexy Jesus" is an original song, and we're in no position to question that. But what do you think, PopWatchers? Do the songs' choruses sound different enough from each other? Or are they too close for comfort? Listen to these embedded clips of both songs -- fast-forward to the 52-second mark of "Sexy Jesus" and the 35-second mark for "Little Shop" -- then weigh in on our message board below.
In the comfy, tucked-away college town of Williamstown, Mass., where every summer they host a wonderful three-month retreat for actors with some spare time (TV hiatuses, failed Broadway endeavors of the previous season) and theater lovers who want to see quality thesping for half the price of a Rialto ticket, there is a roar this summer where there is usually a purr. On a recent visit, one could not traverse the hilly walkways without hearing someone effusively buzz about The Understudy, Theresa Rebeck's superb new comedy about Hollywood's effects on Broadway.
Rebeck seems destined to conquer all entertainment these days, with her TV background (NYPD Blue, Law & Order), a 2007 play that drew comparison to David Mamet (and made EW's ten-best stage list that year), and even a new book. And this one might, very ironically, have Hollywood a-callin'. It centers on a tic-laden understudy (Reg Rogers) who shadows the B-list Hollywood leading man (Bradley Cooper, left, in a remarkable bit of meta-casting) in a new three-and-a-half-hour Kafka play on Broadway, with a harried, no-nonsense stage manager (3rd Rock From the Sun's Kristen Johnston, right) desperately trying to keep up with the beleaguered rehearsal process (and her history with one of the men). The play is like 90 minutes of pure oxygen — and catnip to curious producers. Funny, poignant and surprisingly multi-leveled, The Understudy seems already primed for the Great White Way, and with any luck, its three marvelous stars will get to take the journey there too. (Cooper, especially, should take his cue from the play itself and just become Broadway's new leading man and fast, it's shocking to believe this is only his second major play, after his scene-stealing turn opposite Julia Roberts in Three Days of Rain in 2006.)
This is the final weekend at Williamstown, but if my crystal ball is on point, you'll be seeing it in bright lights very, very soon...
Former O-Town member Ashley Parker Angel turns 27 today. I lost track of the boy, but surprise! He's across the street from EW's offices, appearing as Link in Broadway's Hairspray (and, I'm praying, never running into me after I've had two mojitos at Victor's Cafe).
Below, for your viewing pleasure, is O-Town's legendarily bad performance of "Liquid Dreams" at the 2000 Miss America pageant. They blamed faulty earpieces. (If only I could have found the clip of the boy band being forced to watch a tape of that performance on the 2001 second-season premiere of Making the Band — it made EW's 2004 list of the five best reality TV moments.)
After the jump, a webisode of "ParkerTV," which finds Ashley preparing to sing the National
Anthem for the first time solo, at Shea Stadium in May '08. Show the boy some love.
If we're talking about something that I own and wouldn't want to have to pay to replace, it would be my 20-disc Kids in the Hall Megaset. If we're speaking of things that are priceless, I would say my now-abandoned collection of "Thanks for last night!" autographs, some of which decorate my office door. (Note to impressionable young EW staffers and all aspiring journalists: I did not obtain any of these autographs while conducting an interview. I am a professional.)
I've mentioned my collection before on PopWatch. It started 10 years ago, when I was at a book signing for Jon Stewart's Naked Pictures of Famous People.
We were given Post-its to write our names on, so he'd be able to spell
them correctly. I heard him ask the person in front of me what he
should sign in his book, so I wrote "To Mandi, Thanks for Last Night!"
on my Post-it, and when it was my turn to hand my copy to Stewart, I told him
I'd made it easy for him. He wrote it, added "Va Va Va Voom!," and we
were both happy. Two days later, I went to a signing for Steve Martin's
Pure Drivel, and asked him to sign "Thanks for last night!" He
looked at me, in silence, then finally said, "Just don't hold me to it
in court." A collection was born.
Other autographs include: • Stephen Colbert — A 30th birthday present from a colleague three years ago. • Trey Parker and Matt Stone — A present for being a friend's maid of honor four years ago. • Anthony Stewart Head (that's him, dressed as Frank-N-Furter) — I got that one myself, at a Buffy fan convention, five years ago. • Jimmy Fallon — He and his sister both signed a copy of their 2003 book I Hate This Place: A Pessimist's Guide to Life. Twisted, but funny! • Ryan Seacrest — A present from a colleague, from the early days of Idol. • Dave Coulier — A present from a colleague, just because he was friends with Coulier's publicist. • Justin Timberlake — This was back in, like, 2000, maybe. He signed it "Thanx 4 last night!" — how cute was he? — and told the colleague who got it for me not to let it fall into the wrong hands. • Coolio and Smash Mouth lead singer Steve Harwell: I put them together because they were dining, separately, at a restaurant in D.C. years ago, when a friend had them each sign a cloth napkin (that I have framed in my office). Coolio wrote, "Thanx 4 last night & yesterday & the day B4. It was good!" Harwell added, "You bend like no other!" • John Wesley Harding — He signed "Thanks for last night... when you
let me play 'Little Musgrave'" because I'd had the friend who met him
ask him if he really wanted to play that song at every live show or if
he just did it because there was always someone in the crowd yelling
for it. • Rudy Boesch — I accompanied a friend to the former Survivor contestant's book signing (The Book of Rudy: The Wit and Wisdom of Rudy Boesch) in 2001. He kept repeating it: "Thanks for last night?" "Yes." "Thanks for last night?" "Yes." But he did it. • Dave Karpen — A former colleague, also obsessed with Paradise Hotel, got it for me when she ran into him doing a signing at Sephora five years ago.
