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HAIL TO THE CHIEFS! (3)

THOSE UNBEATABLE DAMN YANKEES By Peter Filichia

Stephen Sondheim couldn’t do it. Neither could Jerry Herman nor Frank Loesser. Ditto Rodgers and Hammerstein. Perhaps Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez will, but they haven’t yet. No, the only people who could ever boast of writing two consecutive Best Musical Tony-winners were Richard Adler and Jerry Ross. THE PAJAMA GAME in 1954-55. DAMN YANKEES […]

HAIL TO THE CHIEFS! (2)

KINKY BOOTS: CHARLIE AND THE SHOE FACTORY By Peter Filichia

Let’s talk a little about Charlie. Usually when people discuss KINKY BOOTS, they center on Lola, the unapologetic, out-there, fully actualized drag queen. And how can they not? The bigger-than-life Lola not only brings to mind a lyric from DAMN YANKEES – “Whatever Lola wants, Lola gets” – but also one from WILDCAT – “Hey, […]

HAIL TO THE CHIEFS!

HAIL TO THE CHIEFS! By Peter Filichia

Mary Martin? Audra McDonald? Patti LuPone? Bernadette Peters? Angela Lansbury? Ethel Merman? Over the years, I’ve heard many claim that one of these performers is The First Lady of Musical Theater. But here’s a question. If for all these years we’ve had a First Lady of Musical Theater, why haven’t we had a President of […]

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MF IN MJ By Peter Filichia

There will be those who’ll automatically say, “If I want to listen to Michael Jackson, I’ll listen to Michael Jackson himself. Why would I buy a cast album with all the songs he made famous only to hear them sung by other people?” There’s another way of looking at the situation. The power of the […]

Filichia

HAPPY 20TH, HAIRSPRAY! By Peter Filichia

When you think of it, HAIRSPRAY will actually be celebrating two anniversaries this week. Twenty years have passed since the musical theater aficionados met the Turnblads of Baltimore. And aren’t we glad we did? In his 1988 film, John Waters gave us irrepressible teen Tracy Turnblad that songwriters Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman beautifully musicalized […]

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.