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Author Archives: boz
History of Musicals: Hollywood Beckons
Short sound films were a popular novelty in nickelodeons at the turn of the 20th century. One of the most successful systems was Cameraphone, created in 1907 by James A. Whitman. In the fourth floor studios above Daly’s Theatre, not … Continue reading
Posted in History
Tagged 42nd Street, Arthur Freed, Astaire & Rogers, Babes in Arms, Busby Berkeley, Irving Berlin, Jeanette MacDonald, Jerome Kern, Love Me Tonight, Rodgers & Hart, Shirley Temple, Snow White, The Broadway Melody, The Great Ziegfeld, The Jazz Singer, The Little Colonel, The Singing Fool, The Wizard of Oz, Top Hat
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2020 Drama League Winners
This morning, the Drama League announced the competitive winners of its 86th annual awards for the condensed 2019-20 New York theater season. The productions chosen by the nationwide organization of theater artists, industry professionals, and audience members for its top … Continue reading
Posted in Awards, Stage
Tagged Danny Burstein, Drama League Awards, Little Shop of Horrors, Moulin Rouge!
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2020 Drama Desk Winners
Last night, Frank DiLella of NY1’s On Stage hosted the 65th annual Drama Desk Awards (watch here), originally scheduled for May 31. Leading the nominations were the musicals Soft Power (11), The Wrong Man (9), and Octet (8), but only … Continue reading
Posted in Awards, Stage
Tagged A Strange Loop, Adrienne Warren, Christian Borle, Dave Malloy, Drama Desk Awards, for colored girls, Harold Prince, Jagged Little Pill, Larry Owens, Lauren Patten, Little Shop of Horrors, Martha Redbone, Michael R. Jackson, Moulin Rouge!, Octet, Sonya Tayeh, Stephen Brackett, Tina, Tom Kitt, West Side Story
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History of Musicals: First Golden Age
It’s been noted that the form of modern musical theater came from operetta, but its soul came from the music hall. This union of body and soul took place during the first two decades of the 20th century, beginning with … Continue reading
Posted in History
Tagged Andy Razaf, Eubie Blake, Fats Waller, George Gershwin, George M. Cohan, Guy Bolton, Harry B. Smith, Ira Gershwin, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, Little Johnny Jones, Noble Sissle, Oscar Hammerstein, Otto Harbach, P.G. Wodehouse, Princess Theatre, Rida Johnson Young, Rodgers & Hart, Show Boat, Shuffle Along, Very Good Eddie, Ziegfeld Follies
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History of Musicals: American Roots
As I noted the other day, commedia dell’arte and opera are the dual threads that eventually spun into what we call musical theater. We’ve explored opera’s role, now let’s take a closer look at that first thread. Commedia dell’arte began … Continue reading
History of Musicals: European Roots
Commedia dell’arte and opera are the dual threads that eventually spun into what we call musical theater. Let’s take a closer look at that second thread and its journey toward early musical theater. As I wrote yesterday, in the 18th … Continue reading
Posted in History
Tagged Franz Lehar, Gilbert & Sullivan, Jacques Offenbach, Johann Strauss II, Naughty Marietta, Oscar Hammerstein, Otto Harbach, Pirates of Penzance, Reginald de Koven, Richard D'Oyly Carte, Rose-Marie, Rudolf Friml, Sigmund Romberg, The Desert Song, The Merry Widow, Victor Herbert
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Essential Film Musicals: Frozen
In 1937, Walt Disney had an idea for a biographical film about Hans Christian Andersen. In 1940, he arranged a co-production with Samuel Goldwyn, who would shoot live-action sequences to accompany Disney’s animated sequences, but World War II brought an … Continue reading
Essential Film Musicals: Beauty and the Beast
After the success of Snow White (1937), Walt Disney began looking for other fairytales to adapt, including Beauty and the Beast. His team continued working on that story through the 1930s and into the 1950s, but it “proved to be … Continue reading
Essential Film Musicals: All That Jazz
In 1974, director-choreographer Bob Fosse was editing Lenny, his first film since winning an Oscar (watch here) for Cabaret, and staging Chicago, a Broadway musical starring his estranged wife Gwen Verdon. To keep pace, he was popping Dexedrine and ignoring … Continue reading
Posted in History
Tagged All That Jazz, Ann Reinking, Bob Fosse, Fame, Gwen Verdon, Keith Carradine, Lebowsky & Tobias, Michael Gore, Michael Weiner, Nashville
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