When I talked to Dolly Parton in the fall of 2005 (click here to read the interview and here to check out my rundown of her sauciest sound bites), she was busy penning songs for a planned 2007 Broadway production of 9 to 5. Well, she was only two years off. The musical will finally hit New York in April 2009, after a six-week warmup in Los Angeles this fall, Reuters reports. I'm in. Especially after reading that The West Wing's Allison Janney will take on Lily Tomlin's role. Perfect!I haven't been this excited since, well, Equus' Broadway run was confirmed. (Who's already got their tickets for that?) And who's excited about the 9 to 5 musical?
Anyone watch the Tonys last night? Anyone? Bueller?... I did, and while I didn't have a dog in any of the Tony races, I thought the ceremony itself was pretty enjoyable, with Whoopi Goldberg doing the live equivalent of those Oscar montages where Billy Crystal is Gumped into the nominated movies (I especially liked her popping up in Phantom of the Opera and Mary Poppins). Not to forget the memorable and heartfelt acceptance speeches (special shout-out to In the Heights creator Lin-Manuel Miranda, who delivered what must be the first rapping, rhyming acceptance speech in Tony history) and, especially, the energetic production numbers from the nominated shows. After watching the broadcast, I really want to see the hip-hop/salsa-flavored In the Heights and Stew's rockin' Passing Strange (pictured).
Broadway fans, who is satisfied with the Tony winners' list? Conversely, which shows and performers do you think got robbed? Anyone else enjoy the Tony ceremony? And who was inspired by the broadcast to buy tickets, and for which shows?
Where can you find John McCain, Tyra Banks, Denise Richards, Patti LuPone, and Dana Carvey all competing for the same prize? Why EW.com's new Sound Bites series, of course! Ch-ch-check it out below, then click here to vote for the funniest quote from this weekend's television landscape!
Recently, Project Runway winner — and purveyor of the word "fierce" — Christian Siriano was commissioned to dress Whoopi Goldberg for her hosting gig at the this year's Tony Awards (June 15, live on CBS). And being the anxious people that we are, last night on the red carpet for Bravo's A-List Awards, EW.com asked him to give us a little sneak preview of the ensemble.
"It's pieces — it's going to be a jacket, a pant, and a top, and then she's going to switch it up and the top's going to turn into kind of a gown," he said. (EW.com asked for further detail on this mysterious transforming top, but he wouldn't budge.) "She doesn't want to change a lot because she's not a diva. But she does want to be dramatic because it's the Tonys, so it's going to be cool."
The pint-size designer also added that the "pieces" will be made out of organza. "It's beautiful," he exclaimed. "It's made out of lots of blacks and shine, and a little bit of silver. A dark purple color is the only real color I used."
With all of his flair for drama, Siriano does seem like an obvious choice for this theatrical job, but how in the world do you dress an a celebrity like Whoopi who isn't, well, all that into looking super glamorous and feminine? "If she's happy and comfortable and feels fabulous, than who cares?" he explained. "I honestly never care what any press is going to say. I know it's going to be amazing and dramatic and whatever, and I know she feels the same way. It will be flattering, don't you worry!"
What's your latest YouTube obsession? Thanks to the Mamma Mia! trailer, and the fact that I saw the Broadway show for the first time recently, I'm all about ABBA videos at the moment.
My favorite clip (because this one of "Honey Honey" is not embeddable) could be "Take a Chance on Me." Every moment is awesomely bad.
As a famous Siamese king once said: "It's a puzzlement." Usually, I have very few quibbles with the Tony nominations. Yet today, around 8:37 a.m. at NYC's Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center, when Tony winners — and former Spamalot costars — David Hyde Pierce (left) and Sara Ramirez (a.k.a. Grey's Anatomy's Dr. Torres, right) revealed the contenders in 26 categories, I saw more than a few oversights.
First, I'll give you the big news. The show with the most nominations? In the Heights, which netted a
staggering 13 nominations, including two for star/writer Lin-Manuel
Miranda.The four Best Play nominees: Tracy Letts' August: Osage County (the 2008 Pulitzer Prize winner, just named New York Drama Critics Circle's Best Play), Tom Stoppard's Rock 'n' Roll, Conor McPherson's The Seafarer, Patrick Barlow's The 39 Steps. Best Musical: Cry-Baby, In the Heights, Passing Strange (NYDCC's Best Musical), Xanadu. (A full list of nominees is available at the Tonys' website.)
So who was crying in their corn flakes? Well, surely Mel Brooks. In 2001 his Producers received 15 nominations — and won a record-setting 12, including Best Musical. This year, his Young Frankenstein received just 3 (for featured performers Andrea Martin and Christopher Fitzgerald, plus best scenic design)... and no one's forecasting any wins. The Catered Affair company no doubt had their fingers crossed for a Best Musical slot, but the chamber piece was passed over for the flashier Cry-Baby.
And now let me register a few complaints: Manhattan Theater Club's very fine revival of Caryl Churchill's crackling drama Top Girls — blessed with a top-drawer female ensemble that includes Elizabeth Marvel, Marisa Tomei, and Martha Plimpton — received only one nod (for the deserving Plimpton). Yet a Best Revival of a Play spot was given instead to the flaccid Les Liaisons Dangereuses? Mon dieu!
