Skip to content

Blog

Filichia 1119

DOES MERRILY HAVE AN OUTSIDERS’ CHANCE? By Peter Filichia

Will the winner be THE OUTSIDERS or MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG? We’re talking about the 2025 Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album. All right, there are four other nominees. But in the Charity-Begins-at-Home Department, we here at Masterworks Broadway – which recorded both THE OUTSIDERS and MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG – are rooting for […]

Filichia 1112

AL HIRSCHFELD: IT’S IN THE CARDS By Peter Filichia

Zero Mostel as Peter Pan? Carol Channing as Lady Macbeth? Robert Preston and Sammy Davis, Jr. as the Dromio twins in THE BOYS FROM SYRACUSE? Sounds crazy, no? But in 1964, Al Hirschfeld – arguably the world’s greatest caricaturist – decided to have some fun. He imagined how these lofty entertainers would look in roles […]

Filichia 1105

YOU’RE A GRAND NEW BOOK (AND GRAND OLD CAST ALBUM) By Peter Filichia

YOU’RE A GRAND NEW BOOK (AND GRAND OLD CAST ALBUM) By Peter Filichia He died 82 years ago this week, but here’s proof that he hasn’t been forgotten. Elizabeth T. Craft’s excellent new book YANKEE DOODLE DANDY may get you to play your GEORGE M! original cast album, either for some additional times or for […]

ROMEO AND JULIET AND MUSICALS

ROMEO AND JULIET AND MUSICALS By Peter Filichia

It was one of the biggest theatrical hits of the 16th century. And this week, we’ll have the opening of the 36th Broadway revival of a drama that first opened in New York 270 years ago. What’s more, with William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet at Circle in the Square for the next four months, Broadway […]

Speak to Us, Oh Beautiful Cast Albums!

SPEAK TO US, OH BEAUTIFUL CAST ALBUMS By Peter Filichia

“Listen, girls, the way to catch a man is to be a natural woman…” So said Lena Horne before she launched into “Pretty to Walk With,” her opening song in JAMAICA, which opened 67 years ago this week. Many moons ago, when Jonathan Schwartz was a radio commentator, he played the song on his program. […]

Peter Filichia is the theater critic emeritus for the Star-Ledger in Newark, New Jersey and News 12 New Jersey.

He is a columnist each Friday for www.mtishows.com and www.kritzerland.com.

Filichia is the author of Let’s Put on a Musical, now in its third printing; Broadway Musicals: The Biggest Hit of the Season / The Biggest Flop of the Season and Broadway Musical MVPs 1960-2010: The Most Valuable Players of the Last 50 Seasons. His new book, Strippers, Showgirls, and Sharks will be published in May, 2013 by St. Martin’s Press.

He has been a columnist for Playbill, Theater.com, Theatermania and Theater Week.

Before joining the Theatre World Awards in 1996 as host and head of the selection committee, Filichia served four terms as president of the Drama Desk. He has served on an assessment panel for the National Endowment for the Arts, and is currently critic-in-residence for the University of Cincinnati-Conservatory of Music and the musical theater judge for the ASCAP Awards program.