Many of the same stories that were writ large across America also came home to roost on stages and backstages of American theatre. While it was certainly a year people still craved news about Hamilton and newcomer Dear Evan Hansen, other trends and narratives took their places in stage headlines. These are the eight most impactful stories and buzzed-about topics in theatre from the year 2017:
WOMEN MAKE HISTORIC MARKS
Women artists made important strides on Broadway this year; not just as actors, but by pulling the levers of power as producers, directors, and writers as well.
Lynn Nottage became the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for a second time. She won for her play Sweat, about the testing of friendships among a group of blue-collar workers when their company begins layoffs. Nottage had won the prestigious accolade in 2009 for her play Ruined, about women trying to survive amid the chaos of civil war in Africa’s Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Several benchmarks were set by Paul Vogel’s and Rebecca Taichman’s Indecent, which told the story of an ahead-of-its-time 1923 play about lesbian love. Indecent was the first Broadway production for Vogel, who had previously won the Pulitzer Prize for the Off-Broadway How I Learned to Drive. In June, Taichman became only the sixth woman to win the Tony Award as Best Director of a Play, for her work on Indecent. The show had been scheduled to close in June after a disappointingly brief stay on Broadway, but it was rescued and prolonged by female producer Daryl Roth, who added six weeks to the run and oversaw its filming by BroadwayHD for broadcast on PBS November 16.
And Bette Midler seemed to own Broadway with her revival of Hello, Dolly!, which won four Tony Awards including Best Revival of a Musical and Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical (Midler). The show regularly sold more than $2.4 million worth of tickets weekly for much of 2017—second only to the grosses for Hamilton.
CASTING CONTROVERSIES
Casting controversies whirled around the U.S. this year. The highest-profile controversy in theatre surrounded the replacement casting of the role of Pierre in the Broadway musical Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812. Grammy nominee Josh Groban opened the show in the role of Pierre, which continually helped buoy the show’s box office. After earning a Tony nomination, Groban departed the cast July 2 and, following an interim stint from the show’s writer Dave Malloy, Hamilton alum Okieriete “Oak” Onaodowan, who is black, assumed the role for a limited run. Originally scheduled to take over the role July 3, he stepped in July 11.
But despite 12 Tony nominations (the most for any show in 2017) and two wins, the show’s box office plunged after the departures of Groban and another pop singer, Ingrid Michaelson, who had joined the cast as Sonya from July 3–August 15. In an attempt to keep the show running, producers arranged for Tony winner Mandy Patinkin to step into the role of Pierre for a three-week run. Onaodowan was asked to step aside—though producers hoped he would return after Patinkin’s appearance. (Onaodowan later said he would not return to the production.) Here’s where things got problematic.
Theatregoers and members of the Broadway community turned to social media to express outrage that a black actor was being asked to surrender a role to a white actor. This turn of events was frustrating for the show’s creators, who had earlier won the 2017 Extraordinary Excellence in Diversity on Broadway Award from Actors Equity for the show’s multi-ethnic casting. Not wanting to take the role from Onaodawan, Patinkin withdrew.
“My understanding of the show’s request that I step into the show is not as it has been portrayed and I would never accept a role knowing it would harm another actor,” Patinkin wrote. “I hear what members of the community have said and I agree with them. I am a huge fan of Oak and I will, therefore, not be appearing in the show.” With no sufficiently prominent actor apparently willing to step into the fray, and Onaodowan declining to return, the Broadway run at the Imperial Theatre ended September 3 after 32 previews and 336 regular performances.
The Washington, D.C., administration of onetime Broadway producer and now U.S. President Donald J. Trump, was as controversial on Broadway as it was elsewhere. Perhaps nowhere moreso than when liberal activist and filmmaker Michael Moore used his one-man Broadway show, The Terms of My Surrender, as a more or less nonstop assault on Trump and his political allies. After the August 15 performance of the show, Moore invited members of that day’s audience to join him in a march on Trump Tower, Trump’s skyscraper and private home located several blocks east of the Theatre District. The president apparently noticed. After the show ended its scheduled limited run on October 22, Trump tweeted “While not at all presidential, I must point out that the Sloppy Michael Moore Show on Broadway was a TOTAL BOMB and was forced to close. Sad!”
On the opposite side of the political spectrum, Hillary Clinton became a frequent theatregoer, attending performances of Sunset Boulevard in February (where she received a standing ovation), In Transit, and Dear Evan Hansen among others. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also visited Broadway, taking in, with Ivanka Trump, the March 15 performance of Come From Away—set in his country’s Newfoundland. The Prime Minister gave a pre-show speech to mark the occasion.
THREATS TO THE NEA
Among the Trump administration's most controversial steps—at least in the world of the theatre—was the announced intention to de-fund the National Endowment for the Arts, on which many not-for-profits, especially regional theatres, depend to close gaps in their operating budgets. The announcement brought a quick appeal from 12 theatre unions including Actors' Equity, and protests from Broadway actors, aimed at saving the NEA. After several weeks of back-and-forth, the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee proposed a $5 million cut to the NEA budget, but preserved the existence of the endowment itself.