At a recent Broadway show in a venue that seats about 670 people, only about 40 percent of those seats were occupied, and upon leaving, I noticed the special Memorial Day schedule and wondered aloud: "Will this show even make it that long?" Turns out that was a generous time allotment, as one of the last Broadway shows to open this season, Glory Days (pictured), closed on May 6th, the very same night it opened, which sent a lot of "I told you so" vibes through the industry and a dagger in the hearts of its very young creators, the 23-years-young duo (okay, one is 24 now) of James Gardiner and Nick Blaemire (who moonlights as an ensemble member of the current John Waters musical Cry-Baby).
So yeah, the show was a complete dog: yet another Rent wannabe about young people "finding themselves" where the songs all had that same Casio-sounding Velveeta glaze, a quartet of sweet, sometimes overeager young actors not quite charismatic enough to mask the insipid dialogue and lyrics (seriously, Two and a Half Men has better zingers than this thing did). But its cruelly quick demise (the likes of which Broadway hasn't seen since Ellen Burstyn's 2004 production Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All shuttered in one night, which meant the show's title was longer than its life) sent an immediate shockwave through the industry. With shows like Passing Strange still struggling to find an audience and old standbys like Rent about to pack it in, is there an audience for shows centering on the younger generation? Will there be another Rent or Spring Awakening in our midst? Has American Idol seized the audience that these shows will depend on?
Okay, I'll admit I personally missed the My Little Pony craze by at least a decade. But having two girls, ages two and five, these pink and purple and green ponies have made their way into my house (kind of the equine equivalent of the Care Bears), replete with long manes with which to practice brushing.
Then I found myself at New York's Madison Square Garden, waiting for a live show of My Little Pony, billed as the "largest tea party ever." Didn't know ponies drank tea. Was doubtful that a group of seven or eight singing and dancing sherbet-colored ponies would keep an audience of toddlers in their seats for 75 minutes.
At a pre-show reception, we eat pink and purple cupcakes and see that TheView's Elizabeth Hasselbeck, who's there with her toddler, knows a thing or two about photo ops, since she's wearing a hot pink shirt and posing with a fuchsia pony. At the start of the show, I chuckle at the one line clearly written as nod to the older folks in the crowd: "I love the smell of freshly baked muffins in the morning." After that, I am straining to find threads of a plot to piece together. Or I should say "squinking" to find a plot -- that's a MLP word for when you're thinking really hard and trying to squeeze a thought out. It becomes apparent the theme is about how each pony has a job to do to make the tea party turn out right. Everything goes as planned but then Pinkie Pie (yes, each one has a different name) forgets to make the tea. I don't think this drama has much of an affect on the audience, who are too busy sticking their pinkie fingers out holding paper tea cups to care. All in a day's work at Unicornopia.
The show runs through this Sunday, April 27th. Do you think you might take your young ones to see it? Were you a My Little Pony fan as a kid?
Missy Schwartz and I try to create a six-song set list that won't turn the Idol stage into a hot honeyed mess. Check out our picks for Jason, Carly, Brooke, ballad-crazy Syesha, and the two Davids, then suggest your own!
Happy birthday to Emma Watson, who turns 18 today. Which means, if her pal Daniel Radcliffe ever films a big-screen adaptation of his stage production of Equus, she'll be old enough to go see it.
It's been a bad week for Richard Widmark fans. First, we lost the actor himself; then Abby Mann, screenwriter behind Widmark's Judgment at Nuremberg; and now Jules Dassin, who directed Widmark in the classic noir Night and the City (1950). Dassin, who died Monday at 96, directed some of film's greatest crime thrillers and capers, though he was probably best known for the comedy Never on Sunday (1960), for which he earned writing and directing Oscar nominations, and which starred his muse (later, his wife) Melina Mercouri. That film was made during his years as perhaps the most famous victim of the Hollywood blacklist, hounded into exile and finding refuge in France and, later, in Mercouri's homeland of Greece.
The movie that put Dassin on the map was 1948's pioneering police thriller The Naked City, whose gritty, then-unprecedented use of New York City locations and extras influenced virtually every film and TV cop drama that followed (including, of course, the '50s cop show based on the movie). Around that time, Dassin made other celebrated crime dramas, including Night and the City and Brute Force, and he enjoyed a prolific career as a Broadway director as well (wouldn't you love to have seen his Two's Company, featuring a singing and dancing Bette Davis?). All that ended, however, when he was named a fellow traveler at the height of the Hollywood blacklist era in 1952. Dassin had been a member of the Communist party briefly in the 1930s, and while he was no longer a member when his name came up, the damage was done. Before he could testify against others, he fled the country, settling in France. Even there, he found it hard to obtain film work, since distributors feared that American theaters wouldn't screen his movies. Still, he found success with Rififi (1955), one of the all-time classic heist movies. A decade later, he did a comic variation on that film with another heist classic, Topkapi.
In 1956, he met Mercouri, whom he would marry a decade later, and with whom he made nine films. Their most celebrated was Never on Sunday, which made her an international star. She played a happy-go-lucky prostitute in a Greek fishing village; writer/director Dassin co-starred as a visiting American self-styled intellectual who tried to educate and reform her, with disastrous results. The movie earned five Oscar nominations, including the two for Dassin and a Best Actress nod for Mercouri, and it won Best Song for its ubiquitous, bouzouki-flavored title track. Mercouri (who died in 1994) and Dassin would both come to be revered in Greece as national treasures. It would have been nice if Dassin could have earned similar status in his homeland.
