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Star System: A Preview of the 2009 Broadway Season
By Robert Simonson
02 Jan 2009
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9 to 5ers: Stephanie J. Block, Allison Janney and Megan Hilty
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| photo by Justin Stephens |
Holding out for a new musical? Well, pickings are slim. But there is 9 to 5, based on the film comedy of the same name. This is the Dolly Parton musical. The country music icon, who starred in the original film, scored the show. The ever-in-demand Joe Mantello directs Allison Janney, Stephanie J. Block and Megan Hilty as a trio of secretaries who plot revenge against their boss. It will open at the Marquis April 30.
Less high-profile is The Story of My Life, an intimate two-actor musical about the contours of a lifelong friendship, starring Malcolm Gets and Will Chase, directed by Richard Maltby, Jr. The show, at the Booth Theatre starting Feb. 3, is the work of Neil Bartram (score) and Brian Hill (book), and tells the story of a writer who returns home to eulogize his lifelong friend.
If you are a fan of the jukebox musical form and find the 1960's music of Jersey Boys and the 1970's music of Mamma Mia! too distant, you may want to try Rock of Ages, a 1980s-set Off-Broadway musical that will make the jump to Broadway's Brooks Atkinson Theatre March 20. Written by Chris D'Arienzo, directed by Kristin Hanggi and choreographed by Kelly Devine, it features music by Journey, Bon Jovi, Styx, Reo Speedwagon, Pat Benatar, Twisted Sister, Poison, Asia and Whitesnake. All in one show!
You like the eighties but not musicals? Lincoln Center Theater has a production for you. On March 19, at the Belasco Theatre, Joe Turner's Come and Gone, the 1911-set August Wilson play that some believe to be his best, will get its first major New York revival in 20 years. Bartlett Sher will direct. No cast has been announced, but Wilson revivals typically attract the cream of African-American acting talent.
Not quite the eighties, but almost, is Richard Greenberg's The American Plan. The 1990 play is getting its Broadway premiere on Jan. 22 at the Manhattan Theatre Club's Biltmore Theatre. This is the second time in recent history that Greenberg's fairly recent canon has been raided for promotion to Broadway. (The first instance was the 2006 Broadway revival of Three Days of Rain.) David Grindley, yet another of the many British directors finding work on Broadway this spring, will be in the driver's seat for the tale of curious social mores in 1960s Catskills. Mercedes Ruehl and Lily Rabe star. MTC will follow that with Samson Raphaelson's Accent on Youth, starring David Hyde Pierce, and directed by Daniel Sullivan. Opening is April 29.
Set in the good old here-and-now is reasons to be pretty. The MCC Theatre Off-Broadway success of last year will be playwright Neil LaBute's Broadway debut. Terry Kinney will direct. The drama about the importance of physical beauty will open April 2 at the Lyceum.
Tovah Feldshuh finds her way back to Broadway in The Directors Company production of Irena's Vow, the true story of Irena Gut Opdyke, a Polish Catholic who, during the German occupation of Poland in WWII, risked her life to save the lives of 12 Jewish refugees. The show, which recently played an extended engagement at the Baruch Performing Arts Center, will arrive on March 10, 2009, at the Walter Kerr Theatre.
Finally, British actresses Janet McTeer and Harriet Walter fill the towering lead roles in a new production of Schiller's Mary Stuart, about the battle of wills between Queen Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots. New York audiences don't see this classic often. It was last on Broadway in 1971. McTeer hasn't been back since winning a Tony Award 11 years ago for A Doll's House. Walter hasn't played Broadway for 25 years, the last time being a 1983 All's Well That Ends Well.
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