Happy Anniversary, Edmund Kean!
By Peter Filichia — Two hundred years ago this week, a star was born. Edmund Kean was a journeyman actor until January 26, 1814. On that night, he played Shylock at the Drury Lane, London’s most famous theater. His portrayal of Shakespeare’s sometimes-victimized and sometimes-vicious Jew in The Merchant of Venice made him the 19th […]
When West Side Story Was Romeo
The most fascinating letter replicated in the recently published The Leonard Bernstein Letters isn’t one solely by Leonard Bernstein. The undated letter – suspected by editor Nigel Simeone to have been written shortly before Oct. 18, 1955 – was a collaboration between Bernstein and Arthur Laurents. We can infer that the latter, the eventual bookwriter […]
A Li’l Bit of L’il Abner
In 1956, long before comic strip icons Superman, Charlie Brown and Annie became lead characters in Broadway musicals, there was Li’l Abner. Al Capp’s famed comic strip about the rustic inhabitants of Dogpatch, U.S.A. began in 1934 and continued into 1977. Thus, a little more than halfway into the run, Broadway got to meet Li’l […]
On the 50th Anniversary of Hello, Dolly!
Every now and then, I come across them. I’m talking about the intense musical theater fans who tell me that they hate Hello, Dolly! And yes, “hate” is the verb they gleefully use. Last January, when I did a story on Dolly’s 49th anniversary, I knew I’d do another around Jan. 16, 2014, when the […]
The Best Phone Call of 2013
How often does your phone ring anymore? We all seem to communicate differently now. Go away for a week’s vacation, and you’ll probably come back to fewer than a half-dozen messages on your answering machine. But, oh, look at those hundreds of e-mails! And yet, some people still use the phone, and I’m glad they […]