The great British stage actor Paul Scofield, who died today at the age of 86, was an anomaly by the standards of today's tabloid-saturated culture. The Oscar-winning actor and master of the Shakespearean stage — cited as one of the greatest English-speaking actors by playwrights Edward Albee and Arthur Miller — was modest to a fault and harbored a deep dislike of the spotlight, even rejecting an offer of knighthood with the statement, "If you want a title, what's wrong with Mr.?"
One of his first lead film roles — as the principled, headstrong statesman Sir Thomas More in A Man For All Seasons — earned him the 1966 Best Actor Oscar and international recognition, but Scofield, who chose his projects as carefully as he might his family and friends ("Only the dead play harder to get," it was said of him), didn't appear in another major film until assuming the title role in Peter Brook's King Lear (1971), reprising an earlier role from a Stratford production. (That stage Lear was reportedly legendary as well, performed when he was just 40, in 1962. That same year, he won a Tony for the stage version of Man for All Seasons.) His brilliant portrayal of the troubled, aged monarch earned Scofield praise from the Royal Shakespeare Company as the greatest performer ever in a Shakespearean play.
Scofield also originated the role of Antonio Salieri in the play Amadeus, and in 1969, he became the sixth performer to win the Triple Crown of Acting (an Emmy for Best Actor, in Male of the Species, joined the Oscar and Tony on his mantel). His other films — including Albee's A Delicate Balance (1974), Kenneth Branagh's Henry V (1989), Robert Redford's Quiz Show (1994), and the screen version of Miller's play The Crucible (1996) — all displayed an actor with a commanding presence, his words given weight by a deep, crackling, astringent voice weighty with authority. Just watch this famous scene, below, from Man for All Seasons:
The Guardian has some fine Scofield tributes today, this essay and this slideshow. And please share your own memories of Scofield with us below.
God, I hope he gets it... right. Does the world really need a muscle-bound TV personality (who paid his dues on Kids Incorporated and shot straight to C-list fame with Saved By the Bell) to step into the acclaimed New York company of A Chorus Line? Mario Lopez will make his Broadway debut as Zach, the director of the show-within-a-show who persuades auditioning dancers to talk about their personal lives.
Lopez' career has been all over the map for years, but you gotta wonder, how did Slater end up in A Chorus Line? At first I thought Lopez was too young for the role of Zach, but don't let his baby-face fool you — he's in his mid-30s. When he partnered with ballroom champ Karina Smirnoff on a certain ABC talent contest, his talent as a dancer was obvious. And I don't doubt he'll be comfortable giving direction and choreography to more experienced Broadway veterans (for proof, see this clip of Lopez on Megan Mullally's short-lived chat show). However, it's always going to be risky to cast a famous name in the role of Zach, since the point of this musical theater masterpiece is to focus on the usually anonymous chorus gypsies. (That's why scripting more Zach screen time for marquee star Michael Douglas helped torpedo the 1985 film version, although the Cassie flashback wigs must share the blame.)
I can only guess that the Broadway production’s creative staff began thinking of Lopez as Chorus Line material after his name recognition rose with each passing week on Dancing with the Stars; they probably envisioned him as Larry (the legwarmered assistant who drills the dance steps), or Paul (the shy Puerto Rican dancer), or Al (the buff guy whose wife can’t sing). But then they must have seen this cheeze-explosion (clip below) from the Oxygen original movie Husband For Hire, and said to each other, "Ummmm, yeah. He should play the guy who’s not on stage very much."
PopWatchers, do you think Lopez has what it takes to be a Broadway star?
I don't really watch Grey's Anatomy all that much, and I've never seen a single minute of Private Practice. But after spending a night watching their respective casts belt out some Stephen Sondheim, Billie Holiday, Paul Simon and Woody Guthrie on stage at UCLA's Royce Hall, I'm kinda shocked creator and showrunner Shonda Rhimes hasn't cranked out at least one musical episode for each of her shows. I know I'd be the first to tune in, at least.
The crooning was for a benefit aiding the Grey's and Private Practice crew members who've felt the financial pinch during the writers' strike. (The night's title, naturally, was "Good Medicine.") And it was clearly a passion project; I was told the casts and their backing musicians had rehearsed over two days before the Feb. 29 show, and goodness did the hard work pay off in a fizzy and fun evening.
After the jump, I'll walk through the highlights from the show, including which actor showed off some surprising chops on the harmonica and which two stars didn't make it onto the stage.
Second only to Amy Ryan, Juno's Allison Janney gave my favorite supporting-actress performance last year (you go, C.J. Cregg, with yer Maybelline eyeshadow and yer flat Minnesota accent!). And second to none — not even to Kenny Rogers' "The Gambler" — Dolly Parton's "9 to 5" is my favorite classic country-pop singalong-friendly single from a vocalist crossing over into acting (seriously, that tune is good enough to drive you crazy if you let it.) So naturally, EW's Hollywood Insider news that Tony nominee Janney plans a return to Broadway in a new musical based on the 1980 comedy 9 to 5 got my attention.
Since Janney will be playing the Lily Tomlin role, let's think about who should step into the slingback pumps of Jane Fonda and Parton. I could see Ashley Jensen, Ugly Betty's funny Brit, as jumpy Judy, the mousy divorcee who tells off her ex while holding Dabney Coleman hostage in a bedroom ("If I want to have an affair, or play sex games, or do M&M's, you can't stop me!"). And wouldn't recently-buxom Christina Aguilera — hilarious on SNL, let's not forget — knocker one out of the park updating Dolly's role, Doralee? I realize Xtina sharing top billing on Broadway is unlikely, but one can dream.
