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As much as I enjoy Lorelei Lee – be she played by Carol Channing on the original 1949 cast album or Megan Hilty on the 2012 Encores! recording of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes – the benign gold-digger will never convince me that “Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend.” A person is. So let’s celebrate our friends […]

During this summer when the weather allows us to wear soft shoes instead of snow-fighting boots, shall we give some thought – as well as some listens – to some of musical theater’s best soft-shoe numbers? In alphabetical order : “Don’t Follow in My Footsteps” (The Goodbye Girl) – You wouldn’t necessarily expect a soft-shoe […]

I’ve seen it five times and I’ll attend again. I can’t get enough of Call My Publicist! – The Starry Education of a Broadway Press Agent, Joshua Ellis’ one-person show. From 1973 (when he was a union apprentice on Ira Levin’s Veronica’s Room) to 1992 (when he was president of The Joshua Ellis Office and […]

Here she is, boys! Here she is, world! Here’s Lane Bradbury! She hasn’t made a Broadway appearance in fifty-three years, but many musical theatre aficionados immediately recognize her name. Bradbury was, after all, the original Dainty June in Gypsy. On the (absolutely great) original cast album, she can be heard in “If Momma Was Married” […]

As we celebrate Independence Day, let’s cite a musical that mentions the famous date albeit in one of Broadway’s most anti-government shows. But there it is in “Going Down” in Hair: “Forgive me if I don’t cry; it’s like the Fourth of July.” The context? Teenager Berger feels that this is his personal Independence Day […]