Here's a daydreamy 9 to 5 clip of Janney's predecessor, Tomlin, doing her best Snow White (I bet Amy Adams would've loved a visit from just a few of these critters during her starkly-staged Oscars performance of "Happy Working Song," but I digress).
Think it's all takin' and no givin' around here, PopWatchers? Nope! Let us hear your fantasy-casting for Janney's next costars, and don't forget the role of the 9 to 5 bossman!
I was bereft of even an inroad into a joke about Clay Aiken's new role as the cowardly Sir Robin in the Broadway production of Spamalot, until fellow PWer Gary Susman suggested this one: Spamalot has a hilarious song about how you can't succeed on Broadway without a Jew, but these days, it seems, you need more than just a chosen person — you need an American Idol alum. (In support of this hypothesis, Aiken even gets to sing that "You Won't Succeed on Broadway" number.)
Before you die of laughter, please check out Clark Collis' review of Aiken's performance in the Tony-winning version of the 1975 movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and let us know if you agree or disagree with his assessment below. Or, for those of us who have yet to see it, which other ex-Idolers would you suggest for the part?
I have recently become smitten with the monthly stage show Mortified Live, billed as a "comic excavation of teen angst artifacts as shared by their original authors before total strangers." So, it was fitting that I spent my Valentine's Day at their "Doomed Valentines Show" in Los Angeles. The night only made my heart grow fonder. One by one, brave men and women took the stage to share their torrid teen tales of failed relationships and crushes gone awry. A few included some hilarious visuals such as drawings (think stick figures intertwined in a Honeymoon "Sweet" with a heart-shaped bed, jacuzzi, and fireplace) and video confessionals (a high school senior sporting a mullet and yellow trenchcoat lip-synching "Wait" by White Lion in the hopes that it will win over the girl of his dreams. Watch it here).
Of course, the night had me thinking about my own teen crushes and how thankful I am that those diaries are long gone, never to be read again (you're welcome, former object of my affection, T.C. Smith). Which makes Mortified all the more enthralling. How do these people bare their souls and expose, as Marcia Brady would say, their "innermost secrets" to a public who will only laugh at their past misery? There are even two Mortified books: the new Love is a Battlefield and Real Words, Real People, Real Pathetic, where individuals offer up their embarrassing journal entries and include photos from their teen-angstiest times.
Please don't let this stop you from confessing anything crush-cringe-worthy in our comment section. I guess we've all been there and are finding comfort in the humor that was our youthful past. I look forward to next month's edition and hope the show will "promise to never forsake me (ahahah, okay, that last portion was ripped off from an e-mail a boy once sent me. A boy who TOTALLY forsook ME)". Mortified's monthly events run in various cities across the U.S. Be warned: tickets, like young love, go fast!
Yes, February 13 may be the inimitable Stockard Channing’s birthday (also shared by Peter Gabriel and Robbie Williams), but have any of them inspired the most crass-to-class opera in history? (Click here for EW's own Melissa Bernardo reporting on the recent Carnegie Hall debut of Jerry Springer the Opera.)
While minions presumably stack the towers of money his syndicated talk show has earned him, Springer has always claimed to be more than a TV ringleader blamed for the dumbing down of daytime. Who remembers that Springer was once mayor of Cincinnati? Okay, that's no secret. But you may not recall that he also ran for governor of Ohio in 1980, in a campaign apparently characterized by classic Springer chutzpah. In this ad, he candidly confronts scandalous accusations, calmly conveying that pursuing a career in public service and being serviced by a prostitute years earlier are unrelated matters, irrelevant to his qualifications for office. You tell 'em, Jer.
To Jerry: We hope your birthday wish isn't to make this relic from your political past disappear. It's just too fascinating to forget. I suspect that, if I'd been an Ohian over 18, I'd have voted for him after seeing such an atypically
straightforward (for a politician) display of articulate
level-headedness. Anyone else agree?
The rumors have been circulating for years, sprung from various innuendos dropped by novelist Chuck Palahniuk and director David Fincher. But those guys weren't serious about turning 1999's Fight Club — that singularly disorienting head injury of a movie — into a Broadway musical à la Legally Blonde or Young Frankenstein. They were just kidding around, weren't they? I'm really starting to worry after reading yet another news story this week in which both Palahniuk and Fincher seem to be on board with this idea. Why, why, why?!
Let me make something clear: I love Fincher's Fight Club. It's funny, gripping, thought-provoking — one of the past decade's most essential pieces of pop culture, I'd say. But it's also extremely dark, disturbing, and weird. It's violent. It's cynical. It's a gigantic mindf---! How on earth could they adapt this for the tourist-heavy audiences that lap up these blockbuster movies-turned-musicals? That MTV News story mentions the possibility that Trent Reznor might write the songs, which sounds
sorta cool, but that would probably make it even less appealing to
Great White Way crowds. And even if the producers did somehow transform Fight Club into something that the mainstream would find palatable — some goofy, "offbeat" garbage — I'm reasonably sure that I would start crying harder than Edward Norton's character at a support group.
Look, I'm willing to see how this thing works out, if it actually happens. Who am I kidding? I'd be first in line trying to snag an opening-night ticket, if only so I could mercilessly mock the proceedings in a blog post the next morning. But I really, really hope it doesn't come to that. (Now, a Broadway musical based on MTV2's late-night, low-rent battle rap showFight Klub— that's a whole other story.) Am I missing something here?
“So dip us in chocolate and throw us to the lesbians!” That’s my favorite lyric from Jerry Springer the Opera — and probably the only one I can quote in its entirety. Because the rest of the musical is just that filthy. The award-winning British import is currently playing a two-night concert stint, starring Harvey Keitel (pictured, with Linda Balgord) as the titular trashy talk-show host, at NYC’s Carnegie Hall — presumably in lieu of a previously announced then mysteriously scuttled Broadway run. (Hmm... could it be that investors are wary of putting their cash behind a chorus full of tap-dancing Ku Klux Klan members?)
The conceit of Jerry Springer is that it is, in fact, a full-fledged opera, packed with arias and fugues, dramatic duets and trios, gorgeous orchestrations, and lush, sophisticated melodies by Richard Thomas. The lyrics, however, by Thomas and Stewart Lee, tend toward the lowbrow (“My mum used to be my dad... snip, snip”). Imagine a soft, confessional ballad that begins with the line “A weird thing happened last night when I went to take a leak.” (Maybe now you get the picture.) By Act 2, the shtick grows a bit tiresome; when Jerry is broadcasting Springer from Hell (get ready for a Satan versus Jesus smackdown!) the show really goes off the rails. But you have to give props to whoever thought to give Eve a serpent tattoo and a mullet. At last night's performance, Keitel — who, incidentally, has the only non-singing role — proved a game, surprisingly low-key Springer; his only truly hammy moment was his back-of-the-house, down-the-aisle, high-fiving, televangelist-style entrance (during which he stopped to quickly greet his pal Robert De Niro in the audience). There’s one more profanity-filled performance at Carnegie Hall tonight; if you can’t get there, but still want to see a 200-pound man in a diaper, you can always spring for the U.K. DVD.
Ever see an Oscar-winning actress and a ventriloquist's dummy get horizontal on a Hawaiian beach in a very sweet, non-kinky way that's also kind of hot? This is a postscript to my recent item about Mamma Mia! star Meryl Streep and her oft-unrecognized musical talent. I absolutely had to share this delightful, obscure video that EW.com's Steve Korn just shared with me.
Preceded by a brief intro from a what appears to be a Wonder Showzenrefugee but is actually the deep-voiced star of Steve Hall's Puppet Music Hall, the clip is from photographer Laurie Simmons' 2006 short film The Music of Regret. (The dummy, and the object of Meryl's affection, is voiced by Adam Guettel, Tony-winning composer and lyricist of Broadway's The Light in the Piazza.) In short, it's a mesmerizing duet.
What do you think, PopWatchers, will this July's Mamma Mia! be half this good?
Before there were Fanadus (Xanadu fans), before there were The Guilty Ones -- AKA Spring Awakening fans, and yes, I've warmed to the show since I wrote that review -- there were the Rentheads. And once upon a time, dear PopWatchers, I was one of them. Well, maybe not a rabid one (though ten visits to the Nederlander Theatre ain’t too shabby), but upon hearing that the late Jonathan Larson's Rent, currently the seventh-longest running show in Broadway history, would pay the fiddler on June 1st, I couldn’t help but be a little verklempt. After all, this was my generation’s Hair, the musical that proved you could be a total East Village slacker, refuse to pay your bills on time, and turn your staid local diner into Coyote Ugly...just because! Sure, Rent had some clunky lyrics: "You'll be my Queen / and I'll be your moat" (i.e., you be royalty and I'll be brown, crappy crocodile water?). But it was the show’s moving, soulful spirit, and soaring rock score that kept it chugging along for 12 years. Here are my top five memories of the show’s many Seasons of Love.
If, like me, you're depressed by the already-bitter presidential campaigning in both parties ("A choice of cancer or polio," as the Rolling Stones once sang; bonus points to the first PW-er who can name that tune without looking it up on the Internet), David Mamet may have a tonic for you. His new political satire, November, opens this Friday on Broadway, with Nathan Lane starring as a hacky president facing a tough re-election bid. To promote the show, Mamet has been blogging in character as President Charles H.P. Smith, casually dropping extremist pronouncements about various issues of the day. (He'll continue doing so for the duration of the play's run.)
I have to say, Mamet's parodic political proclamations aren't making me laugh as much as they should, perhaps because I spend far too much time reading political blogs, and I've seen stuff out there that's far more outrageous than anything Mamet has dreamed up here. (It's really hard for political satire to outdistance reality, though Mamet did pull it off with startling prescience in the screenplay he co-wrote for Wag the Dog.) Still, we have to take political laughs where we can find them these days, especially with Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert trying not to peeve the Writers Guild by coming up with actual jokes. Besides, it's nice to read something from Mamet that isn't NSFW. Read for yourselves, PW-ers, and decide if Mamet's satirical jabs are timely and hilarous or stale and tame.
Over the holidays, I chatted with a number of people who, like me, saw the trailer for July’s Mamma Mia! (pictured, right) — the sexy, salty Mediterranean love story scored with vintage ABBA hits. Unlike me, however, most were unenthused — if not baffled by — the thought of Meryl Streep starring in a musical.
But here's the thing. I've always harbored this suspicion about Meryl: She loves to sing! (In character, that is. Though she reportedly studied singing as a child, she suffered acute nerves when asked to perform songs at the Hollywood Bowl while promoting 2006's A Prairie Home Companion.)
You can hear Streep's singing voice making cameos in 1983's Silkwood, 1987's Ironweed, 1990's Postcards from the Edge, 1992's Death Becomes Her, 1998's Dancing in Lughnasa — and she not only played a professional singer in Prairie (left), she danced (uncredited) in a big production number opposite Greg Kinnear in 2003's Stuck on You. As the star of Mother Courage and Her Children in a 2006 production for NYC's Shakespeare in the Park, she belted out Brecht. And I've even heard her sing the blues, while riding in the car with my nephew, on the 2004 children's CD Philadelphia Chickens (fun fact: other singers on the Grammy-nominated album include Natasha Richardson, Eric Stoltz, Scott Bakula, and Kevin Kline). Streep's warbling may be frequently breathy and occasionally faltering, but she can carry a tune, and it's evident she relishes the art of interpreting a song.
After all that dabbling, it may be Streep's finally gotten what may have been her dream all along: the lead in a musical. Meryl and Mamma Mia! may be a better fit than anyone expects — certainly, the quality of the acting can make a musical theater number flop or soar. I'm totally looking forward to a performance which, if not perfectly in tune, will probably be full of joy. Meanwhile, how many of you PopWatchers remember other forgotten examples of Streep singing over the years, in a movie or elsewhere?
Okay, full disclosure: I've never seen the Broadway show, the one that's taken over Cats' "now and forever" spot at the Winter Garden Theater. I've barely listened to any ABBA; enough to recognize some of the songs — since I have been alive during some of the 20th century — but not enough to profess any love for them. But after seeing this trailer...
...I'd probably go see this flick (it opens in July 2008). Why? Because it looks like vacation (in a way that Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights completely didn't; that one looked like work). And who doesn't wanna go on vacation in a beautiful place, with sun-kissed people dancing around as if life was an open bar? There's only one weird thing here: Much like the Sweeney Todd trailers, you'd almost never know this was a musical. I caught a bare couple of shots of Meryl Streep singing, but nary a do-re-mi from Pierce Brosnan, Colin Firth, or Stellan Skarsgard. Again, I say weird.
When Sweeney Todd hits theaters on December 21, I wonder how many people will be aware that it is an adaptation of a popular musical — a musical so full of singing that it is occasionally performed by opera companies. The TV spots for Sweeney are doing their best to make the film look like SleepyBeetleScissorhands: emphasizing Johnny Depp's gothic look (the hair helps), the Danny Elfman-esque score, and Tim Burton's name prominently displayed at the beginning of every spot. If I didn't know that this was a Stephen Sondheim show, I might disregard the brief snatches of song in some of the ads as a campy Corpse Bride/Beetle Juice type of thing. The commercial below is a typical example:
Earlier this week, Annie Barrett and I went to a preview performance of The Little Mermaid, which opens on Broadway Jan. 10. You can tell by the picture—Annie caught combing her hair with a dinglehopper large, plastic serving fork—that it had a lasting effect on us. We're not allowed to review the show (since it's still being fine-tuned), but here are a few of our freak-out moments:
• Rollerskating fish. The Heelys folks provide footwear that allow the actors to glide across the stage as if they're swimming.
• Sebastian's entrance. Watching the movie, we'd always had a sneaking suspicion that Ariel's crabby (or lobstery?) friend was, in actuality, a black man with a vaguely Jamaican accent. Turns out, we were right. No crab suit involved here. It was more like a multi-tiered Project Runway "Crustacean Challenge." Also, he had googly eyes above his forehead that were rather Cookie Monster-esque, or maybe we just thought that because Annie had Thin Mints in her bag.
• Prince Eric sang to us. Well, not intentionally. He was probably just directed to look in our general vicinity during his first solo, "Her Voice." What he was really thinking was "Mandi and Annie's Eyes."
• Unexpected Whoo-ing. During the curtain call, we found ourselves whooping it up, out of nowhere, for people who weren't even our fave characters. Huh?
• Even more unexpected total delight at: Streamers. Self-explanatory. Streamers.
While
most of us knew that you would one day land a gig on the Great White
Way, I personally didn't expect you to make your debut in Spamalot
(beginning January 2008). Why, Clay, why? Although I may understand that
this might be an exciting opportunity for you, I see this as a questionable
career choice. I'm not sure how the audience that attends
Spamalot will respond to you as the Sir Robin, the knight who is
"not-quite-so-brave-as-Sir-Lancelot." Sure, it's Broadway, but somehow American Idoland Monty Python (even watered-down Python) don't seem to mix.
The
only conclusions I can draw are that: (1) you are perhaps afraid of
straining your voice in a more vocally demanding show, (2) you are eager to prove your acting/comedic chops, or worst of all, (3) that the
producers simply named the right price. Whatever the reason, I can name
a dozen roles better for you than Sir Robin. How about Seymour from Little Shop of Horrors, J. Pierrepont Finch in How to Succeed in Business, or the title characters from either Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoator Pippin? These are roles, of varying degrees of difficulty, that would allow you to sing your heart out as a lead, and prove
yourself as an actor/comedian. However, if you wanted to start small in
an ensemble cast, you could have at least picked a role with more than
one solo piece. People are going to want to hear you sing, it's why
they voted for you on American Idol and bought your albums and
tickets to your concerts. Your voice, which Simon Cowell repeatedly
criticized for being "too Broadway" is your asset for musical theater: Use it! Don't waste it on a role where you will mostly be prancing
around until your song (which doesn't require much in the way of vocal ability, anyway).
In closing, all I can
say is that I wish you good luck with your new job. I hope that this
role won't be your last on Broadway, and will only lead to better turns
on Broadway in shows more suited to your abilities.
When I first heard that MTV was going to broadcast Broadway's Legally Blonde: The Musical (this Saturday at 1 p.m.), I thought, Omigod! — to quote the opening song — why would a show do that? Why would the producers take the thing they're trying to charge $125 for and give it away on TV for free? And then I thought, Omigod, why haven't other shows done this?
Anyone who's already seen the show (starring Orfeh and Laura Bell Bundy, pictured) and liked it will watch the MTV version (you can see a few clips here), which includes a red- (or pink-) carpet celebration hosted by the Hills girls. (Apparently this is a big deal. Personally, I couldn't pick Lauren out of a lineup. Oh
Home
Many of you may have caught Nick Spangler and his Dallas Cowboys cheerleader sister Starr on Sunday night’s premiere of six-time Emmy winner The Amazing Race on CBS (if you didn’t, watch clips here ). Spangler may be the first New York actor who’s doing eight shows a week while also appearing on a hit reality series. (And the TV world plucked him from the thea-tah — unlike the more-prevalent opposite.) Despite his busy schedule playing romantic lead Matt in The Fantasticks (after several months put in as The Mute in the very same show), the affable actor with the Colgate smile was kind enough to provide us with a diary charting a day in his life.
I just found out that my friend Sheila has never seen Pretty Woman, and that after holding out 18 years, she's made it her mission in life not to — just because she wants to see if she can pull it off. I was going to ridicule her until I remembered that I'm never going to see Pulp Fiction. Or a single moment of The Hills.
Trick question! 
Get ready for the biggest feel-good Broadway musical since Sweeney Todd: it's the forthcoming stage version of American Psycho. Yes, according to 
The hot weather is supposed to be behind us (damn you, global warming!) and chillier nights should play host to the new wave of shows. And while it would be utterly loco of me to include everything between now and early December, I figured it would be a good idea to give you some choice highlights, both in and out of the Big Apple, of the upcoming theater season. 
In the comfy, tucked-away college town of Williamstown, Mass., where every summer they host a 
As I read our 
When I talked to Dolly Parton in the fall of 2005 (
Anyone watch the Tonys last night? Anyone? Bueller?... I did, and while I didn't have a dog in any of the Tony races, I thought the 
Recently, Project Runway winner — and purveyor of the word "fierce" — 
As a famous Siamese king once said: "It's a puzzlement." Usually, I have very few quibbles with the Tony nominations. Yet today, around 8:37 a.m. at NYC's Library for the Performing Arts at Lincoln Center, when Tony winners — and former Spamalot costars — David Hyde Pierce (left) and Sara Ramirez (a.k.a. Grey's Anatomy's Dr. Torres, right) revealed the contenders in 26 categories, I saw more than a few oversights.
At a recent Broadway show in a venue that seats about 670 people, only about 40 percent of those seats were occupied, and upon leaving, I noticed the special Memorial Day schedule and wondered aloud: "Will this show even make it that long?" Turns out that was a generous time allotment, as one of the last Broadway shows to open this season, Glory Days (pictured), 
Okay, I'll admit I personally missed the My Little Pony craze by at least a decade. But having two girls, ages two and five, these pink and purple and green ponies have made their way into my house (kind of the equine equivalent of the Care Bears), replete with long manes with which to practice brushing.
Happy birthday to Emma Watson, who turns 18 today. Which means, if her pal Daniel Radcliffe ever films a big-screen adaptation of 
It's been a bad week for 
I don't really watch 
I was bereft of even an inroad into a joke about Clay Aiken's new role as the cowardly Sir Robin in the Broadway production of Spamalot, until fellow PWer Gary Susman suggested this one: Spamalot has a hilarious song about how you can't succeed on Broadway without a Jew, but these days, it seems, you need more than just a chosen person — you need an 
I have recently become smitten with the monthly stage show 
The rumors have been circulating for years, sprung from various innuendos dropped by 
“So dip us in chocolate and throw us to the lesbians!” That’s my favorite lyric from Jerry Springer the Opera — and probably the only one I can quote in its entirety. Because the rest of the musical is just that filthy. The award-winning British import is currently playing a two-night concert stint, starring Harvey Keitel (pictured, with Linda Balgord) as the titular trashy talk-show host, at NYC’s Carnegie Hall — presumably in lieu of a previously announced then mysteriously scuttled Broadway run. (Hmm... could it be that investors are wary of putting their cash behind a chorus full of tap-dancing Ku Klux Klan members?) 
Before there were Fanadus (
If, like me, you're depressed by the already-bitter presidential campaigning in both parties ("A choice of cancer or polio," as the Rolling Stones once sang; bonus points to the first PW-er who can name that tune without looking it up on the Internet), David Mamet may have a tonic for you. His new political satire, November, opens this Friday on Broadway, with Nathan Lane starring as a hacky president facing a tough re-election bid. To promote the show, Mamet has been 
Over the holidays, I chatted with a number of people who, like me, saw the 
Earlier this week, Annie Barrett and I went to a preview performance of The Little Mermaid, which opens on Broadway Jan. 10. You can tell by the picture—Annie caught combing her hair with a 
Dear Clay Aiken, 
When I first heard that MTV was going to broadcast Broadway's Legally Blonde: The Musical (this Saturday at 1 p.m.), I thought, Omigod! — to quote the opening song — why would a show do that? Why would the producers take the thing they're trying to charge $125 for and give it away on TV for free? And then I thought, Omigod, why haven't other shows done this?